Chapter 490

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Protagonist:

Chen Yi

"Is the Poison Dragon God Temple far from West River City Fortress? Is the road easy to travel?" Jin Douna finished her meal and dabbed her lips with a snow-white napkin.

"We're all flying knights. The mountain wind to the south is stronger, but I'm a Child of Wind..." A big-mouthed tall man stared with hungry eyes at the Korean beauty's lips and eyes; such a woman would obviously not be seen in his city-state.

Shen Xu coughed heavily, his pale green eyes flickering, saying: "Chen Yi, Divine Art Knight, you need to decide quickly."

"There are at least 50,000 slaves being sent back, maybe seventy or eighty thousand. How are you going to leave?"

"Equip each of us with a weapon; I'll figure out the rest." When Shen Xu mentioned weapons, he looked obviously guilty, because they were far more expensive than slaves.

Chen Yi immediately shook his head, saying: "A weapon for each person? Impossible, and you wouldn't get far anyway. Passing through the territories of the Fire Dragon God Temple and Water Dragon God Temple, there must be at least three or four city-states nearby."

Jin Douna turned strangely toward Chen Yi, thinking: He isn't really haggling, is he?

The native thought his haggling was perfectly normal, so he stepped back and said: "Half weapons, half leather armor."

"No." Chen Yi answered very firmly.

"Half leather armor, weapons can be wooden, but for every ten wooden weapons, you must give us one mount beast." Shen Xu spoke fluently, like a true priest.

Jin Douna spoke before Chen Yi: "You're asking for too much. Things for tens of thousands of people would take us a long time to prepare."

Shen Xu raised his long arm and said: "I swear by the Poison Dragon that as long as you hand over the slaves and help us train Divine Art Knights, I will give you the antidote when handing over the Divine Art Knights, but you cannot contact those Malacheng slaves in advance."

Chen Yi now confirmed that what they really wanted was a small number of slaves. Because the slaves came from the God Temple Battlefield, although some important captives had been selected, it seemed normal that some had not been selected.

"We'll discuss it."

Shen Xu laughed heartily, pulled out a palm-sized lizard, swallowed it in one bite, chewing with a mouth full of yellow and red, saying: "I'll give you time to prove the poison."

Several natives left in single file.

Huan Long disgustedly jumped out of the window, shouting: "Did he swallow a lizard alive? He ate a lizard? Oh, truly revolting to a dragon. What kind of cruel, savage native would do such a thing!"

It excitedly waved its claws and stomped its feet, as if struggling.

"Settle the bill." Chen Yi grabbed Huan Long back, stuffed him into his coat pocket, and said to the shopkeeper: "Sorry to trouble you to stay with us for a few days at the mine. There's an independent water source there, and it also prevents you from accidentally leaking information about the poison and causing unnecessary panic. Is that alright?"

"I understand." The shopkeeper touched his large ears; he had already anticipated this.

"Yin Senyong, you go follow the people from the Poison Dragon God Temple."

The Divine Art Knight went as ordered. He was a rare Five Divine Spell Knight; although one of his divine arts was the relatively weak "Regeneration Art," relying solely on "Detection" gained from "Humility and Modesty," he could easily tail Shen Xu's group.

Huan Long was still muttering something, but Chen Yi ignored him. Once outside, he threw him on the ground and said: "Turn into a Humvee."

"You're too cold-hearted. I just saw my own kind being slaughtered." Huan Long desperately squeezed out a tear, which was actually a tear of mercury.

"You're a drake, not a lizard."

"But I'm very sad. I'm crying."

Jin Douna laughed and rubbed it, saying: "Reptiles don't have tears. Turn into a car quickly; we're in a hurry."

"Look at my Level 9 Combat drake!" The little lizard propped itself up with its tail and hind legs, bent its hands forward to show off its muscles, then quickly transformed.

"You're practicing pretty fast yourself." Chen Yi knew well the difficulty between Combat Skill Level 8 and Combat Skill Level 9.

In just a few tens of seconds, most of a Humvee's frame had appeared, and it took less than a third of the time.

The car sped all the way to the mining area, which was also the location of the Bacterial Metallurgy Laboratory.

