Roland retracted his gaze only after the Seagull completely disappeared into the sky.
“Sometimes I think I should just build a frontline command headquarters,” he murmured. “Staying where everyone can see me would boost morale and be considered personally participating in the Battle of Divine Will. Future historians would have more material to boast about.”
“Do you even care about that?” a low voice echoed from the void. “Besides, before being recorded in history, you'd have to endure Wendy and Scroll's nagging until you actively admitted your mistake and changed your mind—I’ve experienced it, and it's definitely something ordinary people can't tolerate. Let's not give them any extra trouble.”
Roland couldn't help but chuckle. "You have a point."
The battle with the devils could last for months, even years, and he had to adapt to this new normal.
Thinking of this, he looked at the guards stationed in the distance. "Summon everyone. I'm going to the Third Border City."
The latter immediately saluted. "Yes, Your Majesty! I will inform the guard!"
According to Kaimo Strale's report, there had been new progress in the research of Rubber Worms.
It was time to examine the results.
“Let's go,” he nodded to his side, then walked towards the airport exit.
……
After confirming the important value of Rubber Worm secretions, the Taquila witches not only opened up a series of new caves for them, but also took on the role of keepers in their spare time.
After all, it was not easy to find ordinary people who could calmly face the devouring worms and chat and laugh in the wormholes. In addition, long-term underground work was more likely to lead to psychological instability. The breeding part was now fully taken over by Taquila, and the workers were only responsible for the loading and processing of the rubber material.
It could be said that this was another misjudgment by Roland; he underestimated people's tolerance in a confined environment.
Rubber Worms disliked sunlight, loved humidity, and would move in response to sound. Even without aggressiveness, the rustling sounds that occasionally rang around them were enough to make people mentally collapse.
He also couldn't provide each worker with lighting and communication equipment, formulate detailed shift rules, and then develop a set of psychological counseling guidance—not that it couldn't be done, but the cost-effectiveness was too low. A large number of factories outside needed manpower; pulling them in was useful, and there was no need to spend time on de-witching. Therefore, he simply transferred ordinary people to the more relaxed subsequent processing links.
And Chicken Duck Knight Prees Dessa was not idle either, spending his free time writing breeding manuals and guiding production. The related products in Neverwinter City could spring up like bamboo shoots after rain, and he had an indispensable contribution.
The expanded breeding scale provided more samples for colloid testing. It was precisely because of this basic research that Roland had the conditions to allow the Minister of Chemical Industry to intervene and carry out the next plan.
After entering the underground, Pasha greeted him, "Welcome, Your Majesty. Your people are now in the Rubber Worm Laboratory. Do you need me to notify them?"
“No need, you can take me there,” Roland smiled. “By the way, I heard that Celine built a new breeding farm, bigger than the previous ones combined?”
“That's right, it's opposite the laboratory," Pasha tapped the main tentacle. "It not only applied the latest research results of the Exploration Society, but also borrowed the concept of the Dream World—would you like to visit it by the way?”
“Oh?” He immediately became interested. “Of course.”
“Then please follow me.”
Passing through a long passage, Pasha led Roland to a large cave.
The entrance of the cave was equipped with iron fences, obviously to prevent the worms from escaping. Walking into the cave through a small door on the side, he couldn't help but pause slightly—the environment in the cave was completely designed according to the Snow Mountain Relics, with luminous plants, water systems, and giant mushrooms all available, but the three had obviously been reasonably adjusted. The plants were arranged along the edge of the stone wall and flowing water, becoming new street lights. As the staple food of the worms, mushrooms were obviously the most plentiful species, with huge mushroom caps almost completely covering the ground. Countless worms surged inside, and in the dim fluorescent light, only clusters of wriggling white bodies could be seen. They happily gnawed on the mushrooms, and the dense crackling sound made Roland couldn't help but think of the silkworms he raised when he was a child.
And what surprised him even more was the size of the cave.
