Chapter 438

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Protagonist:

Chen Yi

After Chen Yi fully tested his strength and confirmed he could pull the Water Land God Box fitted with metal wheels, he waited at ease for the Divine Art Knights to arrive.

Yin Senyong, Yin Sen Guan, and Yin Senjin entered the lower level where the Water Land God Boxes were stored in a daze, and Yin Senjin asked easily with the distinctive staccato sound of konjac: "I heard we're not departing until tomorrow, so what do we have to do today?"

"We don't know either." The one who answered was Yun Shisan. Even after receiving an Earth education, they still couldn't face the Divine Art Knights naturally.

Chen Yi curled his lip in a dark laugh, took out a set of clothes from his Space Storage Ring and put them on again, and shouted: "All of you come over here, I've got boxes for you to move."

"Boxes?" Yin Senjin took the lead, jogging over to Chen Yi and looking around for boxes.

"This one." Chen Yi jerked his chin; right in front of him was a section of Water Land God Box 10 meters high and 30 meters wide.

Yin Senyong's mouth fell open in surprise, and he repeated: "Move it?"

"There's too much cargo to transport to the West Continent tomorrow, the basement space is limited, and adding more machinery won't work, so we have to rely on you." Chen Yi explained briefly, then ordered: "From now on you must obey the dispatcher's commands. First, move the loaded Water Land God Boxes to the designated positions. Second, load all kinds of cargo into the Water Land God Boxes. Lu Xiong, give each of them a walkie-talkie."

Lu Xiong suppressed his laughter and handed each of them a walkie-talkie. He was one of the few who could travel to the West Continent, so he knew the Divine Art Knights' illustrious reputation in the city-states. Using them to pull carts — this was even more wasteful than having a thousand-li horse grind flour.

The three Divine Art Knights looked at each other, said whatever, let's do it!

That contract thicker than a dictionary was their most direct motivation.

"Hah!"

"Hah!"

"Meow!"

After various strange cries, Source Energy surged into the Divine Art Knights' bodies like a maddened flood, and all kinds of light dressed the three men up like multicolored dolls as if they were artificial rainbows. Then, sections of iron chain thick as arms settled onto the light, and the Divine Art Knights consciously or unconsciously began chanting work chants.

"One-two-one."

"Yo-heave-yo-heave, hehehe."

Chen Yi casually grabbed a handful of Level 6 Strength Scrolls and tossed them to Yin Senyong and the others, finally getting some leisure time himself.

He couldn't very well let a proper Divine Art Knight work as a porter — of course, although Yin Senyong and the others were Divine Art Knights, their work on Earth wasn't busy, so doing some porter work within their ability was only right.

The loading speed at the Central Storage Area became much faster.

Loaded Water Land God Boxes were originally immovable, and stuffing a section full of cargo was no easy task either. With the Divine Art Knights it was different; their petite bodies and infinite load-bearing capacity instantly put the railway dispatcher at ease, and once he got used to the three's speed, the entire storage area's work efficiency rose.

At the same time, it also meant the Divine Art Knights' workload increased once again.

Yin Sen Guan even had to use Strength Scrolls to endure such heavy physical labor. Dragon God witness, even though he trained daily with 200-kilogram stone locks, he had never done real manual labor; who would have thought that after finally advancing to Divine Art Knight, he would instead become a porter.

Shouldering a 20-ton pressure vessel, Yin Senjin suddenly said worriedly: "Will our main work from now on be just this?"

Yin Senyong had a machine tool on his left shoulder and a diesel engine weighing at least 5 tons on his right, and said dissatisfied: "Porter work? Impossible. I see the Lord only sends goods once or twice a month."

"Just right to let you do porter work in your idle time. Besides this, what... proper work have you ever done?" Yin Senjin was still speaking the West Continent's common tongue, just mixed with Earth vocabulary.

Yin Senyong seriously thought about the "proper work" he had done, then his face flushed red: "A Divine Art Knight's mission is battle; we are waiting for battle."

He actually felt some trepidation too. Chen Yi was clearly different from an ordinary lord; making three Divine Art Knights work as porters was not something he wouldn't do.

"Before the wait, we just have to be porters." Yin Senjin sighed, the iron chains on him clattering.

"This won't do." Yin Sen Guan didn't know which nerve twitched again, and said heavily: "Rather die on the battlefield than do ox-and-horse work."

Looking at him, he seemed about to throw the iron chains down.

At that moment the walkie-talkie "beep-beeped," and the railway dispatcher shouted rudely: "All of you speed up, the next batch arrives in 30 seconds, clear the space, hurry up hurry up..."

So the three men ran frantically.

30 seconds later, Yin Senjin stopped, tongue lolling from exhaustion: "Can't do it."

"Divine power not enough?" Yin Senyong turned his head in surprise. They used divine power to move things; no matter the faith, converting it directly into force was no problem.

"Of course it's enough." Yin Senjin finished with his head high, then lowered it again: "We have to think of a way to not let moving things become our proper job."

Yin Sen Guan recalled a new term he had seen and said: "Strike?"

