Dual Transmigration: Starting from being captured and brought to the Hehuan Sect!

Lin Mo returned to the main world with several bags of cement samples and immediately had Su Qing contact a building materials testing center with CMA certification.

Three days later, the test report came out. This batch of cement, made from local limestone in Lianhai County, had a compressive strength of 42.5, an initial setting time of two hours and forty minutes, and a final setting time of five hours. All indicators fully met the standards for general silicate cement in the world.

After reading the report, Lin Mo felt relieved of his last remaining concerns.

With the cement hurdle completely overcome, Lianhai County will no longer need to transport cement from the main world for building city walls, paving roads, and constructing ports, reducing costs to at least one-tenth of the original amount.

Limestone production quickly got on track.

Liu Si divided the miners into three shifts, with eight people in each shift. The kiln never stopped, even when the workers rested. They worked day and night.

Limestone is hoisted down from the mine pit using a pulley winch, pushed along the newly laid railway tracks by mine cars to the kiln, and the burned lime is sent directly to the cement kiln for batching before the road paving begins.

After the limestone mine stabilized, Lin Mo turned his attention to the iron mine and the steel plant.

Lin Mo had already taken more than a dozen samples and sent them back to the main world for elemental analysis.

He was very satisfied with the result. It was mainly magnetite with an iron content of 55% to 65%, and low sulfur and phosphorus content, making it a high-quality direct-injection ore.

With iron ore secured, the next step is to build blast furnaces.

Ironmaking is not like cement making; the structure of a blast furnace is much more complex.

High-temperature resistant materials, blasting systems, cooling devices for the tapping and slag outlets, and gas recovery systems—none of these can be neglected.

Lin Mo had previously ordered a batch of high-alumina refractory bricks and high-temperature resistant castables for blast furnaces from the main world, along with a small Roots blower and a matching diesel generator. He transported all of these, along with thermocouple temperature sensors and automatic temperature control instruments, to the newly built smelting workshop next to the mine.

He drew the design drawings for the blast furnace himself, referencing the structure of modern small blast furnaces in the main world. The dimensions, angles, and refractory material thickness of each section, from the throat, body, waist to the hearth, were clearly marked.

He then selected a dozen or so young and strong men from among the refugees and taught them how to lay refractory bricks, install blowers, and connect thermocouples.

Ancient craftsmen relied entirely on experience to build kilns, judging by feel where the bricks should be thick and thin. Lin Mo, however, used measuring tools and a level to measure precisely, down to the millimeter. This caused several vagrants with experience as bricklayers to shake their heads, saying they had never seen such meticulous bricklaying in their lives.

After the blast furnace was built, Lin Mo did not rush to feed the materials. Instead, he spent three whole days drying the furnace, gradually increasing the temperature from low to high to dry out all the moisture inside the furnace and prevent the furnace wall from cracking after it was put into production.

During the three days of furnace heating, he gathered all the workers involved in iron smelting and trained them from beginning to end:

How to prepare the raw materials, how to feed them, how to read the temperature gauge, how to control the air volume, how to stand and operate when tapping iron, and even how to handle emergencies.

More than half of these refugees were begging for food just a month ago, but now they have to learn how to operate a blast furnace that can produce molten iron. They are all so nervous that their palms are sweating, but their eyes are full of determination.

They knew that once they learned this skill, they would never have to go out and beg as vagrants again.

The day it officially went into production was exactly the same as the scene during the trial production of the cement kiln.

At the foot of the iron ore mine, crowds thronged, the guards maintained order, the workers took their positions, and the children from Lianhai County who had shaved their heads ran over to watch the spectacle.

Lin Mo stood on the command platform in front of the blast furnace, took a deep breath, and shouted "Ignite!"

The blower roared as it sent hot air into the furnace, and a thick column of smoke billowed from the top of the furnace, illuminating half of the mining area.

More than an hour later, the taphole opened, and a stream of dazzling orange-red molten iron gushed out of the furnace, flowing along the tapping trough into the sand mold, sparks flying everywhere, making everyone present blush.

Molten iron slowly flows, cools, and solidifies in the sand mold, eventually turning into pieces of gray-black pig iron ingots.

The old blacksmiths were so excited that their hands were trembling. They had been blacksmithing for most of their lives and had never seen so much molten iron come out at once.

Lin Mo stepped down from the command platform, bent down and picked up a piece of cast iron ingot that was still warm, weighing it in his hand.

It has a solid weight and a silver-gray fracture surface, making it a standard piece of cast iron.

He had all the first batch of iron ingots moved into the adjacent blacksmith's workshop, where several master blacksmiths tested them.

The experienced craftsmen spent a long time hammering and tinkering, and their feedback was that this iron was much better than the iron ingots they used to buy from outside. It was harder and had fewer impurities, and the hoes and knife blanks they made from it were quite good.

Lin Mo nodded, already planning his next move. Pig iron was just the first step; to make tools and weapons, he would have to start steelmaking.

Converter, open-hearth furnace, electric furnace—the road ahead is long, but the first batch of molten iron has already flowed out. The rest is just a matter of time and investment.

Just as Lin Mo returned to the county government office, Zhang Tie trotted in from outside and said that Commander Yue had arrived at the door with a squad of personal guards and requested to see the magistrate.

Lin Mo nodded and followed Zhang Tie outside.

Yue Pengniao stood in the front courtyard of the county government office, his brand-new armor gleaming. There were about twenty guards outside the office, their ranks far more orderly than the group Sun Can had led last time.

Upon seeing Lin Mo emerge, he knelt on one knee, clasped his hands in a respectful greeting, and spoke in a loud voice:

"Greetings, Your Excellency! I have come to apologize to Your Excellency. I should have reported to Your Excellency last week, but something went wrong during the handover at the Thousand-Household Office."

My uncle's transfer order had already been issued, but then a Cheng Yaojin appeared out of nowhere. A deputy commander surnamed Ma also wanted to compete for the position, so he spent money to ask for favors from the Ministry of War and managed to delay the transfer order for more than half a month.

My subordinate and father spent a lot of money to bribe officials, and even used my uncle's influence to personally go to Hezhou Garrison before the job was finally settled.

"I'm sorry to have kept you waiting, sir."

"Get up. It's good that it's resolved; a few days' delay won't matter."

Lin Mo told him to stand up and looked him up and down.

After putting on the well-fitting armor, the boy was still chubby and fair-skinned, but his spirit and energy were much stronger than when he was tied to a pillar at the Wang family mansion last time. At least he looked presentable now.

"How many people are there in your thousand-household garrison now?"

"Reporting to Your Excellency, the full strength was originally 1,080 men, but in recent years, the problem of embezzling salaries without working has become serious. When Sun Can was in charge, the actual number of soldiers was only a little over 700."

Before my subordinates arrived, they had everyone take a roll call again. There were exactly 630 men who could actually carry guns and fight; the rest were all vacancies.

Yue Pengniao took a booklet out of his pocket and presented it with both hands.

"This is the roster and the list of weapons and armor. Please take a look, sir."

Lin Mo took the booklet and flipped through it. The handwriting was neat and the entries were clear, showing that it had been carefully prepared.

He returned the booklet to Yuepeng Bird and nodded:

"As soon as possible, we should gather a full complement of troops. The remaining thousand-household garrisons should be moved from the west side of the city to the outskirts of Lianhai County."

"I'll have Liu Si allocate you a plot of land later, so you can set up your barracks there, closer to the county government office, which will make mobilization easier."