Chapter 736: We Miners Have Strength!

"No, no, the Daughter Kingdom wasn't like this before."

Tang Luo shook his head. When they first went west, the Western Liang Women's Kingdom they encountered was not a place surrounded by mountains on three sides and facing the sea on one.

Could it be that the world has undergone a tremendous change, the seas turned to mulberry fields? If so, such a change is not impossible.

But why has the geographical environment undergone such a drastic change while the capital still vaguely resembles its former self?

The cold wind in the high sky blew Tang Luo's white hair fluttering, and his brocade kasaya rustled loudly.

He gazed at the capital of the Daughter Kingdom without speaking.

After a moment, Tang Luo shifted his gaze to the mine.

Engaging in mining as labor reform can be said to be one of the most common forms of punishment in the Daughter Kingdom.

Compared to simply imprisoning people in cells and depriving them of freedom,

the Daughter Kingdom seems to prefer making criminals labor.

The Daughter Kingdom possesses abundant resources, including mineral resources, and these are the kind that can be extracted without requiring advanced technology.

If one commits a crime, they are first detained for a period, then sent to mine.

Labor transforms life.

This is also why there are so few people seen in the prisons.

This mine near the capital is naturally the largest in the Daughter Kingdom, and also a special one.

Because here, besides ordinary criminals, there are also men.

Over the years, men who mistakenly entered the Daughter Kingdom have all been made to mine here.

Their numbers exceed ten thousand.

Dong Feipeng and the other two blended in, unnoticed.

The terrifying women of the Daughter Kingdom despise men and want them to labor, but at least they do not wish them dead.

In the first few days, Dong Feipeng and the others got decent rest, and once they had barely recovered, they were issued iron shovels, spades, picks, and carrying baskets.

Go mine!

Mining is the destiny of you lot of men; only by mining enough ore can you have food and drink.

Then Dong Feipeng and the others met with tragedy.

As modern people who have never done any physical labor since childhood, how could they mine?

After gritting their teeth and working for half a day, blisters formed on their palms, making it impossible to grip their tools.

Fortunately, the male miners in the mine are united.

The senior miners gave the three newcomers great help, teaching them mining knowledge and posture, and sharing food with them.

This helped the few of them get through the initial difficult period.

Seven days later, the emaciated Bao Tianxing eagerly dumped the ore from his carrying basket: "Ha, I've met my quota today."

"Impressive!"

"I didn't expect you to have a talent for mining!"

The other two congratulated him.

The three beamed with smiles.

After laughing for a while, Bao Tian's body suddenly jerked: "Damn, wrong! We're not here to mine! What the hell are we getting excited about?"

The other two's smiles froze, then vanished completely.

Yeah, we're not really here to mine—what the hell are we happy about!

Their goal is clearly to escape the Daughter Kingdom.

Their task these days should be to rest and recuperate while gathering more intelligence.

Know yourself and know your enemy, and you will win a hundred battles; handle what you can yourself, and save the master's strength for critical moments.

Recovery, intelligence!

Not mining!

Bao Tian slammed down his pick in anger, then after a few seconds ran over and picked it up again.

Not the time, not the time.

These days they've been "obsessed with mining," failing to gather more intelligence.

It's not yet time to act.

Although they are already close to the Daughter Kingdom's capital, if they head south and pass through the gate named Shanhai Pass, they can complete their mission.

Looking on the bright side, at this moment the master could simply grab a few people and fly them over there.

Wouldn't that complete the mission?

This is undoubtedly only a fantasy ideal; the most likely real outcome is that the master flies them out five meters before dropping them.

And declares that he has already used up his allotted number of interventions, leaving the rest to them.

At that point, they'd still be screwing around!

The three exchanged glances, each seeing determination and confidence in the others' eyes.

They've grown again!

They feel that if, at this moment, they undertook the orthodox newcomer mission—fighting zombies—they would surely find it as easy as grinding for points.

Fighting slow zombies? Just overcome fear.

In the following days, Dong Feipeng and the three followed their plan, laboring while gathering all kinds of intelligence.

From fellow prisoners of the same status, they obtained much useful information.

For example, the Daughter Kingdom has many martial arts masters, both in the populace and at court, resembling a wuxia world.

The guards in the mine, each one, know martial arts.

The male miners in the mine have very unusual origins.

The way they appeared in the Daughter's Kingdom is exactly the same as how gods and demons walk — one day, they suddenly appeared in this special place, the Daughter's Kingdom.

Most of them were asleep when they suddenly changed location.

They appeared in the forests and mountains near the border of the Daughter's Kingdom.

It was as abrupt as some unknown teleportation, or as if an invisible hand had grabbed them and thrown them here.

However, they at least did not appear directly in prison like the gods and demons do.

The slight peculiarity of Dong Feipeng and others was also one of the reasons why that female official initially dragged them to the torture chamber.

Why did you appear in prison? You're a bit different from others — you can ask around.

Another reason is that female official's personal preference.

