Lord of Winter: Beginning with Daily Intelligence - Chapter 395 - 262: Mining
Chapter 395: Chapter 262: Mining
Kael nodded, his gaze lingering on another oddly shaped cylinder.
“And this one?”
“This one’s even more ingenious, a Rock-Piercing Potion Bullet.” Valentine chuckled, “Encased in ceramic, filled with Fire Scale Ointment and refined embers of sinking iron powder; when activated, the temperature can melt iron into water.”
He gestured a scalding movement between his fingers, then added, “It’s used for those hard rock cores that can’t be blasted through, or for sections of rock that need ’no collapsing’—like near veins or tunnel junctions.”
After a pause, Valentine lavishly praised, “This thing, entirely invented by the master and Hillco himself… I say, you’re not just here to mine, you’re here to teach the world what a new era means.”
“Quit the flattery, get arranging.” Louis responded calmly, yet the confidence in his eyes was unmistakable.
Before the official explosion, the artisan team had already completed the target seam’s development tunnel, essentially a working tunnel opened horizontally.
Within the passageway, the rail slide seat system was quietly awaiting, with supporting brackets reinforcing the side walls, drainage channels extending to the rear pit entrance, and oil lamps illuminating along the wall, revealing an intermix of moisture and rust.
The technicians marked the clear blasting range on the rock surface using red powder, distinguishing each ore-laden layer from poor ore layers.
Valentine and a few artisans instructed the detonation point numbers and ignition sequence.
The detonation formally began.
The Shatter Magic Explosion Bullets were placed in the disintegration zone, places with many natural fissures showing signs of rock layer loosening.
Devices were implanted into the rock and gently tightened with a handheld rock drill, then wires were led out to a safety point.
The Rock-Piercing Potion Bullets were used near hard rock layers and main veins, assisted by stable piles and plaster bedding to ensure the cut was smooth and didn’t collapse.
“Multiple points, small quantities, batch blasts, advance under five meters.” This was Louis’s strict rule.
A few artisans nodded to each other and quickly retreated to the rear.
Louis stood at the front end of the tunnel and waved his hand to command.
The ignition line was slowly pulled open, followed by a series of low, muffled booms.
Boom! Boom!
Shatter Magic Explosion Bullets were first to detonate, creating spider-web-like cracks, the rock layers trembled violently, but showed no signs of collapse.
A few seconds later, the Rock-Piercing Potion Bullets activated, red light snaked like a serpent, crawling along the rock surface, scorching through solid stone, burning out mirror-smooth cuts.
The entire mountain belly seemed simultaneously severed by blade and flame.
After the explosion ended, while dust had yet to settle, Valentine had already rushed forward to inspect the result.
His gaze scanned the four walls, the supports intact, rock layers smooth, with some rock surfaces even revealing glistening traces of minerals.
“The entire tunnel is open!” He shouted excitedly, “No collapse, no distortion, the vein is exposed!”
Kael was dumbstruck. He stared at the thin line of luminous rock layer, as though witnessing gemstones opening their eyes from the earth.
“Is this our extraction process? This is too…” He murmured, unsure how to describe it.
“This is just the beginning.” Louis said calmly, “Once the next generation of explosive bullets is completed, workers won’t need to drill; they’ll only need to collect ore.”
Valentine laughed so hard he couldn’t close his mouth, directly turning and shouting at the artisans and technicians: “See clearly now? This is the damned civilized explosion! Learn it and carve it into your bones!”
Applause and cheers erupted like a landslide.
And amid the deafening cheers, the first batch of broken ore was carefully loaded into the rail cars.
The wheels slowly turned, the car bodies carrying the freshly blasted ore glided silently along the slide path, like a silver dragon leading to the future, moving through the mine’s darkness towards the surface’s initial screening area.
There, the technicians swiftly sorted the ores, rapidly discarding the waste rocks.
And those stones with a faint blue glow, like the brightest stars in the night sky, were carefully placed into the “ore division area.”
“Look! It’s a Qi pulse stone! It’s a real treasure!” A young sorting technician trembled with excitement, holding the stone with both hands, almost jumping.
Kael hurried over, gazing at the shining ore core, his Adam’s apple rolling frequently, his voice trembling: “…We’ve struck it rich! Truly struck it rich!”
At this moment, the entire mining area fell into a brief silence, following a burst of fervent cheers, applause, shouts, and laughter intertwining, almost overturning the sky.
They seemed to see future mountains of gold and silver, the dawn belonging to the Red Tide Territory.
This wasn’t ordinary ore; it was a strategic treasure, a fuel coveted by countless magic artisans!
When the raw ore was neatly loaded onto the sled frame drawn by snowhorn cattle, slowly sliding from the mine entrance to the hillside transfer shed, miners and technicians almost jumped in joy, spontaneously applauding and cheering.
“This is a true miracle!” Someone shouted, “We’ve truly found hope in this abandoned vein!”
In fact, before the trial extraction, many, including some technicians and veteran miners, secretly questioned Louis’s decision.
They dared not say it outright, but quietly murmured:
“Why choose this vein? This place was mined before, couldn’t find anything good, that’s why it was abandoned.”
“This seam is too deep, too cold, the freezing stone harder than iron, even if there’s a vein, it’s probably already frozen away.”
“Does Master Louis… really know what he’s doing?”
Some even speculated, it’s just a high-up show, picking a seemingly challenging mine to establish power, truly failing to mine will only leave the groundwork to suffer in the end for these bottom-tier workers.
