Chapter 56 Preparations before the banquet 2
"Brother! I'm back!" Meng Ruolang was followed by three servants holding boxes. One box was full of sulfur, and the rest was naturally bamboo tubes and charcoal.
Bi Yuntao stretched, took Meng Ruoxi to the courtyard, and directed the servants to bring in the firecrackers they just bought today.
"Brother! Why did you buy so many firecrackers?" Meng Ruolang looked at several large boxes of firecrackers and asked doubtfully.
Bi Yuntao did not answer his words. He opened the firecrackers and poured the gunpowder inside into the basin. But looking at the gunpowder in the basin, he frowned and sighed, "Sure enough, it's just as I thought!" The purity of these gunpowders It’s not enough, the content is too little, but luckily, I bought enough firecrackers and there are remedies!
"Brother! What are you going to do? What are you doing taking apart these firecrackers?" Meng Ruolang looked at Bi Yuntao's movements, his little head full of doubts.
"You don't know? You still think you don't know everything!" Bi Yuntao looked at him with amusement.
"Uh..." Hearing the contempt in Bi Yuntao's tone, he scratched his head in embarrassment.
"Pfft!" Meng Ruoxi laughed out loud when she saw her brother's funny actions, "You little fool, you don't even know this. Master told you to read more and you still didn't listen. This time, you will regret it when you know that the books will be used." Come on!"
"Then tell me, what are you planning to do?" Meng Ruolang's face turned red at what she said, and she retorted angrily.
"Well... I think he is going to make a big firecracker!" After saying that, her face turned red, and she didn't know what Bi Yuntao was going to do.
"Uh..." Bi Yuntao's head was covered with black lines. "What, you're still talking about me, and you don't know the result!" Meng Ruolang rolled his eyes.
"Haha! Although what Ruoxi said is different from the final item, it is still very similar!"
"No, brother! Wouldn't it be better to have the big firecrackers customized? They'll be ready in about a week!" Meng Ruolang complained feebly.
"A week is too long. I'm in a hurry, so I'd better do it myself. And..."
"And what?" Meng Ruoxi asked.
"Besides, the power of firecrackers is too small!"
"This..." The two siblings look at me and I look at you. What's the use of powerful firecrackers?
"Haha! Just watch, I'll definitely surprise you!" Bi Yuntao smiled mysteriously, "Just in time, Ruo Lang, you can also help open these firecrackers." Then he pointed at the two servants and said, "Help me find them. Farmers who raise pigs and cows scrape off the hoar frost from their pig pens or cattle pens and bring them to me. The more the better, money is not an issue. As for you!" He turned to another servant and told another servant, "You go to the courtyard. Let me do it in the corner of the wall. I've seen it and there's a lot of hoarfrost in the corner."
Meng Ruoxi watched Bi Yuntao repeatedly directing Meng Ruolang and the others to do various things, and she also wanted to do her part. "What do you want me to do? I can help you too!"
Bi Yuntao looked at her eager expression and chuckled, "Just supervise Meng Ruolang's work!"
Bi Yuntao fetched well water, poured the white frost scraped from the corner of the wall into the bucket, stirred it for a while, let it sit in the water, and then ran to the kitchen to light a fire.
Meng Ruoxi looked at him busy in the kitchen and didn't understand what he was going to do. "What are you doing making fire? Do you need to light a fire to make firecrackers? You asked the servants to pour the hoarfrost into the water and you are doing it again." What?"
Bi Yuntao was in a good mood at this time. He couldn't help but whistle. When he heard her question, he happily explained to her, "The white frost is saltpeter. Saltpeter is usually found in pig and cattle pens, and in the courtyard." Old wall bases, cliff edges, caves, and floors that are not easily washed by rain. These hoarfrosts contain saltpeter. The saltpeter will melt with clean water. Soaking it in water can separate it from impurities. Use an iron pot to boil the water. Boil it dry, and the powder attached to the iron pot is the saltpeter I want."
"Then Zuo Xiang's Mansion also has so much saltpeter!" Thinking of what Meng Ruolang said before about saltpeter being used for gunpowder, he couldn't help but feel palpitated.
Bi Yuntao guessed her worries and smiled. "Haha! Don't worry, you can't make gunpowder with saltpeter alone. You need other things to match it in a certain proportion. Otherwise, every time it rains and is exposed to the sun for a few days, if just someone sets a fire, wouldn't your home be ruined? It just blew up!"
Meng Ruoxi breathed a sigh of relief and patted her chest with palpitations. Seeing that he knew so much, I couldn't help but feel a little puzzled, "But how do you know this? And don't firecrackers always contain gunpowder? Why do you have to go to the trouble of making them yourself?"
"This! Life is the best teacher! These all come from life!" Bi Yuntao smiled mysteriously, without explaining too much why he wanted to make gunpowder. This chemical knowledge is an introductory course for agents, and when I think that this knowledge was spurned by the literati and politicians living in ancient times, they simply looked down on the knowledge that these craftsmen had painstakingly researched, and a little sadness could not help but appear in their eyes. What if I have always attached great importance to these things, how could I be bullied by other young people for hundreds of years.
