Alien Knights

The discovery of hyperparasites gave Todd a lot of new ideas.

If the "keel" parasite is compared to the mechanical skeleton of a combat mech, then the microbiological phenomenon of "hyperparasitism" allows Todd to install various combat modules on this "mechanical skeleton".

For example, the "hive" parasite can be loaded and applied as a communication module. The mother body of the "hive" can be buried in the "keel" of the commander; the offspring of the "hive" can be buried in the "keel" of the legionary soldiers. Since the human nervous system is connected to the neural network of the "keel" parasite, during the battle, the commander of the knight order will no longer rely on messengers, drums or banners to convey combat instructions, but will directly send the instructions in the brain to the "hive" mother in the "keel", and then send instructions to the offspring through the mother's sound wave vibration.

There are pros and cons to this "hive" parasite communication.

advantage:

1. The operation is less difficult and saves a lot of learning costs. Whether it is the way of war communication such as messengers, war drums or flags, commanders and soldiers need to learn and reserve a lot of knowledge. Moreover, due to wrong communication instructions on the battlefield, examples of fighter plane delays or even battle failures are not uncommon in history.

Second, ignore the influence of weather, light and other factors on communication. Fighting in rain, snow and night was basically a melee without any rules in the Middle Ages. Communication through the "hive" can effectively avoid the adverse effects of external factors.

shortcoming:

1. The communication distance is limited. The maximum contact distance of the "Honeycomb" sonic vibration is about 50 meters, beyond this distance, the message effect will gradually deteriorate.

Second, the death of the commander may cause chaos. Since the communication mechanism of the "hive" parasite is that one mother corresponds to multiple daughters, if the commander who owns the mother is unfortunately killed, others will not be able to replace his position for message transmission.

But in general, the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

Todd finished his research on parasites, and after disposing of the experimental materials, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

When he went outdoors, he let go of his thoughts and wanted to take a look around the town on a whim.

Usually, he chooses to stay in churches and laboratories. On the one hand, because the laboratory lacks assistants, he needs to do everything by himself; on the other hand, every time he goes outdoors, he will always be "watched and followed" by a group of people. As time passed, he didn't bother to go out anymore.

Since it was afternoon and there were fewer residents in the town, Todd followed the newly planned street next to the church, walked and watched, and gradually walked into the construction camp of the Knights' Headquarters.

Joe took a few monks and a group of craftsmen on the site, and began to measure distances and divide blocks before construction based on the drawings.

The arrival of Todd made a group of people put down their affairs and come to salute.

Todd didn't understand things like building construction, but after looking at the design drawings in Joe's hand, he noticed something.

With a sense of superiority as a traveler, Todd asked the monks: "I see that the materials on the drawings are mostly bricks and wood. Why not use cement?"

To his bewilderment, Joe actually replied, "That won't work."

Todd was a little surprised: "Do you know how to make cement?"

Joe gave him a strange look: "Of course I know, in the library of the monastery, there is the cement production technology of the ancient Tyro Empire."

(In the previous life, the ancient Roman Empire not only produced cement, but also produced concrete. The concrete lighthouses they made could even stand for two thousand years. It's a pity that Todd didn't know.)

Todd asked hurriedly, "Then why not use it?"

Joe handed over the drawings to the other monks, found a nearby piece of wood as a stool, and explained the reason to Todd in detail.

The reason why the cement manufacturing technology of the ancient Tailuo Empire is not available now is that there is a very important material in the cement materials of ancient Tailuo—volcanic ash, and it is a special kind of volcanic ash. Only by adding this material can the cement be hard and durable, and there is no such volcano near Muxi Town.

After explaining this, Joe mentioned that a few years ago, he had tried to replace the volcanic ash with slag from the blacksmith shop. However, the hardness and durability of the cement after this replacement material were not up to standard, making it unusable at all, so he gave up the idea.

After receiving this information, Todd left the construction camp of the Knights Headquarters, and began to think while walking on the road.

Now there are three kinds of cement in his mind.

The first is the cement commonly used in modern industry, commonly known as Portland cement (Portland cement), the main chemical composition is calcium silicate (calcium oxide and silicon oxide). When mixed with water, a complex physical and chemical reaction occurs, known as hydration. After the cement is mixed with water, it becomes a plastic cement slurry, and the cement slurry gradually thickens and loses its plasticity but does not yet have strength. This process is called coagulation. Then produce obvious strength and gradually develop into hard cement stone, this process is called hardening (harden).