To most people, their slight peculiarity is worthless, like chasing the wind.

She merely regarded Dong Feipeng and the others as ordinary "mistaken entrants."

Besides men, mistaken entrants naturally include women, and they basically all integrate into the Daughter's Kingdom's system.

Regarding martial arts, which Bao Tian and others are quite concerned about.

Those senior elders also gave answers.

Only women of the Daughter's Kingdom can learn martial arts.

Men cannot learn or practice martial arts — this has already been proven.

Moreover, regarding the Mother-Child River, it's not that no men have risked everything, wanting to "gain status through their wives," fleeing and drinking the river's water.

But what awaited him was not the birth of a new life, but death.

Basically, after drinking the Mother-Child River water, that man would suddenly collapse and die.

He died very cleanly, even somewhat peacefully.

The elders' answers basically dashed Bao Tian and others' hopes of gaining any "extra income" in this world.

Equipment, tools, and the like.

Don't even think about it — even if such things existed, they wouldn't be obtainable by them.

Just focus on completing the mission.

But completing the mission is not easy either.

This mine is large enough that all male miners are not allowed to leave; they can only spend their lives here.

After the incident over ten years ago — the "escape river water peaceful death" — protection became much stricter.

Bao Tian and others racked their brains but could not find even a slight possibility of escape.

Unless a master consumes one of their strike counts to help them leave.

Or perhaps...

By leveraging the power of the "natives" of this world.

Those men, like Bao Tian and others, trapped in the mine and laboring — who among them does not want to leave?

Even if they wanted to defect to the Daughter's Kingdom and become dogs, others wouldn't want them.

They only need your labor; if you don't work, then go die.

The foundation for rebellion has always existed — it only needs a spark.

Bao Tian and others believe their arrival is that spark.

The first novice mission isn't fighting zombies — how good is that? It really let them grow a lot.

"Starting tomorrow, I'll begin lobbying." Dong Feipeng tidied his already quite long hair.

"It's time to put your salesman skills to use." Bao Tian said.

"What salesman? From now on, please call me instructor." Dong Feipeng said with a smile, "Watch me use modern wisdom and an unyielding three-inch tongue to stir up a vast war of the people."

That's what he said.

In reality, it's just about trying to get as many people as possible to, at some point, all run away together.

See if they can escape.

Many people surely share their thoughts, they just haven't shown it.

They need a "person" to step up and lead them.

And that "person" should be them.

"Rebelled! Rebelling!"

"Rebelled! Rebelling!"

As they were discussing, outside suddenly came a burst of noise.

At first, only a few people's shouts — not long after, it instantly formed an indistinct number of voices, spreading, surging skyward.

Bao Tian, Dong Feipeng, and Lin Zixuan were stunned.

They hadn't even exerted force yet — how did it suddenly erupt?

Then they saw the joy in each other's eyes — happiness came too suddenly; who would have thought there was still such good fortune?

Without hesitation, the three picked up their mining tools and rushed out of their small wooden hut.

Outside, chaos had already appeared.

A large number of miners rushed out of the huts, just like Bao Tian and others, instinctively grabbing their mining tools.

After a brief moment of confusion, they formed a wave, charging toward the guards, charging toward their freedom.

Bao Tian and others' thoughts were by no means unique.

And long before, someone had already been secretly implementing this.

Tens of thousands — some had been mining here for decades, others like Bao Tian and others, newly arrived.

It is impossible to unite everyone and launch a precise escape operation.

Fortunately, it is not necessary to unite everyone.

As long as some people can stand up, it will create ripples, spread, and affect everyone.

Not only did the male miners on this side erupt.

After a while, the female miners' mining area on the other side also simultaneously erupted.

For a time, chaos descended upon the entire mine.

Meanwhile, the mine's guards displayed extremely high quality; each of them possessed martial skills and were well-trained soldiers.

Normally, even ten strong and sturdy miners could barely "exchange" with one ordinary guard.

The number of guards at this large mine reached as many as two thousand!

Moreover, there were quite a few genuine experts among them.

In the black night, one could see the shadows of these experts darting through mid-air, soaring and flipping; wherever they passed, figures fell down in succession.

Like a harvester reaping straw.

Many more guards formed squads, unleashing an effect where one plus one is greater than two, swiftly suppressing the chaos.

Want to run? No way out!

"How does it feel wrong!"

Bao Tian growled low, at first they followed the crowd charging forward.

But after charging until now, they could clearly feel the team's speed slowing down, fewer people, and the guards' voices around them becoming louder.

"We won't be able to break out!" Lin Zixuan shouted, "Is there any other entrance or exit?"

"How would I know!"

The scales of victory have already begun to tilt.

This escape attempt looks set to fail.

"The Dharma is boundless..."

A "Buddha's name" echoed in the night sky.

The miners still struggling desperately to escape were like withered wood meeting spring, drought meeting sweet rain.

Spring water gushed forth!

Power surged from their limbs and bones!

We miners have power!