Don’t raise unruly people in extreme cold weather

Chapter 856

The Desert Kingdom is an ancient land surrounded by a sea of ​​golden sands. It has been the cradle of human civilization since the mythological era when gods walked the earth.

Mother rivers like the Nile and the Euphrates once meandered here, nourishing a brilliant civilization.

After three thousand years of changes, the dynasty changes recorded in cuneiform and the golden age praised in hieroglyphics have now been turned into fine sand by time.

The oasis city that was once bustling with caravans is now left with only wind-eroded pottery fragments; the fertile fields that once saw rolling waves of wheat have long been swallowed up by moving sand dunes.

Only the temple columns built with ochre-red sandstone still stand stubbornly in the yellow sand.

The strong wind swept through the ruined palace columns, making a whimpering sound like an ancient harp. The fragments of murals inlaid with lapis lazuli still told of the glory of the pharaohs and priests when they ruled.

Occasionally, a shepherd would pick up a clay tablet with strange characters on it, or a golden amulet with a scarab embedded in it - these were the fragments of memory left by the desert kingdom to the present world, witnessing how this land gradually changed from a paradise with lush vegetation to its current state forgotten by the gods.

With the coming of the doomsday winter, this land of yellow sand that had been scorched by the eternal sun for thousands of years was dyed into a vast expanse of white.

Although this is a desert where snow may not fall for hundreds of years, now that the entire world has been frozen into an ice field, this ancient land has not been spared.

The biting cold wind replaced the previous heat waves, whistling through the ruined temples and collapsed obelisks, freezing the once scorching sand into hard ice crystals.

But unlike other places, this desert may be too dry. Even in such extreme cold weather today, ice and snow still cannot completely cover the entire sea of ​​sand.

Amid the white snow, you can still see some exposed yellow sand, like the skin of the earth struggling to be exposed because it is unwilling to be completely frozen.

The strong wind swept across, blowing up tiny pieces of ice and dust, and setting off a chaotic storm between the pale sky and earth.

Sand and snow intertwined and danced, blurring the distant horizon. It seemed as if time had stopped here, leaving only this frozen desert, still silently witnessing the end of the world.

However, even though it is covered by yellow sand and ice and snow, the fire of human survival is still beating deep in this dead desert.

The empire's colonies are like stubborn thorns, deeply rooted in this land forgotten by the gods.

Although the harsh winter of the end of the world destroyed most settlements and reduced many towns to frozen ruins, when Queen Anne last visited this territory, she could still find settlements with smoke rising from chimneys in the gaps between the wind and snow, and cities that were still standing in the wind and snow.

What is even more surprising is that some local kings and chiefs are ready to make moves in the end times.

Wrapped in mottled leopard-skin cloaks and armed with ancestral bronze scimitars, they attacked imperial supply teams under the cover of sandstorms.

These chiefs, who claim to be descendants of ancient pharaohs, regard the extreme cold as punishment from gods for alien rule and attempt to rebuild the long-lost desert dynasty.

However, in the face of the Divine Knights supported by Perfectcot, these resistances melted away quickly like snowflakes under the scorching sun.

The blood of the rebels dyed the smoothies red, and the severed heads of the chiefs were hung on flagpoles in the colonial square - just as their ancestors had treated the rebels three thousand years ago.

When the flag of the empire was once again raised on top of the pyramid ruins, the final restlessness of this land was forever frozen under the ice.

To be honest, if it was prosperous in the past, this land would indeed be worth the empire's efforts. It is connected to the blue waves of the Romulus Inland Sea in the north and the waves of another vast ocean in the south, just like a wedge embedded between the civilization of the old world and the ruins of the desert kingdom.

Caravans once met here, transporting silk and spices from the East with gold, silver and glass from the West; warships also anchored here, controlling the throat of the two seas.

The port docks built with granite still have deep wear marks on the mooring stones, telling of the grand scene of thousands of ships competing in the past.

However, now, all these strategic values ​​have disappeared with the coming of the end of the world.

The Inland Sea of ​​Romulus froze into a thick ice field, and the once busy waterway was reduced to white silence; although the ocean on the other side was not completely frozen, the raging blizzard made any sailing a luxury.

Trade routes were cut off, ports were abandoned, and even the most stubborn merchants evacuated this desperate situation.

The geographical advantage that once served as a bridge between the East and the West now only makes the colonies endure the biting cold winds from two icy seas at the same time.

The Imperial Fleet was frozen in the ice in the harbor, like a metal coffin.

What’s even more ironic is that even the desert kingdom itself has become a burden.

The oases and mineral veins that were once worth fighting for are now nothing more than death traps covered in ice and snow; the clay tablets that record ancient wisdom have become brittle and worthless fragments in the extreme cold.

The cost of maintaining the colony far outweighs any reward it can offer - there is really nothing left in this land worth defending except the unquestionable majesty of Her Majesty the Queen.

But for Perfect, who had witnessed the miracle of the desert in the original world, this snow-covered desert still hides an amazing code of wealth.

She knew better than anyone that beneath the seemingly barren yellow sand, there lay dormant black liquid gold - oil, which was the treasure that could truly change the fate of the empire.

According to the imperial geological exploration report before the arrival of the extreme cold doomsday, the geological structure of this area was surprisingly similar to the oil-producing belt in the Arabian Peninsula.

Perfect would often gaze at the oil sand samples that the colonists brought back from deep in the sand. The sticky black substance glowed with a rainbow-like luster in the firelight, reminding him of the desert empires in his original world that were built on petrodollars.

As long as we can break through the blockade of the permafrost and establish a complete mining system, this barren land will instantly become a treasure trove of black gold.

He once sketched a blueprint for the future on parchment: towering drilling platforms pierced the ice field, refinery chimneys stood at the end of the desert, and oil pipelines connected the lifeline of the empire like blood vessels.

Those colonies that are now shivering in the wind and snow may very likely develop into prosperous oil city-states comparable to the desert cities in the original world.

But the premise of all this is that they must survive this long winter and defend this piece of frozen land that seems worthless but actually contains the future lifeline of the empire.

And now, Perfect has arrived on this land with her floating city, and she has enough technical strength to penetrate the frozen soil and extract oil.

This will undoubtedly completely change the positioning of the Desert Kingdom region in the entire Victoria Empire.

(End of this chapter)