Chapter 568: Petroleum Battle

Secretary Liu gazed at the black column shooting straight into the night sky, his entire body frozen in place.

He only felt hot tears welling up in his eyes.

"Oil... it's really oil! And it's a self-flowing well!" a worker shouted.

Yang Fu walked up to Secretary Liu, his voice trembling with excitement: "I've spent half my life in exploration and drilling, and I've never seen such a good oil well!"

He Yuzhu looked at the oil column gushing incessantly and a faint smile slowly curled at the corners of his mouth. He knew deep down that this land would become the wealthiest region in the entire country in the coming decades.

Man Yatou looked at He Yuzhu with bright, shining eyes and said excitedly, "Brother Zhuzi, we succeeded!"

"Mm, you made a great contribution this time. From now on, you must believe in yourself more," He Yuzhu encouraged.

"I know!" Man Yatou nodded vigorously.

The people in the camp were completely boiling over. The cold wind whistled and bit into their bones, yet they didn't feel the slightest bit cold.

Everyone flocked to the head steward, Lv Hong: "Cadre Lv, can you make some late-night snacks?"

"Alright! We'll boil dumplings!" Lv Hong's eyes also grew hot with excitement.

Secretary Liu suddenly snapped back to reality, wiped the tears from his face, and shouted loudly, "Xiao Liu, hurry and send a telegram, send a telegram to Beijing!"

"Leader, it's two o'clock in the morning now!" He Yuzhu reminded him.

"You don't understand." Secretary Liu shook his head and looked at the communications officer, Xiao Liu, "Just write: Songliao Plain, Saertu territory, a high-yield self-flowing oil well has been struck..."

"Yes!"

Communications officer Xiao Liu finished writing the telegram and handed it to the Secretary. Secretary Liu nodded in confirmation, and he immediately took the telegram draft and ran toward the communications room.

In less than half an hour, an urgent telegram crossed thousands of miles of wind and snow, sent directly to Beijing.

Over in Beijing, the Great Leader picked up the telegram, and upon seeing the content, his hand paused abruptly.

He read it again, then stood up abruptly, his chair making a harsh sound against the floor.

One hour later, Secretary Liu received orders from his superiors: to commend the meritorious personnel and appoint him as the Temporary Commander-in-Chief of the base, responsible for receiving the oil extraction teams arriving from all over...

He Yuzhu smiled with a hint of schadenfreude: "Secretary Liu, it seems you'll be stationed here permanently! I won't keep you company; I'm going back to the Farm tomorrow to hibernate for the winter."

Secretary Liu sneered: "Then I'll appoint you as the Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the base right now, responsible for logistics and support work."

He Yuzhu shook his head helplessly: "That works too. But I have one condition: keep Cadre Lv here as well. She knows the people well, which will make carrying out the work easier."

"No problem." Secretary Liu agreed readily.

Upon hearing that Secretary Liu wanted to keep her to be in charge of logistics, Lv Hong immediately expressed her excitement: "I will definitely work hard! But there are so many things to do here, I don't even know where to start for the moment..."

He Yuzhu thought for a moment and said, "Secretary Liu will mainly coordinate relationships with superiors. Before long, one or two tens of thousands of troops will be stationed here, responsible for building roads and houses. I'll handle the grain, but you'll have to coordinate the meat and vegetables. Additionally, you need to organize at least one or two thousand professional construction workers to come over."

"Will there really be ten or twenty thousand soldiers coming in?" Lv Hong asked in surprise.

"What's ten or twenty thousand? If I'm not mistaken, in the coming year, at least tens of thousands, perhaps even over a hundred thousand people will rush here. By then, the supplies needed here will be countless. Although I am a Deputy Director, I won't be staying here for long; a large amount of the actual work will still depend on you."

"Are we building a city?" Lv Hong murmured.

"Not just a city, but a medium-sized, the wealthiest city in the country. If you can seize this opportunity, in the future, you might even become the main person in charge of this city," He Yuzhu said.

Lv Hong became instantly excited, her voice trembling slightly: "My head is a mess right now. Tell me, what should I do first?"

He Yuzhu said in a deep voice: "The most urgent task is to go back to your county, bring over a group of people you are comfortable working with, and first gain a firm foothold here."

"I understand!" Lv Hong nodded heavily.

The next day, He Yuzhu sent a telegram to Liu Sanman at the Lingnan Food Factory, asking her to transport a large batch of grain over, and at the same time, requested that she bring key personnel to build a Food Processing Plant and grain depot here.

At the same time, he sent a telegram to the Liushi Trading Company, asking them to purchase a batch of oil refining equipment.

He Yuzhu knew clearly that before the formal oil refining equipment arrived, they had to build a Small-scale Indigenous Oil Refinery first.

Over the next few days, he drove out once and soon brought back a Converter Steelmaking Furnace he had collected from an M Country Steel Factory—in reality, he had taken it from his own space.

When the Lingnan Steel Factory was established earlier, he had already contributed a batch, and there were still a few left in his space.

This type of converter had thick, pressure-resistant walls and a sturdy structure; with a little modification, it would be top-tier oil refining equipment.

After returning to the base, he removed the internal refractory structure, converted the furnace cylinder into a Distillation Kettle, used seamless steel pipes for the Condensation Pipe at the top, and equipped it with self-made Valves and a Pressure Relief Device; a set of simple Normal Pressure Oil Refining Equipment was quickly formed.

After Man Yatou's meticulous calculations, this modified equipment could process over ten tons of crude oil a day, producing over three tons of gasoline and diesel.

In this way, the base's Drilling Rigs, Generators, vehicles, heating, and various types of machinery oil could all be self-sufficient, and there would be no need to allocate them from the outside.

Half a month passed, and a simple refinery was successfully built.

On the day of ignition, many people gathered at the scene. Everyone was a bit panicked, fearing that the Boiler would explode after heating, and they all hid far away.

Only He Yuzhu looked calm as he added barrels of crude oil and closed the Valves.

Immediately, a large fire was lit, and the oil gas rose rapidly into the pipes, flowing out slowly after cooling.

He Yuzhu precisely controlled the temperature and successfully refined gasoline, diesel, and kerosene.

At first, Secretary Liu didn't take this to heart and even repeatedly warned him not to blow up the Boiler.

But when he saw that three tons of high-quality diesel were produced on the first day, he immediately perked up.

He had long been annoyed by having to ask for money and supplies everywhere. Upon learning that this oil could not only supply the entire base but also have a surplus, he immediately came up with an idea—use this diesel to exchange for construction materials with brother units, producing and building at the same time.

Soon, over five thousand soldiers marched into Saertu, and the camp instantly boiled over.

The cold wind whistled, carrying snow, but the soldiers ignored the freezing temperatures of over twenty degrees below zero and immediately threw themselves into construction.

Logging, digging foundations, and building simple roads—everywhere there were figures and the sound of work chants.

On the other side, dozens of Drilling Teams from all over had also arrived. They brought all kinds of drilling equipment and, in the areas planned by Man Yatou, drilled day and night. The drilling rigs roared, and oil well after oil well began drilling; the wilderness was brightly lit, as if it were daytime.

A vigorous Petroleum Battle officially raised its curtain.