Chapter 53: Imitation of Heavenly Fire, Part 1

“What’s a generator? Can it make lightning? Can it create heavenly tribulations?” Xia Qingqing, Bei Chen Yuqing, Fang Shijing, and Ling Zhifeng gazed in wonder and a hint of trepidation at the device before them—was this really a generator?

The generator had undergone a tremendous transformation; its size had increased to about two meters in length. Inside, it crackled with electric energy, while four pairs of spiritual energy gathering wires connected it to an external spiritual energy array. The generator’s built-in spiritual energy array had been removed, simplifying the device.

At both ends of the generator were wires the thickness of a finger, wrapped in coarse dry hemp cloth. One end connected to over a hundred large light bulbs.

It was indeed a boon to have cultivators; once Li Xian initiated the process, the remaining experimental components could be crafted using spells. While the bulbs looked a bit unattractive, they were more than sufficient for conducting experiments.

Now, Tang Rong and the others no longer feared electricity. They approached it with a spirit of exploration, having long since stopped worrying about “stealing the powers of heaven.” If they had truly stolen heavenly power, divine punishment would have already struck them down.

Since there was no divine punishment, it meant this phenomenon was worthy of study. The cultivators, emboldened by their newfound understanding, were making rapid progress. After Li Xian’s trip to Wuyang City, they had resolved many issues, and all the various tools he had mentioned were finally being crafted.

It seemed that among those who could cultivate, especially those who had reached the Foundation Establishment stage, there were no fools.

Seeing the technology behind the array generator reach initial maturity, both Li Xian and Xu Ren were excited and eagerly gathered around, completely ignoring Xia Qingqing, Bei Chen Yuqing, Fang Shijing, and Ling Zhifeng.

Although Xia Qingqing had endured hardships since childhood and was quite understanding, witnessing Li Xian so “irresponsibly” abandon her, a delicate beauty, to gaze at the cold machine made her feel a twinge of jealousy. Nonetheless, she ultimately decided to stick close to Li Xian, curious to discover what this “generator” was all about.

Meanwhile, Li Xian personally checked the generator, ensuring that the insulation of the wires and everything else was in order before he proceeded to merge the switches.

At that moment, the over a hundred light bulbs that had been prepared nearby lit up simultaneously. A blinding burst of light erupted, leaving Xia Qingqing, Bei Chen Yuqing, Fang Shijing, and Ling Zhifeng astonished. Xia Qingqing even ducked behind Li Xian, peeking out curiously, looking quite adorable.

Unfortunately, Li Xian’s focus was entirely on the generator. Seeing all the bulbs illuminate and the current meter indicating stable voltage and current made him ecstatic. “Haha! Fantastic! The power issue is resolved, and with that, the wiring problem is solved! Once we settle the wiring issue, we can truly unleash our dreams! This is amazing!”

“Next, let’s prepare to create an electromagnetic vortex heating furnace. This heating furnace will require alternating current. Does anyone have any ideas?”

It turned out that the current produced by this array generator was more akin to a fuel cell, outputting direct current instead of alternating current. While direct current was indeed beneficial, alternating current was undoubtedly superior in the early stages of electric power development.

Tang Rong smiled confidently. “Young Master, we’ve already thought this through. The solution is simple: just add a Yin-Yang conversion array to the two wires. This way, once it’s set up, we can easily alter the frequency of the alternating current.”

“Take a look; we’ve already created it!” 

Li Xian turned to see a spinning device the size of a watermelon, powered by the engine. The entire apparatus was divided into three sections, with fixed parts at the front and back, while the middle part rotated—a Tai Chi disk. As long as this Tai Chi disk spun, it could easily change the positive and negative variations of the current.

“Excellent!” Li Xian was genuinely thrilled, as if the hardest times had passed. The research on wiring and power was making rapid progress.

Next, the group began discussing how to construct the “heating furnace.”

Li Xian immediately set Xia Qingqing, Bei Chen Yuqing, Fang Shijing, and Ling Zhifeng aside to delve into the discussion: 

“The melting temperature of jade should be below 2600 degrees. The melting temperature of steel does not exceed 1600 degrees. As for gold, silver, and copper, their melting temperatures are even lower. Besides the melting temperature, there’s also the boiling temperature; generally, under normal conditions, the boiling temperature of iron is about 2750 degrees, while gold’s boiling temperature should be slightly above 2800 degrees.

However, based on our assumptions, the temperature of the heavenly fire must exceed 6000 degrees, which leads us to two problems that need to be addressed.

First, how can we prevent the heating furnace’s shell from melting? 

Second, during the process of refining mysterious iron and exquisite metals with heavenly fire, it shouldn’t simply cause the metals to boil away, leaving behind some essence. If that were the case, others would have already discovered materials like exquisite gold, secret silver, crimson copper, and mysterious iron.

Since the unwanted substances aren’t simply evaporating, there must be only one possibility: under some unknown conditions, heavenly fire possesses not only high temperatures but also extremely high pressure. The combination of high temperature and high pressure alters the properties of materials.

Therefore, we need to ensure that even if the temperature exceeds 6000 degrees, or even surpasses 10,000 degrees, the metals do not boil!”

Tang Rong took notes while thinking, “Young Master is right. As for the first point, how to prevent the heating furnace from melting, I have an idea. We could arrange an insulation layer using the Samadhi True Fire array and reinforce it with the Hou Tu (Earth) array. However, it would consume seven spirit stones and only last for three days.”

“Use them!” Li Xian decided without hesitation.

“Spirit stones?!” Hearing that there were spirit stones here, Xia Qingqing, Bei Chen Yuqing, Fang Shijing, and Ling Zhifeng all widened their eyes in astonishment. This seemingly insignificant valley at the edge of the region had spirit stones, and apparently, more than just seven! Unfortunately, no one bothered to answer their surprise.

After Tang Rong finished, he scratched his head, “But as for preventing the metal from boiling, Young Master, I can’t think of a good solution.”

The others also scratched their heads. When it came to destruction or combat, that was second nature to everyone—they were cultivators, after all, and combat was a part of their lifestyle. But “protecting” something, on the other hand, was much more difficult. Preventing metal from boiling, in a way, was a form of protection.

Seeing that everyone was at a loss, Li Xian remembered there were still four newcomers.

However, when he asked them for the first time, none of the four could provide an answer. To be fair, they were still in a daze, not entirely sure what was happening around them.

Seeing the puzzled and worried expressions all around, Li Xian finally couldn’t help but show off a little. “It’s actually quite simple to prevent metal from boiling. Boiling is like a rebellion; it just needs to be suppressed. High pressure suppression! But the kind of high pressure we need to prevent metal from boiling is not political pressure, but atmospheric pressure.”

“Let me explain—everyone can try a simple experiment using magic. If you take a pot of boiling water and use a spell to pressurize the area around it, the water will stop boiling.”

The group immediately tested it out, and sure enough, when the water began boiling, applying pressure with magic caused the water to calm down again, and its temperature continued to rise.

“But using this method to handle molten iron at 6000 degrees is way too dangerous! You can’t just do it like that!” Tang Rong was troubled. After several dangerous experiment explosions in the past, the group had firmly established a policy of “caution during trials.”

“It can be done like this.” Li Xian began sketching diagrams and explaining his solution. Gradually, everyone had a moment of realization—it turns out, there was a better way to approach the problem.

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