Deposed? I couldn't be happier! I wouldn't even be a dog to the crown prince.

The carriage bumped along the way, leaving Chang'an City and heading straight for a secluded valley at the foot of Zhongnan Mountain.

This place was originally the royal summer retreat, but it has been abandoned for many years and is now designated as a forbidden area for the Eastern Palace.

Before even entering the valley, a scorching heat wave, mixed with the pungent smell of burning coal, forced its way into the carriage on the wind.

"Cough cough cough!"

Li Shimin coughed from the choking, lifted the carriage curtain, and looked disgusted.

"Chengqian, why did you bring me to this godforsaken place? This smell... is even stronger than the Turks' sheepfold!"

Minister of Works Duan Lun rode alongside the carriage, his face also contorted in distress. He pinched his nose and spoke in a muffled voice:

"Your Majesty, I know this place; it used to be a charcoal kiln. Does Your Highness intend to take us to see charcoal production?"

"Charcoal burning?"

Li Chengqian leaned back on the cushion, peeling a peanut he had somehow produced, and chuckled.

"Minister Duan, your imagination only goes as far as charcoal making. No wonder the knives made by those people in the Ministry of Works are so bad they can't even cut vegetables."

Duan Lun blushed, wanting to refute but not daring to. After all, the Crown Prince had just broken that battle sword with his bare hands in the Ganlu Hall. Facts speak louder than words, and being inferior in skill, he could only endure it.

"arrive."

Li Chengqian threw the peanut shells out the window and jumped off the carriage first.

Li Shimin followed closely behind, and as soon as he landed, he was stunned.

In the once tranquil valley, three enormous black buildings, each three stories high, now stood towering. They resembled monsters constructed from countless firebricks, rising amidst billowing smoke and dust, their tops spewing thick columns of black smoke as if connected to the molten lava beneath the earth.

The enormous waterwheel rumbled and turned in the river beside it, driving thick drive shafts and producing a sickening metallic scraping sound.

"What...what is this?"

Li Shimin looked up at the three dark, massive figures, feeling the sweltering heat emanating from them. His mouth went dry, and a strange sense of oppression arose within him.

"This is a stove."

Li Chengqian stood with his hands in his pockets in the wind, his clothes fluttering in the hot air.

"A furnace? For alchemy?" Li Shimin asked instinctively.

"For iron smelting."

Li Chengqian corrected him, then curled his lip in disdain, "To be precise, it's steelmaking."

When iron smelting was mentioned, Li Shimin's face immediately darkened.

This was precisely his deepest concern.

"Chengqian, you are unaware of something."

Li Shimin sighed and pointed to the huge furnace, saying, "Don't bother anymore. Smelting iron is harder than ascending to heaven. Although our Tang Dynasty also produces iron, it has too many impurities and is too brittle."

"To obtain a good knife, one needs a skilled craftsman to repeatedly forge pig iron hundreds of times to remove impurities, thus transforming it into steel. This is called 'hundred-refinement steel'."

"A single hundred-refined steel sword costs tens of strings of cash and takes several months to make. Even my Xuanjia Army cannot provide one for every soldier."

At this point, a hint of hatred flashed in Li Shimin's eyes.

"Those powerful clans have figured this out! The fine iron they hoard is the result of years of accumulation and countless forging processes! Once it's transported to the Turks, it will amount to tens of thousands of sharp scimitars!"

"When that time comes, and the swords fall on our Tang soldiers, it will be a river of blood!"

Duan Lun, listening from the side, nodded repeatedly and echoed:

"Your Majesty is wise! The art of smelting lies in controlling the heat and the skill; it cannot be rushed. Although Your Highness's furnace is large, without skilled craftsmen forging it day and night, what will be produced is nothing more than a pile of lumps of pig iron, too brittle even to make farm tools, let alone suitable for fighting on the battlefield."

Li Chengqian almost burst out laughing while listening to the two "know-it-alls" explain the science.

He looked at Duan Lun as if he were a caveman.

"Refined steel? Forged?"

"Minister Duan, is your mind still stuck in the Stone Age?"

Li Chengqian walked to the huge blast furnace and patted the scorching hot brick wall.

"If I told you that my furnace doesn't need hammers or pounders, and all you have to do is throw in ore, and molten steel will come out, would you believe me?"

"impossible!"

Duan Lun stiffened, his pride as a technocrat instantly making him explode. "This goes against the laws of our ancestors! Iron has never been smelted like this since ancient times! Without forging, how can you remove the carbon? How can you turn it into steel? This is just a pile of scrap iron!"

"Scrap metal?"

Li Chengqian sneered, his eyes suddenly turning sharp.

"Those 30,000 catties of so-called refined iron that the aristocratic families transported out—in my eyes, that's scrap iron! That's garbage! That's leftovers from the industrial age!"

"Since you bunch of bumpkins have never seen the world, then I'll teach you a lesson today."

He turned around, pointed at the three blast furnaces, and his voice was filled with arrogance.

"Those methods of frying steel and pouring steel are all outdated."

"Faced with true industrialization, your proud 'forging steel through countless trials' is as inefficient as trying to sharpen an iron bar with a needle!"

"Mo Ju!"

Li Chengqian shouted loudly.

Mo Ju, the successor of the Mo family, who had been waiting at the top of the blast furnace, was shirtless and covered in soot. Hearing the summons, he trembled with excitement.

He leaned halfway out, waving a red command flag in his hand, and roared in response:

"exist!"

"Open the furnace!"

Li Chengqian waved his hand with such elegance that it was as if he were commanding a vast army.

"Let Father and the officials of the Ministry of Works see what a... steel torrent really looks like!"

"promise--!"

Mo Ju suddenly waved the command flag down.

"Boom—!!!"

With a heart-stopping roar, the massive connecting rods attached to the waterwheel began to spin wildly.

That was the sound of the giant bellows being pulled.

Each pull is like a giant beast breathing, forcibly pressing a massive amount of air into the bottom of the blast furnace.

Inside the already scorching furnace, the temperature instantly soared to a terrifying level.

Flames burst forth from every crevice of the blast furnace, illuminating the entire valley as if it were daytime.

The heatwave swept over them like a tidal wave, forcing Li Shimin and Duan Lun to retreat repeatedly, their sweat evaporating instantly.

"Is...is the oven going to explode?!"

Duan Lun was terrified, his legs went weak, and he clung tightly to Li Shimin's sleeve. "Your Majesty, let's go! It's too dangerous! The fire is too big; it's completely out of control!"

Li Shimin was also terrified, but seeing Li Chengqian's calm and even somewhat excited demeanor, he stopped in his tracks.

"What's the panic! Keep watching!"

He gritted his teeth, staring intently at the colossal tower that seemed to be on fire.

Just then.

The taphole at the bottom of the blast furnace was violently pried open with a long pole.

"Splash—!!!"

A crimson, viscous liquid, radiating destructive heat, roared out of the furnace mouth like an angry fire dragon!

That's not water.

That's molten iron!

It is magma powerful enough to melt gold, corrode bones, and burn everything!

Duan Lun's eyes widened, his eyeballs almost falling out of their sockets into the molten iron.

"It...it's dissolved?"

"The stone... really turned into water?!"