by <unknown>
Li Yao scratched his chin quickly. Well… I'm best at creating brands!
After they took a brief rest in a desolate town, a lot of warriors would join Nepenthe's army and march upward with them.
Li Yao secretly observed the army. The quality of the soldiers was out of his expectation. They were all extremely strong. It was hard to imagine that such a group of people was raised in the underground worlds where the resources were highly inadequate. Although their spiritual roots were not awakened, they all had bulging muscles and rising temples, which suggested that they were all good fighters.
Li Yao secretly compared them to the general soldiers of the Star Glory Federation, only to discover that they were not very far behind in terms of body quality.
Thinking quickly, Li Yao soon realized that it was probably a "survivorship bias".
First of all, the refugees escaping to the underground worlds over the past tens of thousands of years were certainly the elites and experts on the ground back then. So, their bloodlines had been very powerful since the beginning.
It was exactly because of the harsh environment and the shortage of resources in the underground worlds that the people who were relatively weak were screened out in the cruel filtering in the ten thousand years, their genes eradicated in the infinite darkness.
The people whose bloodlines survived to this day were naturally the most stubborn and strong ones!
Most of the warriors in the army used to be miners and relic explorers. They were the best type of soldiers.
Miners were sturdy and highly organized. To control the complicated and precise mining magical equipment, they had to be more or less educated. At the very least, they knew the operations of a lot of magical equipment and how to maintain the simple-structured civil magical equipment. So, they could control the military magical equipment after slight training.
Also, the mine owners of the Imperium of True Human Beings, to reduce the cost and increase productivity, often insanely modified their miners, which, objectively, transformed them into monsters with infinite strength.
Think about it. If a miner's work efficiency was higher than a spiritual puppet, he must be as good at smashing someone's head into pieces.
In the "Heavenly Ring Sector", one of the four new worlds of the Star Glory Federation, a great riot of the miners against the rulers had taken place before. Ding Lingdang was even the organizer of the riot who experienced it in person. Later, when she chatted with Li Yao about the details, Li Yao learned how terrifying the well-trained miners could be after they were organized.
It was needless to say the relic explorers.
Although the Immortal Cultivators were just using hominoids as mice, which they put in the unexplored relics to test the traps and the defense rune arrays, and nine out of ten "mice" were killed in accidents, those who luckily survived could become terrifying monsters after they passed the trials of the relics.
Boss Bai, the Pirate Potentate that Li Yao encountered in the Flying Star Sector, was such a relic explorer at the beginning.
There was also "Heaven Battering King Qi Changsheng", one of the "Four Rapscallions" of the Ancient Sages Sector on par with Long Yangjun. The man and his Heaven Battering Army were grave robbers at the beginning, which was another kind of relic explorers.
While the relic explorers were far fewer than miners in number, they were the captains and lieutenants of the army. Every one of them had been lashed by the Immortal Cultivators with electromagnetic whips to explore the unknown relics and survived when too many of their companions were killed. Naturally, they were full of resentment for the Immortal Cultivators.
Such an army, after being armed by the magical equipment excavated from the warehouses, shelters, and relics, was truly not to be underestimated. Chances were that they could really achieve something great.
Chapter 2373: Thing in the Great Iron Plants! |
Since they had already been gathered into an army, they would certainly be discovered if they were to move together. Most of the soldiers hid in the forsaken towns and mines not far away from the "Great Iron Plants" and would turn into a surging torrent below the ground at an order.
Only Long Yangjun, Li Yao, Li Jialing, and the few experts in the army were bold enough to approach the Great Iron Plants and contact the local Nepenthe believers who were directly commanded by the Grand Guardian.
The underground worlds were essentially a giant maze made of countless caves that were connected through tunnels and gaps. Theoretically speaking, it was easier to defend than to attack. As long as an elite troop was sent to block the critical tunnel between two caves, nobody would be able to move between the two places.
However, the Great Iron Plants was a developed mining area that had been operating for a hundred years. There were simply too many complicated, interconnected holes and channels. Even the most experienced miner might not know where exactly a deep, dark branch inside a certain tunnel led to.
In the meantime, in order to transmit fresh air and clean water from the top to the bottom, and to ship the precious resources from the bottom to the top, tremendous ventilation and logistical systems were required.
In the past tens of thousands of years, the demons had built such tube systems, and so did the Star Ocean Imperium and the Star Ocean Republic. Naturally, the Imperium of True Human Beings was not an exception either.
The tube systems abandoned by the previous regimes became the best shortcuts for the secret march. It was impossible to catch them with the few Immortal Cultivators in the area.
Among the Nepenthe believers, there were old miners who had spent their entire lives with rocks. Li Yao was also an unparalleled expert when it came to traveling in ventilation tubes. They crawled from the cracks into the ventilation tubes, from the ventilation tubes to the tunnels, and from the tunnels to an abandoned cave that had been drained decades ago smoothly without meeting any trouble.
