Will the kemonomimi encounter Alien Ranch Story?

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At the Ursus Western Army Group's base, the rumbling tracks rolled over the dirt road, raising clouds of dust that blotted out the sky. Military transport ships passed through the defense zone almost end to end, their cargo containers piled high with various kinds of cargo.

"Has the supply arrived?" Ever since Ursus's basic national policy shifted from external expansion to internal development, the army has been gradually reduced and merged in order to decrease the empire's financial expenditure.

Although it didn't reach the point of distributing dog food to the Soviet army like in the late Soviet era, military pay and supplies were still being provided normally, but the quantity had been significantly reduced.

Those backed by local nobles were better off, as they needed a certain level of military force to maintain local autonomy. Therefore, local nobles were generally willing to provide some money and resources, while warlords were even more adept at making money.

However, things were a bit tough for General Helag's men. Helag himself was a penniless nobleman who was unwilling to turn his army into his private property. He also had some principles and patriotism and would not allow his men to engage in plundering.

Although the general turned a blind eye to some shady income, such as charging fees to passing merchants and accepting gifts while providing escorts and rescues for caravans.

After all, if even this is blocked, these officers, who rely on the empire's military pay, will have no choice but to drink human blood to survive, and the lower-ranking soldiers will have no way to live.

Even so, daily food and expenses were still tight, and only when there was a small battle could they have a little meat.

"Supplies? His Majesty the Emperor isn't that generous—" another sentry scoffed. "These are vehicles from the logistics department. They're supposed to escort domestic caravans, but they're really just for transporting goods for others."

In Terra, plagued by natural disasters and rampant bandits, it is common for caravans to request military escorts. This is also a channel for maintaining basic trade and material exchanges between cities. For most Terran nations, the military has an obligation to escort legitimate caravans to other defense zones, protecting them from bandit raids.

The exception is Colombia, which has no army; its entire defense is provided by Raytheon Industries. Therefore, they are not obligated to escort caravans; this is a legitimate paid service.

Of course, if you can't afford Thor, you can downgrade to Blacksteel. If you can't afford Blacksteel either, you can hire Rhine Lab or Rembitox. If you don't have the money for either of those, there are plenty of mercenaries and swordsmen like the one who carved the knife.

In Ursus, this is considered an invisible yet legitimate source of income for the various army groups; theoretically, it is their obligation.

However, in order to ensure that these people would do their best and not suddenly turn into elite bandits halfway through the journey, caravans would usually give them a small reward, like a tip, to avoid any mishaps.

"However, thanks to their efforts, our meals are much better now."

The rye bread with sawdust was now replaced with rye bread with bran and chaff, and the quartermaster would provide soldiers and officers who performed well in training and duty with small amounts of sugary drinks and low-proof potato liquor.

Moreover, it is said that the logistics department has received a batch of brand-new cold-weather gear. The brothers on duty outside said that winter duty is not as difficult as before.

This is all thanks to the guys in the logistics and transportation department who somehow landed such a long-term, large order.

Moreover, the other party paid quite readily, and the items were all hard currency, such as refined flour, frozen meat, sugar, and alcohol.

"Boom boom—" Vehicles started up in the camp, it seemed that the second transport convoy was about to go and needed armored escort. Transport missions of this scale inevitably require escort.

Otherwise, friendly forces from neighboring legions might temporarily turn into bandits, not to mention that some noble private armies and small-scale rebel groups are extremely enthusiastic about attacking military transport convoys.

"But this number is a bit strange, why are there so many?" This is the second batch of the day. I heard that all the vehicles and ships at the transfer center are being used. "Did they dig up treasure in the snowfields?"

Have you ever seen a treasure trove containing only flour and sugar?

"Well, that makes sense." If it were minerals or something else, one could say they went to the snowfields to dig for treasure or robbed someone, but all the agricultural products in neat, uniform packaging are obviously manufactured.

“Standing guard and still bragging? Do you want to get whipped?” The small outpost fell silent for a moment, but not for long. “I think I can smell the aroma of sweet malt whiskey.”

