Krafft's Anomaly Notes

Chapter 120 The Old Mine

As we all know, in underground caves, glass will not be brushed out by itself.The creatures in the deep layer may not be able to burn pottery, so these things can only come from people, and it is unlikely to be the aborigines in the village.

Kraft threw away the small glass shards, put on gloves to clean the ground mixed with dust and gravel, and found a larger surviving fragment.

It is about a thick cup and bottle with a round bottom, with obvious traces of artificial firing. The craftsmanship is not as good as that of Vichem, but after wiping off the dust, it can be seen that the transparency is relatively good, and the light can easily pass through a distance thicker than one finger. Irregular spots caused by uneven melting.

Untie the scabbard, and use the head end to poke away the fragments of the large pottery's bottle belly, and you can see the remnants between yellowish brown and reddish brown attached to the inner wall.

Twisting a pinch, he found in it the smell of old metalwork that had lost its varnish, had been left wet for too long due to mishandling, and was scrapped.

The attachments are like micro-moisture flour that cracks and falls off under light pressure, and disperses into a dust-like substance, which is inevitably inhaled a little into the nasal cavity, and there is a slight sour smell that has not yet dissipated in the rusty smell of blood.

Among them, the uneven particles appear to be common rocks, and such slags are deposited after calcination of unclean minerals.

"Rust powder?" Due to Kraft's menacing gaze, William didn't take another sip, but this did not prevent him from figuring out what it was, and it would often be rubbed on the old iron parts in the cabin.

As for why the rust was ground into powder, the captain had no idea, but the rust powder reminded him where he had seen these green minerals before, "I remembered, I have seen these green things before, but they don't look like this It is ground into powder and added to ink, which was given to me for drawing parchment charts."

"You actually recognize it?"

"It tastes quite special, a bit like iron rust and red iron ore." William smacked his lips in aftertaste, perhaps because of the hidden vigilance of injury hidden in his instincts, this strange taste that is close to the blood when biting his lips is easy to remember, "Do you have any idea?"

Kraft was using his meager knowledge of chemistry to analyze the wreckage in front of him.It is a pity that due to the change of the examination pattern that year, this alien soul did not have any advanced studies in this area, and medical chemistry was also passed at a low altitude, and the level was about equal to that of middle school.

Fortunately, it's not too barren, and it can be roughly guessed that it is some kind of iron salt. It is suspected that it will turn into rust after being calcined. Oh no, he means iron oxide.

"I have two messages."

"A good one and a bad one again?" William showed a fairly good ability to accept, or compared to what he had experienced before, this is nothing. "I don't want to choose, just choose one."

"We're in that alchemist's mine." Kraft picked up a green crystal block that was separated from a rough stone. It was roughly broken from the root and piled up next to the device for retrieval. "Got it we The target is not a unique and rare mineral, it has even been used in ink long ago."

The appearance of green crystals is probably ferrous ions. Considering that the product is sulfuric acid, there are sulfur-containing anions, and it may be crystals made by adding a few water.

The case was solved, it seems to be the original dry distillation method, and the heating product was collected to obtain sulfuric acid.

Congratulations to this talented amateur chemist who went to poor mountains and poor waters and backcountry, and discovered a beautiful mineral that had been discovered earlier. Under the guidance of "refining the essence of ore", he accidentally discovered dry distillation, and finally came up with sulfuric acid, Fuck myself.

Out of secrecy, or because he really didn't know that this kind of thing exists in other places, but it is only used in a very small amount and supplied as powder, he insisted on mining in a cultural and geographical environment that is almost completely isolated from the outside world.

This makes it extremely difficult for news to spread to the outside world. In the case of strict control of key personnel, it is not easy to reverse the source from the outside to the inside, which directly leads to the death of technology and people.

This premature invention would have been buried forever, along with its creator and the horrific reason for its disappearance, until someone got bored and tossed some ink raw material into a retort.

In the end, a clever guy dug out clues from a patient with cerebral infarction, and led people all the way here to catch up with the last wave of bad luck after a few years of this accident.

There is a feeling that the treasure map found after all the hard work points to the crooked neck tree at the entrance of my village.

"We don't need to take the risk of developing this mine. We just need to go back and ask where this kind of thing is produced. It's unbelievably simple."

William was stunned for a moment, the green light that was worthless a few minutes ago seemed to be changing color, and was plated with a bright gold edge, "You just said that there are two news, what about the bad news?"

"That was bad news just now."

"Ok?"

"We are in the mine where alchemists unearth raw materials." Kraft reiterated the fact, stuffed the crystal into his pocket, and walked forward with a torch, "I hope you still remember what happened in this mine, or Calling it 'the old mine' would be a better memory?"

They crossed the pottery and glass slag, stepped over the broken-handled mining pick, and there were gouging marks on the cave wall. William quickly realized what their biggest trouble was now.

"Collapse..."

In the area with the most concentrated mining traces, the whole section collapsed and the rocks were congested.The arrival of the cave builders was not the direct cause of killing the miners, but it dealt a fatal blow to the weak structure.

On the huge rock blocking the way ahead, the chiseling marks converged into several small pits, and a rusty iron pickaxe with a broken pickaxe was discarded beside it.

"Can you go back and try another way?"

Kraft shook his head slowly, and lit the remaining torches. He had prepared a lot when he came, but he couldn't stand the consumption. "I'm afraid I don't have time to find a second way."

"Just a little bit, just a little bit?" William pushed the stone violently, and was shocked by the reaction force to take a few steps back, and the rock remained motionless.Walking such a long way, escaping from the mouth of such an evil thing, being in the treasure hunt, and being blocked at the exit at the last step?
Now it may be only a few dozen steps away from the outside world, and the fallen rocks have turned this section of the road into a natural moat. This is a distance that is absolutely impossible to dig through with manpower.

"Could it be that those things have two faces again?" Repeated hope and despair hit the captain alternately, and now they are probably at the end of their rope. No matter how clever Kraft's "magic" is, it can only take them through different levels, and there is no way. Carved out a way out of thin air.

Kraft was silent.To say he was not reconciled, he was much more reconciled than William.Compared with the desire to go out and tell stories, he still has unfinished content that is less than half a person's height, and he doesn't want to be with arthropods and long-shelled worms in the deep.

But this is really not a problem he can solve. Unless he can create a shield machine, how can he dig through a rock formation that is at least ten meters thick?
"I don't even see a single bone here, it's probably all dragged away by those things..." William picked out a heavy long stone and tried to swing it.It seems that he intends to make a last-ditch effort and die with dignity.

It makes sense, I only saw alchemy equipment and mining picks along the way, contacting the characteristic faces of the locals that emerged, it is not difficult to guess the whereabouts of the victims.

[Shield machine? 】

Kraft touched his chin, and found a dangerous inspiration in his active thinking, and realized that this matter did not seem to be entirely a daydream.

(End of this chapter)