From Robinson Crusoe

Chapter 73 Friendship Artifact
After sharpening the two axes, he tested the sharpness of the axe blades with his fingertips.

It's a bit blunt, so it's definitely not suitable for cutting vegetables, but it's perfect for chopping wood.

He picked up the long-handled axe and looked outside the cave.

The rain brewing in the clouds is gradually exhausted. Although it has not stopped at this moment, it is expected to continue developing in this trend. After you go out for a while, it will turn into a drizzle, which will not cause a cold.

Thinking about the stones and wooden strips on the beach, and worried that the mysterious reward would be destroyed by rain, Chen Zhou did not choose the safest way. He put on a leather raincoat, a wide-brimmed hat, put a long-handled axe at his waist, and was ready to set off.

Lai Fu was not tied up yet. When he saw his owner go out, he hurried to follow. Chen Zhou originally wanted to leave it in the cave, but it was difficult to tie it up.

The scene of shitting in the cave last time was still vivid in his mind, so he had no choice but to dissuade Lai Fu from following him.

But Lai Fu didn't listen to him at all. He wagged his tail, rubbed his head against his raincoat, and had a flattering look on his face.

There was no choice, Chen Zhou could only take Lai Fu down the mountain with him.

Still following the dog and looking at its hair wet by the rain from afar, Chen Zhou secretly thought that he would make a raincoat for Lai Fu out of seal skin when he had time.

On this isolated island with no medical care or medicine, it is a problem whether people or animals get sick.

You can't rely on resistance for everything.

……

Arriving at the beach, Chen Zhou knew the answer from a distance without even having to get close - a great success!
The wood and stone wall surrounding the reward had been cut again, and even with wooden stakes on both sides it could no longer maintain its intact shape.

Affected by the wind and rain, the wooden and stone wall began to tilt to one side from the top and collapsed. Several stone slabs that were cut flat on both sides were wet by the rain and placed diagonally on the beach, reflecting light from a distance and being particularly conspicuous.

The closer you get, the clearer the cut wooden slabs become.

They are scattered on the sand, turning this place into a small building materials storage plant.

He walked forward, picked up a few wooden boards and bricks and turned them over to examine them.

Chen Zhou found that they were not cut as he had expected, with both sides cut levelly. Some were thin and some were thick, but the error was not obvious.

Of course, some wooden boards and stone bricks are of high quality and can be used directly as building materials without any fine-tuning.

Chen Zhou picked out the best quality stone bricks and wooden boards with two sides that were almost completely horizontal and carried them to the edge of the woods by the sea.

The stone bricks and wooden boards of slightly lower quality, with slightly different surfaces on both sides, were piled together.

Finally, the worst scraps were taken away and thrown directly on the beach to be used to fix the new wood and stone cut walls.

After sorting, he took a few wooden boards and rested for a while. Looking at the neatly stacked wooden boards and bricks, Chen Zhou could not hide his joy.

These building materials can be used in the cave's fireplace, pottery furnace, charcoal stove, exterior walls, floors, and ceilings.

If it were not for his careful observation and bold attempts, he would not be able to build a cave house even after more than ten years of hard work with just his own hardworking hands.

Fortunately there is such a giant cutting machine, otherwise he would be very busy.

……

Looking at the sky, the light was a little dim. I estimated that the sun had passed its zenith and was beginning to set in the west.

Without daring to rest any longer, Chen Zhou pulled out the long-handled axe from his waist and began to cut a new batch of wood and carry a new batch of stones.

At the same time, he also has to sort out the wood and small pieces of stone that can be processed for the third time and add them to the construction of the "second phase cutting materials."

While building a new wood and stone wall, in order to avoid trouble after the wall was built, he checked the mysterious reward in advance.

This time the mysterious reward comes in a different large packaging than before. It is only a 40 cm square black packaging bag. There is no box inside the bag and it looks like a piece of clothing.

But the weight of the thing was very different from the clothes, it was very heavy, and when it was shaken there was a sound of metal collision, which made Chen Zhou unsure what it was for a moment.

Take a look back at past rewards.

From toilet paper to cement to canned food, although none of them are crucial top-level rewards, they all have their own functions, which is inconsistent with the style of the first few rewards.

If every reward was a lottery, Chen Zhou felt that he was lucky enough as he had won the second prize several times. This time it should be garbage.

However, there is a difference between different types of garbage.

In Chen Zhou's opinion, metal waste is far greater than plastic waste, and plastic waste is greater than wooden products.

He did not have too high psychological expectations for this reward, and only regarded it as a few pieces of special metal materials. Therefore, he did not check it immediately. Instead, he threw the packaging bag next to the pile of materials in the seaside woods and concentrated on building a new wooden and stone wall.

