Studying at Western University starts with a knife-forging competition

As the morning light streamed in through the workshop's high windows, Lin Yuan was already seated in front of the belt sander.

The sword blank had been resting under the fine linen cloth all night, and now the golden sheen on its surface was more subdued than when it was first rough-polished.

He removed the cloth cover, turned the sword over, and checked the uniformity of the blade under the combined illumination of sunlight and lamplight.

The silky sheen after 2,000-grit polishing is delicate and consistent, without any skipped marks or color spots left by localized overheating.

The first thing to do today is fine grinding.

He replaced the belt sander with a new 2,000-grit belt, adjusted the tension of the track wheel, and used a ruler to confirm the angle between the grinding platform and the belt.

The sword blade is long and slender, and after each side is sharpened, it needs to be flipped over, repositioned, and the angle readjusted.

His movements were slow, but there were no pauses or rework—the day he practiced with the sword blank, he had already etched the entire curve of the blade line into his muscle memory, and today he was just going through it again with a finer grit.

After using a 2,000-grit belt, he switched to a 3,000-grit belt.

This grinding process involves almost no cutting, and the sound of the abrasive belt brushing across the cutting edge is very soft, like a fine velvet cloth rubbing against a metal surface.

The golden light, polished with three thousand grit, became more restrained. It no longer flowed wildly with changes in the angle of light, but instead floated steadily on a very shallow position below the blade, like a layer of light sealed under the surface of ice.

He took out a rectangular piece of vegetable-tanned leather from the tool cabinet—this was the tool Professor Robert usually used to deburr the edges of blades. The leather had been soaked in fine abrasive paste, and its color had changed from light brown to dark brown.

He laid the leather board flat on the worktable, dripped two drops of polishing oil, and spread it evenly with his fingertips.

He then tilted the sword to an angle almost parallel to the leather surface, gently pressed the blade against the leather, and dragged it in one direction.

The step of slicing the blade was called "slipping the blade" by his father back in Longquan.

After quenching and sharpening, a layer of micro-burrs invisible to the naked eye will remain on the surface of the blade. The high temperature of the belt sander may also cause slight stress deformation of the metal on the outermost layer.

The fiber structure of leather is softer than the finest abrasive belt, which can remove burrs one by one, while forming an extremely thin work-hardened layer on the surface of the blade.

This hardened layer does not change the overall hardness, but it can significantly improve the edge retention during initial use.

He swung the blade on one side, then flipped it over and swung the other side.

After swinging it back and forth a dozen times, he wiped the remaining polishing oil off the blade with a cotton cloth and checked the blade line against the light—the blade edge showed a continuous, non-radiating reflective line after the leather was polished, which was a sign that the micro-burrs had been cleaned.

He hovered his thumb very close to the blade to feel it.

You don't need to actually touch the blade; the skin's sensitivity to the sharp edge is enough to judge the condition of the blade.

Then he put the sword back on the workbench and began making the scabbard.

The stingray skin he bought from the system store had tightly packed scales and uniformly sized grains, making it better than any batch he had seen in Longquan.

He selected a piece of fabric whose grain pattern most closely resembled the hilt cover, and cut out two main pieces of fabric for the scabbard according to the length and width of the blade, leaving a half-inch seam allowance on each edge.

An extra section was left at the scabbard opening to cover the edge of the scabbard opening and prevent the blade from cutting the seam when drawing the sword.

The lining is made of thin goatskin, which is soft and dense and will not leave scratches on the surface of the blade.

After cutting the lining, he stacked it together with the main fish skin material, applied a thin layer of leather glue along the edges, aligned and pressed it tightly, and then used a bone knife to gently press a few lines in the indentations between the scales to make the glue between the lining and the fish skin more even.

The stitching was done using a double-needle hand-stitching method. Two needles, threaded with the same waxed linen thread, crossed each other through a hole on one side of the sheath, creating a diagonal stitch on each side of the leather surface. The advantage of this stitching method is that even if a stitch wears out and breaks during use, the entire stitch will not come loose.

The stitches are evenly arranged along the curve of the sheath, with a consistent stitch spacing, and each stitch is pulled taut with the same force as the previous stitch.

After sewing it up, he moistened the scabbard with warm water and pressed it into a shape that fits the blade with his fingers. He had seen his father do this wet pressing and shaping technique countless times when he was a child—after the scabbard was finished, he would repeatedly try to pull it out of the blade. If the scabbard opening was too tight, he would use a soldering iron to heat it slightly and open it up. If it was too loose, he would press another line.

He's doing the same thing now: inserting the sword into its sheath, pulling it out, checking the fit on the inside of the sheath, adjusting it, and then inserting it again.

The inner wall of the sheath was finally lined with a small ring of goatskin as a buffer layer.

When drawing the sword, the blade will not directly scrape against the stingray scales on the edge of the scabbard, thus preventing the scales from being worn down by the blade after long-term use.

This is the idea he learned from Professor Robert—if the hardness difference between the contact surfaces of materials is too large, the softer side will wear out sooner or later.

Adding a transition layer with intermediate hardness between hard and soft materials can significantly extend the overall lifespan.

After the scabbard was finished, he sewed a loop on the back of the scabbard, made of the same stingray skin, with the loop opening just wide enough to pass through a standard-width belt.

He sheathed the sword and placed it beside the worktable.

