Industrial Revolution of the Mage Lords

Chapter 477: Outsider

"Oh my God! Is this the train that's been rumored?"

As soon as he stepped onto the dock of Grizzlie Castle, Dave saw a steel behemoth with thick white smoke billowing out of its locomotive slowly approaching on the embankment not far from the dock.

Ever since the war in Jinhui City subsided, the newly established City Hall began to issue a large number of job recruitment notices, and at the same time, it also seized and annexed the land and farmland in the hands of the nobles. In order to seek a livelihood, the people of the "former royal capital" who did not want to leave their hometown migrated to other surrounding towns, while those who were more courageous and far-sighted... chose to accept the jobs provided by the City Hall and leave their homes to go to the wilderness to make a living.

Dave is one of those people who go north to work.

Compared to others who were full of doubts and worries, he believed that coming to the North would help him find a satisfactory job... Benny, his good friend from the same hometown who grew up with him, even joined the army in the wilderness, and the treatment seemed to be quite generous. Naturally, what he said was true.

Of course, Dave, who was penniless, could not afford the travel expenses from Jinhui City to Grizzlie County. If he wanted to take the armored sailboat provided by the city hall for free, he needed to sign a contract in advance to obey the work deployment, and the travel expenses and meals would be directly deducted from the first month's salary.

Riding on an ironclad ship was a rare and new experience for him. The fleet, laden with civilians, departed from the old capital and reached Fengyuan City in just three days, a journey that used to take a week. After anchoring at the dock for the night, they continued northward upstream...

After the fleet passed through the estuary of Sancha Town and officially entered the Grizzli Bear territory, the entire Ralph River suddenly became busy. Most of the ships passing by were strange iron ships without sails. Chatting with the sailors on the ships, I heard that ironclad ships were divided into military and civilian types, but all of them relied on magic power to operate, without having to consider the influence of wind direction and countercurrent... Even if the river was frozen in the dead of winter, they could still break the ice and move forward unscrupulously.

For an ordinary person like Dave who has always lived near the royal capital, this is simply too novel. It is worthy of being something created in the fiefdom of a wizard lord. The magic power can directly act on the people without being released through the hands of a noble spellcaster.

Dave, who had previously worked as a porter at the docks in Jinhui City, also understood that the busy flow of ships... showed how many people and goods were being transported. Even in the summer when the old capital was busiest in trade and transportation, there wouldn't be such a grand scene.

This shows how prosperous the northern city located in the wilderness is.

The propaganda notices posted by the City Hall in the streets and squares of the old royal capital are probably not self-promotion to deceive the public, but real facts.

A fellow clerk tugged at Dave, who was standing dazed on the dock, and urged him, "Stop looking! Hurry and catch up with those city hall officials. They say that to get to Spark City... you have to take that strange, rumbling, smoke-belching carriage we just saw. It seems... it's called a train!"

Dave rolled his eyes and said disdainfully, "I know it's called a train! I heard the sailors from the North mention it many times before I came here."

But what he still couldn't figure out was... How could this huge thing, which seemed to be made up of several iron boxes connected together and weighed tens of millions of pounds, carry them over the majestic Divine Ridge Mountains and finally reach the Spark City in the north?
The answer to this question was not revealed until we were urged and driven by city hall officials and queued up in a crowded manner to board the "train".

……

"Oh my God! They... they actually dug through the Divine Ridge Mountains and built such a deep mountain tunnel for... for this train to pass through the mountains!"

Although the train carriages were fully enclosed, there were still several windows covered with tarpaulins next to the two rows of long seats. As the front of the train rumbled and carried several carriages into the dark mountain, Dave felt his vision go dark. Then, a few bright white lights slowly lit up on the top of the carriages. He carefully lifted a corner of the tarpaulin on the window and found that the wind was whistling outside... In the faint light, he could vaguely see the smooth stone wall of the mountain receding rapidly.

This "train" was actually traveling through the interior of the Divine Ridge Mountains! This was the "North-South Express" that officials had been talking about, a train that could reach the wilderness from the southern border in just half a day!
Dave, like others who were experiencing it for the first time, leaned against the window with his mouth wide open, speechless. The sailless ironclad ship was incredible enough to them, but they didn't expect that there would be an even more miraculous mountain-piercing train right in front of them.

As for the slight discomfort caused by the loud noise and constant vibration of the train, it was nothing compared to the miraculous and novel experience.

"Accepting the King's City Hall's recruitment and coming to the wasteland to make a living was the wisest decision..." Dave sighed inwardly. "Even if I return home in the future, at least I can be considered a man who has seen the world."

While the crowded carriage was engaged in a heated discussion, the iron door at the end of the carriage suddenly opened with a bang, and a man in a dark blue uniform, who claimed to be a conductor, walked in pushing a light two-wheeled cart.

"Everyone, make way! Pull your feet back! Watch out for the wheels! Don't stick your head or hands out the window!" He pushed the cart expertly while shouting, his voice drowning out the noise of the train. "Motion sickness medicine! Does anyone need some? Take it orally and it works instantly!"

Selling medicine on the train? Dave was stunned for a moment, then turned to see his fellow passenger's little sister, huddled in the corner of the carriage, her face pale and blue. She had been like this since she boarded the train from the capital, unable to eat and vomiting from time to time. It was obvious that she was not acclimatizing, and perhaps she had contracted malaria...

He and his fellow villager exchanged glances and simultaneously called out to the man in blue uniform, "Wait! Doctor! We need to buy some medicine!"

The conductor turned around, bewildered, and muttered, "I'm not a doctor. Do you need motion sickness medicine? It's two gold yuan a pack, and there are ten pills in it. One pill is enough for each motion sickness."

Dave hesitated, "Please help me take a look at this child's symptoms...is it the motion sickness you mentioned?"

The conductor frowned and approached, briefly examining the listless child. He shook his head and said, "I'm really not a doctor. I can't tell you what's wrong with this child. You'll have to go to the hospital after we get off the train..."

He thought for a moment, then pulled out an unsealed package of motion sickness pills from his jacket pocket, poured one out and handed it to Dave. "Maybe it's motion sickness. Let her take this pill and see if it works."

The fellow villager quickly took the pill, coaxed and persuaded the child into giving it to him, and waited for a moment... He found that the little girl's complexion gradually improved, and her spirits became much better.

"Thank you! Thank you so much!" Dave thanked him repeatedly. He and his fellow villager took out the few poorly minted, slightly blackened silver coins from their pockets and said hesitantly, "I wonder how much this medicine costs?"

The conductor curled his lips, waved his hand, turned around and pushed the cart away.

"No money, that's medicine I prepared for myself! Besides, your currency doesn't circulate here... Remember to exchange it for gold coins when you get to Spark City."

"Ah, you outsiders are really..."

(End of this chapter)