Damn it, I'm in the garbage book I wrote

Chapter 794 The Oppressive Force of the Steel Behemoth
There are rumors circulating outside that a monster has appeared in Fuliang. It has a black body, is covered in steel armor, and makes eerie noises. The white smoke rising from its head is like the legendary Zhulong, which sees day as day, closes its eyes as night, blows as winter, and breathes as summer. However, its power is bound by the dragon-binding rope under its feet, so it can only let out unwilling and painful roars, but it is still driven forward by people.

A rumor spread and became increasingly outlandish, even reaching Hongdu Prefecture, where it was now said that a fire dragon had been captured in Fuliang and was being tamed like a horse. This attracted countless people to travel long distances to witness the dragon's majesty.

"Gentlemen, are you also here to see the fire dragon?"

In front of teahouses in the small villages along the way, young shopkeepers smiled and asked the weary travelers who had come to rest that there had been so many people like them these past few days. They had come here despite the hardships of traveling, mostly just to catch a glimpse of the fire dragon.

"Indeed, I wonder if it's as shocking as the rumors say."

The guest stroked his long beard, appearing somewhat like a hermit.

This man was a recluse living near Yuelu Mountain. For many years, he had been writing travelogues in search of immortals and Taoist masters. He had a deep longing for the traces of a true dragon. Now that he heard there was a true dragon here, and since he happened to be in Hongdu, he decided to come and take a look.

"Shocking, of course it's shocking. Just you wait and see, the fire dragon passes by this place twice a day, at dawn and dusk. Look at all those people waiting here."

Looking up, one could see that the area outside the railway safety line was crowded with people, all eagerly waiting for the fire dragon in their hearts. If it weren't for the soldiers standing guard around the dragon rope along the way, some people would probably have already gone up to touch the dragon rope to see what it was made of.

One hour, two hours, and finally, after three hours, it was time for the fire dragon to return. As the waiter at the teahouse shouted, the earth actually trembled.

Those who came to see him flocked forward, but unfortunately, the soldiers held up their spears and kept them outside the cordon.

At this moment, the fire dragon arrived, with sparks and thick smoke billowing from the chimney, accompanied by howling winds and the might of dragon roars and tiger cries.

It came, just as everyone described, it came in such a magnificent and spectacular way. If it were the dog that was dressed up and called a Qilin by those swindlers in the past, or the dragon disguised as a tree branch and straw, then this wise man from the foot of Yuelu Mountain would have laughed loudly. Although he might not have said anything, he would have returned to the mountains and never come out again.

But it is not; it is a fire dragon. Its armor weighs more than ten million pounds. Its breath carries the scent of sulfur. Its vigorous and roaring power is unstoppable. The clouds that the dragon travels through are the white miasma it spews. Its face is both ferocious and majestic. It also possesses immense strength.

It's a dragon! It really is a dragon!

The old man stared blankly as the fire dragon rode away, then involuntarily knelt down beside it, his hair disheveled and his face contorted with madness as he laughed wildly to the sky: "A real dragon, a real dragon!"

The soldier next to him glanced at him at a 45-degree angle from below, muttered "idiot" to himself, and then continued to maintain order among the restless crowd.

The hermit cried until his eyes were red and his voice was hoarse before he silently got up and stumbled along the railway tracks.

He was going to explore the lair of the fire dragon, and he was willing to be eaten by the dragon.

But after walking for a full hour, he still couldn't find the lair. Instead, he saw a group of spirited young men, arm in arm, chatting and laughing. They had coal stains, soot marks, and bandages on their bodies, but no dragon scales or dragon blood.

The hermit hurriedly stepped forward, gesturing wildly as he asked, "May I ask you young friends, have you seen the Fire Dragon True Lord?"

The teenagers were clearly stunned for a moment, unable to figure out what the "Fire Dragon True Lord" the old man was talking about was.

So the old man quickly gestured and said, "It's that fire dragon. Its head is over ten feet tall and its body is over twenty feet long. It moves like the wind and lightning, swallowing clouds and spitting out mist. Its power is unstoppable."

"Huh? You're not talking about..." A student from Changsha County clearly heard the old man's accent: "You're not talking about a train, are you?"

The old man was also confused: "What do you mean... a train?"

Now things were really complicated. The group of teenagers surrounded the old man, offering their explanations all at once, but their descriptions sounded like gibberish to the old man. What did they mean by traveling a thousand miles a day without eating or drinking, or carrying a heavy load without blood or flesh...?

"Old man, have you ever read Journey to the West?"

"I've seen it, I've seen it."