The second type is the ancient Tyro cement from another world, which is very similar to the ancient Roman cement from the previous life, and its main components are quicklime and volcanic ash. Quicklime is calcium oxide, and volcanic ash is silicon oxide.

The third, homemade cement made by monks using slag instead of volcanic ash.

So, why can modern cement and ancient Roman cement be used in construction, but monks' cement cannot?

Todd thought for a while, and finally found the reason - temperature.

In the production of modern cement, small and medium-sized factories generally use furnace kilns, medium-sized cement factories generally use rotary kilns, and small cement factories generally use vertical kilns. The temperature in the kiln can generally reach about 1450 degrees Celsius. Such a high temperature can calcine cement raw materials into clinker.

As for ancient Roman cement, the volcano next to the city is a natural kiln. The temperature inside the crater can be as high as 1800 degrees Celsius. The volcanic ash calcined by it is naturally the best cement clinker.

The monks’ self-made cement is made from the slag of the blacksmith shop. Although the main component is silicon oxide, due to the limitations of the medieval furnace process level and fuel supply materials, the furnace temperature is generally only about 900 degrees Celsius, so it is naturally impossible to fire qualified cement materials.

So how to increase the furnace temperature?

The kiln for firing cement in the previous life is not as simple as the "farmer's furnace" for refining silver. It is assembled from special material cylinders, tires, and silos, and has extremely strict requirements for sealing. And the fuel it uses - pulverized coal with high ash content needs to be processed through multiple processes. For those who have no professional knowledge and relevant experience, it is tantamount to fantasy to make it.

But what if you use the power to increase the temperature of the furnace?

This method is indeed feasible. For example, Leslie, a variant of "Flame Breath", once used his own ability to cooperate with Rachel's "Mind Power" to create some parts of the printing press. But just the manufacture of three printing machines had already exhausted Leslie half to death, and within a few days, there was no way to use the "flame breath" ability anymore.

Therefore, unless the number of alien species reaches a certain scale, it may still be unrealistic to rely on the existing "flame breath" alien species in Muxi Town for large-scale cement production.

While thinking about these issues, Todd, who was planning to return to the church, passed the "Sisters Hotel", and suddenly saw Rachel walking out of the hotel with a large basket carrying Karin.

Todd stepped forward, and after some excuses from the two, he offered to help them carry the baskets to the vegetable field behind the hotel.

"What's in here?"

Rachel lifted the cloth, and the basket was full of rotten ingredients. She only heard her say: "The weather has been sweltering recently, and the ingredients in the cellar have spoiled a lot."

Karin stood beside Todd, helped him with his arm, tilted her head and said, "A few days ago, Uncle Huggins brought us some ice cubes from the north, but they all melted after only a few days."

Todd sighed when he heard this. He thought of his "Ability Library"—those petri dishes loaded with heterogeneous bacteria, and he had to spend an hour transplanting them every two days, which was a meticulous and arduous job. If you have a constant temperature freezer in the previous life laboratory, you can directly use the bacterial cryopreservation method, which can save a lot of time and energy.

But how can a constant temperature cold storage be such an easy-to-manufacture device?

Making a biological laboratory freezer that meets the minimum requirements requires at least a digital temperature control device, finned evaporator, foam box, anti-corrosion spraying process, etc. If you want to build a freezer in the Middle Ages, it is estimated that it can only be realized in a dream.

Karin curled her lips and said, "The room has been stuffy and hot these past few nights. Without Pamela, I'm afraid I won't be able to sleep all night."

Todd glanced at the girl with black hair and black pupils, and asked, "Pamela? Is that the girl who can use the 'freezing' ability?"

"That's right, at night, her body will emit a slight chill, and it's the most comfortable to hold her to sleep!"

Todd laughed when he heard this, but the first picture in his mind was two girls hugging each other in disheveled clothes. After transporting the basket to the vegetable field behind the hotel, he said goodbye to the two nuns and returned to his small experimental building.

Sitting on the chair, Todd began to sort out today's thoughts in his mind, and classified these thoughts on paper.