According to the regulations of the excavation industry in the Imperium of True Human Beings, caves that had been completely drained must be filled with rocks and rapidly-consolidating liquid metals to ensure the stability of the entire tectonic structure and to prevent the massive collapses and tectonic movements from affecting the worlds of Immortal Cultivators on the ground.
However, the cost to refill the rocks was very high. For the greedy, corrupted Immortal Cultivators, the regulations were nothing but nonsense. The Black Iron Group was under the name of the Dongfang family at the beginning. The capital was not the Dongfang family's territory. Why would Li Minghui care about the regulations at all?
Therefore, the Great Iron Plants was surrounded by dark, empty caves that had been abandoned. The Nepenthe believers spent a few years digging through most of the caves before they covered the caves with disguises carefully. The rocks in the area were like a tree that had been hollowed by ants. They were full of holes inside but showed nothing outside.
Li Yao and Long Yangjun crawled out of the depths of such a cave. They had bypassed the guards of the Black Iron Group and appeared on the rocks not far away from the Great Iron Plants.
Wearing the gray cape, everybody seemed to be melted with the rocks nearby. As they observed the general picture of the Great Iron Plants from the high stance, the first thing that could be seen was naturally the well of magma at the center of the factories, which looked like an erupting volcano.
The torch that was ignited by billions of fires was burning and screaming furiously. Although they were several kilometers away, they could still sense the scorching heat. Sparks seemed to be splashing on their faces when they blinked.
According to Long Yangjun, below where the Great Iron Plants was at was a place where three mother lodes of fiery spiritual energy were gathered. They could yield the very intense and stable spiritual energy of the fire class. In the terms of the modern Cultivation civilization, there was a magma belt below the Great Iron Plants, which had a super high temperature, a super high pressure, and a very steady tecto
nic structure. Also, since there were a few rare mines nearby that had a high reserve and an excellent quality, a lot of purification factories were established on the spot to refine the minerals with the geothermal energy. The raw minerals would be shipped to the surface of the planet after they were refined into concentrates. In such a way, the cost would be significantly reduced.
Li Yao looked far away and did see the geothermal factory that was constructed around the well of flames, as well as the mines, purification factories, and fashioning factories that were based on the geothermal factory. There was also a factory that produced the components of magical equipment.
The refining furnaces large and small rose all the way to the dome of the space like cold giants, making the underground space that was supposed to be spacious rather suffocating.
The trickiest problem for underground refining was not the water but the discharge of poisonous wastes. Li Yao noticed that a lot of giant tubes with powerful attraction forces were distributed on the dome and the wall of the Great Iron Plants. They were pumping the black air that was so dirty that it was almost consolidating without any stop. After multiple filtering procedures, the toxins were all screened out and compressed into very small cubes, and the air that had been cleaned would be provided back.
Although the thousand most powerful air cleaning devices for industrial purposes were working at the highest efficiency, the air was still filled with all kinds of choking flavors. Even Li Yao felt slightly uncomfortable, as if somebody had stuffed two clusters of hybrids of rubber and asphalt into his nostrils. He truly wondered how the workers and their families could handle it.
"In fact, the Imperium of True Human Beings is just like the New Federation before your return. A lot of demon workers are used here. To be more exact, the 'demonic cells' inside the body of the bottom-level workers are activated through all kinds of drugs, giving them a myriad of uncanny 'abilities' that have severe side effects."
Long Yangjun said in a low voice, "Or rather, ever since the demons' reign collapsed ten thousand years ago, humans have never stopped enslaving demons at the center of the cosmos. Leaving aside the high-level demons, the strong and sturdy low-level demons are the best labor force. Who could've been determined enough to slaughter all the 'livestock'? Wouldn't it have been a great waste?
"Of course, to defend the dignity and pride of mankind, and for 'humanitarianism' reasons, the simple and crude approaches to completely transform humans into bizarre-looking demons are rare today. However, to partly modify the organs inside a human body or to let the human beings with certain demonic genes to mate according to the principle of 'eugenics' so that offspring with certain functions may be produced, just like how pet dogs are bred, has never stopped.
"For the workers living inside the heavily-polluted factories below the ground, their respiratory system is more like demons than like humans, which allows them to survive and work in the heavily polluted area.
"But the advantage comes with a cost. The demonic genes can only help improve their working abilities in their prime years, but they cannot stop the lethal heavy metals from accumulating inside their bodies. The final result will be a significantly reduced longevity and the possible damage to their intelligence. For the owners of the factories, that is not exactly a 'cost' at all. After all, they do not need the miners to live to the end of their natural lives or to have a high intelligence. It will be easier to control the workers if they are dumber."
Li Yao was both scared and infuriated. "Those Immortal Cultivators are truly unbelievably sordid!"
"I'm afraid that you are wronging the Immortal Cultivators."
