Castle of Black Iron

As soon as the overwhelming stress disappeared, those people in military uniforms recovered their composure; however, those engineers lost their balance. If not being held up by someone on their side, they might have sat on the ground.

It was out of their imagination that Commander Cheng could play such a terrifying joke with them.

Zhang Su let out a sigh inside too. ‘Although one life for one life is applicable to knights in Taixia Country; in fact, the number of knights who compensated for commoners with their own lives is definitely fewer than that of shadow demons that I’ve ever heard. If Cheng Honglie killed everybody at present out of fury, I’m afraid that nobody else would like to find him trouble except for Zhang Tie. Not only that, someone might find various reasons to prove the “necessity” and “legitimacy” of Commander Cheng’s deed such as moles of Three-eye Association are discovered among the crowd, disrespect Commander Cheng or Commander Cheng kills us by mistake when he’s hunting for bloody demons. Wherever it is, as there are humans, power would predominate. It’s determined by humanity. It’s the same wherever it is.’

After such a train of thoughts flashed through Zhang Su’s mind, Zhang Su took in a deep breath before saying, “I could take Commander Cheng to find our master. However, he’s about 120 miles away. I wonder which traffic tool did Commander Cheng take? Do you need me to have people pick you up by the airboat of Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory?”

Zhang Su didn’t see the airboat of Commander Cheng; therefore, he thought that Commander Cheng and his assistant just flew over here themselves. Given the status of Commander Cheng, he deserved such a hitchhike.

Cheng Honglie waved his hand as he pointed at those cool military SUVs over there and said, “No need, let’s go there by that vehicle…”

“Sure, please follow me, Commander Cheng…” Zhang Su immediately took Cheng Honglie and Gao Tianqi towards one military SUV after saying something to one military official on his side.

After coming to the front of a military SUV, Zhang Su opened the trunk and took out a metal cranking bar. Closely after that, he came to the front of the vehicle and inserted one end of the cranking bar into a hole. Only after waving the cranking bar for a few circles forcefully, he had already started the engine of the SUV, causing a muffled and euphonious sound; at the same time, the exhaust at the end of the vehicle started to smoke.

Gao Tianqi’s eyes turned bright as he asked, “Is this vehicle’s engine driven by Fiery-Oil?”

“Right…”

Cheng Honglie looked at this military SUV for a short while before sitting on the back seat. Zhang Su put the cranking bar back in the trunk before sitting in the front of the vehicle together with Gao Tianqi.

“Bang…bang…” After they closed the doors. Zhang Su pulled down the handbrake. After that, he put the vehicle into gear and pressed down on the accelerator. The vehicle started to move rapidly. This vehicle was much better ordinary steam vehicles in starting speed, acceleration performance, ride comfort, controllability and the output range of torque. Although there was also noise in the vehicle, it was much lower than that of the ordinary steam engine. After closing the windows, the noise inside the vehicle was only about 40-50 decibels.

After getting on the vehicle, Commander Cheng didn’t speak anymore. He just watched the scenery outside the window. By contrast, Gao Tianqi was more interested in this vehicle. He then started to chat with Zhang Su. As a result, the atmosphere in the vehicle was not embarrassing.

“Is the engine of this vehicle as same as that of the airplane above Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory?”

“No, this engine is much smaller than that of the airplane. Its cylinder is only 5 liters. Its driving force is over 320 horsepowers. By contrast, the engine of Air Cavalry Type-I is 18.5 liters and could output 1,500 horsepowers comprehensively. The two engines are also different in structures. This engine is the latest product produced in the factory of Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory; this vehicle and those vehicles that you saw are the trial vehicles of the first batch of vehicles which are going to be handed to Fire-Dragon Corps. They’re not in official production and matched with the corps yet. They’re used for discovering problems…”

“Is there any problem?”

“Yes, there is!”

“What’s that?”

“The problem is that this vehicle drives pretty well. Anyone who has tried this vehicle would not like to drive those steam vehicles anymore…”

Gao Tianqi looked at Zhang Su who was driving solemnly as he wondered whether Zhang Su was joking or not!

