Chapter 54: Incense Making Skills
[Congratulations to the host for successfully upgrading his paper-making skill to level 4. 100 check-in points are awarded as a reward.]
After three days of continuous fighting, Shi Liu finally improved his paper figurine skills. Now that his goal was achieved, he was a little dazed. After a while, Shi Liu came to his senses and shouted to Bai Luosang, "Master Bai, my paper figurine——"
"I see. When you activate the spirit, you can input certain knowledge into the paper figurine. What abilities do you want to give it? Also, what do you want the paper figurine to look like? Male or female?"
Shi Liu had never really thought about this question. After a moment's hesitation, she said, "I want someone who can do odd jobs, like cleaning, cooking, and collecting petals..."
"Cooking is not an option, I can't cook, but the other things are fine. The abilities granted by the spirits must be possessed by the creator."
"Okay then." Shi Liu hadn't expected that Dian Ling had this restriction. That's right, if there were no restrictions, wouldn't it be a mess? "I want a beautiful woman who looks like a beautiful girl next door, just like the paper figurine that Master uses."
"Okay, but you need to provide paper, thin bamboo strips and other things." Now in the space, except for the things brought in by Shi Liu, the rest were transformed by the sisters and could not be taken out for use at all.
Shi Liu directly pulled out the Yin Yang Pavilion and asked Master Bai to buy it himself. Anyway, she still had a lot of merit in her account, which should be enough.
"Master Bai Luohuai, let's start learning how to make incense now." If it weren't for upgrading her paper-making skills, she would have wanted to learn how to make incense a long time ago. Making incense sounds very elegant.
Bai Luohuai lit a stick of incense and said, "If you want to learn how to make incense, you must first learn how to identify incense. Ask about this stick of incense."
Shi Liu had never been exposed to incense making before, so when she heard what Master Xiaobai said, she walked forward and smelled it obediently: "I seem to smell the fragrance of Yulong tea, and a faint fragrance of bamboo, but I can't smell anything else." The smell reminded her of her ex-boyfriend Zhou Pan.
"Yes, your sense of smell is quite sharp. I believe it will become even more sensitive after training." Bai Luohuai's tone was gentle and full of relief. She and her sister now had successors.
"Yulong Tea is a gentleman among teas, full of poetry. The main spices used are citrus, black tea, green tea and ambergris. The water used in the incense making process is all dew collected from the leaves of the bamboo in the early morning, so the Yulong incense has a hint of bamboo fragrance."
Shi Liu didn't know much about making perfume. In her previous life, she would just go to a store and buy perfume and spray it on. "What are the benefits of Yulong Incense?"
"Jade Dragon Incense has the same calming and calming effect as Qingxin Incense, but Jade Dragon Incense is generally used when practicing painting and calligraphy, while Qingxin Incense is more often used when teaching Buddhism and Taoism."
Hearing that it was for human use, Shi Liu felt relieved. She also knew that the skills required to sign in at the funeral shop were probably related to worshipping ghosts and gods. Fortunately, incense had a wide range of uses.
"Perhaps you would like to learn how to make bamboo standing incense, which is used to worship spirits and gods."
"No, Jade Dragon Incense is fine. However, Master Xiaobai, I don't have any raw materials like citrus, black tea, or ambergris. How about you teach me how to refine some raw materials that are easier to find?"
"Then let's try a beginner's incense. Actually, since you're just starting to learn how to make incense, it doesn't matter what kind of incense you make. Your most important task right now is to learn the shape of the incense, and then the smell." Bai Luohuai waved his hand, and another incense stick appeared in front of him. "Smell this, it's mosquito repellent incense. The main raw material is mugwort, which is quite abundant here and is almost readily available. Mosquito repellent incense is a must-have in the summer."
The tip of her nose was filled with the smell of mugwort. Shi Liu looked at the mosquito repellent incense that was no different from the one she had just used and nodded with some difficulty. She had a pile of mugwort stored in her warehouse. She had obtained it by signing in at the reed marsh when she first got the sign-in system. She had originally planned to use it to fumigate mosquitoes in the summer, but the appearance of the mosquito repellent incense was just in time.
The rural environment is indeed not as good as the city. Once summer comes, the buzzing of flies and mosquitoes makes people feel restless every time they hear it.
Now that she has mosquito repellent incense, Shi Liu plans to make more to share with her family. She originally thought she had a lot of mugwort, but after careful calculation, the mugwort she has is hardly enough. Well, she will ask her elder brother and others to pick more for her next year.
Incense sticks have been around since the Song and Ming dynasties. Because of their long burning time, incense sticks are also known as "immortal incense" or "longevity incense." Ancient temples often used the length of incense sticks as a unit of time, hence the term "incense inch." Master Xiaobai was about to teach her about coreless incense sticks, which are made by removing the bamboo sticks in the middle, resulting in a purer and more transparent aroma.
Shi Liu watched Master Xiaobai rub a straight and smooth stick of incense with his little hands. But after she tried it herself, she found that it was extremely difficult. She either broke it or rolled it into uneven thickness. In short, there were a lot of problems.
"Master Xiaobai, can we use machines to make incense?" Modern mechanical equipment is so easy to use. Just put the spices into the raw material trough, and the incense with uniform thickness will come out quickly, saving time and effort.
Bai Luohuai shook his head slightly. "Machine-made incense is indeed fast, but truly excellent incense still needs to be made purely by hand. The spices undergo wonderful changes through contact with hands, which is something machines can never achieve... It is precisely because of your fear of hard work and your desire to save trouble that many precious traditional handicrafts are gradually being lost."
These words made Shi Liu look embarrassed. She was actually just lazy. If machine-made incense was really that good, then why did people in the upper class still pursue pure handmade production? In the final analysis, it was still a little lacking.
"I understand, Master Xiaobai, I will try my best." This time, Shi Liu completely concentrated on making incense.
Bai Luohuai nodded in satisfaction. She was worthy of being the candidate chosen by the judge. She was a hardworking and good child, and she was also gifted. She could master both paper-making and incense-making at a glance. Although her sister seemed to be very dissatisfied with her, in fact, her sister was as satisfied with her as she was, otherwise she would not have spent her soul power to make spiritual paper figures.
The handmade process of making coreless incense sticks is both simple and complicated. Its simplicity lies in that it only requires incense powder, sticky powder, and natural spring water, which means it can be made with just your hands without the help of complicated production tools. On the other hand, it is complicated because if you want to make a good-smelling incense stick, you need to have a lot of knowledge; and every little detail of each step is very important.
The more Shi Liu learned, the more she felt that incense making was a broad and profound art. It was obvious that it was not easy to master any skill, and the ingenuity of the old craftsmen was worthy of admiration. She decided that after she learned how to make the sacred incense, she would burn some for all the masters so that they could enjoy the incense.
(O ^~^ O): Vote and vote——
Monthly tickets, recommendation tickets, and evaluation tickets will become invalid after expiration, so don't be stingy——
(End of this chapter)
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