Deciding what to do from here is a difficult decision. I have so many tasks to complete, deciding what to prioritize is whats catching me up I need more tools an ax can only do so much. On the thought I decided to gather more iron ore, I'm going to need it to be able to test how to make steel. First I need to cast the tools for the worker on its way and my forging tools.
Gathering all my iron ingots I get to smelting them. first filling the ax head and pickaxe mold, Then the anvil and hammerhead molds. once finished I'm only left with a single 5-pound ingot. I decide to make molds for chisels for more advanced carvings. letting those cool down I carve out some handles for the tools and set them aside and plunge the nod mostly cooled iron into the water hardening them.
grabbing my pickaxe I head to the cavern to start to gather iron ore from the vein I found in one of the walls. taking my first swing at the wall it shatters almost instantly. Shocked at what I saw I take another swing along with another large segment of the wall crumbling away. confused for a second before finally remembering that I can now lift a few hundred pounds easily so my strength has gone up rather quickly. I guess I'm strong enough now that mining won't be too much of a challenge. Looking at my pickaxe though I see that it's slightly cracked. Great I forgot that it's only cast iron while it may be hard it's also very brittle.
Sighing I gather up what I do have and separate the whole ore and the stone fragment taking the ore with me to meltdown to ingots. Then I disassembled my pickaxe and place the head into the forge to heat up to red hot. placing the now soft metal onto the anvil I start to hammer it out into flat iron and folding it slowly repeating the process for 3 hours working the impurities out of it once satisfied I start to shape the hot iron into a pickaxe head again this time having a sharper head and wider back end. rapidly, cooling and heating it multiple times to try and increase the hardness. I'm not a master smith so it won't look amazing, But it should withstand my strength for now.
once the pickaxe is fished it comes out as a slightly shinier piece of metal than the previous black color. reattaching it to the handle I get back to work mining more ores. After a full day of mining, I finally gathered just over 500 pounds of iron ingots. it should be enough for a while. my next project is a grinding wheel. But first I need sleep my body is aching.
Once morning came around I starting making molds to build a grinding wheel stand. I also need to create a pedal system to turn the stone wheel. I can use some rope and weave it into a belt and make some a basic pulley system to increase the speed of the wheel should be easy enough with the tools I have now. Getting to work I first design a 3 piece stand consisting of 2 legs that we'll connect with a crossbar on the bottom backside and the axle in the middle. then in the front will be a rest plate for whatever is being grinder to keep it steady on the stone wheel.
I'll forge the axle and petals out of iron rods to strengthen them and also make a couple of washers to prevent seizing. For the stone ill use my new chisels to make a round stone and punch a hole in the middle then ill get a chisel it's to as perfect as I can get it then use them to do the rest once I can get it moving on the grinding stand to get a perfectly flat edge.
going through each step carefully making sure I keep everything lined up properly and as straight as possible to avoid seen wobbles from anything balanced. after testing out the pedal system I start to grind down on the stone wheel, once perfectly flat thanks to using the axle as a cent point it's perfectly round. grabbing my ac I test it out by throwing a little water on the stone wheel and sharpen my ax before testing it on a tree.
With all my strength I chop into the tree only for my ax to cut clean though and the rest of the tree to shatter.Surprisingly I can actually cut a tree down in one swing now...a sharp blade really made a difference granted it splintered thanks to the momentum of the ax but a tree down in a single swing is a lot of progress. I wonder if I could make a giant cleaver type tool to cut down trees faster and possibly use for a weapon. But I'll need a much larger crucible to smelt that much iron. as well as a way to make it into steel and forge it. Maybe I'll make a hydraulic machine that can do the hammering for me in the future it is the best way to lift heavy machinery. I need oil for that though for rubber and plastics I need seals and valves if made right I can get thousands of pounds of force for very little energy input.
Shaking myself out of thoughts of future plans I continue to cut trees down to the hundreds and trimming and stacking the logs into a massive pile for future use. I plan on making a lumber mill but in order to do that ill need a constant supply of mechanical energy something like a water wheel catching the energy from perhaps a massive waterfall. I also need to perfect steel manufacturing and get finer tools to make more complex machines such as saw blades and chains.
making sure to dig out all the stumps in the clearing and putting them aside for future use I look over the land only to realize I need to flatten it out for future building. a process I'm not yet ready for. I'll need a plow and a big one as well as rope I wish I had horses or oxen to pull it with but I'll have to do for now. I'll flatten the land and then I can start outlining with a basic wooden wall to make a compound. with that in mind I think it's time to perfect my steel forging processing capabilities.