The next morning, the sun blazed as fiercely as ever.
Li Daoxuan had only just woken up when he glanced into the box and found Shan Shi'er standing outside Gao Yiyi's workshop, giving the blacksmiths a proper dressing-down.
"Li Da! Gao Yiyi! You two good-for-nothing freeloaders! Is eating the only thing you know how to do?"
Hands on his hips, Shan Shi'er pointed furiously at the pair.
"Dao Xuan Tianzun ordered you to forge iron armor more than half a month ago! And what have you accomplished? When the bandits attacked a few days ago, all you had to show for yourselves were two miserable suits of liangdang armor! Two! What exactly have you been doing all this time? Don't you feel ashamed accepting the food Tianzun provides while contributing practically nothing in return?"
The rebuke struck home.
Both blacksmiths flushed with embarrassment. Behind them, several newly recruited smiths from Wangjia Village, Zhengjia Village, and Zhongjia Village also lowered their heads. Apparently, the shame was contagious.
After a lengthy silence, Gao Yiyi finally stepped forward, keeping his head bowed.
"This isn't entirely Li Da's fault. Tianzun assigned him the task of forging those strange new firearms, while the responsibility for making armor fell to me. I simply didn't expect the bandits to arrive so soon, let alone bring such a large force. That's why I only managed to assemble two suits of liangdang armor. I've actually spent most of my time learning how to make different kinds of armor plates. I've forged plenty of them already. I just haven't had the chance to put everything together."
The new smiths quickly jumped in to defend themselves, though their explanation sounded suspiciously similar.
"We've been learning from Li Da too. We've made a mountain of iron plates, but we haven't managed to assemble them into complete armor either."
Shan Shi'er glared at them.
"Don't give me excuses! You claim to have plenty of armor plates? Fine! Bring them out. Let me see this mountain you've been talking about!"
Gao Yiyi hurried into his house and returned a moment later carrying a large winnowing basket. It was filled to the brim with iron plates of various shapes and sizes. Some were designed to protect the shoulders, others the arms, and still others the chest.
Shan Shi'er stared at the basket.
"If you've already made so many plates, why haven't you joined them together?"
Gao Yiyi scratched his head, wearing an awkward grin. He opened his mouth, but apparently couldn't think of a convincing answer.
Li Da stepped in before things got any worse.
"Advisor Shan, this really is our oversight. First, we never expected the bandits to arrive so quickly or in such numbers. We assumed Gaojia Village wouldn't need large quantities of iron armor anytime soon, so we didn't rush the work. Second, we're missing the materials needed to connect all these iron plates."
The Village Chief, who had been standing nearby, immediately chimed in.
"Tianzun gave you such a large supply of iron! How could you possibly run short of materials? Are you telling me there's not enough metal?"
Li Da shook his head.
"We have plenty of iron. But a suit of armor isn't supposed to be made entirely out of metal. Think about it, Chief. If we connect all these plates using nothing but iron, the finished armor will be unbearably heavy. A soldier would be crushed under his own equipment before he even got close to the battlefield!"
The Village Chief frowned.
"Then what are you supposed to use?"
"Cotton," Li Da replied.
Hearing that word from outside the box, Li Daoxuan immediately understood what he meant.
Cotton cloth.
He vaguely remembered reading about surviving examples of Ming Dynasty armor in a historical document. They weren't constructed entirely from iron. Instead, iron plates were attached to thick layers of fabric, either riveted or stitched into place. Some designs actually contained more cotton than metal, which was why they were often referred to as cotton armor.
Compared with conventional iron armor, this design offered quite a few advantages.
For starters, it was considerably lighter. Soldiers wouldn't have to exhaust themselves just walking around before the battle even began. It was also relatively inexpensive to produce, easy to maintain, resistant to rot, and provided excellent insulation against the bitter northern winters.
More importantly, it didn't require the kind of painstaking custom fitting associated with heavy plate armor. Its construction was flexible, and despite being made partly from cloth, it could offer surprisingly effective protection against early firearms.
These were practical advantages that conventional forms of armor, whether lamellar, chainmail, or scale armor, couldn't easily match.
