Chapter 28: Pottery firing without building an earthen kiln


    The next day, Senior Brother did not lead the group for hunting after the meal as usual. Instead, he followed Han Cheng, the seven or eight children, and Lame towards the small river. Apanying them were Shaman, as well as other people from the tribe who were curious about what magical items Divine Child had created.


    After a night, these y embryos had dried considerably. The surface water had evaporated, and with a gentle touch, one could feel that these y embryos were much harder than the previous day.


    Shaman, looking at this area, revealed a thoughtful expression. If these things were sturdy enough, they could hold many items. As Divine Child mentioned, they were far better than stone bowls or basins.


    However, the key was that these things were made of y. How could they possibly be sturdy?


    The shaman was puzzled. Even with the knowledge passed down through generations of shamans, he couldn''t understand how Divine Child can make these y items solid.


    Shaman is intelligent. He knew the Divine Child also knows mud is not sturdy. Since Divine Child knew this and still continued to do it, he must have a way to make them solid.


    "Use fire, burn them," Han Cheng said in Mandarin.


    However, Shaman and Senior Brother were even more confused after hearing this method. In their understanding, fire could burn and destroy many things. Shouldn''t burning these mud items turn them into ash?


    Communication became difficult at this point because exining these concepts was too cumbersome.


    Han Cheng could only resort to his usual method, attributing everything to the will of the gods, and he wouldn''t provide much exnation. He would demonstrate the final results, saving a lot of unnecessary words.


    Senior Brother, who had be even more confused after this visit, took the bewildered group to hunt, while Han Cheng continued to make y embryos with the children inside the cave.


    Shaman stayed and observed Han Cheng and the tribe''s youngsters ying with y. After understanding the process to some extent, the shaman also joined the fun.


    On the third day, the y embryos made on the first day had dried halfway. Looking at the over fifty y embryosid out on the ground, Han Cheng temporarily stopped making more. Instead, he led the people to collect dry grass, fallen leaves, and small twigs.


    As it was spring, and these people did not have the habit of setting fire on the slopes, there was a thickyer of dry grass on the ground.


    After hearing that their handmade items could be made sturdy through burning, these youngsters were eager to participate in the process. They worked energetically, and soon, arge pile of dry grass and small wood was collected in the vicinity.


    By the afternoon of the fourth day, the first batch of y embryos had dried almostpletely. Due to weather conditions, the rest were intact apart from three that were cracked and discarded. Han Cheng breathed a sigh of relief, considering it a good start.


    Han Cheng threw away the three damaged ones and then marked out an area of about two square meters. He had the people dig about thirty centimeters deep, and then he covered it with ayer of dry grass.


    With the help of Senior Brother and others who came to see what was happening, the y embryos made on the first day were carefully ced on top of the dry grass, neatly arranged with about five centimeters of space between each one.


    Following Han Cheng''s demonstration, everyone filled the gaps between the y embryos with the dry grass and twigs collected the previous day, pressing them down by hand topact them. Then, they further crushed the dry grass, mainly using sturdy stalks, to cover the y embryos. Eachyer was about ten centimeters high. They pressed it down with their hands and continuedyering until the height exceeded one meter, covering therge jar made by Hei Wa. They stopped there.


    At this point, all the pottery was covered with crushed dry grass,pletely concealing them.


    When everyone, including Shaman, thought they could start the fire, Han Cheng gave an unexpectedmand.


    Instead of lighting the fire, Han Cheng instructed them to fetch water from the river and wet the loose soil that had been dug up, mixing it with the y. Unlike the rtively hard y used to make the y embryos, ording to Han Cheng''s request, this y mixture was softerreferred to as slurry.


    Yes, Hei Wa and the others were now ying with slurry.


    Under the gaze of the onlookers, Han Cheng scooped up the slurry and pasted it onto the pile of dry grass, covering it from top to bottom. All the grass had to bepletely sealed wherever he went, and the grass should not be visible from the outside.


    After a few days of ying with y, Hei Wa and the others had be familiar with it. Following Han Cheng''s demonstration and orders, they began imitating him, applying slurry to the pile of dry grass from different angles.


    Han Cheng did it for the bottom of the grass pile instead of letting Hei Wa and the others do it. He left four square openings, about twenty centimeters on different sides, without sealing them with slurry.


    "Bring the fire over," Han Cheng ordered, and without him specifying, Sandy, who had been watching, quickly ran to the cave.


    Although Sandy didn''t understand why Divine Child was doing this, he could still sense the difference in the orderly process.


    The fire arrived.


    Han Cheng took the burning logs from Sandy and ced them near the four openings he had left. He lit them one by one. Since they had used specially crushed dry grass and leaves for filling and they had pressed it down firmly, these fires did not burn quickly. They didn''t even produce a strong me.


    Especially after ensuring that the fires wouldn''t go out, Han Cheng used slurry to seal the four ignition points separately, leaving a hole with a diameter of less than half a centimeter for each to allow venttion. As a result, the mes inside burned even more slowly.


    Relieved, Han Cheng turned to Shaman, Senior Brother, and the others, stating that it would take three days to see the results.


    This made the impatient crowd a bit anxious.


    However, there was nothing they could do. After staying there for a while and realizing they couldn''t see the results in the short term, Senior Brother, eager to know the oue, took the hunting team out for a hunt.


    As the spring ice melted, catching fish was not as easy as in winter. Hunting wild animals became the primary source of food.


    Shaman stayed behind with Han Cheng and the others.


    After ying around for a while, at Han Cheng''s call, the group of primitive youngsters started making y embryos again.


    However, unlike the previous days when they were focused, today they seemed a bit distracted. They asionally nced at the pile of y-covered firewood, hoping for something magical to happen. They and even Han Cheng looked at it asionally, sometimes crawling on the ground to check if the fire inside had gone out.


    After all, this was Han Cheng''s first time making pottery. He had only watched a video once. Even in his mind, whether it would seed on the first attempt was uncertain.