Chapter 3
Wild Hope of Industrial Refining
Generally speaking, other than the person in charge of the red copper mine and the two remaining cultivators of the Chen clan, almost no one lived within the Red Copper mountain range.
Most of the members of the Chen clan resided in a county called Changping County.
Changping County was located on a plain not far from the foot of the Red Copper mountain range. The county bordered the Red Copper mountain range as well as the two freshwater lakes of Shuanghu Island—the Sun and Moon lakes. On the right was the deep-water port of Shuanghu Island.
However, the Myriad Sea of Stars was different from the sea back on Earth. Other than fishes, there were also demonic beasts roaming about in the sea. Therefore, very few mortals dared to fish in the sea.
Over time, this deep-water port had basically been abandoned.
Other than the clan leader, Chen Xianhe, who occasionally led his clansmen out to purchase supplies, this deep-water port was rarely used.
Changping County had a population of about 3,000 people, and the people residing here were all from the Chen clan.
It was not that the Chen clan had only produced so few people in the past 300 years.
It was just that the cultivation resources on the island were scarce, and the number of cultivators in the clan had not increased; even now, there were only Chen Xianhe and Chen Daoxuan.
In the Myriad Sea of Stars, if there were not enough cultivators to protect them, a large amount of the population would only end up as food for the demon beasts.
The disaster of the demon beast riot in Changping County ten years ago was evidence of this fact.
Even though the demon beasts that wreaked havoc in Changping County back then were only some of the lowest grade demon beasts, to mortals, even the lowest grade demon beasts were existences that could not be contended against.
As Chen Xianhe had been alone, it was a foregone conclusion that he would be unable to protect Changping County.
This was also the fundamental reason why the population of the Chen clan could not develop.
Without the protection of enough cultivators, they could not grow the population. Without a sufficiently large population, they could not grow the number of cultivators in the clan. The two factors formed a cycle of cause-and-effect.
…
Changping County office.
The county magistrate, Chen Zhizheng, the registrar, and a group of officials, accompanied Chen Daoxuan outside the county office.
Looking at the group of clansmen and officials of Changping County in front of him, Chen Daoxuan instructed, “Regarding the mining of the red copper mine, your county office must fully cooperate with the person in charge of the red copper mine. Do not neglect your duty!”
“We will comply with the Immortal Master’s decree!”
The scorching sun hung high in the sky. The county magistrate, Chen Zhizheng, was dressed in a stylish official uniform. He ignored the sweat on his forehead and hurriedly nodded his head in agreement.
Seeing the county magistrate of Changping County’s attitude, Chen Daoxuan was slightly relieved. Following that, he did not waste time with any more words and immediately used the wind control spell, riding the wind into the sky.
Watching Chen Daoxuan ride the wind into the sky, the eyes of the officials of Changping County revealed an unspeakable sense of envy.
After dealing with the matter of the red copper mine, Chen Daoxuan’s tense nerves gradually relaxed.
Currently, the only cultivators in the clan were thirteenth uncle and himself. In addition, Chen Xianhe was already very old. The pressure and responsibility that Chen Daoxuan had to bear was far beyond what the cultivators of other cultivation clans could imagine.
Unless he was willing to abandon the clan and become an itinerant cultivator…
However, when he thought about how thirteenth uncle had cared for him for so many years, and had even been willing to selflessly give up the path of cultivation for his sake, no matter what, Chen Daoxuan would never do something like abandoning the clan.
…
Very soon, Chen Daoxuan’s figure landed on a mountain peak not far from his cave abode.
This mountain was the second-most important place of the clan apart from the red copper mine—the earth fire chamber.
When the Chen clan’s patriarch established the Chen clan’s foundation on Shuanghu Island, apart from discovering the red copper mine, he also discovered that this island was actually connected to an earth fire vein.
One had to know that, for a cultivation force, the importance of the earth fire vein was not inferior to a small spirit mine.
However, it was not easy to utilize an earth fire vein; one had to construct a building called the earth fire chamber.