"The Ruyi Jingu Bang (Monkey King's magic cudgel) inside weighs 36,000 jin."

"That's extremely high, that's the number of the Heavenly Palace, beyond human reach."

Upon hearing this, the surrounding children burst into laughter, and one of them proudly declared, "Our train can carry a hundred golden cudgels in one trip!"

"Absolutely impossible!"

"The fire dragon you mentioned is the train we built, so how can it not be possible?"

Hearing their words, the old man looked around and, though reluctant, finally spoke up, "Then could you show this old man around?"

"That won't do. This place is a restricted area. We need Lord Xia's permission to go in, but he's been taken back to the hospital. We dare not make a decision on our own."

"Young men, could you... please pass on my message?" With that, the old man took out several silver ingots and spread them out in his hand: "This is your reward."

They looked at each other, and then the boldest one took the money and said, "You wait here while I go and ask around."

He rushed off to find Xia Lin, who was now under even stricter surveillance because of his previous escape. Dong Niang had even moved into his hospital room to keep an eye on him.

"Dongniang, Dongniang, you'll be thirty next year. People who are thirty are almost grandmothers, why are you still like a little girl?"

But Dongniang clearly wasn't buying it. She sat there reading a book while performing her supervisory duties, without even saying a word.

Xia Lin sighed, squatted down beside him, and began to play with a longhorn beetle that had fallen from a tree but hadn't yet hollowed out the wood. First, he broke off the beetle's wings, then placed it in front of the ant nest to watch this earth-shattering battle.

Just then, one of his researchers ran up to the base of the wall and, upon seeing Xia Lin, shouted loudly, "Headmaster, Headmaster!"

Upon hearing the call, Xia Lin jumped three feet high: "Something happened?"

"No," the student said breathlessly. "There was an old man who claimed to be a wandering cultivator from the foot of Yuelu Mountain. He mistook our train for a fire dragon and insisted on going to the fire dragon's lair. We couldn't explain it to him no matter what we said."

"Then let them go in and touch it. Why are you asking me about this?"

Xia Lin's words left the student speechless: "Headmaster, the test site is a restricted area. How can we let just anyone in?" "It doesn't matter. I set up a restricted area to prevent villagers from stealing iron." Xia Lin waved his hand: "Even if you put our train on the side of the road, those spies and traitors won't be able to figure it out. What's there to be afraid of?"

Perhaps it was the vividness of the line about fearing the villagers would steal iron, that even Dongniang couldn't help but laugh out loud, and the student paused for a moment: "Oh, it's not about fearing leaks..."

"What are you leaking? I gave them the blueprints, what can they do besides wipe their butts? Even if they understand them, do they have a water forging machine? If they have a water forging machine, do they have a coke oven? If they have a coke oven, do they have high-temperature oxygen blowing? They have nothing. Are they planning to file this lump of iron out with a crowbar? Or are they going to have a few civil officials discuss it for a few days and then a locomotive will suddenly appear out of nowhere?"

Upon hearing this, the student slapped his thigh... This restricted area was precisely to prevent villagers from stealing iron.

The student ran back, but the old man was still sitting in that spot, peering into the restricted area. However, all the researchers had gone home by now, leaving only the soldiers guarding the area. It was pitch black inside, and nothing could be seen.

However, the student quickly returned. He didn't say much, just nodded to the old man, and then handed Xia Lin's token to the soldier guarding the restricted area: "The headmaster asked me to bring this old gentleman in for a visit."

After inspecting the tokens, they arrived at the testing grounds.

Or perhaps it's the Fire Dragon Cave the old man was talking about...

It wasn't as mysterious as I'd imagined. There was a row of simple houses used to store parts and tools, and an open coal pile simply covered with some thatch to prevent it from getting wet. Then there were a few simple small brick houses, which served as their rest area and holiday duty room. It didn't look like a fancy place at all, a far cry from the magnificent, dragon-palace-like Fire Dragon Cave I'd envisioned.

Moreover, the whole place is pitch black, and you can't see anything at all.

"Please wait a moment, sir."

The researcher walked to a nearby pillar, pulled the switch, and instantly the entire area became as bright as day. The old man was so startled that he fell to the ground.

"What...what kind of magic is this?"

"The Lightning Goddess from the Thunder God and Lightning Goddess, we've captured her and whip her every day to make her light our way."

The students chosen by Xia Lin to come here are basically pure-blooded materialist warriors. As for the thunder god and lightning goddess, these are just the "electricity" generated by the large windmills and waterwheels next to them, which drive the blades to rotate and drive gears of different sizes to cut magnetic field lines. Then, a converter and voltage regulator are added to generate electricity. The electricity then produces light and heat through high-resistivity materials, which is the electric light. As long as a low-oxygen environment can be maintained, it can burn for a very long time. Any glass bottle can be vacuumed using the fire method.

