Chapter Thirty-Nine: Is There a Mine in My Family?

A somewhat dim environment.
A bald head remained as conspicuous as ever.
Clang!
A massive rock was split open by an iron pick.
Two companions hurried to carry away the broken stones.
Their seriousness was truly admirable.
“Did they really find ore?”
Mu Chen was less than fifty meters away, watching the scene unfold not far ahead, feeling uncertain.
When he approached, Sade and the others finally noticed him.
“Greetings, Master.”
They put down their work and quickly greeted him.
“It’s fine, just carry on. I’m only here to check on things,” Mu Chen said, glancing at the pile of stones collected from the ground.
“There’s quite a lot.” He packed all the stones into his backpack.

“Obtained [Stone] x51, transferred to backpack.”
“Obtained [Iron Ore] x4, transferred to backpack.”
[A mining segment extending toward the main vein—this is only the most exposed section. If you keep digging like this, you’ll reach the area beneath your own building in six months.]
Mu Chen’s face was full of confusion. “Beneath my building? The base?”
“So, I don’t have to pretend anymore? Can I just lay my cards on the table?”
Circling the area, he gathered many stones scattered on the ground into his backpack, feeling temporarily overwhelmed.
“Wouldn’t it be more convenient to dig directly below the base?” That was Mu Chen’s first thought after recovering.
The mining site was a full seven hundred meters from the base—a distance unfriendly for servants collecting and returning resources. Moreover, being so far from the base lowered the safety factor; once monsters appeared, the servants’ safety would be at risk.
[The main vein is seventy-four meters below ground. If you insist on your plan, you could mobilize all servants to dig with full force, and in five to ten days, you’d see the shy ore below.]
...
Since the idea wouldn’t work, he decided to continue collecting from here. The mine was within his territory anyway; he didn’t need anything more.
He took out the workbench and crafted four iron picks in succession, placing them in front of Servant One and Servant Five.
“You two don’t need to carry stones anymore. Here are iron picks—join Sade and start chiseling! Once you’re done, organize the rubble together.”

After giving instructions, he left some bottled water on the ground. Watching the three servants working hard, his mood grew brighter; he turned back and rewarded them with three chicken drumsticks.
He had already devised safety measures for the mining site.
Either build a watchtower nearby and have servants take turns guarding with a Type 95 rifle, or he and Ivy could take turns keeping watch.
He opened the building menu to check the details of the watchtower.
[Level 1 Mystical Watchtower: A structure that can attack intruders autonomously, with a five-second attack interval and a range of one hundred meters.]
[Required materials: Wood x100, Stone x50, Twisted Bones x10, Murky Essence x8, Mithril x5]
“Automatic attack, five-second interval, one hundred meter range? Is this still the kind of watchtower I imagined...”
[Don’t be surprised. Though its firepower is only about as strong as a suppressed firearm, with it, your mining site will at least have basic protection, right?]
“Eight Murky Essences—hurts a bit. The water supply area still isn’t finished, and while the old resource gaps haven’t been closed, new ones keep appearing.”
He sighed and closed the building menu, deciding to let Ivy keep watch for a while. Once the crises of food, shelter, and water were resolved, he would return to construct the watchtower.