wild trail

Chapter 35 Metal Discovery
At night, the outside of the cave was pitch black, and by the light of the fire, the rainwater could be faintly seen hanging down the cave entrance like a waterfall.

In the dark night sky, occasionally a thick bolt of lightning cut through the sky and fell in the distant jungle. I don't know how many trees turned to ashes on this rainy night.

People were too tired, even though the thunder outside continued to roar, but people still fell asleep with peace of mind.

In the early morning, the rain weakened, and the raindrops fell intermittently on the puddle at the entrance of the cave, making a soft sound.

After a night's rest, although the muscles on the body are still a little sore, people's tired bodies have been relieved a lot.

When people walked out of the cave, the scene below the mountain made people's faces turn pale.

Floods, endless floods are everywhere in front of you. The raging floods knock down trees, roll up mud and stones, a large number of animal corpses rise and fall in the dirty water, and there is a faint stench in the air.

Looking at such a large-scale flood, Wang Lang couldn't help secretly rejoicing, if they didn't come to this valley in time, then they would also be engulfed by this terrifying current and become one of the corpses on the water.

The bottom of the mountain has become a vast ocean, and people can't go down the mountain at all. Before the flood recedes, they can only stay on this mountain.

On another mountain not far from the cave, a large-scale landslide occurred. The soft soil on the surface of the mountain was washed away by the rain, a large number of plants were buried in the soil, and the rocks under the soil layer were exposed to the outside. Wang Lang looked at where he was. This hill full of protruding rocks, I think there should be no danger of landslides.

"Lang, Lang, come quickly and see what this is!" There was an exclamation in the cave.

People looked back in surprise, and saw Fan Xing and a few women curiously poking the ashes on the ground with branches.

People walked over curiously, not knowing what all the fuss was about a pile of useless ashes.

As the ashes were gradually pushed away, there was a layer of white substance covering the rock below. Looking at these silver-white things, Wang Lang's eyes lit up. This thing was obviously some kind of metal. Wang Lang's first reflection was that it was Silver, but then denied it. These things are obviously formed after melting. My chemical knowledge has not been fully returned to the teacher. The melting point of silver should not be so low.

Wang Lang squatted down and buckled the white substance with his hands. These things were very firmly stuck to the rock. Wang Lang picked up a stone and knocked it hard, making a "dang-dang" sound.

Only a few uneven pits were left on the surface.

"Light a fire, light a fire!" Wang Lang shouted excitedly, if he guessed correctly, this thing must be tin.This was the first metal I discovered when I came to this world, so I was naturally very excited.

People looked at each other in blank dismay. Although Zhi Shi looked very beautiful, Wang Lang had always been very calm since he was the leader. He didn't know why he lost his composure this time.

Seeing that people didn't take any action, Wang Lang said dissatisfiedly: "What are you still doing in a daze, this thing is a treasure, hurry up and start a fire."

Hearing that it was a treasure, people cheered up. Every treasure Wang Lang said brought great benefits to the tribe.

Huo is the best at making fire in the tribe. After hearing Wang Lang say "baby", his eyes lit up. He found something to light the fire without saying anything. The dry wooden stick spun quickly in his hand. Sparks appeared, and Huo carefully took the wooden stick to the dry grass prepared aside, and kept blowing air. It didn't take long for thick smoke to rise from the dry grass, and after a while, the flames rushed up.

After the fire was lit, Wang Lang picked up some scattered gravel in the cave and told them to throw them into the fire.

During the burning of the flames, only some silver-white stones slowly cracked, and the rest remained unchanged in the fire.

With the continuous heating, liquid slowly flowed out of those silver-white stones. Seeing these silver-white metal solutions, Wang Lang could hardly close his mouth from ear to ear.

"Metal! This is metal, even the worst metal is infinitely better than stone!" Wang Lang was ecstatic.

When Wang Lang was in school, he heard from his teacher that the earliest metal discovered by human beings was tin. It is precisely because of the low melting point of tin that it does not need to build any kiln for smelting. It only needs to be calcined with ordinary flames to melt them.

Seeing these miraculous stones turned into liquid in the flames, people all opened their mouths in disbelief.

Although metal tin is relatively soft, even less hard than stone, it is an indispensable thing for future development. As long as copper ore can be found in the future, this metal can be added to refine bronze. There will be no rivals in this world.

Although tin is relatively soft, it has better plasticity than stone as a metal. As long as it is polished, it can be used as an arrowhead. Even if it is blunt, it can be sharpened after grinding.

Thinking of this, Wang Lang was so excited that he ran outside the cave and found some yellow mud on the hillside. After bringing these things back to the cave, Wang Lang picked out the gravel from the yellow mud, took a little water and poured it on the mud .

People looked at Wang Lang as if he was going to fire pottery, and they didn't know what Wang Lang was going to do, but seeing his excited look, they knew that this must be a very important thing.

"Huo, bring an arrow and a spear!" Wang Lang said without raising his head.

After Huo heard this, he immediately took an arrow from the animal skin quiver and handed it to Wang Lang, and put a stone spear beside Wang Lang.

The arrows used by people today are extremely simple. The arrows are made of triangular stones, and a groove is carved on the top of the arrow shaft. The stone is stuck in the groove and tied with a rope. Strong, it can certainly deal with humans who don't even have a piece of clothing, but for beasts with rough skin and thick flesh, they can only be stabbed but not fatal.

Wang Lang didn't plan to use metal to make such an arrow, it would be a waste to do so.

Wang Lang put the reconciled mud on a relatively flat stone, used a straight spear as a rolling pin, pressed the yellow mud into a palm-sized cake with a thickness of five or six centimeters, and then cut it into two pieces with a stone knife. Neatly sized rectangles.

Next, Wang Lang used the arrow shaft to press out a semicircular groove on the edge of the two pieces of mud, and then used a wood chip to carve two scratches of a few millimeters along the shape of the groove, and then used a wood chip to make a hole in the groove. A conical shape is carved on the top of the groove, and finally the top of the groove is sealed with a pinched mud piece.

After finishing these tasks, Wang Lang put these two simple molds into the fire to calcine. It is reasonable to say that firing pottery is more ideal, but in the current situation, Wang Lang does not have the conditions to do such complicated things. As long as the two clay tablets are hardened, they should be can be used.

Half an hour later, the template was successfully fired. Although there were some cracks, it did not affect the use. Wang Lang polished the clay boards to a smooth surface with a stone knife, and put the two clay boards together. However, this handmade thing is not very accurate. , errors can be seen with the naked eye.

Wang Lang didn't care about this, as long as he could make an arrowhead, it would be easier to polish it with the properties of metal tin. If it was made of other metals, the thing Wang Lang made would be almost useless.

(End of this chapter)