It was dawn, and Zuo Tianxuan, who was killing enemies on the battlefield in his dream, was awakened by a heavy metal knocking sound. When he opened his eyes, he saw a dim room with only a few lights coming in through the cracks in the curtains from outside.
After muttering something, he turned over and covered himself tightly with the quilt and continued to sleep.
But less than five minutes after closing his eyes, Zuo Tianxuan opened his eyes again and looked up at the clock placed by the bedside with fluorescent hands.
I found that the time was already 5:37.
Realizing that if he didn't get up, his grandfather would beat him up next, so he jumped up decisively.
While feeling pain in his back, he dragged his tired body to wash up and clean up, then put on a black vest and went downstairs.
When I walked out of the house, the cold air hit me suddenly.
The dim world is covered with goose feathers and white snow, and the cold wind is howling across it, causing the distant vegetation to tilt and sway. At this time, only the cleaning robot continues to work on the street, and there is no figure in sight.
Being hit by the cold wind, Zuo Tianxuan was shocked, and his still hazy mind suddenly became much clearer.
He rubbed his hands at the hairs on his arms that had stood up due to the cold, huddled up and ran towards a building not far away.
This building is very distinctive. There is a huge hammer standing on the roof. From a distance, it looks like the building has been flattened by a hammer falling from the sky.
The sound of heavy metal beating came from this building, waking him up from his sleep.
Stepping into the building, a wave of heat hit him, and the cold air that swept over him was swept away. What appeared in front of Zuo Tianxuan were huge calcining furnaces.
At this time, an old man with white beard and hair and a naked upper body was busy in front of the furnace. Although he was old, this old man was in excellent spirits. The muscles in his upper body were bulging, and his arms were covered with veins. It looked like
It's very powerful.
"Grandpa, I'm here."
"I don't need your help today, just watch and study hard."
The old man glanced at Zuo Tianxuan, continued to cast his gaze on the burning flames in the furnace, and then opened his mouth and roared:
"Old man, where have you been? Come over here and heat it up!"
Hearing the old man's cry, he saw the door of the room in the house being knocked open, and a vicious dog with flame patterns on its forehead and a fiery red body ran quickly, came to the stove, opened its mouth and spit flames into the stove, and suddenly the fire inside the stove was full of fire.
The temperature began to rise, and the entire room was filled with heat waves.
Zuo Tianxuan's head suddenly became covered with fine beads of sweat in the heat.
"Old man, that's enough."
"Hiccup!" The fiery red vicious dog stopped spitting flames, and then belched again, with two wisps of flame spilling out of its nostrils.
The vicious dog that grandpa calls his old friend is named Blaze Dog. It is a spirit beast that has broken through the three-stage bloodline shackles. Its average combat power ranks among the top thirty in the spirit beast illustrated book, and is stronger than many high-level spirit beasts.
This blazing dog was personally trained by my grandfather. When he was young, he won the runner-up in the Star City West District Lihuo Street Cup Championship.
As he grew older, my grandfather rarely used this blazing dog to fight, and basically only used it for work.
Grandpa's job is quite special, he is a blacksmith.
This is an ancestral profession. According to genealogical records, his ancestors were blacksmiths serving the front line as early as the Year of Dawn.
My usual job is to customize weapons and equipment for frontline soldiers.
According to his grandfather, many of the weapons of frontline heroes in the Star City Historical Collection were forged by his family.
The profession of blacksmith was a profession with a very high social status at that time. After all, it is not easy to design and forge spiritual weapons that can compete with domain creatures. It requires strong structural control ability. If you want to make a difference in this industry, you need to be very strong.
High talent.
However, with the development of society, the profession of blacksmith has gradually become lonely.
In the era he lives in now, the orders for customized weapons that his grandfather receives every month can barely cover his living expenses, and it is difficult to improve. Unlike in the past, warriors who needed customized equipment booked in advance and had to pay higher fees.
.
This is inseparable from the development of the times.
In the past Star City, blacksmiths were a profession that was in very short supply. After all, there was a huge gap in frontline weapons and equipment, and ordinary technological weapons could not meet the consumption and use of the frontline.
This also resulted in weapons used by frontline soldiers being taken back even after death and hung in stores to be sold to the next soldier, with the proceeds from the sales being sent to the families of the fallen soldiers.
But the development of the times has allowed Star City to take many new paths.
Many professions are facing the embarrassing dilemma of being eliminated by the times, and blacksmith is one of them.
In those days, weapon forging had to be given soul by the hands of a blacksmith, but modern weapon production tends to be streamlined.
Once you have a fixed template, you can mass-manufacture it in the equipment forging factory.