Judging from the luminous plants that could not be seen at a glance, this place was probably even larger than the main hall of the Third Border City—he originally thought that the new breeding farm was just a combination of several old caves, but it now seemed that this was not the case. The orderly blue light spots, and the straightforward tic-tac-toe water system, all gave him a sense of a large factory.
“This place happens to be located on the edge of the Impassable Mountain Range, and its surface height is equivalent to that of Neverwinter City.” Pasha took the initiative to introduce, "If a cave is opened from the south side, it is only one kilometer away from the Kingdom Avenue.”
Doesn't this mean that the new breeding farm and Neverwinter City are only separated by a wall? If he remembered correctly, estimating the distance he had just moved, this place was no more than two kilometers away from the main urban area, and the outside of the rock wall should be exactly the temporary residential area for migrants.
Roland said thoughtfully, "To facilitate the transportation of mucus?"
“Exactly.” Pasha raised the main tentacle, "Your Majesty, please look at the south end.”
He looked in the direction the other was pointing—he saw a deep horizontal ditch faintly exposed below the wall, like an escape route specially reserved for Rubber Worms.
“What is that?”
“Extraction area.” Pasha explained, "Celine used the sound-seeking characteristics of the worms to dig a narrower and narrower passage in the wall. As long as a specific chirp is emitted at the other end, they will drill into it and move towards the sound source—however, limited by the width of the passage, they can only stick out half of their heads at most, and their bodies will be stuck in the passage.”
“And then?” Nightingale, who had been listening, couldn't help but ask.
“Next, we will activate the magic core located at the end of the passage.” Pasha continued, "It has been adjusted to the blade mode. This vortex is generally used to defend enemies in narrow passages. The core will shoot out a magic light, filling the entire passage space, tearing apart any obstacles in front of the light. And that horizontal passage is the path that the magic light passes through.”
“The worms will be divided into two, and the mucus in their stomachs will gather together with the diversion grooves in the horizontal ditch. In this way, there is no need to kill them one by one, and a large amount of mucus can be obtained at one time.” She paused, “The reason why a distance of one kilometer is reserved is precisely for the collectors to use. According to Celine's idea, ordinary workers can enter the extraction area from outside the mountain, but they will not see anything except the grooves and pools flowing with mucus. This is both convenient for collection and not easy to cause panic.”
“……”
Roland was speechless for a moment.
He had nothing to add.
This plan can be said to be mature and flawless under the existing technology, taking into account the entire process from breeding to harvesting. If a rubber factory is built outside the mountain, it will simply cover the entire production and processing. Especially this modern style of flowing slaughter line, worthy of the concept learned from the Dream World.
But wouldn't it be a bit of a waste to use the precious magic core and Celine's life-long research as a crude butcher knife?
Even if you can't find the Chosen One and can't activate the instrument of Divine Retribution, you don't have to give up on yourselves so much...
No, Roland suddenly realized a problem.
“How many Rubber Worms can this breeding farm accommodate?”
“It is estimated to be around 100,000, but given their reproduction speed, it will take about a year to fill this new farm.”
“Then what about the corpses after the mucus is taken?” he asked, “Where do you plan to transport them out from?”
This was not a small problem. Roland had seen in a documentary that a modern chicken farm produced hundreds of tons of chicken manure every day. If not handled properly, it would cause serious soil and water pollution. Once the scale is enlarged, any small detail can cause huge problems.
Now the God's Punishment Witches can still transport the corpses, but when the worms reproduce to tens of thousands, it is easy to kill them, but it is not so easy to clean them up. If the corpses cannot be disposed of in time, accumulation in the cave will definitely cause a catastrophic impact.
“Don't worry, Your Majesty.” Pasha chuckled, "Fulan and the others will accept anything. In fact, the consumption of the three Worm Carriers when digging at full strength is really a bit alarming.”
“Gurulu—” After understanding the meaning of this sentence, Nightingale made a sound of stomach wall peristalsis.
Uh... okay.
Now Roland finally understood why there was a small door at the entrance, but a large fence was installed in a redundant manner.
It turned out that it was just a dining channel reserved for the three witches.