Chapter 2

Black Flame City's Seventh National School is a standard boys' school. As the name suggests, there isn't a single girl in the entire school. The curriculum for boys and girls is vastly different, and it is said that to save resources and improve teaching efficiency, after the initial five years of co-educational compulsory education, boys and girls are separated into different schools. All the courses in the boys' school serve one purpose—survival. The goal is to enable every young person entering the school to accumulate the necessary capital for survival in this era as quickly and with the least cost possible. Every graduate from this school does not receive a diploma. The best proof of graduation is the ability to survive in the world after leaving school. Therefore, every course and every lesson taught in the school is directly related to one's ability to survive in the world. It is said that the education in girls' schools is gentler, with additional courses in music, literature, cooking, art, and dance. However, these courses are not available in boys' schools. Apart from the most basic language, law, and mathematics classes, every course taught here corresponds to a skill that helps humans survive in this era—such as how to care for a seed and grow it into food in the fields; how to use available resources to make basic survival tools; how to build the simplest house using available resources; how to identify and avoid attacks from dangerous wild animals; how to use wild plants to make basic first-aid medicines; how to treat common diseases; how to use weapons in combat; and how to exercise to strengthen one's body...

After completing the 8-year compulsory national education, for most students, over 99% of ordinary people will leave school and enter society, starting their lives. The skills learned in school, if applied with some effort, can turn one into a farmer with a hoe, a worker in a factory, or a soldier in the army, or more accurately, cannon fodder and food for the enemy. The spirit of national education in the Black Iron Era is to use the least cost and the most efficient means to cultivate the most capable survivors, not a bunch of useless decorations or sources of beast droppings.

Of course, like in the pre-catastrophe era, the compulsory education in every era is not the highest level. After completing the 8-year compulsory education, a few true elites and those with powerful backgrounds or exceptional talent in some areas can enter higher and more mysterious places to study more specialized knowledge and receive true elite education. The Black Flame City, established by merchants and factory owners, has no high-level elite academy, only an ordinary business school, which is already highly sought after by ordinary people.

True elite academies are said to exist only in other human cities and core settlements with deeper foundations. The conditions for entering these elite academies are extremely stringent, with only one in ten thousand qualifying. For example, the Seventh National School of Black Flame City graduates over a thousand students each year, but for eight consecutive years, not a single student has qualified to enter a true elite academy. Eight years ago, a talented student named Li Shizhen from the Hua clan was selected by the Continental Alchemist Guild and taken away after graduation. He became the pride of the entire school, and his personal photo has hung in the school's exhibition room for eight years. At every school assembly, the principal would talk about him tirelessly, to the point where people's ears grew calluses. Hanging next to his photo are two other legendary figures from the school.

Higher education in this era is truly elite education. The scale of higher education in pre-catastrophe human countries, which admitted millions of students each year, seems like a myth now. Knowledge in this era is extremely expensive, beyond imagination, and is held by a few people, a few families, and powerful sects, temples, and churches. Only true elites have the opportunity to access it.

Although Zhang Tie felt he had worked hard in school, in an era where everyone is striving for survival, his efforts did not make him an elite or a lucky one. His family had no influential figures, so his performance in all aspects was average, not the worst, but not outstanding either. If life went on without any surprises, Zhang Tie thought he might end up like his father, seeking a stable and peaceful job after military service, trying hard to enter a factory in the city as an ordinary worker, marrying a not ugly but hardworking and capable woman, having a few children, and working hard every day to provide food for his family until he lay on his deathbed, reflecting on his tragic and gray life as an insignificant screw in this era, thinking about the beautiful women he had seen but never been with, such as the goddess Daina, and before closing his eyes in frustration, raising his trembling hand to give the world the middle finger, then dying...

This thought made Zhang Tie shudder as he entered the classroom. He was truly unwilling to live such a life. Although he had made up his mind long ago, he reminded himself again today—his life must be long enough, he must have enough gold, and he must have been with enough beautiful women. If he were to leave this world, he hoped to see a scene where a large number of beautiful women would cry and even die for his death, and a large number of dissatisfied descendants would secretly rejoice and even laugh out loud at the thought that the old man was finally gone...

Maybe one day, he could live the life of a big shot, with dozens of pairs of underwear and new shoes, eating meat three times a day, and having a beautiful, seductive, big-breasted, and curvy maid...

Zhang Tie often thought this way. In his mind, the lives of all big shots should be carefree and worry-free, but this dream was as unreachable as a duckling in the mud dreaming of becoming a dragon.

There were about ten minutes before class started, and the morning class was a technical class. When Zhang Tie arrived at the technical classroom, he saw several classmates standing in a row by the window, each with their head sticking out and their other hand moving quickly below their waist, some even moaning softly. Zhang Tie looked out the window and saw the goddess Daina walking gracefully through the flower bed below. From this angle, her chest looked incredibly magnificent...

Zhang Tie swallowed hard...

These bastards!

"Bighead, how about it, come join us..." The guy with acne, while moving his hand, turned his head and "sincerely" suggested.

"No, I just saw Captain Collin heading towards our classroom. You guys enjoy yourselves slowly!"

Upon hearing Zhang Tie's words, everyone stopped immediately. The acne-ridden guy's face turned pale, and the things they had pulled out shrank rapidly, like deflated balloons. The classroom then turned into a chaotic scene, with several people hurting themselves while zipping up, causing a chorus of screams. It was uncertain whether they would become impotent in the future. God forgive me, Zhang Tie was sure that if Captain Collin knew what was happening in the classroom, he would really want to come and crush each of their balls...

Everyone quickly returned to their positions, standing in front of their workbenches with their eyes fixed on their noses, and the classroom quickly quieted down. Zhang Tie also came to his workbench, casually wiped off the dust, and began checking the tools on it. The ten minutes passed quickly, and when the bell rang, the technical class teacher entered the classroom with a pile of things. Captain Collin still hadn't appeared, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. The bastards who had been caught earlier glared at Zhang Tie but didn't dare to act out during class.

The technical class teacher was a middle-aged man in his fifties, bald, and seemed very gloomy and quiet. He never talked much in class, but no one dared to underestimate him. This old man once demonstrated to everyone how to use a few simple tools to create a small single-cylinder steam engine from a pile of junk in one morning. When a fire pot was placed under it, the steam engine started running. In this era, no one who could be a teacher was simple.

As usual, the bald man entered the classroom, wrote "Manual Production of Spiral Springs" on the blackboard, and began to lecture. After finishing, he left some formulas and data on the blackboard, including spring winding ratio, compression ratio, core diameter, and tensile strength, and then distributed the steel wires he brought, giving each student three. For Zhang Tie and the others, the morning's task was to manually produce three types of spiral springs. After receiving the steel wires, everyone started working at their workbenches, even the bastards from earlier, who now seemed like different people, began to work hard for their survival. The bald man then left the classroom with a cup of water.

The biggest difference between humans and powerful beasts and the barbaric enemy races is the ability to use and make tools. Although springs may seem insignificant, they have a wide range of uses, and the ability to make them by hand is undoubtedly a survival skill.

After receiving the steel wires, Zhang Tie thought for a moment and had an idea. He memorized the formulas on the blackboard, measured the three steel wires of different lengths and thicknesses, and began calculating on a writing board at his workbench. He decided to make three types of springs: a simple cylindrical compression spring, a concave cylindrical compression spring, and a cylindrical torsion hook spring...

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