Unfortunately, the Chen clan’s patriarch was only an itinerant cultivator back then. He did not have the ability or the resources to construct the earth fire chamber.
It was not until the clan’s “Immortal” generation of cultivators rose up that the number of cultivators in the clan reached thirteen. Only then did they obtain the resources to build the earth fire chamber, relying on their battle merits.
In other words, the building in front of Chen Daoxuan had only been built around a hundred years ago at most.
Of course, Chen Daoxuan did not know the exact year because there were no records of it in the clan.
Taking a deep breath, Chen Daoxuan pushed open the heavy bronze door of the earth fire chamber.
Accompanied by a series of teeth-aching creaks, the bronze door slowly opened. As the door opened, a wave of heat rushed out toward his face.
It felt similar to when he had stood in front of the smelting furnace of the steel factory in his previous life.
This place… was the place where Chen Daoxuan had stayed the most over the past five years.
When the clan built this earth fire chamber, their greatest wish was to nurture an artifact refiner for the clan.
However, the cultivators of the “Immortal” generation had spent their entire lives, until their souls were extinguished, without seeing this come to pass.
Of course, their sacrifice was not meaningless. It was due to their hard work on the battlefield that they were able to construct a building like the earth fire chamber and obtain a second-tier artifact refiner’s inheritance.
Without their sacrifice, the Chen clan of Shuanghu Island would never be able to cultivate an artifact refiner.
There were three buildings located where the earth fire chamber of the Chen clan was.
The main building was the one that Chen Daoxuan had entered. It was the place where the earth fire vein converged upon.
The two buildings that were slightly shorter next to it had been built on Chen Daoxuan’s instructions. The words ‘Blueprint Room’ and ‘Laboratory’ were written on their plaques respectively.
After routinely examining the array in the earth fire chamber, Chen Daoxuan walked out of the earth fire chamber and pushed open the door to the laboratory next to it.
Compared to the extreme heat of the earth fire chamber, the temperature in the laboratory was much cooler.
However, compared to the clean and tidy chamber, the interior of the laboratory was a mess.
All kinds of materials were piled up everywhere. Most of them were spirit ores that Chen Daoxuan had used in refining.
In addition, in the most eye-catching spot of the laboratory, a cylinder-shaped object about ten feet in diameter stood quietly. It looked a little out of place inside the ancient-looking laboratory.
If this object was seen by steel factory workers back on Earth, they would find that the object in front of them resembled, 70-80%, a modern steel furnace.
However, compared to the steel furnace on Earth, this cylinder-shaped object was engraved with array patterns, giving it a more mysterious aura.
Chen Daoxuan walked into the laboratory and stared at the huge object in front of him. His eyes were filled with a complicated expression.
After five years of failure, he had to admit that he had taken things too lightly.
Five years ago, when he first came into contact with the artifact refining inheritance, as a mechanical engineer in his previous life, Chen Daoxuan could not help but think… could he use modern industrial production methods to increase the output of artifact refining?
According to the second-tier refining inheritance, artifact refining was generally divided into three stages, which were refining, shaping, and fusing arrays.
According to Chen Daoxuan’s knowledge, the most time-consuming stage of the refining process of a first-grade spiritual artifact was precisely the refining stage.
Take the first-grade flying sword, the Red Shadow flying sword, as an example.
The main material used to refine the Red Shadow flying sword was the spirit ore, red copper ore, which the Chen clan had a large amount of.
It would take three days and three nights just to refine the red copper ore needed to refine the Red Shadow flying sword.
On the other hand, the subsequent shaping and fusing arrays stages did not take too long. Normally, it would only require about two hours to complete.
This meant that even if a refiner wanted to refine the most basic and lowest first-grade flying sword, they would have to labor inside the earth fire chamber for three days and three nights without rest.
This greatly affected production efficiency!
In the eyes of Chen Daoxuan, who was a mechanical engineer, this purely manual production method was simply akin to killing oneself slowly!