“Me too…” All eyes turned to the cockpit of the transport ship, which was waiting for the escort team to depart. The guy at the helm happily pulled out a bottle of wine from below and poured himself a glass.

In other countries' militaries, drinking alcohol during transport missions or while on duty would likely result in disciplinary action.

In Ursus, drinking while on duty might result in punishment, but drinking on transport missions... well, that's practically an open secret. Or rather, if they didn't drink, they might not drive at all.

Of course, there is another crucial condition: when transporting goods on a frozen snowfield, if you don't have some warming supplies, the entire crew will perish sooner or later.

Soon, this round of transport began again. Land transport of bulk goods mainly relies on land-based ships, which can only carry a few hundred tons of goods at a time. This time, flour alone would require approximately 30 shipwrecks.

There were also about five shipments of bean products, and nearly 50-80 shipments of the largest cargo – fish.

The yield of fast-growing fish species in the Star Alliance is about 6 tons per acre, but it may be lower if fish are raised using nets on the river surface.

However, based on the water surface area and depth, the actual number of fast-growing white-fleshed fish produced at one time has exceeded 4.8 tons per year. They are harvested about once every three to four months and then processed into fish paste to make fish meat-type protein energy bars.

This doesn't even include the beef and fast-growing pork slaughtered on the ranch. The beef doesn't need to be transported out for sale; it can be consumed locally. At most, a batch of the best is reserved for the boss. As for the pork, with intensive fattening, it can be slaughtered in batches every three and a half months.

If we reduce labor costs a bit, we can raise a batch every five months, which is two batches a year. With the scale of the farm, we might not have enough to feed ourselves in the first two years, but starting this year, we will have a surplus.

After deducting the amount for their own consumption, there were still 2,000 pigs left to be exported. The logistics department paid for 1,000 of these pigs, each weighing about 150 kilograms, with a meat yield of about 0.75, which is about 120 kilograms of meat. In fact, the bones and internal organs could also be utilized.

Nearly fifty tons of meat products were processed into Russian sausages, smoked meat, smoked ribs, cured lard, and other products, almost collapsing the entire legion's logistics department on the spot—after all, meat will rot if it's not processed quickly.

Not to mention that the transportation department in Helag is operating at full capacity to ensure a bumper summer harvest, even the commercial transportation company of the Swire Group, which is responsible for the harvest, is having a headache. The cargo boxes in the warehouse have never been seen to go down. One day a fleet of goods is loaded and sent to the transshipment center in Victoria, and the next day a whole bunch of stuff is sent over.

This is after the various warlords took nearly 40% of the cargo. Without this cut, the actual cargo box height would be even higher.

"What on earth was he doing on the snowfield?" Big Tiger was completely baffled, holding the Xia Group's trade figures reported by his subordinates.

That doesn't make sense. You said you exported tens of thousands of tons of ore, and he wasn't surprised at all; he even thought it was just so-so.

But what the hell do you mean by sending me nearly 100,000 tons of meat products from the snowfield?

Although it's fish meat, he hasn't tried those fish paste-flavored protein strips yet, otherwise he would have discovered an even more troublesome problem—these are all "protein nutrition bags" manufactured according to the Star Alliance Standard Category II ship meal standard.

This means that they have undergone preliminary processing and seasoning, and can be directly heated and supplied in the ship's kitchen, or used as cooking ingredients like canned or vacuum-packed food to make fish soup, fish ball powder, flavor enhancers, etc.

This means that, according to the traditional thinking of the Terrans, they not only have the means to eat meat, but they also add spices to it, and they dump these spices and seasonings on a massive scale—

To be honest, if this had been sent from Iberia or the Great Yan, no one would be surprised, given their national strength.

It's not surprising that it was sent from Ursus, after all, they are rich in resources, have a vast territory, and a large population. If you really want to exploit them, this output is child's play—but you sent it from the snowfields!

Besides these, there are also seasonings such as chicken essence, monosodium glutamate (MSG), and salt. However, these things, which total less than a thousand tons, are practically invisible mixed in with this huge pile of fish bags.