Long Yangjun said coldly, "The Immortal Cultivators are just the successors of the practice, not the founders. Back in the Star Ocean Republic, those sanctimonious Cultivators built 'model factories' on the surface of the planet during the day, and such factories were beautiful and full of flowers and birds. But below the ground where the sunlight could not reach, weren't they doing exactly the same thing? After all, since the demonic genes of those workers had been activated, they could be considered to have been corrupted by demons, or simply a part of demons.
"Demons are the greatest enemy of mankind. Then, neither the Cultivators nor the Immortal Cultivators should have any guilt when enslaving the 'demons', right?"
Li Yao was silent. He suddenly wanted to appreciate Jin Xinyue for what she had done in the past hundred years.
If it weren't for her resistance with the demons, would the Star Glory Federation have kept so many cruel factories like those here today?
They were certainly not the things that should exist in Li Yao's dream world!
Apart from the fatal gas, the deafening noises raised by the thousand air-cleaning devices when they were functioning with the full power also hovered above the Great Iron Plants incessantly like thousands of snakes that were dripping venom, finding a way into everyone's ears.
Li Yao tried concealing his spiritual energy to the minimum and just resisting the noises with his tough body. But very soon, his mouth was dry, his heart was racing, his back was covered in sweat, and his veins were bouncing. Countless dark and bloody thoughts popped up in his heart.
"How about it?"
Long Yangjun said with a smile, "You should understand now why so many people are crying, screaming, and begging me to practice the Serenity Arts, shouldn't you? It will certainly be worth it if the skill can do nothing other than to resist the ceaseless noises!"
Narrowing his eyes, Li Yao observed the air cleaning magical equipment above his head that was running stridently. He shook his head and said, "This is unreasonable. Even though it may be a high-power air cleaning system for industrial purposes, as long as it is carefully produced and regularly maintained with the replacement of quieting pads, such earsplitting noises will be impossible. There's no reason why the Imperium of True Human Beings cannot resolve the problem that even the Star Glory Federation can take care of!"
"Like you said yourself, it needs to be 'carefully produced' and 'regularly maintained with the replacement of quieting pads'. Each replacement will mean that parts of the factories have to be shut down. The cost is very high, alright?"
Long Yangjun said, "Compared to such a high cost, it will be a lot cheaper to simply offer three headsets to every worker and their family every month. Which approach do you think an Immortal Cultivator like Li Minghui will adopt?"
Li Yao frowned. "The air cleaning system is running all the time, which means that the noises will not be away for a single second. Wouldn't it be very inconvenient for the local residents to talk to each other with their ears stuffed every day?"
"Such an inconvenience can't be better!"
Long Yangjun said, "They might as well not talk and just shut up and work for the Immortal Cultivators diligently. Wouldn't that be much greater?"
Chapter 2374: Rise in the Chaos! |
Silently, Li Yao focused his spiritual energy on his eyes and observed the workers in the Great Iron Plants carefully by maximizing his eyesight.
When observed from so far away, the workers who were busy working on the furnaces, the tubes, and the iron scaffolds were like black and brown ants.
Most of them had covered themselves tightly in gray capes and were wearing simple protective respirators and eyepatches. Their skin that was exposed to the air, however, had been smeared into brown and black because of the dust and the pollutants. Also, because of the protective earplugs that they were wearing, they were somewhat sluggish and inert, like a bunch of mechanical reptiles that were not fully-wound or a group of lifeless zombies.
Li Yao finally understood why Nepenthe could spread far and wide in the area without being noticed. Whether or not the workers had practiced the Serenity Arts, they looked equally emotionless, like machines experiencing mental fatigue.
Most of the workers were occupied inside the mines or the factories and could not be directly noticed. However, Li Yao did notice that workers were dragging carts o
f raw minerals from caves in rows.
Even such a simple job that could absolutely be taken over by spiritual puppets was shouldered by the hominoid miners. As far as Li Yao's eyes could reach, the only spiritual puppets he saw were the monitors at the commanding heights. In the Great Iron Plants, it was machines that were supervising the work of humans and maintaining the cruel and bloody order!
Li Yao even saw a cross-shaped execution terrace in a corner of the factory area. A hominoid miner was tied to it, and a battle puppet was slapping the miner's back that was full of scars brutally with an electromagnetic whip.
Pa! Pa! Pa! Pa!
Flesh and blood were splashing together with sparks. The hominoid miner was screaming miserably because of the excruciating pain.
A hundred hominoid miners were forced to watch him by the battle puppets. There was no telling their countenance because their faces were covered by the masks, but judging from their shaking shoulders, they were obviously in extreme fear and anger.
Also, based on the bloodstains around the execution terrace, it was clear that somebody was sent here for punishment every other day.
Clenching his fists, Li Yao mumbled to himself, "What crimes have this worker committed to deserve such whipping?"
Long Yangjun said, "He has been whipped more than ten times. So, it is probably a major crime like damaging the mining magical equipment instead of a minor crime like spending too much time in the toilet."
Li Yao was rather surprised. "What? Spending too much time in the toilet is a 'crime' that needs to be punished by whipping?"