Mark stood up from the corner. Today's filming had lasted for nearly four hours. The cameraman changed the memory card once, and the sound engineer quietly moved the microphone pole forward half a meter when the scabbard was halfway sewn, trying to capture more of the subtle friction sound of the leather cable passing through the hole.

Lin Yuan cleaned up the scraps of leather and loose threads on the worktable, rolled up the remaining stingray skin and put it back in his backpack, and put the tools away one by one.

Then he picked up the sword, scabbard in hand, and walked to the other end of the workshop—Professor Robert's office was at the end of the corridor, and he should have been there by now.

Robert sat behind his desk, an open journal in front of him, and a steaming coffee cup beside him.

He heard a knock on the door, looked up, took off his glasses, and placed them on the magazine.

"Is it finished?"

"It's done." Lin Yuan placed the sword horizontally on the desk, with the scabbard beside it.

Robert did not respond immediately. He turned the sword over, letting the golden light move slowly under the fluorescent light.

He ran his fingers over the thickness transition section by section, examined the gap between the sword guard and the sword root against the light for a long time, and gently scratched the blackened treatment of the counterweight ball with his fingernail to check the adhesion.

He then put the sword back on the table, took off his glasses, and slowly wiped the lenses with the hem of his shirt.

The silence lasted longer than Lin Yuan had anticipated.

"This is no ordinary piece." Robert put his glasses back on, his voice steady, but his pace much slower than usual. "This is a masterpiece, a work of art worthy of being passed down through generations. If it accumulates enough legend and the passage of time, it will leave its mark on the history of this industry."

His fingertips gently traced the brass letters embedded in the inscription, from A to E, touching each letter as if he were reading a book that only a blacksmith could fully understand.

"I've never seen this kind of material treatment before. The luster inside the blade isn't something that can be achieved with surface treatment; it's the natural sheen of the material itself, right?"

"The silver was added during the forging stage, hammered out together with the steel billet."

Robert did not ask for specific details about the process.

He simply put his glasses back on and glanced at the inscription on the sword again.

"Aequitas ex Pallore," he read the Latin words aloud, then looked up at Lin Yuan. "You chose this word after careful consideration."

Lin Yuan didn't answer. Some things don't need a response.

Robert sheathed the sword and handed it back to Lin Yuan along with the scabbard.

"I have nothing more to teach you." He said this in a very calm tone, not as a sigh, but as a statement of a conclusion he had reached after repeated verification: "It is my honor to have such an excellent student as you."

Lin Yuan took the sword and tightened his fingers on the stingray scales of the scabbard.

He wanted to say something, but Robert had already picked up the magazine again, flipped to the page he had just been looking at, and added without looking up, "Go. Come back with the championship; my wife is waiting to watch the show."

-----------------

Matt was already waiting for me downstairs at the dormitory before I left for Atlanta.

His car was parked in its usual spot, the engine still running, and the same classical rock album was playing on the stereo. Seeing Lin Yuan emerge from the building carrying the sword case, he turned off the stereo and opened the car door.

"Is everything settled?"

"All done." Lin Yuan placed the sword case on the back seat and fastened his seatbelt. The film crew's van was already waiting at the intersection. Mark leaned out of the window and gestured to him, meaning to stay close.

The airport terminal building gleamed with a grayish-white reflection in the afternoon sunlight.

Matt parked the car on the side of the road at the departure level, turned off the engine, but didn't unlock the door immediately. He leaned against the steering wheel and turned his head to look at Lin Yuan.

"I have something to tell you."

"explain."

"Whether you win the championship tomorrow or not," Matt's voice lacked its usual lazy, drawn-out tone, "you're already a champion in my heart."

Lin Yuan looked at him. Matt Wayne, a man who would text his roommate to ask which drawer he put his socks in, was looking so serious that it was unlike him.

"But you still have to win the championship," Matt added. "I'm waiting to ride the wave of popularity."

Lin Yuan smiled, opened the car door, and took out the sword box from the back seat.

The security checkpoint staff examined the sword in the sword case for a long time—according to regulations, weapons must be checked in. Lin Yuan had already completed the check-in procedures at the counter, and what he carried with him was the competition item certificate and check-in receipt issued by the program team.

The security inspector flipped through a few pages of documents, then looked down at the inscription on the sword, and finally stamped the receipt.

The flight landed in Atlanta in the evening.

At the airport arrival level, the same black driver who had come to pick him up last time was leaning against the van. When he saw Lin Yuan walking out carrying the sword box, he grinned.

"We meet again. This time you have an extra box compared to last time."

"The entries inside are from the final round."

"That's worth much more than a suitcase." The driver opened the trunk and carefully laid the sword case flat, placing two foam boards next to it to prevent it from shaking.

As the car drove out of the airport, the sky had already transitioned from blue-gray to deep blue. The Atlanta night view was the same as last time, with GG signs, streetlights, and the lights of the city's skyscrapers in the distance layered upon each other.

Lin Yuan leaned against the car window, the sword box lying securely in the trunk, the golden light sealed within the scabbard, separated from his hand only by a few layers of luggage compartments.

Tomorrow morning, the sword will be drawn from its sheath at the testing grounds to undergo the tests of slashing, cutting, and impact. But before that, it will have one last quiet night.

He leaned back in his seat, closed his eyes, and calmed his breathing. Outside the car window, the lights of Atlanta receded quietly into the night.