Ling Tian manipulated the furnace before him, melting the steel pipes into molten iron.
Next, the molten iron flowed along a channel next to the furnace and onto a mold.
Soon, the shape of an iron ingot appeared on the mold.
Following the inheritance he had received, Ling Tian then used his spiritual power to control a pair of iron tongs and two hammers placed on a rack next to the controller.
The iron tongs and hammers floated in mid-air, the tongs tightly gripping the iron ingot. Ling Tian then controlled the two hammers to continuously forge the ingot.
Controlling these items consumed spiritual power, not qi. After only a short while of controlling them, Ling Tian felt exhausted, his mind unable to keep up.
Ling Tian mused that controlling things with spiritual power was too tiring. He decided it would be better to do it himself.
However, when he stepped forward and picked up one of the smaller hammers, he was stunned.
This iron hammer, which looked like it weighed only a dozen pounds, felt wrong as soon as Ling Tian held it. The hammer actually weighed four to five hundred pounds. He wondered what material it was made of!
He could only swing it a few times with all his might before feeling overwhelmed. He decided it was best to stick with controlling it using his spiritual power.
He quickly took out a pill and swallowed it. The medicine took effect quickly, and Ling Tian's spirit was instantly invigorated.
Then, he began to control the two hammers and the tongs, forging the iron ingot.
But Ling Tian soon discovered that this task was not as simple as it looked.
The force, angle, and timing of the hammers' descent had to be carefully controlled by his spiritual power.
As long as his concentration wavered slightly, the position and force of the hammer strikes would deviate.
If the position deviated, the hammers would not strike evenly, failing to achieve the forging effect.
If the force was not controlled properly, he could even smash the red-hot iron ingot with a single blow, rendering all his efforts futile. He would then have to remelt the ingot.
Thus, it went on until nightfall. Ling Tian finally produced his work for the day: a dagger with a very crude appearance.
When Ling Tian emerged from the spiritual realm, Wang Bingxia was startled. Ling Tian looked utterly exhausted, as if he hadn't slept for days.
"What's wrong?" Wang Bingxia asked worriedly.
"Nothing, just overexerted myself practicing."
Ling Tian ate a large meal and immediately fell asleep, not waking until morning.
Upon waking, Ling Tian was surprised to find that both his fire-attribute inner energy and his spiritual power had grown significantly.
Ling Tian was pleased. It seemed that forging was an excellent way to practice cultivation.
Using true qi to power the furnace rapidly consumed his internal qi. When his true qi was depleted, practicing again yielded twice the results with half the effort.
Controlling the hammers and tongs with spiritual power was also a great exercise for his mind.
Do not underestimate the importance of spiritual power. The stronger one's spiritual power, the stronger their soul.
Furthermore, strong spiritual power allowed for more precise control when manipulating inner energy, and even when releasing techniques with inner energy.
This, in turn, increased the efficiency of inner energy usage and the power of techniques!
Thus, over the next few days, Ling Tian became deeply engrossed. He practically spent all his free time in the spiritual realm, forging various items.
He even downloaded many weapon schematics from the internet and used the knowledge gained from his inheritance to forge these weapons.
At first, the items he crafted were misshapen and could only be described as unsightly.
But as time passed and Ling Tian became more familiar with the techniques, the items he forged became increasingly well-formed.
His inner energy allowed him to operate the furnace for longer periods, and the temperature of the flames within the furnace also increased.
He could now even melt materials like meteoric iron, which were difficult to melt due to their impurities.
What pleased Ling Tian even more was the progress in his spiritual power. Ling Tian could feel how powerful his spiritual power had become. He could multitask and even keenly sense every gust of wind and every grain of sand around him.
If anyone tried to attack Ling Tian's mind directly with spiritual power at this point, they would be met with a solid wall and be utterly incapacitated!
Ling Tian spent nearly a month solely on forging, and his inner energy and spiritual power saw tremendous improvement.
By this time, Ling Tian's forging skills had also become quite proficient. He decided to personally craft a few weapons for himself.
Ling Tian was always a decisive person, acting immediately on his thoughts!
In the small warehouse next to the blacksmith's shop were various materials, accumulated by Ling Tian's ancestors over many years.
Ling Tian first selected a material called volcanic rock iron.
Volcanic environments were characterized by high temperatures and pressures, akin to hell. Even the hardest metals would only melt in a volcano.
Iron elements and other precious elements in the Earth's crust, under the high temperature and pressure of volcanoes, would undergo melting, cooling, remelting, and recooling repeatedly over thousands of years.
In such extreme conditions, impurities were burned away completely, leaving behind iron elements and some very rare metallic elements.
These things could truly be called "tempered a thousand times" in volcanoes!
Ling Tian's ancestors extracted the essence from the core of volcanoes using secret methods. After cooling, it became volcanic rock iron.
This material was not only exceptionally strong but, more importantly, weapons forged from it could release immense flame power when infused with inner energy.
Weapons made from this material were also capable of continuously amplifying the power of fire-attribute true essence.
There were very few weapons made from this material for two reasons: firstly, the environment where volcanic rock iron was found was extremely harsh, and one could not obtain it without exceptional skill.
Secondly, the molten volcanic rock iron had an extremely high melting point, exceeding 4000°C.
In ancient times, without high-temperature electric furnaces, it was impossible to melt this material.
Now, Ling Tian could use the furnace in the spiritual realm to completely melt these materials!
Ling Tian carefully selected the material, placed it into the furnace, and placed his hands on the furnace handles, beginning to inject fire-attribute true essence into it.
The temperature inside the furnace began to rise. After more than ten minutes, the volcanic rock iron actually began to melt!