"What's wrong? Did I say something wrong?" Meng Ruoxi saw that his mood was a little low, and she didn't know what she said wrongly, which made him unhappy.
"Ah, it's nothing, I just remembered something." Bi Yuntao collected his emotions and then asked Meng Ruoxi thoughtfully, "What do you think of the knowledge of these craftsmen?"
"I think it's quite magical. The hoarfrost that can be seen everywhere in the corners of the walls and in the pig and cattle pens can actually be turned into gunpowder for firecrackers after you process it like this."
"Is it just magical?" Bi Yuntao murmured to himself. When she nodded, he asked casually, "Then do you want to learn? I can teach you."
Meng Ruoxi shook her head, "Forget it, these tricks are still difficult to achieve, not to mention that they are not favored by the world. I just didn't expect that you, as a prince, would be interested in these things!"
"Haha! It's really a little trick. I learned it from the craftsmen when I was very curious when I was a child. I didn't expect that it would be useful." Bi Yuntao kept adding firewood to the stove and saw that the fire was already burning vigorously. He stood up and wiped the dust off his hands, "Okay, it's almost done. I'm going to see how Meng Ruolang and the others are doing." Forget it, I will teach these things to others when I can participate in court affairs in the future. People.
Meng Ruoxi felt that he seemed to have something on his mind, but she didn't know how to solve it. She walked up to him inadvertently, blushed and stretched out her hand to take his thick hand.
Bi Yuntao was startled by her actions. He glanced at him and noticed her pretty red face. He understood her intention. He smiled and tightened his grip, "Come with me and I'll show you." What kind of battles can these little tricks create!"
"How's it going? Let me see if it's enough!" Bi Yuntao walked to Meng Ruolang's side and was overjoyed when he looked at the pile of gunpowder in the basin. "You continue to dismantle, I will take these away first!" Holding a pot of gunpowder, he walked to the bucket where the saltpeter was resting, and began to fish out the upper clear liquid and filter out the impurities, and then put the filtered Pour the liquid into a basin and take it to the kitchen for cooking.
After a lot of work, the most time-consuming saltpeter powder was finally obtained. Bi Yuntao thoroughly mixed the white saltpeter powder with sulfur and charcoal, carefully poured it into the bamboo tube of the diamond hole, inserted it and soaked it in the saltpeter mixed solution. String and simple explosives are ready.
"What is this?" Meng Ruoxi looked at the firecracker-like object and asked in confusion.
"Isn't this just a firecracker?!" Meng Ruolang twitched the corner of her mouth. She spent so much effort just to create such a thing? !
"This is the firecracker you guessed before, but now his name is dynamite!" Bi Yuntao explained, "I just want to eat fish recently, let's use this to fry fish!" Bi Yuntao couldn't wait anymore I want to try its power. If it is not satisfactory, I need to reconfigure the content of gunpowder.
"Hey! No! What about the dismantled gunpowder?! It took me nine years and two tigers to dismantle it. Brother, don't you use it?"
"Oh, those gunpowder will be used later, don't worry, let's get food first."
"Stay away and cover your ears!" Bi Yuntao stood by the pond in the courtyard and shouted to Meng Ruoxi and the others.
The two looked at each other, followed Bi Yuntao's words, and stayed away, covering their ears.
Seeing that the two of them were hiding, he picked up the fire stick and lit the fuse, ran towards them quickly, and covered his ears at the same time.
Just as he stood still, he heard a "boom", and the bamboo tube explosives floating in the water exploded, splashing water all over the ground.
"Hahaha! What a great harvest!" Bi Yuntao ran quickly to the pond and picked up the koi carps scattered on the ground. The power of the explosives is still acceptable, and there is no need to reconfigure it. The rest is to see how powerful the gunpowder stripped from the firecrackers is.
Meng Ruoxi and Meng Ruolang stared at the scene in front of them with their jaws dropped. They never expected that Bi Yuntao would produce such a powerful explosive with a casual touch.
"Come and help me pick up the fish! I've wanted to eat these fish for a long time. It's too troublesome to catch them one by one, but it's still so fast!" Bi Yuntao waved to the two people who were stunned.
Only then did the two of them react and walked towards Bi Yuntao in shock, "Brother! This, this, this, this, this explosive is so powerful, and you can get these things easily."
"Hahaha! I said, life is the best teacher!" Bi Yuntao looked at Meng Ruoxi, "Ruoxi, how about it, can you still see through these little tricks?"
"You, these koi were carefully cultivated by the imperial palace, and now they are ruined by you. It's really hard for these koi!" Meng Ruoxi rolled her eyes at him and did not answer his question, but she had to admit it. Tricks do have merit.
"Haha! How can you say it's a waste? It takes a lot of money and effort to raise these fish, so you might as well eat them! Besides, if you don't have any more, just ask the mother and concubine for it. Anyway, it's not my money. If you don't eat it, it won't be in vain. Eat, there are so many fish, we just want the kitchen to make us a full fish feast."