However, this kind of mass manufacturing is limited to relatively low-level spiritual weapons. Advanced spiritual weapons obviously cannot meet the tailor-made needs through mass manufacturing.
After all, the fit of mass-produced weapons and equipment cannot be compared with tailor-made ones.
It stands to reason that the blacksmith profession will be very popular in any era and should not become lonely.
But when it comes to tailor-made weapons, the human race has a channel that can also obtain them in batches.
That is Destiny City.
There is a racial force in Destiny City that specializes in making profits by customizing weapons and equipment for other races.
This clan is called the Forging clan, and they have a very special imitation miracle item called "Equipment Black Hole".
Black holes can be summoned and charged through a ring.
The way to use this imitation miracle prop is very simple. You only need to put the materials into the black hole, and the black hole will automatically reorganize and fuse the material structure and spit out equipment or weapons.
When using the equipment Black Hole, there is also a built-in data panel. You can look through the illustrations to find weapons and equipment that suit you, and then search for materials according to the requirements in the illustrations. After investing in proportion, you can spit out the magic weapons in the illustrations, and even manufacture them in batches.
This is still just the primary way to use the black hole equipment.
It is not difficult to tailor-made equipment. Before inputting materials, you can adjust the size of the equipment on the panel for refined production.
(PS: The plot chapter of related props is in Chapter 508, which was mentioned when Feng Qi went to Destiny City for the first time.)
Compared with the equipment black hole, the blacksmith is at a disadvantage in all aspects.
The first is the speed of forging equipment. Depending on the strength of the weapon and equipment, it will take at least several days for the blacksmith to create a piece of equipment. For special types of high-strength weapons, it may even take several months.
But to equip the black hole, you only need to put in the materials according to the illustration, and wait a few seconds to spit out a weapon and equipment tailor-made according to the specifications.
Secondly, in terms of cost performance, Blacksmith is also completely at a disadvantage.
There is bound to be material loss in the process of forging weapons and equipment. The utilization rate of materials cannot reach 100%. The additional consumption needs to be borne by the equipment customizer. This is an unavoidable problem.
However, the additional consumption rate of materials for equipping black holes is 0.
It can be said that Blacksmith is at a disadvantage compared to Equipment Black Hole in terms of price and efficiency in making equipment.
The most important thing is that the blacksmith is still at a disadvantage in terms of strength of equipment made from the same materials.
Spend more money and wait longer, and the equipment you get will not be as good as the output of the equipment black hole, which puts the blacksmith profession into an embarrassing dilemma.
With the development of the times, society has become more and more accepting of Destiny City, resulting in a large number of new warriors choosing weapons and equipment produced by Destiny City without hesitation.
Every month, Destiny City envoys will go to Destiny City to customize equipment in batches with the list of weapons and equipment submitted by the front line or the school.
As this model was gradually accepted, the blacksmith industry gradually declined.
It's like the intangible cultural heritage before the disaster.
Although the blacksmith profession still exists, the meaning of its existence is more towards historical inheritance and a symbolic imprint of the old era, rather than an important profession that stands at the forefront of the development of the times.
A simple description is that the blacksmith profession no longer plays any role in the development of the times.
It is just a product that should be eliminated by the times.
But my grandfather has been working in the iron industry all his life, and he didn't want to give up just like that. He also thought of many ways to revive the line of blacksmiths.
It's just that his efforts seemed so small and powerless in front of the black hole of equipment produced efficiently by the assembly line, and all his efforts were vulnerable in the face of substantial benefits.
But grandpa never thought of giving up.
After all, Equipment Black Hole is an imitation of a miracle prop, not a pure miracle prop. Grandpa has carefully studied a series of equipment produced by Equipment Black Hole and found that there are obvious shortcomings and flaws in them.
The weapons and equipment produced in batches by Black Hole actually have high limitations.
If it is broken or damaged, it cannot be repaired. It is often discarded after being damaged, and its structure has been integrated into a whole.
Back then, some frontline soldiers came to my grandfather to repair their damaged weapons, but my grandfather failed after all his attempts.
The Forging clan took the damaged weapons to Destiny City and mastered the equipment Black Hole. The Forging clan also had no ability to repair the damaged equipment.
Through this point, Grandpa believes that the weapons and equipment produced by the Black Hole have great limitations and have lost room for expansion, that is, room for growth.
But the equipment produced by the blacksmith is different.
Even if it is damaged, it can be repaired. Secondly, as the strength of the warrior holding the weapon and equipment increases, the weapon and equipment can be recast to increase the overall strength and lethality of the weapon.
In addition, Grandpa asked the messenger of destiny and learned that some special high-level spiritual mines and equipment are difficult to identify and decompose and reorganize with black holes.