Once Li Da had explained the problem, Shan Shi'er's anger gradually subsided.
"So that's what it is! If you were short of cotton cloth, why didn't you say so earlier? I could have sent someone to the county seat with flour and arranged a trade!"
Li Da and Gao Yiyi exchanged awkward glances before scratching their heads.
"We honestly didn't expect the bandits to arrive so soon. There was no particular reason to rush out and buy cotton before."
Shan Shi'er nearly choked.
"Good grief! What a pair of fools! Thoroughly, magnificently foolish!"
Listening to their conversation, Li Daoxuan couldn't help chuckling.
Actually, I have an old cotton-padded jacket lying around that I don't wear anymore. Could I just pull out some of the stuffing and give it to them?
Then another thought occurred to him.
Wait. If the cotton is enlarged two hundred times inside the box, would its fibers become too thick to weave with?
He paused, considering the matter more carefully.
Something about the scaling rules inside the miniature world had always seemed a little strange. The more he thought about the various objects he had dropped into the box, the more he suspected that things didn't simply become larger according to a straightforward scaling ratio.
Perhaps microscopic components, the things too small to see with the naked eye, didn't expand at all.
Take the cabbage leaves he had given the villagers, for example. If the individual plant fibers inside them had also grown two hundred times larger, the villagers wouldn't even have been able to chew their food properly.
The same applied to the molecules and atoms inside eggs, rice, and other ingredients. Had those microscopic structures expanded proportionally, the entire miniature world would have descended into chaos long ago.
And what about the bacteria in the pond water? If every single bacterium had grown two hundred times larger, would anyone still be able to drink from it?
The more he considered it, the clearer the answer became.
Microscopic components such as bacteria, molecules, and fibers didn't increase in size inside the box. Instead, their numbers multiplied accordingly, contributing to the overall expansion of the object.
In other words, individual cotton fibers remained just as fine as before. The enormous increase in volume came from having proportionally more fibers, not from making each one thicker.
That explained quite a few things that had puzzled him previously.
Well, there's no point sitting here theorizing. A simple experiment will settle it.
Li Daoxuan opened his wardrobe and dug out the old cotton-padded jacket he had been meaning to throw away for ages. Reaching through a tear in its lining, he pulled out a generous handful of stuffing.
Then he carefully lowered his hand into the box and placed the cotton right in front of Gao Yiyi and the others.
Down below, Shan Shi'er was still thinking about where to buy cotton when a gigantic mass of white fluff suddenly descended from the heavens.
It drifted down gently and landed before Gao Yiyi.
Everyone stared.
A colossal clump of cotton, large enough to rival an entire house, had appeared out of nowhere!
There could be only one explanation.
Another divine gift from Tianzun!
The crowd immediately dropped to their knees, bowing in gratitude.
After finishing his kowtows, Shan Shi'er scrambled back to his feet. He rushed toward the enormous mound, plucked a small tuft, and rubbed it between his fingers.
His eyes practically lit up.
"Magnificent! This celestial cotton really is extraordinary! Look how white and fine it is! And the fibers are so long!"
Li Daoxuan chuckled to himself.
Of course they're magnificent. This is premium Xinjiang long-staple cotton! A variety introduced from Central Asia through the Soviet Union in 1955. Naturally, you people in the Ming Dynasty have never seen anything like it.
He examined the cotton carefully and confirmed his earlier suspicion. The individual fibers hadn't become any thicker. They retained their original delicate texture, proving that microscopic components did not expand inside the box.
The enormous pile was simply the result of having vastly more fibers packed together.
Satisfied with his little experiment, Li Daoxuan watched as Shan Shi'er enthusiastically clutched a handful of the heavenly cotton.
"Chief!" Shan Shi'er called out excitedly. "Go gather all the women in the village! Anyone who knows how to weave needs to get to work immediately!"
The Village Chief was already beside himself with joy.
Looking at the mountain of cotton before him, he could hardly contain his excitement.
"With this much cotton, everyone in the village can finally have a complete set of new clothes!"