Industrial Revolution of the Mage Lords

Chapter 192 Pangolin Project

At daybreak, Harvey, surrounded by a dozen bloodline warriors and personal guards, boarded a massive mammoth war beast and left from the south gate, heading for the junction of the northern slope of Jackdaw Ridge and the mountains south of the Pioneer Territory.

The originally dense and rugged primeval forests along the way have undergone large-scale felling and clearing. With the Ministry of Construction working day and night, a concrete gravel road has been built that goes straight to the foot of the mountain, which is fully sufficient for three giant war beasts to travel side by side.

Near the cliff at the foot of the mountain, a high concrete wall with barbed wire appeared in front of everyone. It surrounded and enclosed a steep cliff. There were tall wooden watchtowers on the three corners of the wall. Several defense soldiers stood on them and kept looking into the distance to give warnings. Several teams of soldiers were also arranged to patrol intensively outside the high wall.

The defense measures here are comparable to the core area of the lord's castle where Harvey lives, and are even stricter than the magic military factory that requires strict confidentiality.

Harvey stepped down from the war beast and walked into the open iron gate under the saluting gaze of the soldiers and officers.

The scene inside the high wall immediately made everyone who followed him exclaim in amazement - a huge hole with concrete-reinforced edges appeared on the enclosed cliff. The height and width were infinitely close, with a diameter of more than five meters.

A huge iron gate slowly rose up under the pull of the hoisting alchemy beast. This was a heavy metal gate that Harvey asked the iron foundry and the steel mill to spend half a month to cast together. In order to build this secret base, Harvey almost consumed an entire month's iron ore production from the territory mine.

The group embraced Harvey and walked into the cave. The light inside suddenly dimmed a lot.

Several bloodline warriors who were responsible for leading the way immediately took out the magic stone of illumination, fixed it with a metal bracket, and held it high up to illuminate the way ahead for the lord.

"Sir, after you pulled the half-dead macrophagnum worm here, did you conduct the alchemical life soul transformation experiment? Was it really successful?" Reiner asked in a low voice as he walked.

Harvey nodded, his voice echoing faintly in the empty mountain space. "Yes, that thing is too large to be transformed in the castle's underground laboratory. Moreover, its alchemical medium... is also specially made, so it needs to be completed here."

Asdalen also followed Harvey and sighed softly, "Even after seeing the sketch drawn by the adults themselves, I still can't imagine what kind of alchemical life form a giant life form like the macrophagous worm, which has existed since ancient times, can be transformed into..."

After a brief conversation, everyone gradually walked towards the brightly lit area ahead.

It was a huge cave that seemed to be naturally formed inside the mountain. Except for the ground which was still leveled and hardened, the top of the cave and the surrounding mountain walls remained in their original state. Several long stalactites hung above, and there were occasional water stains dripping.

This cave, which is about the size of two or three football fields, is almost entirely illuminated by the large number of lighting magic stones hanging everywhere. Without natural light and ventilation facilities, it seems somewhat stuffy and depressing.

But everyone's attention was not on observing the structure of the underground cave, but was all fixed on the giant alchemical instrument in the center of the open space, which was so huge that it was a little scary.

Harvey walked over to the giant instrument with a smile and stood next to it. His height of less than 1.8 meters was only one-third of the height of the instrument, making him look like a skinny antelope standing next to a giant mammoth.

"Seven meters high, thirty-five meters long, six meters in diameter... This is the soul carrier of the macrophagous worm. I now name it the Magic Energy Shield Machine!"

Chris, who was responsible for assisting Harvey in completing this important transformation experiment, witnessed and participated in it for the first time. This top-level alchemical secret technique involving the refining of life and the creation of souls was a top-level alchemical secret technique. Although the transformation experiment had been completed for more than a week, he was still extremely excited. Looking at this alchemical creation that was as huge as a prehistoric behemoth, his eyes were slightly red and his body trembled slightly.

"A feat of creation comparable to the creation of life itself, a genius in experimental creation and alchemical theory... Your Excellency's soul transformation experiments are countless times more advanced than those genius alchemists in the Exploration Society who are obsessed with the delusion of creating artificial gods!"

