Chapter 343: Ecosystem
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Anfey thought too much again this time. The meeting the following day ran all day. All the reform ideas were approved by all the mercenary group commanders, even though some of the changes seriously affected their interests, which even made unemotional Anfey feel bad for them.
Mages in different mercenary groups gathered together and formed a mage group. The chief commander of the mage group was Christian and the vice commander was Blavi. Most of the mage group were senior mages, but their fighting ability could not be underestimated when they would fight together. If they shot large fireballs together at a target as powerful as Ernest, he had to avoid them instead of fighting them off.
The first unit was formed mainly by Ozzic’s mercenary group. Of course, the commander was Ozzic. The vice commander was Ye. Female mage Elizabeth’s mercenary group joined the first unit, while she herself became vice commander of the mage group. She shared the same rank as Blavi. Among other commanders, she suffered the most losses. From now on, she would not have her own mercenary group anymore. Maybe because she was thinking of everyone’s interests, or maybe Ernest’s powerful strike made her worried. After a little hesitation, she nodded and agreed to Alice’s arrangement.
Ozzie’s Warflame mercenary group was renamed the second unit, while Beastman Tiger’s Wuming mercenary group became the third unit. Alice merged a few other mercenary groups into these second and third units. Those mercenary group commanders became Ozzie and Tiger’s assistants.
The rest of the mercenary groups were merged into the fourth and fifth units. The commander of the fourth unit was an intermediate swordsman named Stein, while the commander of the fifth unit was a gigantic axe warrior, Khufu. Khufu had blood of a barbarian in him. Anfey had only met Stein and Khufu once, at the previous day’s meeting, and did not know much about them. But Anfey could tell Alice had planned this a long time ago and knew what she was doing. He knew they were good picks, because other commanders all heaved a sigh of relief when they heard Stein and Khufu were appointed commanders of the fourth and fifth units. The rest of the commanders seemed to think they were good picks as well.
Anfey and Alice argued heatedly over the candidates of the sixth unit. In the end, Alice agreed with Anfey on Shinbella as the commander. The sixth unit was the smallest. Because of the unpleasant experience, it was not possible to merge other mercenary groups into the six unit. The sixth unit was composed of all the surviving mercenaries of Jagged Roses mercenary group. After they heard Shinbella would be commander, the concerns of other commanders had seemed to calm down.
After Anfey finished the errands, the sun had gone down beyond the horizon. This day had been the toughest for Anfey. He had not realized he had so many errands to run. Since he was the official ruler of Moramatch, he had to stay here and make sure he got everything under control.
Seeing the newly-appointed commanders leave the conference room, Anfey stood up and stretched his sore neck. He laid eyes on Alice. "Alice, can you be honest with me and tell me whether we have enough food?"
Anfey did not know much about politics or military strategies. He did have a good understanding of the concept "Before making any military moves, food and ammunition should be in place."
This line had been in many works of fiction and historical novels. Anfey had never attended a military academy: all of his military common sense was from fiction and historical novels. That was why he was worried about food.
"Master, would you like to walk with me in the underground city?" Alice broke into a smile.
"The underground city?" Anfey asked.
"Yes, but I think you should be prepared for the changes. Since you left, those gnomes and dwarves have been busy working on it. They have totally changed it," Alice said.
"I would love to take a look." Anfey was intrigued. "Let’s go, Suzanna."
After they resolved the problems between them, they all looked comfortable with each other’s presence. Alice briefed them on the way. When Shansa Empire retreated, they burned many items and buried the stuff they could not take with them. Kumaraghosha had all the records. When he came to Moramatch and the necromancers had not attacked them yet, Alice had took dwarves, gnomes and Kumaraghosha’s subordinates to dig out lots of ammunition.
Dwarves were famous for their forging skills. They could really make a lot of things out of the ammunition. Dozens of smelting surfaces were built underground with unlimited fuel from forests. They should have no problem with armaments for a long time.
After passing through the dark cave, the dwarves opened the heavy doors for them, because they got the news in advance that Alice was leading Anfey down there. Under Alice’s guidance, they walked into another alley. At one turn, Anfey remembered there should be a small underground city in about a dozen yards. They bright light made Anfey surprised. To save magic crystals, most magic everlasting lights were not lit up in Moramatch. How many magic crystals had they used to keep this underground so bright? Anfey thought to himself.
