Iron Age (2)
Before melting the ore, Chester fetched a scrap of wood and began carving it with his machete.
"Do you really have to carve that with the machete?"
"The claw knife's too dull. I want this as clean as I can get it."
He laid the machete across two pieces of firewood so it hovered just above the ground, then pressed down hard and worked the wood against the edge, shaving it carefully.
Unlike his usual hobby carving, he moved with deliberate caution. Once the rough shape emerged, he paused to knead the tight knots in his shoulders and trapezius.
Doesn't have to be perfect. I can refine it with stone later.
Still, he aimed for perfection.
Chester carved a knife that would fit his hand exactly—the shape he knew best. Accounting for his large hands, he made the grip a little longer and thicker, and cut a groove between blade and handle so his fingers could catch there and keep from slipping onto the edge by accident.
Once the wooden knife was carefully shaped, he pressed it firmly into clay to take the impression. He covered that mold with a second slab of clay like a lid, then poked a hole with a stick for the molten metal to pour through.
He left the clay to dry. When it had hardened, he separated the two halves and checked that the knife-shaped cavity had come out clean.
"Yeah. Looks good."
Satisfied, Chester nodded and finished the last preparations for melting the ore.
He dropped a couple of ore chunks into the cup he had made and set the whole thing inside the kiln. Then he built the fire with fierce concentration.
"It won't melt. No matter what I do, it just won't melt!"
To cut straight to the conclusion: melting the ore failed.
"It did glow red, though."
"Well, of course it heats up when you throw fire at it."
"Right."
But heating was all it did. The ore never reached melting point.
"…We're going to need more heat."
"How?"
"First, more air holes."
They paused the melting attempt while Chester repaired the kiln. He smashed out a section, rebuilt a fresh air channel, and modified one of the two remaining bellows so it could force air in. Then he and Monia lit the fire again and pumped hard, trying to melt the ore.
Still nothing.
"Aaaargh! Just melt already!"
"Why won't you melt, you bastard!"
The ore glowed a deeper red than before, but it still refused to liquefy.
"At least we confirmed that more air makes a stronger fire. …We need even more air."
Beside the existing intake, Chester broke open another hole and converted the last bellows into a third air feed. The plan was to work two bellows at once with both arms.
"Don't just pile wood. Lay charcoal underneath. And forget about impurities—bury the whole cup under firewood. We can fish out the slag later, or live with a little of it."
"All right."
Monia nodded. They spread charcoal across the kiln floor, hollowed a space in the middle, jammed the ore-filled cup into place, and heaped wood over everything. Fire again. Third attempt.
"Melt!"
"Melt already!"
They pumped the bellows while praying with everything they had.
Chester tried every trick he could think of.
He carefully balanced fast-burning wood against long-burning wood so they would open the lid less often and keep air flowing longer. He even packed ore and wood together inside the cup so the metal sat in direct flame rather than merely under it. He chipped away as much stone matrix as possible to expose more ore surface. He built yet another bellows and another air port. With Monia's sharp eye for detail he carved a new lid that followed every irregularity of the kiln rim, sealing the fire as tightly as their materials allowed.
How many failures did they taste while chasing molten metal?
Doubt began to creep into Monia's heart, but Chester never quit. He kept at the ore with stubborn patience.
Whether that stubbornness finally paid off or pure luck intervened, success arrived at last.
After long hours of heat, Chester carefully shoved the scorching lid aside with his foot, raked away the piled wood, and peered into the cup.
"…Oh."
"What? Still not melted?"
"It melted."
"…What?"
At that single quiet word Monia dropped her bellows and ran to the kiln. The moment she saw the silvery liquid lapping gently inside the cup, her fist shot skyward of its own accord.
"Yaaaaaaah! It melted!!"
It was the same victory pose Chester always struck when he finally conquered something hard. And right beside her, Chester was doing exactly the same thing—both arms thrust high, roaring.
"Aaaaaah! It melted! It finally melted!"
"We did it! At last! Finally! Uwaaaah, that was so hard!!"
"You made us work for it, you little bastard!"
"Why the hell wouldn't you melt until now? Thank you for melting!"
They stomped the ground, clung to each other and spun in wild circles, and belted out whatever nonsense songs bubbled up from pure relief. Melting that ore had been pure misery.
"Ah—this isn't the time!"
Chester stopped spinning with Monia still in his arms, set her down, and grabbed the two new wooden tongs he had made. The old pair had charred and weakened from constant trips in and out of the fire.
With the tongs he carefully lifted the cup free. Using two sticks like chopsticks, he plucked out every floating impurity—stone chips freed when the ore melted, ash that had mixed in from the burning wood. Only when the metal was clean did he carry the cup to the clay mold.
Slowly, carefully, so not a drop would spill, so carefully that even the tiny tremor of tension in his hands felt like an insult, he poured the molten metal into the pour-hole.
When the silvery liquid rose steadily inside the cavity, he set the cup down and gently rocked the mold.
"…"
Monia, who had watched in silent suspense, finally spoke.
"Is it done?"
"Yeah. Now we wait for it to set."
"Aren't you going to hammer it or anything?"
"Forge it? We can't, not with what we have. I know forging would make it stronger…"
"We went through all this hell to make it. If we're going to do it, shouldn't we do everything we can?"
Chester fell quiet for a moment, thinking.
"…You're right. If we're going this far, we might as well push every advantage we can."
That was exactly why he had built the water channel in the first place—hauling water from the river every day was exhausting, so he had decided to solve the problem properly with a major project.
"All right. Since we've come this far, let's do everything possible. We've got plenty of ore; we can make all the tools we need."
"Right?"
When Chester nodded with serious resolve, Monia smiled and held up a length of bamboo.
"What's that?"
"I wanted to improve the water bottles a little. Nothing fancy—just leave a small drinking hole instead of an open mouth so less spills when we carry them around."
"Hmm. We do have bottles. Narrowing the mouth instead of using a lid makes sense for travel."
"Oh, really? Anyway, I'm trying to make one."
She had been thinking about it ever since the coming-of-age challenge, but one crisis after another had pushed it aside until now. Chester assumed the idea came from the time she had climbed to the upper level, found the river gone, and nearly run out of water. Whatever the reason, good was good. He patted her shoulder and told her to make it well.
"The shape's simple, so it went faster than I expected. If I'd known, I would have done this ages ago."
Monia had hoped for praise, yet felt a twinge of conscience about fishing for compliments over such a small job.
"No, it's excellent. I hadn't given the water bottles much thought. I'm glad you did."
When Chester said that and wrapped his arms around her from behind, Monia's face melted into a soft, happy smile.