A simple dandy... and all this talk of thunder gods and lightning goddesses. It's just that this guy still has the heart of a young man and is teasing the old man.

"Don't be offended, don't be offended, children speak without thinking." The old man clasped his hands together and bowed fourteen times, but the bright light before him made him uneasy...

"This way."

The boy's voice rang out from not far away, and the old man hurried forward. Just as he turned a corner, he suddenly found himself face to face with the "fire dragon".

The old man looked up at the imposing monster, so nervous that he forgot to breathe. He took several steps back before bowing and saying, "Fire Dragon True Lord, this humble Taoist Anshi greets you. I have only disturbed you to see your divine countenance. Please forgive me."

"Ha ha ha ha……"

The young man standing nearby couldn't help but laugh at his appearance, which clearly displeased the old Taoist: "Please, young friend, do not disturb True Lord Fire Dragon."

"What true ruler or false ruler?"

The boy stepped forward and climbed straight into the train's driver's cab: "Old man, come on up. The headmaster asked me to show you around and dispel your superstitions."

At first, the old man was hesitant, but he couldn't resist his strong curiosity and eventually followed the boy into the heart of his "True Lord".

"This is a push-pull lever. Pushing the lever forward increases the speed, which will increase the vehicle's speed. Pulling the lever all the way back activates the idle speed. We usually use first gear when hauling heavy loads."

"This is a steam whistle."

After he finished speaking, he pulled the rope, but the steam inside had already been released, so the whistle did not sound.

"See that? That's not a fire dragon, it's a train!"

At first, the old Taoist priest muttered to himself, but the young man had one good point: he liked to teach others, and he insisted on explaining it to the old man clearly.

From the initial planning of the train project to the laying of the tracks, and then to how to piece it together piece by piece, even their most capable headmaster, who almost died on this project, was told to the old man.

Actually, it's not just about showing off anymore. It's because I'm really unwilling to let the efforts of myself, my classmates, and teachers be attributed to some god or miracle with just a few words. That's unfair, an insult to their wisdom, and a disrespect for the pain they endured while overcoming difficulties.

Although the old man couldn't immediately understand how a group of frail people could create such a colossal, almost miraculous creature, he was still incredibly excited and even wrote a poem on the spot for this "fire dragon":

"The Crimson Emperor roams the heavens, riding the spirit of fire, the jade of Mangshan shattered to forge a brilliant light. First, the wrath of the Thunder God is heard from the earth, then the Lightning Goddess is seen hiding in the clouds. His hundred-foot-tall black body swallows the northern wind, his golden pupils shoot towards Fusang. The sons and daughters of Jinling flee in terror, while the youths of Luoyang vie to raise their cups. He spews forth straight smoke that splits the azure sky, and sprays a shower of stars that falls upon the vast wilderness. Qin Shi Huang's crossbows pierce stone in vain, and Emperor Wu of Han's warships fail to cross the ocean. The Queen Mother of Kunlun halts her chariot, and Magu of the East Sea miscalculates. Lu Ban's axe and chisel should be ashamed to be seen, and Zhang Heng's seismograph is difficult to measure. It is said that Zhurong whips the nine regions, or that Zhulong awakens the four directions. In a moment, a thousand mountains appear small, and in an instant, the Five Sacred Mountains can be swallowed. The Holy Emperor sends envoys to inquire of alchemists, and old men in the countryside burn incense and pray to Heaven. Little do they know that the mechanism of creation is ingenious, and that there is another way of creation in the human world!"

Xia Lin eventually got his hands on the poem. He felt it was rather ordinary, but it was quite fitting, and it was a good starting point for breaking superstition.

So the next day, he personally received the old Taoist priest from Hunan.

The old Taoist priest claimed to be a seeker of immortality, and had written countless travelogues over the years, but this place was the only one that overturned his entire life's experiences.

The two sat in the courtyard and chatted for a long time. Finally, Xia Lin lit a cigarette and said, "Actually, it's not that being superstitious is bad, but it's just too easy to deceive people. If it's used by someone with ulterior motives, it might not be as simple as just losing your family and your life."

"I understand what you mean, sir, but what can the common people do? We've been living in chaos for years, alas..."

"That's not quite right. I wonder if this old gentleman has ever heard of these two terms."

"Please enlighten me, sir."

Xia Lin cleared his throat: "Idealism and materialism."

(End of this chapter)