The military SUV soon rushed out of the mountainous road and came to the vast plain. It was rough land all over. As Zhang Su changed his gears and gradually accelerated the vehicle, the speed of the SUV gradually reached 120 miles per hour. Ordinary steam cars could never reach such a high speed. Only expensive alcohol cars such as Faerie-Dragon sports car could make that on the standard highway.

After half an hour later, the vehicle entered a residential area and moved onto the highway. There were large areas of farmlands, cities and towns on both sides of the highway. The summer wheat harvest led to a prosperous and pleasant scene everywhere.

When they passed by a piece of wheat field, Commander Cheng let Zhang Su pull over the vehicle when he saw those farmers busy working in the field. After that, he got off the vehicle. He then picked up a heavy ear of wheat and rubbed it.

After breaking the hulls, he saw full and crystal kernels. It seemed to be a new species as the kernels were full; besides, the two ends of the kernel were a bit slim. Under the sunlight, the kernels gave out shiny, golden light. After looking at it carefully, he found that the kernels even looked a bit reddish. Holding it, he could smell the faint fragrance of the kernels.

Even if Commander Cheng had no experience in farming, he also knew that this wheat was good. He had not even seen this kind of wheat before.

“Hey, man, how’s your harvest?”

Commander Cheng asked a 40-year-old farmer who was busy working kindly.

As a steam wheat reaper was working in the field, the farmer was shoveling the straws left by the steam reaper onto the oxcart.

When the farmer found Zhang Su’s military uniform of Fire-Dragon Corps and the unusual looks of Commander Cheng and Gao Tianqi, that farmer stopped what he was doing for the time being as he pulled off his gauze scarf which was used to cover his mouth and nose and revealed a swarthy and honest face. He then replied with a smile, “It’s better than last years. I’m afraid that each mu could produce over 800 kg’s grains…”

Of course, the farmlands in Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory were not as fertile as that in Ninghe Prefecture. In Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory, each mu of land could at most produce a bit more than 700 kg’s wheat; therefore, over 800 kg’s wheat per mu was a big harvest in the eyes of the farmer.

Commander Cheng nodded as he asked, “How’s your harvest last year?”

“About 700 kg’s wheat per mu!”

“Why so many this year?”

“Thanks to Qianji Hermit the master of Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory. Soon after Qianji Hermit arrived at Fire-Dragon Bounty Territory last year, he had sent people to deliver many wheat seeds to us. As those seeds looked fuller than those wheat seeds that we usually preserved for sowing, we sowed his seeds with uncertainty. We’ve not imagined that it could have such a high yield. A few days ago, someone came here and wanted to purchase our wheat at 30% higher price than the market price. But I didn’t agree. It’s my first time to see such good wheat after being a farmer for so many years. I plan to use them as seeds…”

“You don’t need to sow many seeds!”

“I have some relatives in Spiritualmaple Prefecture. It’s said that they suffered from a crop failure this summer. After hearing that I didn’t suffer from a crop failure, they all came here.”

After chatting with the farmer for a short while, Commander Cheng returned to the vehicle. Gao Tianqi and Zhang Su changed their seats.

…

1 hour later, this SUV entered Yangui Mountain Range which was over 60 miles away from Xuantian City in the south. After entering this region, they passed two posts before entering a manor on one side of a lake.

The scenery in this manor was beautiful. With a lake in the front and a mountain on its back, it’s a rare scenic spot. Soon after they got off the vehicle, Commander Cheng and Gao Tianqi had noticed that there were posts everywhere in the landscape, visible or invisible as they were targeted by those hidden sentries. If not being knights, they could not sense such a considerate arrangement.

Zhang Su took them all the way to a leisure wharf on the lakeside after passing by a garden and a pine wood in the manor.

Many people were over there. Some distinctive top beauties were standing in the pavilion beside the wharf, talking and laughing while pointing at something in the center of the lake…

In the center of the lake, a steel-hull boat was dashing forward on the lake, leaving a white line at the stern. It almost flew off. In the rapid movement, the boat rose waterdrops in the air. Under the sunlight, a small rainbow was looming at the stern…

Each time the boat bumped and flew off on the lake, kids’ exclamations and Zhang Tie’s chipper and pleasant laughter would drift from the boat to the lakeside, “How about that? Is your papa something…”