Alice gave Anfey a mysterious smile and walked straight to where the lights were. Walking along the corridors of the underground city, Anfey noticed a silver white paint all over the roof and walls. There were only three magic everlasting lights, but they lit up every corner. It was obvious this kind of paint had strong reflection.
Anfey walked over and felt the wall. It felt cold. Alice walked next to Anfey and said in a low voice, "Gnomes made them. They could mix mercury and other stuff and made them into this paint, like alchemists. Master, you probably can tell this paint can reflect lights like mirrors. The whole city only needs about twenty magic everlasting lights to light up everything. However, the rooms on the sides are still dim. We could not install magic everlasting lights in every room. It would be such a waste."
"Nice, nice. It makes it very convenient." Anfey nodded. "Alice, where do you store food?"
"Follow me, please," Alice said.
They walked to the border of the city and followed along the drainage pipe for a few hundred yards before they reached the underground river, which flowed quietly. Anfey did not expect more changes here than in the underground city. The high arch was installed with dozens of magic everlasting lights. The light radiating from every light was reflected on the arch painted with the same silver white paint. The light reflected on the river and its banks. They could even see the fish swimming in the river.
A wooden bridge was built over the river. The bank of the river had been built up. It seemed all of these changes were made by dwarves and gnomes. The most surprising thing were the green plants and the different sized boarbeasts running everywhere. Adult boarbeasts were only a small percentage of all the boarbeasts, while young ones were the majority.
Boarbeasts were naturally timid and afraid of darkness. They only played around in places with lights and did not run elsewhere. Two small boarbeasts caught Anfey’s attention. It seemed they had caught something like a snake. They bit on each end of it and fought over it.
"What is that?" Anfey asked.
"That is a gigantic earthworm," Alice said.
"Earthworm?" Anfey asked.
"Yes. These earthworms eat boarbeast’s waste, while boarbeasts eat gigantic earthworms. They live off each other while we have food source as well," Alice said.
"Did you think of this?" Anfey thought about the ecosystem. He had a weird feeling that this woman might come from his previous world as well. Could she be a professional poultry feeder? Anfey thought to himself.
"No, it was a suggestion from a gnome," Alice said.
"How many boarbeasts do you have?" Anfey felt relieved and stopped wondering.
"About five hundred," Alice said.
"Do you think it will be enough for us?" Anfey asked.
"We only had just over a hundred of them at the beginning, but we have about five hundred now. The more boarbeasts we have, the more gigantic earthworms will grow. The more gigantic earthworms we have, the number of boarbeasts will grow as well." Alice smiled. "If these are not enough for us, I have stored a lot of flour in other parts of the underground city. I think these boarbeasts and flour should last until next summer without any other help."
"How much flour do you have?" Anfey asked.
"Because the number of mercenaries keeps growing, it would feed us for two months," Alice said.
"Why did you store so much flour? I remember I only left you two hundred gold coins. You…?" Anfey asked.
"I sold some defective armor. Of course, dwarves thought they were defective, but those merchants thought they were high-quality military equipment. They gave me a good price. I bought a large amount of flour with that money." Alice smiled. "You told me to turn this place into a fort. If we do not have enough food storage, no matter how strong the fort is, we could not stay here long. You do not think I made that decision without your permission, do you?"
Anfey chuckled. "I do not blame you for that." Anfey turned to look at the magic everlasting light above him. "How many magic crystals do you need for these magic everlasting lights?"
"When I bought boarbeasts, I was thinking of raising them in the city. Later, when the Death War broke out, I had to raise boarbeasts here." Alice sighed. "It was a coincidence. A businessman from Tumen Commercial Union bought a lot of magic crystals. He wanted to ship them back for sale, but he was attacked by death spirits in the valley. Most mercenaries he hired died, while the rest of them retreat back to us. That businessman was bitten by a death spirit. Before he lost himself, he handed me all his goods and gave me all the top magic crystals in his Dimensional ring. He hoped those could help us fight the death spirits. Those evil organisms were the enemies of all humans. I understood his wishes."
Anfey nodded vigorously. Now he finally felt relieved.