The poison was either biological or chemical. The laboratory was full of biologists or candidate biologists. Zhou Houyuan was a well-known domestic microbiologist; bacterial metallurgy was only part of his specialty, and the bacterial laboratory built with a large amount of gold bonds was quite good, equipped with world-class bacterial testing research tools.

Those who understand biology also understand chemistry. As for how much they understand, opinions vary. However, with the development of science, chemistry has become a stagnant old-fashioned discipline. Hopefully, the biologists haven't forgotten what they learned in school.

Liu Xinyu and a group of mining area officials met the Humvee at the intersection.

The mining area was a Second Alert Zone, with armored vehicle fleets and helicopter units patrolling long-term. Despite the vast area, defenses were still strict.

Upon learning of Chen Yi's arrival, Liao Fou, Shi Nengren, and Li Duo had all lined up to welcome him.

Shi Nengren was the first Group Leader of the Basic Construction Group, removed from office due to the first slave revolt. Liao Fou was the second Group Leader of the Basic Construction Group. Li Duo was a specially recruited 45-year-old Machine Repair Worker. The new team formed by them could best manage the platinum mine, which produced tons of gold, platinum, and purple copper. For any Earthling, it held an indescribable attraction. Organizations with the same background were not the most suitable.

"Hall Master."

"My Lord!"

After various greetings, the three tactfully returned to work. They still didn't know about the poison.

"The water in the city is cut off. We're temporarily using distilled water instead. Zhou Houyuan seems to have found the source of the poison and is already studying it." Liu Xinyu changed into a cool blouse and hot pants. Life on the West Continent had made her figure even better; her exaggerated S-curve was exceptionally beautiful.

"Already found it? Not bad. Any other news?" Chen Yi raised his wrist. It had only been one hour.

"Biological. That's what he said."

Chen Yi felt somewhat relieved, but not entirely so.

The West Continent's unique tens of thousands of years of evolutionary history displayed many extraordinary creatures, including various small organisms. For example, the super bacteria used for bacterial metallurgy was a very good example. Compared to artificially selected metallurgical bacteria, being able to devour almost all metal ores showed superiority by far.

Whether the Poison Dragon God Temple's priests obtained special chemical poisons, bacterial poisons, or simply used intimidation, Chen Yi would not find it strange.

However, he had also prepared himself psychologically for failure. Tens of thousands of slaves, tens of thousands of sets of weapons and horses—other city-states might find them hard to part with, but for the West River City-State, their value was equivalent to only a few days of consumption.

Even the price of slaves couldn't compare to metal tools, and Divine Art Knights were just a bit of trouble.

The bacterial laboratory was busy all day, and Chen Yi planned to travel back and forth for help at any time.

By afternoon, Shen Xu rode an Owl Beast with a small head and large body down to the outskirts of the mining area. Four soldiers pointed anti-aircraft machine guns at them, but the latter was completely unaware.

Jin Douna was responsible for reception, but only brought them to the edge of the mining area. Even so, the natives saw the mining area's machinery at work.

Machinery produced specifically for the mine was extremely huge: off-road trucks with a 50-ton load, 900-horsepower wheeled loaders running everywhere. The most eye-catching was a 9750-type walking shovel under construction; its exposed base alone was ten stories high, like a steel giant or a dead Transformer.

This excavator for open-pit mines weighed 5,300 tons itself, with a 110-meter arm length and a 90-cubic-meter bucket capacity, and 9,700 kilowatts of power. The staff from Baiselos, whom they had finally managed to bribe, needed eight months to assemble it. Once built, one shovel could dig up over 100 tons of earth, equivalent to the hourly output of a small coal kiln. Continuous operation was comparable to the mining volume of any large open-pit mine domestically—a heavy machine that could truly let one person defeat tens of thousands.

Such an ultra-large walking shovel could not be hidden. The natives from the Poison Dragon God Temple looked at it with a country bumpkin's expression and asked after a long while: "Is this your altar? An altar made of pure metal?"

"Of course not." Jin Douna smiled, revealing extremely shallow dimples, adding much charm.

