Magic, Mechanics, Shuraba Vol 2 Chapter 13

Chapter 13 A Simple Mission, A Small Discovery

Actually, there was one main reason Lu Yun let Tia take charge of the investigation of the Black Steel City’s Mining Area —— Other than the three main mining areas in the country, the six other middle-sized mining area, and the numerous small mining areas all belonged to the people —— Alright, to put it bluntly, it belonged to the gangs of the area.

That was why there exist the scene of Tia opening the road.

However, anyone with eyes could tell that without the protection of authorities, the gangs could not exist in the area for long. Furthermore, the Lula Ore was a rare and practical material which was rated as a battle grade material. Not only was its mining strictly restricted, its sales was also strictly monitored and distributed —— Despite that, the Lula ore still brings in high revenue.

So, who exactly are the ones protecting these gangs? It’s actually the current Prime Minister, Tia’s Father, Archduke Jacqueline —— Every year, these gangs have to pay the Jacqueline family up to seventy percent of the profit in order to obtain permission from the authorities to operate.

Therefore, the proud and arrogant behavior of Tia’s just now was perfectly understandable —— Such was just a small example of her special privilege. There were even more of such privileges that made it hard to give up.

Very quickly, the car went into the mining area and carts and carts of Lula Ore could be seen being pushed out from inside the mining area. The ores were transferred onto the transportation belts and transported to the nearby refinery factories. Even though only ten grams of Pure Lula Ore can be refined from an average of one kilogram raw unrefined ores, this was already considered a rich mine already.

Tia took a look at the mining area before taking out her multi-purpose crystal ball and projected an image of the map of the area. After comparing several times, she frowned.

“That’s weird.”Ouyang Tao said: “From the map, there should be four mining spots here but just from what I see, there are already seven here.”

“Of course I know, and those might not be all.” Tia would, of course, know of such happenings. Over mining and selling illegally were important sources of income for the local gangs. Of course, all these were silently accepted by the authorities —— What Tia had come to investigate this time were these privately opened mining spots and where the ores ended up.

With the original map becoming near useless, Ouyang Tao was a little uncertain of what to do next: “What shall we do next?”

“Of course we should first plot a proper map.”

Bang! Boom! Pow! Whack… What happened need not be elaborated. In conclusion, about ten minutes later, Tia exited from an office within the mining area with an accurate map in her hand.

From the map, there were approximately fifteen mining spots of various sizes and within each spot, the structure was complicated making it seem like a maze —— It was not hard to tell that the mining of the ores here was just executed without much planning. Not only was it without planning, it was very dangerous as well.

“Alright, the locations of the ground measuring device shall be decided by you. I’ll go prepare them.” Although Tia was the leader, she did not do everything. She still left stuff for Ouyang Tao to settle.

Although the structure of the mining spots was complicated, the use of the ground measuring device was even better. Soon, more than twenty devices had been set in place and would automatically send the results of the scan to Ouyang Tao and Tia’s multi-purpose crystal in two days time.

After that, all that was left was to wait for the people to sort out the accounts…

It looks as though after two days of rest, the simple mission would be able to be completed.

In the evening, Ouyang Tao returned to the hotel and saw the others returning with large boxes of paper. In the boxes were the records and receipts that they had collected concerning the transactions of Lula Ores for the past five years.

“Yo, Tia, is the progress at the mining area smooth?” Rem asked with a smile while hugging two large boxes.

“Very smooth, what about your side Rem?” Tia asked while helping Rem with one of the boxed.

“Yup, it’s quite smooth. However, I found something weird within the accounts. I’ll tell you when we go back to the room.”

“Okay.”

As they spoke, the two went upstairs together. Seeing this situation, Annie curiously poked Ouyang Tao’s elbow asking: “Ehh, are the two of them…… Are they?”

Since someone who was as clueless as Ouyang Tao could tell, a sensitive young girl like Annie could definitely tell. However, to this, his principle stayed the same: “This is their private matter, don’t ask too much.”

But, his sister Ouyang Xue seemed to have a similar interest in this and asked: “Really? Bro, Senior Tia and General Rem are in that kind of relations.h.i.+p?”

“One is a famous n.o.ble family’s daughter, the other is a General who climbed to that rank from a commoner. They suit each other so well!”

“Yeah, yeah! Furthermore, they sleep in the same room.”

“Which means to say……”

“Aiyaaa —— ! It must be like that!”

Seeing the two la.s.ses becoming more and more exaggerated, if he lets this go on, this will be a topic of gossip between the girls and spread wildly when they returned to the Academy, . It wouldn’t be long before everyone knew about it. Ouyang Tao quickly took out his authority as a brother and group leader: “You two, this are their private matters. Don’t ask and don’t gossip about it. Do you understand?”

“Ohh.” Annie kept her interest to herself.

However, his sister Ouyang Xue obviously did not understand her brother’s intention: “Why?”

“This is other’s privacy. Everyone has their own secrets and we must learn to respect them. Do you understand?”

“Ohhh, I know.” Ouyang Xue slightly pursed her lips, looking as though she was not satisfied. “Then, if I have someone I like, I won’t tell bro.”

“Ahhh!? WHAT, WHAT?!?!” Hearing this, Ouyang Tao started becoming nervous “Ah Xue, tell me properly! Do you have someone you? Who is it? If I don’t… No, I mean, when are you going to let me see him?”

“I won’t tell you~ I won’t tell you~” Ouyang Xue made a cheeky face and escaped.

This la.s.s, I should settle it with her later.

Instead, it was Liu Xinya who remained very quiet. She maintained her smile and looked at Tia and Rem, looking as though she was silently giving them her blessings.

Only until Ouyang Xue had left did Liu Xinya open her mouth to speak: “Annie, let’s go back to our rooms to clean up too.”

“Yup, okay.”

Lastly, only Ouyang Tao and Zhao Yuecheng were left slowly making their way back to their rooms from the stairs.

“Big Bro, do you know alloys?”

“Alloy? Of course!” As a mechanical engineering magician, Alchemy was one of the most basic skills. Refinery and mixing metals all require high levels of alchemy and Ouyang Tao was an absolute expert in the field of Alchemy.

“I had really found something rather interesting here.” Within Zhao Yuecheng’s voice, he specifically emphasized on the word “really”.

Ouyang Tao lowered his voice and asked uncertainly: “Then could you possibly mean that the problem Rem found was fake?”

“That might be true. But I personally think that that isn’t the main point.” Zhao Yuecheng said: “Therefore big bro, you have to decide what to do next.”