……

With the experience of building the wall last time, the work progressed much faster this time.

If Lai Fu hadn't been running around on the beach, disrupting the arrangement of materials and interfering with Chen Zhou's work, forcing him to yell at him or tease and comfort him from time to time, the work could have been completed earlier.

Before the sun sets, place the last stone.

Before taking a break, Chen Zhou remembered the mysterious reward and retrieved the black packaging bag.

He originally wanted to imitate what he did last time when he took the reward and take the packaging bag directly to the mountain and open it, but when he remembered that there was metal material in the packaging bag, he gave up the idea.

If the metal products in the packaging bag cannot be disassembled and can only be turned into usable materials by cutting, now is the time to place them on the pile of wood and stones.

The cutting opportunity once every two weeks cannot be wasted.

Thinking of this, he took out a dagger and cut open the black packaging bag.

The packaging bag was wrapped in a thick transparent plastic bag, inside which was a brown leather case and four silver finger-shaped metal objects. It was not very clear when looking from above.

Chen Zhou felt that it was something like a medieval knight's hand armor, but when he looked closely, he felt that it was not the case - what knight only had four fingers, and two of these four fingers were middle fingers, so it couldn't be an alien knight.

“Why do I feel like it looks familiar, as if I’ve seen it somewhere before, but I can’t remember where it is for a while.

Forget it, let’s take it out and see what it is…”

Pull out the transparent plastic bag, tear open the sealed seal, and take out the brown leather case first.

The leather case is wide and thin, and overall short. It has watch strap-like buckles on both sides that can be tied together, making it look like a wrist guard or something like that.

As for the four metal finger-shaped objects, Chen Zhou remembered them the moment he saw their full appearance.

It was the "brain-breaking artifact" that was once popular on the Internet, and was also jokingly called the "friendship-ending artifact" by netizens.

The inventor's original intention was to help women with weak fingers gain an advantage in the head-smacking game among friends, so that they can also cause impressive pain to others like men.

This seems like a good idea, but the power of the so-called brain-smashing artifact made by the inventor far exceeded his expectations, or in other words, it was exactly what the inventor expected. The brain-smashing artifact is made of four sections of stainless steel and three springs, two short and one long, with a simple power storage device, just like a crossbow.

When the spring "string" is fully pulled and the fingertips wrapped in stainless steel gloves hit the person's head, the force is more than just pain.

In the demonstration video, an adult man wearing the brain-breaking device can easily pop a hole in a can of beer and even break a glass.

Because of its powerful destructive power and no practical use in life, the brain-destroying artifact is also known as a useless invention and is one of the most famous weird products on the Internet.

When Useless Inventions became popular, discussions about it could be seen on all major short video platforms.

As a surfing expert, Chen Zhou naturally did not miss this information. He even searched with interest how much it would cost to buy a brain-destroying artifact.

Finally, seeing the high customization fee of 200 yuan and the very few sales of the product, he calmed down.

I never expected that the thing I was reluctant to buy at the beginning would now be given to me for free. It’s really unpredictable!

Chen Zhou took out the brain-destroying artifact from the package and put it on his finger. He bent his finger and felt the force of the spring. He frowned and thought that this thing might not be the "weakened" version sold online, but a one-to-one version made according to the data demonstrated by the inventor.

It takes almost all the strength of the fingers to straighten the two short tension springs. When they pop out, the fingers are completely out of control and the force is ridiculously great.

According to the law, toy guns with an output exceeding 1.8 joules per square centimeter can be considered illegal firearms.

Chen Zhou made a simple estimate that the kinetic energy of the brain-smashing weapon in his hand should be able to reach 16 joules per square centimeter. If it were to get close, it would be no problem to smash a rabbit's skull, not to mention a thinly wrapped beer can.

Of course, due to the limitation of attack distance, the brain-smashing artifact cannot be used as a weapon at all.

But unlike other rewards, the Brain-Breaking Artifact may seem useless, but it is actually full of treasures.

The removed spring can play an important role in improving the firearm.

Although the spring of a flintlock is completely different from this tension spring, in principle they are the same, and using a spring made with modern technology may produce better results.

Moreover, these four brain-breaking artifacts can provide a total of 12 high-quality springs.

Chen Zhou can not only use them to improve flintlock rifles, but also use them to make compound bows, repeating crossbows and even magazines.

Due to the limitations of technology and materials, he was unable to produce many important parts of modern industry on the isolated island, and springs were one of them.

Even if the spring is removed, the remaining stainless steel finger sleeve is still useful.