After all, it is just a prop to prevent miracles. In addition to being affected by the materials, the equipment produced by the black hole has an obvious upper limit.
For equipment that reaches a certain level of strength, the equipment black hole cannot be manufactured.
This is why grandpa believes that the blacksmith profession can be revitalized.
Grandpa Zuo Tianxuan is very clear about his thoughts. He believes that if the human race wants to become a powerful racial force, they must master core technologies themselves. If they blindly rely on equipment black hole production, this channel for obtaining equipment will be cut off in the future.
For example, the Forged clan was exterminated, and their equipment Black Hole was stolen by other races.
Moreover, the race that took away the black hole equipment has no intention of doing business in Destiny City, so the human race is equivalent to being cut off from access to weapons and equipment.
This is only one of the reasons.
During this period, Grandpa repeatedly approached the head of the executive department of Star City, hoping to invest resources in the blacksmith industry to cultivate better blacksmiths.
Facing the inquiry from the head of Star City's executive department, Grandpa's words were that the human race could not limit their thinking to the rapid and convenient production of weapons and equipment, but should look at the future development of the situation from a long-term perspective.
In the future, the strength requirements of weapons and equipment will change with the increasingly harsh environment.
When the strength demand of the human race for weapons and equipment exceeds the upper limit of what the equipment black hole can produce, how to obtain better equipment will become a difficulty that hinders the development of the human race.
Only by continuing to ensure the development of the blacksmith profession, even if we encounter such difficulties in the future, we can try to make a breakthrough by restarting the blacksmith profession.
Once the line of blacksmiths completely disappears, the foundation built with previous efforts will disappear.
How can one build a tall building without a foundation?
Grandpa's words convinced the head of Star City's executive department, and he submitted Grandpa's request to the Star City Supreme Council.
The Supreme Council of Star City finally decided to support Grandpa to develop the future of the blacksmith lineage. Even though the demand for equipment is still mainly based on the output of Destiny City at this stage, the human race must master the core technology and face various challenges and variables that may exist in the future.
But Grandpa undoubtedly failed to live up to the expectations of Star City's top brass.
The forging building at his feet was specially built for him, equipped with a large number of advanced equipment, and even a free energy line was specially connected from the energy agency for his grandfather to use.
In the early days, a large number of apprentices were sent to Grandpa to learn and gain experience.
As a result, even though grandpa tried his best to reach the upper limit of the black hole equipment, it could even be said to be far out of reach.
In terms of manpower, resources, and equipment, Star City satisfied Grandpa in all aspects, but Grandpa was unable to meet Star City's expectations. It was even difficult for Grandpa to break through the upper limit of his own manufacturing technology, and he was still making some ancient spiritual equipment.
Facing Grandpa's failure, the person in charge of Star City's execution department also comforted Grandpa to continue working hard.
But as time went by, it was discovered that grandpa still had not made any progress, and the support given to grandpa by Star City was gradually decreasing.
Today, except for the building at your feet and the equipment that you once supported and provided, all the blacksmith apprentices who once followed your grandfather have left.
They think there is no way out in this industry.
Faced with the excellent performance of Forging Black Hole in mass-producing customized equipment, Grandpa's laborious forging seemed like a lot of effort, but it was meaningless from a profit perspective.
Decades of hard work have yielded no results, and Star City's top management has long lost their patience.
However, Star City's top management has not given up on self-developed equipment. They always believe that Grandpa's idea is right. The human race must master its own core technology and cannot completely rely on weapons and equipment produced by foreign races. They must always prepare for the worst.
, so Star City’s top management has planned a self-research route for psychic equipment, and Grandpa’s oldest method of forging equipment is being gradually phased out.
Grandpa's persistence is like a blacksmith believer standing before dusk, looking forward to the sun rising again.
But what I saw was the darkness gradually enveloping me.
Grandpa has been walking this road all his life. He has the ambition in his heart to open up a new path, but he has reached a point of no return.
His father did not follow his grandfather and chose to continue on this ancestral path. He also had a quarrel with his grandfather over the inheritance of blacksmith skills. Now his father is conducting research on urban construction with the Silver Moon tribe at the Psychic Research Institute. He rarely
Come back to visit grandpa.
As for him, he was brought up by his grandfather.
However, I was not good at studying. I originally wanted to go to the front line to kill the enemy, but due to various reasons such as physical fitness, I was unable to enter the combat academy for further study, and my path to the front line was cut off.
When he learned that he had not been admitted to even the lowest school, he frowned.
But his grandfather was beaming with joy, thinking that the future of the blacksmith lineage would finally have a successor.
Thank you for the 10,000 starting coins from May the Glory of Mankind Live Forever, and for your continued support.