The first thing to write down is "cement" and a long series of logical expressions: cement - silicon oxide - furnace temperature - kiln or "flame breath"

Todd wrote here, thinking to himself: "If you want to burn cement, you must increase the furnace temperature; if you want to increase the furnace temperature, there are two ways, one is to make a kiln, and the other is to use the "flame breath" ability. I don't know how to make a kiln, so..."

Todd put a cross on the word "Kiln".

Looking at the rest of the word "Breath of Flame", Todd frowned and crossed his arms.

"Although the "flame breath" ability can increase the furnace temperature and obtain silica suitable for cement production, Leslie is the only one of the "flame breath" variant. He has to rest for a period of time after using the ability. It is impossible to mass-produce..." Todd thought of this, put a question mark behind "flame breath", and said: "Maybe I can inject the supernatural bacteria into other people's bodies to create a batch of "flame breath" variants?"

After a little thought, Todd immediately dismissed the idea.

If a large-scale heterogeneous transformation is carried out, not only will there be social unrest, but it will also cause a lot of unnecessary troubles. This approach is not feasible, at least not now.

Todd, unable to do anything after much deliberation, could only temporarily give up thinking about cement and began to write the second word "ice storage".

Pamela's ability is "freezing", which can be divided into active release and passive release. When the girl actively releases the power, the temperature around the skin can be quickly lowered in a short period of time; when she falls into a deep sleep, the skin will slowly release the cold air and maintain the space around her at a relatively stable low temperature environment.

If Pamela can be kept in a deep sleep state, then in theory, the cold around her body can transform the room into a constant temperature cold storage. However, it is impossible for a girl to stay in a deep sleep all the time. In that case, her brain and body will go into hypothermic shock within a few days.

Therefore, it seems that the method of using "frozen" alien species to make a constant temperature cold storage does not seem to work.

Todd stood up, turned around the room a few times with his hands behind his back, finally heaved a long sigh, and said: "If I had received more than 50 doctorates and knew everything in all walks of life before the crossing, it would be great; or, I can bring an encyclopedia..."

Walking to the back of the laboratory, Todd found a clean surface and sat down, unconsciously looking at the little white mice wearing "keel bones" in the iron cage. After watching for almost five minutes, he suddenly remembered something.

It is temporarily impossible to transform humans into alien species in large quantities...

What if it's just about transforming animals into xenomorphs?

What if animals are allowed to carry heterogeneous bacteria with "flame" and "frozen"?

Thinking of this, Todd took out two kinds of supernatural bacteria from the "supernatural library" and began to conduct corresponding research.

First of all, "phlogistic" bacteria are a kind of methanogenic bacteria, which belong to strict anaerobic bacteria. Under the microscope, it can be observed that it is a variant of Methanosarcina bacteria of the same genus. It exists in the digestive cells of humans and animals, and can decompose and polymerize H2/CO2, methanol, trimethylamine and other substances to produce a large amount of methane. Compared with those methanogens in the previous life, the methane production and speed of this supernatural bacterium are astonishing.

Todd's specific method is to prepare a glass jar (or iron jar), fill it with culture medium and inject "flammatory" bacteria, and then bury an animal called "tube worm". When the "flammation" bacteria enter the digestive cells of the tube worms, and the tube worms eat the culture medium, a large amount of methane will gradually be produced in the tank, which can be used for high-temperature calcination of cement after collection and purification. (The theoretical combustion temperature of purified methane can reach up to 2860 degrees Celsius, and the actual temperature is about 1700 degrees Celsius)

Regarding the "frozen" bacteria, Todd found a merchant in the town and bought a batch of "dormouse" (European dormouse, Dryomysnitedula) from him. A small dose of "frozen" bacteria was injected into the bodies of these dormouse, turning these little guys into a group of miniature "frozen" aliens. Then, the dormice were divided into two groups, one group was fed continuously to ensure the nutrition in the body, and the other group was induced to hibernate in low temperature. For the dormice that are hibernating, the cold air emitted by the bacteria on their bodies can turn a closed room into a constant temperature cold storage. After a period of time, the two batches of dormouse were rotated.

Through this method, Todd adopted the method of microbiology and manufactured two extremely special industrial basic "equipment" for the future development of Muxi Town - "Bacterial Fuel Storage" and "Microbial Ice Storage".

A large chapter with more than 4,000 words, I wonder if you can get used to it? If I'm not used to it, I can split the 2K into two chapters.