"Suicide." Yin Senjin kicked an iron chain on the ground, and amid the ear-piercing grinding sound, said: "We need a way to satisfy the Lord's transport needs without moving things ourselves."

Yin Senyong's mind turned, then he immediately covered his ring and said: "Don't even think about using my Earth Dragon."

"It's not much better than those... trucks." Yin Senjin shook his hand. He really hadn't set his sights on the Earth Dragon, though he had thought about it before.

The walkie-talkie buzzed urging them again.

Yin Senjin ran off in anger, then shouted: "We have to find some other knights."

Yin Senyong chased after him, doubtfully: "No need for that, right?"

"Would you rather stay here moving things than find a few knights?"

Yin Senyong was of course unwilling; he idled all day anyway, so he asked: "Where to find knights?"

"The family, Ma La, or recruit." Yin Senjin spread his hands: "I don't want to pull chains anymore."

Chen Yi didn't know that a casual decision of his made three Divine Art Knights determine to recruit high-level knights from all sides.

By the time they reached the West Continent, it was the West River Water Fortress's turn to busy itself with unloading, and this time it wasn't just Yin Senyong and the other three; the stay-behind Yin Senchen also had to help, equivalent to 4 train locomotives. Even so, the West River Water Fortress took two full days to move all the cargo out.

They'd been porters for three days!

Divine Art Knights have no notion that all professions are equal; knights who kill and plunder or defend home and country are naturally nobler than honest laborers and farmers. If they had to be porters for life, they might as well go back to being Temple Knights.

This time, the Divine Art Knights all firmed up the idea of finding replacement knights, and the four nominated Yin Senyong and Yin Sen Guan to request leave to return to the family from Chen Yi.

Chen Yi didn't ask the reason and approved all of it, but required the remaining two to help handle the cargo.

Yin Senjin and Yin Senchen couldn't refuse and did another three days of ox-and-horse work, finally loading the ore from Shenqi Mountain onto the Water Land God Boxes — 60 tons of precious metals, up to 8,000 tons of copper and tin metals, and another 500 tons or so of newly produced paper to be sent to the Saint Qiao Kingdom to exchange for Divine Oil and other necessities.

In a flash five days passed; when Yin Senchen returned to the West River Water Fortress he just slept soundly. Divine Art Knights aren't gods; from Earth to the West Continent, working non-stop for over a week, almost all at the limit, their fatigue was no less than porters in a sweatshop.

After Yin Senchen woke from one sleep, the kitchen's prepared meals had been changed three times; he wolfed down the food before asking: "Where has the Lord reached?"

Those serving Divine Art Knights were clever young people selected from Yun Village; even bathing in Source Energy benefited their growth, and the pay was not small. This was one of the benefits West River Water Fortress gave to villages and strongholds that surrendered early—more opportunities for public rations.

Shang Yundong poured wine for Yin Senchen while saying: "Mr. Chen has been at the mine these past three days; those nobles from Ma La who want to see him must go to the mine to pay their respects."

"The mine?" Yin Senchen had a bad premonition.

He downed the cup in one breath and said: "Bring me my clothes; where does Yin Senjin live?"

"Outside." The Divine Art Knights all lived in one courtyard; Yin Senjin lived upstairs, his voice lazy.

He hadn't slept that long, yet his body recovered less easily instead.

"I heard the Lord is at the mine?" Yin Senchen paused, but still said: "Have supplies increased again?"

"Of course." Yin Senjin sat helplessly beside him, lifted the wine bottle and drained it clean, then wiped his mouth: "An additional 5000 tons of ore."

"5000 tons!" Yin Senchen's head swelled. This was obviously their work again.

Divine Art Knights plus Level 6 Strength Scrolls made moving thirty or fifty tons of supplies relatively easy, but that did not mean 5000 tons of supplies was the work of a hundred fifty-ton jobs.

Moreover, even if it were a hundred porter jobs, Yin Senchen did not want to do them.

He was, after all, a proud Divine Art Knight!

Divine Art Knight!

Pride of the Kingdom, pillar of the Divine Temple, backbone of the family!

The family's backbone was doing porter work!

When recruiting Knights for the family, why was Yin Senyong so indecisive? He was just afraid of losing face.

Yin Senchen pushed the table aside and stood up: "Why such a huge increase all at once?"

"What increased is ore, not metal; supposedly it's surplus from smelting."

"The part that cannot be smelted at current smelting speed." Yin Senchen knew quite a bit; silently calculating, 5000 tons of ore could yield about 500 kilograms of platinum, and if lucky, 100 tons of gold and varying amounts of copper, tin, and zinc—seemingly not worth hauling.

Yin Senjin saw his thought and snorted: "Supposedly they will use blasting; within a week, ore is to increase by 50,000 tons."

"50,000 tons?" Yin Senchen was even more surprised.

"Go see. Supposedly it's blasting."

……(Unfinished. If you like this work, welcome to Qidian (qidian. com) to vote recommendation tickets and monthly tickets; your support is my greatest motivation.)