The old things I repaired have become fine

Chapter 264: Using ancient old paper to repair ancient old books, such a good method, am I not thinking about it?

"I...I don't know!"

"I can't read!"

"From childhood to adulthood, all I ate were paintings! Paintings! Why do you think I can read?"

The little creature, three centimeters long, less than one millimeter thick, covered with a layer of fine silvery-white scales, was shivering.

To his left, a giant head, at least ten thousand times larger than he was, looked down upon it, its shadow looming over it.

In the little guy's perception, what was more terrifying was not the size, but the strength. The power of the monster was like a mountain hanging beside him:
The gas was so strong that just a tiny wisp - as small as a hair - could crush it into a thin piece of paper, thinner than any paper it had ever eaten.

Looking to the right, there was another giant head, looking down at it with great interest.

That was a human, a human that the worm demon was quite familiar with. His sense of power was not that strong, but it was more condensed, and more ethereal and far-reaching.

It's not that dangerous, it doesn't have that menacing feeling, but it might be even scarier...

Shen Le looked down at the tiny termite monster, then looked up at the Alloy Boss - he really didn't know much about the habits of this non-mainstream monster.

The Alloy Boss frowned and snorted coldly:
"Who are you kidding! You can't read, how can you become a spirit? I know of no bookworm that doesn't read a lot of books. If you don't read a lot of books, you can't become a spirit!"

His anger and sense of oppression were released as he questioned, and even if it was not intentional, it made the termite monster flatten a little bit - it was really flattened a little bit visibly to the naked eye.

The little fellow shrank back in fear, and after trying to hold back, he finally burst into tears, causing the silver-white powder on his body to tremble and float away:
"That's a bookworm! That's a bookworm! You also said it was a bookworm! - I am a painting beetle, can't I? From childhood to adulthood, all I have eaten are paintings. Can't I become a spirit by eating paintings?

You are not a bookworm, why do you discriminate against us artworms!"

This little monster is actually making a scene... Shen Le resisted the urge to cover his head and groan, and asked calmly:

"So you've seen a few bookworms? Did they discriminate against you?"

"Uh……"

Shen Le rolled his eyes silently. The termite monster, or this kind of monster, lives in a book or a row of bookshelves, and eats for a lifetime.

It is hard to imagine that they have any need to migrate, communicate, find a spouse, hold meetings, etc. As for discrimination?
In a social structure that lacks communication, is there such a thing as discrimination?

The worm curled up a little more. The Alloy Boss sneered:
"So what are those words you ate? Where are they located? Tell me the truth!"

"I really don't know... I told you I really can't read! If you ask me what the missing parts of the painting look like, I can still explain a little bit..."

To prove that what it said was true, it began to crawl in a zigzag manner on the paper, shedding its scales as it crawled.

As it crawled, vague patterns did appear on the paper: willows, water waves, river banks, rocks, mountains in the distance, clouds in the sky...

Shen Le and the Alloy Boss looked at each other in bewilderment. Well, this borer monster really looked like it grew up eating paintings, so it seemed that we couldn't rely on it to restore the handwriting...

"It's okay. We have other ways." After sending the borer back to the waste paper box and letting it continue eating, Shen Le comforted the Alloy Boss:
"Continue to repair the painting. During the repair process, I will try to get some information related to the painting. After all, you know, I can recall some of its memories, such as... putting love before friendship?"

Alloy Boss rolled his eyes. But the information in the painting was more important. He didn't bother to argue with Shen Le, but instead reminded him earnestly:
"Then you must remember it well! You must remember it accurately! - This information may be related to how to move through the formation. If you remember it wrong, we will die if we make a wrong move!"

Hey, is it possible that I don't plan to explore an unknown formation with you...

Shen Le complained calmly in his heart. But he just asked curiously:

"Array?"

"Yes, the formation. You see, the first section must be arranged according to the directions of the sixty-four hexagrams, telling us where to go from and where to go from;"

Alloy Boss explained to Shen Le very confidently:
"The second part is based on the directions of the twenty-eight constellations. The third part, the third part..."

He frowned and snapped his fingers back and forth, looking like a poor student who had encountered a difficult problem and was completely unable to solve it:
"It seems to combine time sequence, direction, hexagram, constellations and so on... This is too difficult, especially since there is a missing part. I can't guess what the formation looks like..."

Shen Le stared at him for a while, then turned his head away silently. Formations and the like were too difficult for experienced monsters, and for him, that was not something he should consider at all.

Now, he should just work hard and try to repair it!

Shen Le tidied up his studio and took out all the painting silk he had prepared for restoration, as well as the operation records of artificial aging, for Teacher Zhang to check.