While it may be hard to understand, the stronger the partner's capabilities, the greater the benefits of the cooperation. These goods don't even need to be sent elsewhere; Victoria can process them all on its own. Not to mention, a batch can actually be exported back to some border cities in Ursus.

As retail giants, they have the capacity to absorb all these products. However, if the snowfields continue to be cleared for farming, they won't be able to handle the workload, at least not the Victoria department. And transporting them to other countries over long distances would result in losses.

Clearly, Lao Xia thought the same way. Apart from advanced technology products, the Snowfield Base could only supply Ursus and neighboring countries like Sami with agricultural products that were close to the farms.

Its positioning is as a large-scale breeding center and advanced technology center, while Longmen is positioned as a distribution center, primary processing center and assembly center, and Kazdel and Kazimir are two other agricultural production centers.

[Cold climates do have advantages for establishing seed banks and conducting scientific research; they're like natural refrigerators...]

According to Lao Xia's calculations, these three agricultural centers can cover the agricultural product markets of almost all countries in Terra, forming a perfect triangle. As for the functions of the other two product centers...

Kazdel has a large temperature range, is arid, has hot days, high accumulated temperature, and high photosynthetic efficiency. It is expected to be a production area for sugar crops and cotton, and can also be used to build super-large solar farms, and incidentally raise sheep to produce wool—as for whether there will be scenes of sheep eating people, he doesn't care that much.

After all, Kazdel is a country in the midst of a civil war, and it's in the south, unlike the Ursus snowfields. A compassionate approach here would mean weakness and being plundered, unlike the tragedy on the snowfields where burning down farms would lead to mass starvation.

Moreover, the population density is different from that of the snowfields of Ursus, and transportation is convenient. Simply put, there is an abundant supply of cheap labor and a transportation infrastructure.

And there's another major problem: the land here isn't a snowfield; it's all owned.

Various tribes, kings, and nobles occupy it. Simply put, for Kazdel, Old Xia's strategy is: the warm period is over.

What follows is the daily life of southern plantations and sheep eating people, and these people cannot be appeased, or rather, a considerable number of them cannot be appeased.

It was a time of land consolidation and killing with money as a weapon. Otherwise, without concentrating enough manpower and land area, it would be difficult to form an agricultural production center of sufficient scale. For the Kazdel people, such days might have to last for hundreds more years, amidst tribal wars, divisions, poverty, and discrimination.

Kazimir, on the other hand, is a completely different story. It's a sparsely populated area with fertile land, and the local nobles are still in the era of manor knights, making it the most suitable place for cash crops. After all, growing cash crops here won't lead to starvation. Of course, it's also necessary to maintain a considerable scale of food production.

The vast land and sparse population meant that land acquisition was easy, the era of manor knights meant that defeating them was not difficult, and there were a large number of skilled farmers and serfs. The fertile land meant that the reliance on Lao Xia's advanced fertilizers and pesticides was slightly lower.

Most importantly, Kazimierz has excellent geographical conditions. It is a vast plain with easy access to all directions. Ursus, Victoria, Sargon, Kazdel, Iberia and other places are all around it. Even if they are not directly adjacent, they are not far apart in a straight line.

If it weren't for the natural disasters in Terra, Old Xia would have already convinced Little Tiger to pool his money to build a transcontinental railway. This would have allowed the metal ores of Rembiton, the industrial products of Victoria, the energy of Ursus, the seafood of Iberia, and the gold and manpower of Sargon and Kazdel to circulate freely. Kazimir would have also become rapidly wealthy due to its status as the central hub of the transcontinental railway network.

However, the existence of natural disasters means that this grand plan can only remain on paper, unless Lao Xia can find another graduate of the Star Alliance Engineering Academy and the large smelting array on the Windrunner is still there.

That would be worth considering building a planetary ground rail transport system based on Covenant technology standards.