The crowd dispersed and surrounded the huge alchemical beast, looking around and praising it endlessly.

The TBM was covered in an extremely thick metal armor. Through the cracks in the tightly welded joints, one could see the delicate alchemical components and metal structures within. Much of the enchanted metal was densely engraved with countless energy-driven inscriptions. The TBM's head was particularly peculiar, a massive, conical metal structure covered in threaded grooves. The entire cone shone darkly golden against the backdrop of the illuminated magic stone.

Asdalen was silent for a moment, then suddenly asked, "Sir, is the head of this giant beast made of a single piece of the demon race's unique metallic mineral, Phantom Light Copper?"

He still vaguely remembered that in the previous battle with the evil orcs in the valley, the territory army had seized a batch of rare magical minerals weighing two to three hundred kilograms and worth at least one hundred thousand gold pounds. It was the phantom copper.

Harvey chuckled and turned to glance at Chris, indicating that he should explain the problem.

Chris clutched the collar of his robe and replied with a pained expression, "This was the master's insistence... He insisted on using such expensive and rare magical materials to forge the head of this tunnel boring machine. But the effect is very significant. After this behemoth was activated, the superb magical conductivity of the phantom copper material in its head greatly enhanced its soul's innate ability to detect minerals. This cave inside the mountain was actually discovered by its perception..."

Reiner keenly noticed a clue in Chris's words and asked in disbelief, "Activate? How much mana is needed to activate such a large alchemy beast? I'm afraid only the planetary energy array assembled by the adults themselves in the territory can output such a huge amount of energy to charge it, right?"

The territory currently has only three continental-level energy-gathering arrays, which are installed in magic military factories to be responsible for the transformation and charging of alchemical beasts. They also need to bear the production lines of magic guns and magic bullets. The energy supply is already operating at full capacity.

As for the planetary energy-gathering array, it is responsible for the smooth operation of the magic network spellcaster forum and the energy supply of several large magic network teleportation arrays. It cannot be easily moved to other places. Even the daily energy charging of Asdalen and Reiner needs to be completed in the castle area covered by its energy network.

Harvey had anticipated that Reiner and the others would ask such questions, so he smiled and asked Chris's alchemy apprentices to go to the other side of the cave and uncover all the alchemy instruments covered with tent cloths and display them in front of everyone.

"Remember the demon tribe's blood-summoning device and the magic potion injection experiment?"

Harvey pointed to dozens of neatly arranged new instruments. They were very similar in shape to the blood-summoning instruments, but significantly larger. "I had Chris dismantle the original instruments and replicate these enhanced models. They're used to convert the pure solid magic energy found in the energy-absorbing beetles into highly concentrated liquid magic energy. Injecting this into the magic-powered engine within this shield machine will activate it perfectly..."

Asdalen asked doubtfully, "The blood-summoning instrument needs to transform and prepare magical potions, and it also requires the flesh and blood of magical creatures. Where do we get these materials? There are no traces of magical creatures around the territory..."

Chris laughed heartily, "Oh, don't you forget, after the transformation of the giant worm's soul, the huge body left behind is the best flesh and blood material for magical creatures, isn't it?"

What a great way to produce and sell your own products, taking them from living worms and using them in the worm alchemy beast...

Everyone was immediately silenced by this experimental method that seemed a bit crazy.

Harvey clapped his hands to redirect everyone's attention back to him, and then he said seriously, "Next, I will launch an operation called Project Pangolin..."

Form a mineral exploration team composed of bloodline warriors and alchemy apprentices. Under the guidance and leadership of this giant worm alchemist, conduct deep excavation and drilling along the mountain of Jackdaw Ridge to find all high-value rare minerals.

This plan was a strong idea that came to Harvey after he accidentally saw a historical research paper in the ancient documents uploaded to the Magic Encyclopedia by the Federation.

The article used detailed historical materials and decades of exploration data to attempt to prove a terrifying conjecture - all the magic stone deposits in the southern countries originated from the Divine Spine Mountains that stretched across the middle of the continent.

And deep underground in the Divine Ridge Mountains, there is a high possibility that there are one or more magic stone vein cores!

(End of this chapter)