When Mr. Zhang came in the next day, he held the organized operation ideas, operation records, and reference papers, and talked freely: "According to the results of previous observations, the core of the ancient painting to be restored is double-warp, double-weft, double-silk. We have searched the market before, but have not found silk of the same type and similar age..."

This first sentence made Teacher Zhang's mouth twitch. When it comes to restoring ancient paintings, who doesn't know that it is best to use materials of the same type and similar age as the original?

Ancient books from the Song Dynasty are restored using ancient paper from the Song Dynasty, and ancient paintings from the Ming Dynasty are restored using ancient paper and silk from the Ming Dynasty. Don’t you want such a good thing?
It's impossible!
Unused paper from the Song Dynasty or Ming Dynasty is even rarer than ancient paintings and books!

It is already a great luxury to have blank papers in books and scrolls to use!
"So you really looked for it?"

"I really looked for it." Shen Le met his gaze and nodded seriously.

He asked Lao You to ask the monsters he knew, and also asked the practitioners from various schools through the Special Affairs Bureau.

Unfortunately, there are silks and even brocades from the Ming Dynasty, but there is no such thing as the "double warp, double weft, double silk"...

Teacher Zhang breathed a sigh of relief. Shen Le's failure to find the right materials actually made him feel "not bad, not bad":

Fortunately, this student's abilities have not completely deviated from the human category...

“…So, I bought new silk and used several treatments.”

Shen Le pulled out four trays and showed the teacher the different colors of silk according to the labels on them:

“The first method is to hydrolyze with 10%wt sodium hydroxide solution at room temperature for 10 minutes according to the results of “Artificial Aging of Silk Fabrics – Research on Cleaning and Reinforcement”;

The second method, also in accordance with the results of this paper, uses ultraviolet light to accelerate aging, with an amplitude of 1.20 W·m, a wavelength of @340 nm, and a temperature of 60°C;

The third method is based on the results of the study on artificial aging and reinforcement of silk paintings colored with mineral pigments..."

He took out two printed papers and put them aside for Teacher Zhang to check. The teacher waved his hand calmly:
"No need. I have read both papers. Although one is about materials engineering and the other is about textile engineering, and we don't need to review them, they are related to our majors after all, so we still have to read them!"

Alas, cultural relics restoration is becoming increasingly difficult nowadays, and more and more people are crossing professional boundaries to do this.

Take the recent influential papers for example, they are either in the field of materials science, engineering, information, algorithms, etc.

On the contrary, it is not easy for them to publish a paper on how to repair the problem, and they are often criticized for their poor quality of the paper.

Like Shen Le, who is financially free, he can do whatever he wants, repair whatever he wants, and not publish papers if he doesn’t want to... How great!

Something that even he can't do!
Shen Le failed to hand in his paper and gave up. He put the paper aside and continued his report:

“…Use 2% gelatin and 0.5% alum to prepare gelatin-alum cooked silk, place it in an oven at 150°C and continue aging for 24 hours;

The fourth type is the same as the third type, except that the alum content is doubled from 0.5% to 1%.

Four pieces of silk, four aging treatment methods. Teacher Zhang carefully observed the color of these silks, and then stretched out his hand to gently twist them:
"Have you done the test?"

"We have already done the ink wetting performance test and the tensile strength test." Shen Le responded by handing over a stack of test data tables:
"We have done the infrared spectrometer test, but haven't found someone to calculate it yet. We have also done the color difference test, but the conclusion is a bit hard to understand. We haven't done the crystallinity test..."

This is the saying that different trades are like different mountains. Teacher Zhang carefully looked through the data table and stretched out his hand:

"Let me draw it and see!"

In the end, it all comes down to feeling. People who write papers and do research may rely more on the data fed back by instruments.

In particular, the authors of the two papers, one is a materials engineer and the other is a textile engineer, neither of whom has anything to do with calligraphy and painting restoration;

However, those who work in calligraphy and painting restoration trust their own eyes and hands, their own feelings and experience more.

Shen Le presented the brushes, inks and pigments, and Teacher Zhang tried the brushes one by one, applying ink and various pigments one by one, feeling the touch of the brush moving and the speed of ink and pigment penetration:

"The fourth method is the best. But you can also try to use the hydrolysis and light aging methods to treat the glue-alum silk again and see if you can see how it goes?"

Well, the teacher opens his mouth and the students run around. Shen Le worked diligently, took out the prepared and unaged silk, and started to work again:

In order to repair the painting, he originally wanted to buy ten times the amount of silk, but thinking it was not enough, he simply bought twenty times the amount.

Now it seems that it is fortunate that I bought a lot at that time. Otherwise, I would have to place an order for more silk halfway through the experiment, which would have been a big delay.
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(End of this chapter)