Chapter 59 The Magic of 0.04 Millimeters of "Growth"

This young man wasn't manufacturing civilian goods.

He was forging the heart of the nation's defense industry.

"President Lin!" Lao Zheng suddenly changed his form of address, speaking with utmost solemnity.

"This technology is top secret!"

"Absolutely top secret!"

"Even if everyone at Factory 702 has to go begging for food, we must protect this!"

"Rest assured, until the patent barriers are built, this is our biggest trump card."

Lin Xi patted Lao Zheng's shoulder, his gaze passing over him to look at the other end of the workshop.

"We have the heart."

"Next, it's time to give this beast its teeth."

"You mean... the foil mesh?"

"Yes, a geometric foil mesh that is ultra-thin, tough, and capable of capturing whiskers at any angle."

"How thin?"

"0.04 millimeters."

Lao Zheng sucked in a cold breath.

Before he could speak, a loud, angry shout erupted from deep within the workshop.

An old man wearing oil-stained overalls with goggles hanging around his neck rushed over.

"Nonsense! Absolute bullsh*t!"

The old man's face was flushed red as he pointed at Lin Xi's nose.

"Which unit did a greenhorn like you come from?"

"0.04 millimeters? That's aluminum foil!"

"Do you even know the yield strength of stainless steel?"

"One press from the stamping machine and it'll shatter into dust! Not even a god could pull that off!"

Lao Zheng gave a bitter smile and introduced him to Lin Xi in a low voice.

"This is Master Niu, the director of our main workshop."

"He's been working with stamping for thirty years. His temper is harder than that three-hundred-ton punch press."

Lin Xi wasn't angry; instead, he smiled.

An expert.

If he weren't an expert, he wouldn't be this furious.

"Master Niu, is it? Who told you I was going to use a stamping machine?"

"No stamping?" Master Niu glared with his wide eyes.

"How are you going to make the holes without stamping?"

"Are you going to poke them one by one with an embroidery needle?"

"Those apertures need to be dozens of microns wide. Let's see you poke one!"

"I'm not poking them. I'm 'growing' them."

Lin Xi turned around, his gaze locking onto a long-abandoned electroplating tank in the corner.

A pungent, acidic smell permeated the air—the mixed scent of copper sulfate and chromic acid.

"Big Cannon, clear out that tank." Lin Xi rolled up his sleeves.

"Then go and get the 'scraps' we brought."

The so-called "scraps" were several pieces of insulating ceramic dismantled from a decommissioned radar station, along with a bucket of an unidentified black solution.

Master Niu stood to the side with his arms crossed, a sneer on his face.

"Electroplating? You want to chrome-plate the mesh?"

"Young man, you've got it backward!"

"If you can't even make the base material, it's just scrap metal even if you plate it in gold!"

Lin Xi ignored him.

Explaining now would be a waste of breath.

Facts speak louder than words.

He directed Wang Yu to carefully attach the ceramic pieces to a cylindrical metal mold.

The ceramic pieces had been cut into extremely fine hexagonal patterns, densely packed like a miniature honeycomb.

"This is the mask," Lin Xi explained quietly, not caring if those around him understood.

Next, he applied the current.

But the way the electricity was applied was somewhat strange.

Lin Xi didn't just flip the switch; instead, he held a modified knob, his eyes fixed on the scrolling comments in the livestream.

[Chemical Madman: Set the current density to 4A/dm² and the pulse frequency to 1000Hz! Do not use DC!]

[PhD in Materials Science: Duty cycle! Watch the duty cycle! You have to give the nickel ions time to 'rest' so the crystallization is fine and dense!]

Lin Xi's fingers moved rapidly over the knob.

The current flickered on and off, and the needle swung wildly.

Master Niu frowned as he watched. "What kind of sorcery is this?"

"Electroplating requires constant current and voltage. Why are you shaking like you have Parkinson's?"

"There aren't even any bubbles. Are you playing around?"

Indeed, there were no bubbles.

The bath solution was as calm as a pool of stagnant water, with only the occasional, extremely subtle ripple.

Time passed minute by minute.

Half an hour.

One hour.

The temperature in the workshop rose higher and higher, and the acid mist made everyone's throats itch.

Sun Erga squatted on the ground until his legs went numb. He couldn't help but mutter under his breath.

"Manager, if this fails, we're going to lose face big time. That old man was looking at me like I'm an idiot just now."

"Shut up." Lin Xi didn't even turn his head. Sweat dripped from the tip of his nose into the solution.

This was called Electroforming.

In 2025, this was the standard process for manufacturing precision filters and holographic anti-counterfeiting labels.

No cutting, no smelting, and certainly no violent stamping.

Under the influence of an electric field, metal ions were made to line up obediently on the mold, stacking at the atomic level.

It wasn't subtraction; it was addition.

"Stop."

Lin Xi suddenly cut the power.

The entire workshop fell silent instantly, leaving only the whirring of the exhaust fans.

Master Niu snorted and stepped forward.

"Finished messing around?"

"Let me see what kind of crop you've grown."

The mold was lifted out.

It was covered in a layer of dull, greyish material.

It looked neither like metal nor plastic, and it had no luster whatsoever.

"This is it?"

Master Niu shook his head in disappointment, a look of disdain on his face. He reached out to pick at it.

"All that effort for a layer of oxide scale. What a waste of electricity..."

"Don't touch it!"

Lin Xi barked, slapping Master Niu's hand away with a backhand.

With a crisp *smack*, the back of Master Niu's hand turned red.

Before the old man could explode, Lin Xi picked up a specialized soft-bristled brush and gently swept away the surface dust as if he were handling a priceless treasure.

Then, he used needle-nose tweezers to grip the edge of the grey layer.

He took a deep breath.

Lift!

*Rrip—*

An extremely faint sound, like silk tearing, rang out.

A metal film, thin as a cicada's wing yet shimmering with a cold silver light, peeled away perfectly from the mold.

It trembled slightly on Lin Xi's tweezers, its luster shifting with the flow of air as if it were alive.

"This..."

Master Niu's eyes nearly popped out of his head.

He instinctively pulled out his vernier calipers, but his hands were shaking so violently he couldn't even grip the film, which looked like it might break if he so much as breathed on it.

"Don't bother. Calipers aren't accurate enough for this."

Lin Xi held the "cicada wing" up to the light.

It was translucent.

Countless tiny holes, too fine for the naked eye to distinguish, allowed points of light to shine through like stars.

They were arranged with a geometric beauty that was absolutely unattainable by human hands.

"0.04 millimeters, pure nickel material, Rockwell hardness of 55."

Lin Xi rattled off a string of data.

"The toughness is three times that of ordinary stainless steel. As for the aperture precision..."

He looked at the completely stunned Lao Zheng.

"Factory Director Lao, I recall that our factory's final assembly workshop has a German Zeiss microscope used for testing missile gyroscopes?"

Lao Zheng nodded blankly.

"Bring it here."

Lin Xi gently placed the foil mesh onto the oil-stained workbench.

"Let Master Niu see what 'God's Honeycomb' looks like."