By sewing them onto metal-inlaid fur, a stainless steel gauntlet with only four fingers can be made. In a battle with wild beasts or natives, having a pair of hands that are not afraid of being chopped off is enough to decide which side the balance of victory or defeat will tilt towards.

The reason why Chen Zhou was afraid of the backward cannibalistic natives was, on the one hand, because they were as wild as beasts, ferocious and brutal.

On the other hand, they were afraid of their bows and wooden spears.

Without armor, their defenses were equal, and relying only on their slow-firing muskets and sharp long-handled axes, their lethality and range were indeed far superior to those of the natives, but their tolerance for error was the same.

If he was unlucky and was shot with a poisoned arrow from a distance, he would lose his life even if he was given a Gurkha knife, let alone a long-handled axe.

If there was a set of iron armor, even if it was not a full-body heavy armor as airtight as a European tin can, but just Tang scale armor or chain mail, the situation would be very different.

The cannibal natives were completely unarmored and could not withstand the power of axes or lead bullets ejected from gunpowder.

Although he was covered in iron armor, he could ignore their wooden arrows and spears. As long as he had enough physical strength, he could fight ten natives at once without getting hurt.

Unfortunately, the metal parts brought down from the ship were already formed, and could not be used to make armor unless they were melted and reforged.

Those lead plates do have a certain plasticity.

But lead is too heavy. If you make a suit of lead armor and wear it, it would be difficult to walk, let alone run and chop people with an axe.

Acquiring these four brain-destroying artifacts can not only increase the frequency of attacks, but also provide a layer of protection for the palms. In Chen Zhou's opinion, this is also a small step towards completing a full body armor.

……

After putting the brain-blasting artifact back into its packaging and calling back Hui Fu, Chen Zhou returned to the cave.

After dinner that night, he removed the 12 springs, lit the oil lamp, took out his notebook and his newly made "fountain pen", drew a few lines on the paper, and conceived the structure of an improved version of the flintlock.

With his current conditions, even if he could make a magazine, it would be impossible for him to make a fully automatic rifle.

The slow firing rate of the flintlock is determined by many factors.

The gunpowder loading position is separated and has to be loaded twice, the muzzle is loaded, and the rod loading is slow, these are all its problems, and the most fatal one is the gunpowder loading.

If you can rub the primer bullet by hand, all problems will be gone.

But unfortunately, rubbing bullets by hand is basically impossible for Chen Zhou at the moment.

And he didn't want to take too big a step - it would easily get his eggs stuck.

He just wanted to make a breech-loading rifle with a simple loading device, which would save time in loading and only require adding gunpowder.

By eliminating one step, the new flintlock's rate of fire could be increased from two shots per minute to at least six shots per minute.

In other words, if he faced the attack of ten natives within the effective range of 150 meters, fighting and retreating at the same time, and when the natives got close to him, if his shooting skills were accurate enough, he could kill at least five of them.

A reduction of up to 50% in numbers was enough to make the natives lose their fighting spirit and flee in all directions.

……

Paper is limited and must not be wasted.

After improving the drawings several times, Chen Zhou was still not satisfied.

Referring to the magazine of an automatic rifle, it is indeed not difficult to make a device that can load bullets into the chamber of a flintlock.

The difficulty lies in how to ensure that the space inside the barrel is sealed so as not to disperse the power of the gunpowder, while also avoiding mechanical structure failures and sudden jams during firing.

I worked for several hours late into the night, but ultimately failed to achieve a satisfactory result.

After racking their brains, the new solution developed did solve the problems of chamber space and mechanical structure jamming, but it made the gun body very bloated, which was not only inconvenient to carry, but also affected shooting and aiming.

Overall, it's still not suitable.

Sitting at the table and scratching his head, Chen Zhou felt as if he had returned to his student days, but his thinking was no longer as creative and flexible as it was back then.

Closing his notebook and blowing out the oil lamp, he finished his work for the day and returned to bed.

　Thanks to: HarveyZhang, Look at that big melon, Starry Sword Shadow, Failed Renjiu, Moonlight Star Curtain, book friend with the last digit 7733, Steven himself, Chinese Heart, Chinese StarCraft is finally number one, Yong Ai Jiuzhi, Ni Jiefu, Wen Tian Cheng Dao, Toxic Milk Powder Player, KZZL, book friend with the last digit 0937, When Love Stops, Old Wine and Long Eagle, book friend with the last digit 4238, book friend with the last digit 7791, Zuxian is the most beautiful, Guan Shan Mu Han’s monthly tickets, thank you all for your support!
　　
　
(End of this chapter)