The Transmigrated Farm Girl Has a Cheat Code

Chapter 90 Research

In the following days, Lin Yu resumed his daily school routine, while his parents continued to urge him to complete the house construction.

Lin Yan began designing the furniture in the house, including essential items like beds and cabinets, as well as some special items.

The first thing that caught Lin Yan's eye was the full-length mirror she saw in a clothing store in the prefectural city. It was made entirely of brass and was certainly not as clear as the glass mirrors of later generations, but its main advantage was its size, allowing her to see her entire body. Having a full-length mirror at home would make the house feel complete.

Nowadays, the main materials used to make mirrors are copper and silver. Many poor families don't even have mirrors and rely on the reflection of water to see their reflections.

Lin Yan pondered: should she buy a bronze mirror directly or try to make a glass mirror? Actually, a bronze mirror can also reflect very clearly. At least the mirror Lin Yan saw in the prefectural city was completely beyond her expectations. Although the color tone was somewhat dark, it could reflect very clearly.

However, after seeing clearer ones myself, I felt that bronze mirrors were not good enough.

"Making a glass mirror is too difficult with the current conditions. Not to mention how to make the glass, the reflective coating on the back of the glass is also a big problem!" Lin Yan muttered, rubbing her forehead in exasperation.

Lin Yan suddenly remembered the various books in her space. She flipped through them and actually found the glass manufacturing process in a book on building materials. The extended content also mentioned the reflective coating behind glass mirrors.

"I've got it! Knowledge really is the biggest advantage of time travel!" Lin Yan exclaimed.

The main component of glass is silicon dioxide, as well as oxides such as calcium oxide and sodium oxide.

The glass-making materials mentioned in this book are mainly quartz sand, soda ash, and limestone.

The main component of quartz sand is silicon dioxide, the main component used in glassmaking. This is easy to understand; you can simply crush quartz. Moreover, glassmaking techniques already existed in this era, which is the ancient method of glassmaking. The materials used are basically the same. Although glass itself is very expensive, its raw materials are very cheap and can be purchased elsewhere.

Glass is very expensive in Daliang, and the best manufacturing techniques mainly come from the glass factories in Daye. Lin Yan saw many treasure pavilions selling glass in Yun'an Prefecture, which were circulated by merchants from Daye.

As for the coating on the back of the glass, it mainly uses silver ammonia solution and glucose solution. After the two react, a stable silver coating is formed, which can reflect light, allowing the mirror to clearly reflect the image.

These two solutions were definitely not readily available in Daliang, so Lin Yan could only try to find substitutes or generate them through certain reactions.

From then on, Lin Yan began flipping through books non-stop, looking for methods to make coating materials in chemistry books.

When Lin Yu returned home that evening, he saw his older sister engrossed in drawing on the table with a thin stick she had never seen before. Curious, Lin Yu went over to investigate and saw that the thin stick in Lin Yan's hand could actually produce color. Under Lin Yan's pen, she kept drawing all sorts of strange symbols that he couldn't understand. The paper on the table was white and smooth, unlike any paper he had ever seen before.

However, his older sister always had some strange ideas and quirks, which Lin Yu had to get used to. But he had never seen this kind of pen and paper before, so he stared at it with great curiosity.

"Sister! What are you doing?"

"I'm studying!" Lin Yan cried out in despair. She had been flipping through books all day, trying to figure out how to react silver ammonia solution, but she wasn't a chemistry major! Fortunately, she was still a science student, so she could understand the chemical formulas completely.

Lin Yan hadn't studied chemistry for many years, including the fifteen years of the apocalypse. She never expected that she would be able to study chemistry after transmigrating to ancient times.

However, she finally had a glimmer of hope: she could try to prepare a silver ammonia solution. One is silver nitrate, and the other is ammonia water. With the level of industrial technology in ancient times, it was impossible to produce pure ammonia water, but as long as it contained a small amount of ammonia, she could give it a try.

"Sister is studying too?! What are you studying? Why can't I understand any of this? Are these words?" Lin Yu pointed to the chemical formulas Lin Yan had written on the paper.

"Hmm... this is a magical technique..." Lin Yan thought: That's not wrong, is it? Ancient alchemy was considered a magical technique!

"Celestial arts?! Pfft!" Lin Yu suddenly laughed.

"What are you laughing at?" Lin Yan looked at her younger brother in surprise.

"Sister, don't lie to me! I'm all grown up now! What I can write down definitely isn't magic!" Lin Yu said seriously.

"Sigh, kids grow up, they're not so easy to fool anymore! But you're only two months older than before, right?" Lin Yan complained. Two months ago, she had made up a story in front of Lin Yu, and he believed her then.

Lin Yan took another sheet of Xuan paper and wrote down what she needed on it with a brush: silver, saltpeter, salt, quicklime, or limestone... because Lin Yan wasn't sure if quicklime existed in this era.

Lin Yu sat quietly to the side watching Lin Yan finish writing the materials. Only when she stopped writing did he ask, "Silver? Saltpeter? What are these?"

"This is the mirror I've been longing for!" Lin Yan's voice was low and deep, filled with both sorrow and joy.

Lin Yu asked in surprise, "A mirror? Why not just buy one? Why write all this down? What does it have to do with anything?"

He knew that Lin Yan had her eye on the full-length mirror she had seen in the prefectural city, but couldn't they just buy the mirror directly? Although those full-length mirrors were definitely not cheap, they had made a lot of money recently, and his sister was someone who was willing to spend money, so why did she look so troubled?

Lin Yan sighed. She also wanted to just buy it directly; she only realized how complicated it was once she started. However, for the sake of her clear mirror, she decided to give it a try.

"This mirror is different. If we can make it, it will absolutely blow your mind!"

Lin Yu remained noncommittal, asking, "What's different about the mirror?"

Lin Yan said mysteriously, "It can reflect every single strand of your hair clearly, as if there is a person standing in front of you. It reflects much more clearly than those bronze mirrors or obsidian mirrors!"

"Mirrors like this? I've never heard of them before?" Lin Yu's jaw dropped slightly.

After Lin Yan finished speaking, her excitement subsided, and she sighed, "Sigh! I'm not sure I'll succeed, but I'll give it a try!"

"Sister is so amazing, she'll definitely succeed!" Lin Yu looked at Lin Yan with bright eyes, full of trust.

Lin Yan smiled and patted her younger brother's head, "Yes, with A-Yu's auspicious words, it will definitely work!"

Lin Yan tidied up the things on the table, putting everything except the piece of paper with the materials written on it into her spatial storage.

"I'll rest today, prepare the raw materials tomorrow, and then start the experiment," Lin Yan muttered. She had spent the whole day reading and felt more tired than fighting zombies. All she wanted to do was lie down on the bed and clear her mind.