Shen Xu didn't believe him, picking out flaws to the utmost: "It's a bit hollow; if it were a solid iron block, the god would be happier. No wonder they all say West River City-State is different."

"Who says?"

"Many people." Shen Xu snorted: "Don't test me; if there's no antidote, you'll kill tens of thousands."

"You're overthinking it." Jin Douna pretended to be wronged, pouting her lips, then smiled: "I've prepared delicious food for you; come to the room and try some."

Shen Xu pulled a fresh, lively lizard from his pocket, wiped it on his clothes, then like an animal tore off its head, stuffed the remaining half of its body into his mouth, and said: "I'm full; where is Chen Yi, the Divine Art Knight?"

He certainly didn't want to eat and drink on someone else's turf.

Jin Douna had long since turned away in disgust, her back to them: "He'll be here shortly; he asked me to convey his apologies, please rest for now."

"I can wait, but I'm afraid you can't." Shen Xu took off his backpack, pulled out a long, soft meat stick, bit into it like a carrot, chewing with blood filling his mouth: "I love Elephant Beast whips the most; I brought two, if he comes back quickly, there's still time to get one."

Jin Douna grunted twice, agile as a raccoon dog standing upwind, feeling Chen Yi would definitely not "come back quickly" no matter what.

An Elephant Beast whip was as thick as a girl's calf, over 1.5 meters long, wrapped in a layer of white soft skin, like Guo Jingming wearing yoga tights. The native Shen Xu took a full ten minutes to swallow it entirely, the sounds he made during the process were truly nauseating; put tactfully, it was like eating a living person raw.

When the sky turned pitch black, Shen Xu ate the second Elephant Beast whip; blood and stench filled the room, while the knights behind him turned a deaf ear, probably long accustomed to it.

"No matter how much time you waste, you can't crack my poison; you should know, that's poison sent down by the Divine Dragon; if not for the Divine Art Knight, we wouldn't use it." Shen Xu was full of confidence; in fact, the Poison Dragon God Temple was one of the few able to obtain Divine Art Knights from other temples, though the odds were small and they offended countless people, but they spent a lot of intelligence funds for this.

This time, intelligence concerning slaves incidentally mentioned that West River City-State was selling Divine Art Knights for 100 tons of gold; Shen Xu acted upon hearing the news.

They were enemies with the Water Dragon Temple, so they didn't dare hope to buy a Divine Art Knight with money; poison was the best choice at this time.

"Lord Divine Art Knight will be here soon." Jin Douna stood under the door eaves; she couldn't stand the smell inside.

"Hurry up; once the poison takes effect, it can cause harm at any time, irreparable." Shen Xu proudly tossed a lively lizard into his mouth, savoring its slender tail, like eating a snack.

The door was pushed open with a "creak."

Chen Yi, Liu Xinyu, Zhou Houyuan had walked halfway when they covered their noses.

"You're late; I ate the last one." Shen Xu had an expression of extreme regret; the dark green lizard tail swayed left and right as he spoke.

"It's fine; Mr. Zhou wants to ask you a few questions to determine our range of poisoning, extent, and whether it can be interpreted." Chen Yi made way for Zhou Houyuan.

Having lived in the laboratory for a long time, even on the West Continent, Zhou Houyuan wore proper clothing—a shirt, Western trousers, and leather shoes stained with earth—quite the air of a hypocrite.

Shen Xu touched his blood-stained lips with his hand, stuffed the last segment of tail into his mouth, and smiled maliciously: "So you're also a poison expert?"

"More or less." Zhou Houyuan opened a notebook with the air of a scholar, turned to the first page: "I have three questions; if you can answer them, it will be extremely helpful for us to make a quick decision."

Shen Xu smiled as if seeing through him: "Don't even think about cracking the Dragon God's poison; once there was a genius physician who tried that; know the result? He didn't crack it; the other side sent his whole family to the Poison Dragon God Temple to beg for forgiveness; we ate his whole family, one after another, one only half-eaten, saved for the next round to eat the other half..."

"You can't find my family; I'm old and ugly; so, let's start asking questions." Zhou Houyuan had the composure of a thick-skinned scholar; he had been threatened by quite a few students; being a bad scientist wasn't that easy.

