Chapter 323 - 140: Little Black Box (3)
In the countryside, almost no one is willing to burn smokeless coal for heating, but in the cement factory, coal is not a rare commodity.
Whether it’s the rotary kiln using bituminous coal or the vertical kiln using smokeless coal blocks, both have strict requirements for the calorific value of the coal, as well as for the coal’s ash content, volatile content, moisture, and sulfur content.
Every day, large trucks come and go from the cement factory, loaded with coal.
For this reason, Chen Zhou is not unfamiliar with high-quality smokeless coal.
This kind of coal has a much higher ignition point than lignite. If used at home, one needs to add wood to the furnace first, wait until the wood burns vigorously, and then add the coal.
Although high-quality smokeless coal has a high ignition point, once it starts burning, the heat output is considerable, and the firepower is extremely strong. A household boiler using smokeless coal for a year may even have its inner walls burned through.
Sometimes, to reduce the damage smokeless coal does to the boiler, it’s necessary to mix in some low-quality coal or coal dust when adding smokeless coal to lessen the firepower.
For Chen Zhou, the greatest use of smokeless coal is in metal smelting.
Charcoal’s heat output is ultimately insufficient, merely adequate for heating and forging ordinary wrought iron and cast iron. But for processing alloys or steel, smokeless coal is necessary.
As long as there’s enough coal, besides regular agricultural tools, he could forge armor himself, or even manufacture lathe parts and assemble a mechanical lathe.
Even if making a lathe is too complex, replacing some wooden parts in windmills and waterwheels with metal would greatly extend their service life.
Holding the lump of coal in his hand, as he envisioned a bright future, Chen Zhou didn’t forget to weigh its heft.
This particular "black brick" in his hand has a much higher density than a red brick, and when weighed roughly, it’s around six or seven pounds. Crushing it and putting it in the stove should easily burn for an hour or two.
...
"So, this black box is a machine that synthesizes smokeless coal?"
Understanding the black box’s purpose, Chen Zhou couldn’t help but feel puzzled—given the usual temperament of the Space-Time Administration Bureau, it didn’t seem likely they’d give him a machine that’s practically cheating.
Even in modern society, infinite coal could overturn the industry of a small country, so why would such a valuable resource be given to him for no reason? It seemed impossible just thinking about it.
"Unless there’s a limit!"
At this thought, Chen Zhou pressed the button on the black box again.
As expected, nothing happened.
"I knew there wasn’t such a good thing; it seems this device has a cooldown.
I just don’t know how long it takes to reset each time, a day? Two days? Or a week?
If it produces a seven-pound piece of coal every seven days, its usefulness is limited; saving each production, it would take at least two months to fire up the furnace once."
Since it was unclear how often the black box could produce a piece of coal, Chen Zhou set it and the coal aside, taking out the other items from the gift box one by one.
...
The biggest advantage of the anniversary gift package is that everything inside is useful, the only difference being the degree of usefulness.
Besides the green onion seeds, metal nunchucks, and the coal-producing black box, the box also contained a set of arrowheads, a xiao flute, five rolls of Xuan paper, an ink stone, three large bags of loose traditional Chinese painting pigments, and two books.
The arrowheads were stored in a wooden box, with four types: triangular willow leaf arrowhead, blood groove willow leaf arrowhead, regular willow leaf arrowhead, and spinning willow leaf arrowhead, five of each type.
It just so happened that Chen Zhou was dissatisfied with his homemade arrowheads, so these were like delivering coal during a snowstorm, making the process of assisting the natives presumably smoother.
The xiao flute appeared to be made from bamboo, crafted very exquisitely, and was quite long.
Chen Zhou wasn’t knowledgeable about traditional instruments, only knowing this was a xiao flute, but had no idea how to play it.
The two books were "Introduction to Gongbi Bird-and-Flower Painting Techniques" and "Introduction to Traditional Chinese Painting Techniques," seemingly intended for use with the Xuan paper, ink stone, and pigments.
But what confused Chen Zhou was that the four treasures of the study—brush, ink, paper, and ink stone—had only three elements in the anniversary reward; he couldn’t help but wonder.
"Where’s my calligraphy brush?"
With this sentiment, he rummaged through the entire gift box, even inspecting the xiao flute and nunchucks.
He discovered that this anniversary gift indeed lacked a calligraphy brush, thinking it must be a little joke from the Space-Time Administration Bureau.
However, as the most difficult items to make—paper and pigments—were provided, crafting a brush could easily be done by hand, and Totoro’s fur seemed like a good material for making a brush.
For Chen Zhou at present, this wasn’t a difficult task.
...
Overall, this anniversary gift package was passable. Apart from the small black box producing coal and the arrowheads, the other rewards provided limited assistance.
Compared to the previous anniversary gift package, this one seemed more focused on spiritual life, as if intended to add some leisure activities to his monotonous life.
Unfortunately, he was still driven around in circles by various trivial matters, always busy from morning till night.
Besides his small personal hobbies, he found it hard to spare time to learn the xiao flute, let alone practice the nunchucks. If not played well, they wouldn’t hit others but might end up bumping his own head, leaving him bruised all over.
Moreover, these nunchucks were made of thick steel pipes, and if he accidentally swung it onto his head, it could cause either a concussion or, in the worst case, could be fatal on the spot.
As for traditional Chinese painting, he was indeed very interested and was willing to learn Gongbi painting techniques from the books, drawing on the strengths of traditional culture to improve his artistic skills.
But the five rolls of Xuan paper were really too few; combined, they might not even be sufficient for practice.
Before using up these pigments and sheets of paper, Chen Zhou was skeptical whether he could get to the starting point of traditional Chinese painting.