This device, typically used on industrial planets to connect various ground-based industrial manufacturing arrays, also connects various orbital industrial stations in space via pipelines and railways. It then forms a transportation network with the ground via mass projectors and space elevators. It is worth mentioning that these industrial arrays are almost entirely unmanned.

The reason I say "almost" is because there is at least one small-town-sized residential area for engineers, debuggers, drone experts, and their families, with a population of several thousand to ten thousand. Then there is an industrial base that can supply the residential areas of several surrounding planets, which is about the same number of people.

Given the intensity of the Cataclysm in Terra, the damage to this railway line wouldn't be enough to render it unusable; at most, the maintenance costs would be a bit high.

However, all of the above is nonsense. Lao Xia doesn't have such colleagues, nor does he have such a large-scale manufacturing array and equipment.

Ultimately, the only option was to adapt to local conditions and revert to Terra's land-based transport model, which is similar to maritime transport. This diminished Kazimierz's transportation advantages, but it still possessed sufficient potential to become Terra's largest agricultural production center.

"What a grand plan! But do you really have that much money?" This was the first thing Little Tiger thought after watching Old Xia's PPT presentation. This wasn't the kind of money they were asking for, like for old city redevelopment.

Moreover, it's difficult to recoup the costs immediately; it's not like before, where someone could just bring a bare bowl and scam a hot pot meal.

"Therefore, continuous investment is needed, as well as the full operation of the industries here, to continuously supply talent, technology, and even project military force."

Old Xia nodded. "You're right, there's not enough money."

"Would you like me to sponsor you?"

"how much do you have?"

"If you include the dowry, it's about the same amount of money you spent on renovating the old city."

"More than 400 billion?"

“I mean the total is over 2300 billion—” Little Tiger rolled his eyes. “Of course, the vast majority of it is shares and real estate, which cannot be sold off. In reality, even if we sell everything we can, we probably wouldn’t be able to raise 100 billion in cash.”

"Forget it, that's too little." Old Xia shook his head. "However, much of the cost of this investment is intangible. If I can't establish a manufacturing industry, then it will be even more, but if I can, most of the cost can be absorbed internally."

"Hmm, I have a question," the white rabbit jumped up, "When did we start discussing Lungmen Dollars, which are measured in hundreds of millions, and even feel that they are too few?"

"Starting with the renovation of the old city, by the way, the revenue from the snowfield has already been sent over by Swire Group. The estimated payment is close to 100 billion. This is just the first batch; the sales revenue from the later batches hasn't come out yet, based on a percentage." Old Xia nodded.

"But don't think this is a big number. The Ursus blockade alone costs more than 700 billion LMD a year, not to mention that this is only one-third of Ursus's military strength."

"so much!?"

"Well, as I said before, it's all fictitious. Much of it is absorbed internally, and some of the expenses are fictitious in themselves."

For example, soldiers' salaries; if you convert the money into goods, the actual expenditure isn't that high. It's just that, based on market procurement standards, their expenditure is indeed more than 7000 billion a year.

In reality, many payments are made directly from materials produced by the company itself, rather than from market purchases. This can reduce the inflated cost by at least half, to close to 70-80%.

"My second question is... when did you two become so close?" The white rabbit looked at the two suspiciously. The little tiger blushed and immediately pulled his tail back—well, he'd gotten used to being petted.

"I don't know, maybe after the engagement?" Old Xia analyzed it rationally.

Even after the engagement, although the two remained just friends, this particular issue inevitably affected their interactions.

Moreover, if things between men and women start to change a little during their time together, and neither party feels any aversion, they can easily develop into a real romantic relationship under the influence of hormones and shared interests.

Therefore, if you don't want to create a love triangle or become a player, it's best to maintain a certain boundary when interacting with female friends. Once you cross that line...

When ambiguity and changes begin to occur in a relationship, it's not far from one of them falling for the other.

Therefore, based on the above general rational analysis, it is normal for the intimacy level to increase, Lao Xia nodded.

After all, most people are all talk and no action; they say no, but after spending time together, they still end up doing the same thing.

Chapter Thirty: Talulah's Penetrating Internally Heated Ammunition