Shen Xu snorted, pulled out another lizard, used its sharp claws to pick his teeth, and said: "Ask."

Zhou Houyuan turned on the recording pen: "First question: the poison is a self-replicating bacterium, an extremely small organism, right?"

Shen Xu put away his cruel smile and said seriously: "You really are a good pharmacist; yes, an extremely small organism, invisibly small; they grow by drinking water, spread throughout the river water; those who drink it, boom, all bitten to death by them."

"Actually, they eat the nutrients you put in; death isn't directly caused by them. They die of stomach pain." Zhou Houyuan tossed out some middle school biology knowledge.

"Stomach pain is because of them; you'll vomit and have diarrhea until there's nothing left in your belly, then keep hurting, and finally die." Shen Xu answered viciously.

West Continent people didn't mind dissecting corpses and knew human internal organs very well.

Zhou Houyuan didn't need to explain the cause of death by bacteria, but directly said: "After taking the antidote successfully, the manifestation is stomach pain stops, normal excretion, right?"

"Correct."

"How long, how long until onset, how long until the antidote takes effect?"

"This is your last question." Shen Xu said somewhat uneasily: "The earliest onset is within one day, at the latest no more than 7 days; the antidote takes half a day to work. Here's some news for you: the earlier you detoxify, the less antidote you take; once it takes effect, you need the dosage of three people; and I won't give you extra antidote; I give you as much antidote as you do things. First the slaves, then the weapons and mounts, finally the Divine Art Knight."

The thick-skinned bacteria expert rarely became nervous; he wrote a line of small text in his notebook and passed it to Chen Yi, which read: "As expected, no unexpected factors."

"Are you sure?" Chen Yi asked directly.

"Based on what we currently know, yes. Moreover, we've also conducted experiments." Zhou Houyuan feared most that some magical substance would exceed the scope of modern biology, like some mysterious powers Chen Yi mastered. When he learned it was caused by bacteria, just as they saw under the microscope, and not a misdiagnosis, he had already breathed a huge sigh of relief, but wasn't truly relaxed.

This was a major decision.

The same for Chen Yi.

"Did your experiment succeed?"

"It succeeded." Zhou Houyuan explained: "We extracted river water and compared it with river water we previously stored; finally screened out a dominant strain that reproduces very fast in new river water, almost not at all in old river water, and matches his description just now: an aerobic Gram-negative bacillus, no spores, no capsule, has flagella and pili, very similar to Salmonella, and also has DNA gyrase..."

"Can existing medicine be used?"

"Its DNA gyrase has an A subunit, and it's the main subunit; we checked a great many cells; we worried there might be mutated cells without an A subunit that could still normally synthesize and replicate; fortunately, so far there haven't been..."

Shen Xu looked at him and Chen Yi speaking a language he didn't understand, completely clueless; gradually, he also became nervous.

If the Divine Dragon's poison was really cracked!

Shen Xu suspected the other priests of the temple; if the antidote leaked, though it happened rarely, it had happened after all.

But once it happened, Shen Xu absolutely didn't believe he could walk out of here alive.

He put a lizard into his own mouth, letting it tremble on his tongue while alive.

This lizard's belly contained lethal poison, which would make him die instantly without pain.

Zhou Houyuan announced the result at this time: "If our judgment is correct, Norfloxacin can kill it; a very common antibacterial agent; it attacks the A subunit of bacterial DNA gyrase, inhibiting DNA synthesis and replication leading to bacterial death; so, as long as their biological bacteria don't have a major mutation, Norfloxacin will work."

"Do we have stock?"

"Enough for 3000 people; we'll give it first to the more severe cases. All volunteers who tried the experiment had results with Norfloxacin, but the time wasn't long enough..." The last sentence was Zhou Houyuan's habitual buck-passing, like all experts.

Chen Yi didn't have many choices, but almost the moment Zhou Houyuan's voice fell, he moved his left pinky finger.

In an instant, the four Divine Art Knights who had been watching for the signal pounced from front, back, left, and right.

The lizard in Shen Xu's mouth was smashed out by Yin Senyong's first punch.

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