Industrial Cthulhu, starting from the island lord

Chapter 412: 135% Enrollment Rate
Is it feasible to build a railway to the North?
It's theoretically feasible, but no one has actually tried it yet.

Throughout Earth's history, there have been instances of railways being built specifically for war, but this is the first time such a project has been undertaken in this world.

From an engineering perspective, there are no problems at all; in fact, it can be considered simple. Hughes plans to recruit a large number of workers from Blood Harbor to join the railway construction project. This part is not difficult, but it requires a lot of manpower. In order to prevent cognitive interference, certain training will also be necessary.

Castells had experience with these things before. From literacy classes to specialized training, the Guardians of the Church were very familiar with them, and even had a lot of experience in organizing study groups. If it was just about general education, they could easily pull out a large number of trainees.

If the construction goes smoothly, the remaining problem will be security.

Are there any dangers when building railway tracks?
Hughes thought it wasn't a big problem. First, since the workers involved in the construction were being taught by the religious guards, it wouldn't be a big problem for them to also take on some defensive duties.

Moreover, the workers can also receive some military training.

If the army can engage in construction, then workers can also be armed.

But these were all light infantry, which were by no means light for the enemies of this era, but Hughes was still somewhat uneasy.

We need to get some big stuff for the young men in the missionary corps to take with them.

A harbinger of death?

No, there's no need. There's a simpler way—just have the armored train's locomotive follow.

When fighting broke out at the front, they retreated to the vicinity of the armored train and relied on the heavy firepower on the train for defense.

Support? The support is coming by train, it won't be slow at all!
Moreover, another locomotive can be set up for transporting supplies, so there will be no shortage of building materials, ammunition, food, or water.

If we advance with the railway as the core, logistics will not be a problem.

But despite the good intentions, as soon as the project was launched, a bunch of unexpected troubles immediately arose.

The first issue is the expeditionary force.

"How many?" Hughes stood up, looking at Alexei with disbelief. "Tell me again, what percentage of the people enlisted in the expeditionary force?"

Alexei's expression was strange: "135%, sir, 135% of the people have signed up."

Hughes paused for two seconds, then asked, "What? Mathematics no longer exists? And suddenly there's an extra 35% of the population?"

"Well, because our expeditionary force has a lot of engineering projects to do, we recruit not only the Christian Guards, but also a lot of workers. As you know, many workers have Christian Guard status. They signed up as workers and then signed up as Christian Guards."

Hughes's eye twitched, and he turned to look at Nini.

"Don't worry, my lord. Only Ash from our Banshee clan has signed up for the expeditionary force; the others haven't."

"Really?" Hughes looked at the booklet in his hand suspiciously. "But you applied for a total of twenty war correspondent groups?"

"Well, these are just personal hobbies of everyone, and I can't really interfere."

Hughes gave a cold laugh.

"Okay, then I'll assume you want to do an interview, but why did you apply for so many Dragon Breath Cannons? Each person could get four, why didn't you each take six?"

"Then we need to keep two hands to write the battle reports!"

Good heavens, four hands create battle reports, two hands record them, is this how you war correspondents record them?
If there's no news, create it; if there are no results, fabricate them. Others are just making things up in terms of numbers, but can you actually produce those fabricated results? Hughes had a feeling that if this group of "war correspondents" were really sent to the battlefield, before the Church Guard had even finished building the railway, they would be having to use dragon breath cannons to interview Count Bazel.

"By the way, do you all use dragon breath cannons? Why didn't you bring the Gatling gun? Did you stop liking it so quickly?"

Wasn't it you who was running around the firing range with six Gatling guns back then?

Nini gave a look of disdain: "Gatling gun? That thing is just a toy for Monica, only good for shooting coyotes."

Ever since Ash got a coyote and incidentally caused agricultural pollution, a trend of keeping coyotes as pets has become popular among banshees.

Moreover, some female banshees walk their wolves without leashes, and there have already been several incidents of coyotes stealing fries. Hughes is preparing to introduce new policies.

“That won’t work either. Dragon Breath Cannon is powerful, but its range is not as good as a heavy machine gun. We still need to bring some Gatling guns.” Hughes pulled out the application form and started making changes to it.

"You agree!?" Nini's tail stood on end in surprise, swaying like a rattlesnake.

“I agree.” Hughes glanced at Nini, whose face was beaming with joy. “But!”

"Uh, but what?"

"The number of banshees in each war correspondent group must be limited to one, and they must be accompanied and supervised by a religious guard. All actions must be carried out under command, and any matter must be reported in advance."

Nini's tail tip drooped: "Then, that means only a few people can go, right?"

"I wasn't planning to send many people anyway. This is a war of mortals. Besides, you want to go to the North to fight? Are you trying to have a paid vacation? Anyway, the number of people is fixed: twenty war correspondents and twenty banshees. You can decide for yourselves. I will assign the accompanying guards. You can hand them over to them in person."

Nini walked out the door dejectedly, but after walking a short distance, she seemed to suddenly remember something, paused for a moment, and then excitedly and quickly left.

Hughes didn't pay attention to these details; he turned to Alexei and began discussing the matter of the Guardians of the Church.

"Alexei, the issue of the expeditionary force's quota still needs further discussion—we also need to coordinate with the Secret Order. Have you seen Josh and Zoe?"

Alexei nodded with a bitter expression.

Josh and Zoe came to the island specifically to apply for some spots in the expeditionary force.

Moreover, their reasons were quite valid: the Secret Order was mostly composed of refugees from the North, and it was only natural for them to want revenge. Alexei wanted to refuse, but Zoe interrupted him with "You're from the North too, aren't you?"

Alexei, being a Northerner, was enraged upon hearing about Nora's situation and wished he could immediately return to the North to avenge her.

No one in the North could bear to see their fellow countrymen suffer and be bullied, and Alexei could no longer bring himself to say the words of refusal.

“I have no grounds to refuse,” Alexei sighed.

"Why refuse?" Hughes looked down at the application.

"This is certainly because they have not received systematic military training, are not proficient in using new weapons, and their combat effectiveness is definitely inferior to that of the Christian Guard."

Hughes laughed and shook his finger: "You're thinking wrong, Alexei."

(End of this chapter)