If it does not want to fall into the passive situation of being trapped in a lonely city, the Kolas government can only retreat to the north, enter the hinterland of the Far East to deal with the imperial expeditionary force, exchange space for time, use strategic depth to lure the enemy deep into the complex northern hinterland, and mobilize the whole people to fight a protracted war, so that the invaders may continue to lose blood, fall into the quagmire of law and order warfare, and finally be forced to retreat.

In order to achieve the above strategic objectives, one of the most important prerequisites is to establish a communication line into the mountainous areas of the north, otherwise it is impossible for the government, army, and massive materials of the south to be transferred to the north in a timely manner in a state of war, let alone fully mobilize the manpower and material resources of the north to devote themselves to the war against the imperial aggression.

In late April, the "Northern Trunk Line" project, which had been in preparation for a long time of the national railway construction plan, finally broke ground. The Cabinet of Ministers of Transport and Chairman of the National Road and Bridge Engineering Corporation Matwi Wittgenstein was appointed as the chief commander of the project, and the "Independence" airship was temporarily transferred to the project leading group as the "air command".

Roland held the title of deputy leader in the railway engineering leadership group. Although it was only in name, he took it seriously, and on the morning of April 25, he accompanied Matvey to inspect the construction site by airship.

Roland is a pure layman in railway construction, and the planning on the drawings seems simple, but when he sees it with his own eyes on the construction site, he finds that difficulties are everywhere, but fortunately, with the expert guidance of Matvey, he can always find a way to overcome the difficulties encountered in the construction process.

The Northern Railway, which starts at Krasbourg and passes through the Casse Plateau, the Perron Gorge, the Subsidence Plateau, the Whispering Jungle, the Misty Swamps, the Balle Pass, the Kitland Plateau, and finally the North Bay, is estimated to be more than 2,600 miles long – more than all the railways in the Far East combined today.

Roland had personally measured the land through which the railway would run three years ago, and knew what a huge undertaking it would be. If we use the railway in his hometown of China on earth as an analogy, the Northern Railway is comparable to such an epoch-making great project as the "Beijing-Kowloon Line". The engineering level and the number of workers in the Kingdom of Kolas are far inferior to those of Huaguo during the construction of the "Beijing-Kowloon Line", and the original "Beijing-Kowloon Line" was opened to traffic after five years of construction, and according to the plan formulated by the Ministry of Communications of the Kolas government, the Far Northeast Railway is scheduled to be completed before the end of next year! There are huge shortcomings in technology and manpower, and the construction period is less than two years, Roland initially felt incredible when he saw this construction plan - how could this be done?!

This time, he took an airship to the construction site in person, just to find out whether the Ministry of Communications, presided over by Old Man Matvey, was bragging and whether the construction project could be completed on schedule.

Matvey listened to his question, and smiled a little helplessly. Roland knew very well what kind of mood was hidden behind this expression. It is evident that the old gentleman has been questioned the same question more than once, including His Majesty Rudolph, and he can only patiently explain it again and again to these ignorant and troublesome laymen.

"Your Royal Highness Roland, the National Road and Bridge Company is only responsible for the construction of the trunk line of the Northern Railway, and all the branch lines along the way are outsourced to private institutions, so as to help us share part of the amount of work, and then the trunk line project is also divided into several sections, for example, the current construction is the Colasburg-Icewind Valley section, the total length is about more than 1,000 miles, this section is divided into 20 sections, the average length is about 50 miles, our construction team adopts a quasi-military formation, and a total of 20,000 workers have been recruited, Among them, 5,000 people are free support from the Dwarves of Icewind Valley, which is equivalent to two engineering divisions, with twenty engineering battalions, each engineering battalion is responsible for a small section of the project, and the team that completes the first and passes the quality acceptance can get all the remuneration first, and then can be transferred to the construction of new road sections, seize the time to earn a share of the money, or you can support the team that is lagging behind and share the remuneration of the other party, and at the same time, the company will also give additional bonuses to the teams that perform well, so that the competition mechanism can be introduced in the construction, It greatly stimulates the enthusiasm of workers and improves work efficiency. ”

Roland understood Matvey's approach after a moment's thought, but there were still two doubts.

"Mr. Matvey, according to your construction plan, it is equivalent to cutting the huge overall project of railway construction into several equal pieces of work and contracting them to various engineering battalions. For example, there is a discrepancy between the section of the road built by the 9th Engineering Battalion and the section built by the 10th Engineering Battalion, resulting in the inability to connect smoothly......"

Matvey smiled, not surprised by his question.

"Your Highness, in order to prevent problems when connecting the road sections, we have made full preparations when we surveyed the terrain and drew the construction drawings in advance, if the construction is carried out according to the drawings, it will not be a big problem, each engineering battalion has at least two senior agency warlocks as on-site supervisors, they will always pay attention to the construction progress, ensure that the lines on the drawings are consistent with the tracks laid in reality, and there is also an insurance," Matvey pointed to the airship porthole, "We take the airship back and forth to inspect the construction site from morning to night, not to see the scenery, There are 20 observation crystals on the airship, and each observation crystal has at least three observers in shifts to monitor the construction of each section of the road below, and report to the headquarters immediately if there is a problem with the road section. ”

"I have benefited greatly from your guidance, Mr. Matvey, and allow me to ask a superficial layman's question." "You once said that different sections of the road have different geological environments, so it is conceivable that the construction of mountainous and hilly sections or sections crossing rivers is more difficult than that of plain sections. ”

"His Royal Highness the Prince, in fact, we have also taken this issue into account, so not only ordinary workers participate in the construction, but also a team of spellcasters that we have specially set up, if any section of the road encounters construction obstacles, the supervisor will send a letter to the airship command for help, and the airship will rush to the construction site as soon as possible and send a spellcasting team to solve the obstacles." With that, Matvey turned and pushed open the hatch that led to the airship's main deck, introducing Roland to the spellcasting team that was recuperating in the hall.

The casters in blue, green, and yellow uniforms sat neatly in the hall, and Roland looked at it, as if he saw the flag of a small African country called "Gabon" on the earth.