The mine is still working as usual.

The old miners walked out of the dormitory, bowed their heads and sighed when they saw the bright sunshine, they did not like to see the wind and the sun, but they wanted to see the storm and the tsunami, so that they could get a holiday.

There were no days off in the Sivar mines, a system that was very common in the Norman kingdom, and in order to develop steam technology as quickly as possible, large quantities of mineral resources were needed everywhere.

Every day, steam trucks come in and out of the mines, taking with them batch after batch of black gold.

It has been eight days since they arrived at the Sivar mine, and today they officially started their work, and the rookie miners stood at the door of the dormitory to gather to receive their equipment.

"Rookies, follow me for a while and follow the arrangement. ”

The miner captain handed out the equipment and grinned with yellow teeth.

He is an old man, and the mining area specially sent him to lead the team for newcomers, and it is easier to direct others to do the work than to do it himself, so his face is full of smiles.

Picking up his pickaxe, clothes, and hard hat, Bill followed the team toward the mine, where steam wagons drove by, kicking up a cloud of dust.

Squinting at the steam wagon, he saw the driver sitting in the car and a soldier with a gun, the soldier wearing a military cap with the Norman royal army insignia on it, and the driver wearing a plain dark blue worker's uniform, not like a soldier.

As far as Bill knew, the Norman nation had invented the steam locomotive for some time, but the technology had not yet been widely used.

In addition to the fact that the technology is not yet fully mature, and the high cost factor, the main reason for the lack of popularity is that the government strictly controls the use of steam locomotives, and in the Norman country, only government agencies and the military, as well as important mining areas, are eligible to own steam locomotives.

The same is true for steamboats, all of which are recorded in the government archives, and the wealthy gentry and nobles with high titles are not allowed to build steamships privately.

Therefore, the driver of the steam car is not simple, but the driver just now looks no different from an ordinary miner.

This led Bill to think of the possibility that he might be able to get his hands on a steam wagon and drive it away.

There's nothing wrong with being ready to retreat.

"I've never driven a steam car...... Captain, will we have a chance to drive out to deliver goods in the future?"

"I don't think the driver is a soldier, he's wearing a miner's suit just like us. ”

He asked seemingly casually, with envy on his face.

The miners also remembered this possibility, became excited, and rushed to ask the captain.

Driving a steam locomotive was already quite a decent job for their origin.

The captain of the miners was stunned for a moment, then laughed.

"Do your job well, you haven't even been in the mine, you want to be a truck driver, how can this kind of thing happen to you?"

"I've been digging coal here for two years before I have a chance to come out and breathe, and I want to drive......?

The chatter has come to the entrance of the mine.

The mine was bottomless, with occasional gusts of cold wind, and the miners were terrified for the first time.

Thick wooden strips formed a frame, steel cables were hung above, the cable car swayed slightly, and the rookie miner clung to the cable car guardrail, swallowing saliva and trembling.

"Money is not so easy to make, I hope you don't have a fear of heights and claustrophobia. ”

The captain of the miners smiled again and nodded to the workers who controlled the ropes, and the cable car was slowly sent into the underground mine, and when the bell rang, the cable car was pulled up.

"The next one is...... John, go up. ”

John was shaking, he was afraid of heights, he was afraid of the dark, and when he saw the deep darkness of the mine, the soles of his feet were weak and cold sweats broke out.

Especially the nightmare the night before, which made him even more afraid of being alone in the dark.

Not daring to expose his timidity, he finally became a miner, and for the sake of his beautiful and gentle wife at home and his old mother with limited mobility, John could only board the cable car.

There were already five people on the cable car, and when John jumped onto the cable car with his eyes half-closed, the cable car shook violently.

"Go down, go down, you fat man!"

"Captain, I must not go with him!

The miner screamed, and John quickly jumped off the cable car and lay on the ground to gasp, still scared for a while.

The captain of the miners held on to the cable car and looked at John with a frown.

"Forget it, just come and go down with them, and the fat man will go with me last. ”

In the end, only Bill and John were left, and they calmly walked onto the cable car, and Bill could see in the dark, and he would not be afraid in places where there was no light.

The captain of the miners looked at Bill more, and felt that he was different from the miners.

Follow the cable car slowly into the mine, David's lamp above the cable car, illuminating the narrow shaft, except for the sound of the steel cables grinding and John's whispering, Bill gradually heard more tapping and the sound of tracks pressing against the rails.

"Captain, I would like to inquire personally. ”

"It's really rare, do you still have friends in the mining area, although I have been working in the mining area for more than two years, I only know the miners who came with me. ”

“？”

"You don't realize yet, each team of miners is in charge of a different mine. ”

"After leaving the mine, I eat, take a bath, sleep, and when I eat, I can't speak, and when I take a bath, everyone patronizes and grabs the shower head, and I feel more like an enemy than an enemy. ”

"But what the name of the person you're looking for might be on a team with us. ”

"His name is Kurt. ”

"Sorry, I'm not impressed. ”

"It doesn't matter. ”

The cable car is still descending, and the mine is deeper than expected.

"By the way, Captain, have there been any strange things happening in the mines, such as people suddenly going missing, or dying of illness, all kinds of strange visions. ”

"This ...... It doesn't seem to be any, the mining area is normal, but what are you asking for?"

"It's not a big deal, Kurt is my friend, he's missing. ”

"Then he didn't go missing in the mines, where every miner has a file record, right in Mr. Bam's. ”

"I see, thank you. ”

The cable car lands and the chatter ends.

The mine is crisscrossed with railroad tracks and carts, and digging tools and wooden crates are piled aside.

The David's lamp is also used carefully in the mines, where the light can only illuminate part of the area, which is dimly lit and only two meters high, and is full of oppression.

The air was dark and muddy, and it felt like it was about to suffocate, and in addition to the high carbon dioxide content, it also smelled of gunpowder.

The captain of the miners rings the bell, which is tied to a long line and must be shaken vigorously to transmit the sound to the ground.

They rode into the mine in a minecart and began mining.

There are many mines and caves in the Sivar Mine, and there are no overseers that Bill imagined, and there are only this group of newcomers and miner captains in this mine, and there is no way to reach more people.

Time has not changed significantly in the mines, only sweat and hunger can make Bill feel the passage of time, and the mines have strict requirements for workers to mine coal and complete the workload before returning to the surface.

The miners, who used to work as coolies in the past, also find the working conditions unbearable, and Bill is thin and slower in mining, and soon needs to rest.

"Find something and leave as soon as possible, I haven't done this kind of work since I was a child!"

Wiping his sweat with a wet towel and throwing down his pickaxe to get around the mining site, there were no toilets in the mine, and he had to walk a few hundred meters along the coal road.

Not all of the underground mines are long and narrow caves, and one side of the middle section of this coal road is an underground cliff, and a Davy lamp is far away from the coal road, which cannot illuminate the entire coal road.

Standing on the edge of the cliff, a cold wind blows from the cliff.

A faint light under the cliff beneath the underground caught Bill's attention, and he was unusually sensitive to the light.

To Bill's knowledge, the current coal mining shafts in the Sivar mine are not considered deep mining, and the cost of deep excavation is extremely high, so there is no reason for the mine to carry out deep excavation operations when the shallow coal mine still needs to be mined.

"The mining area has to be excavated deep regardless of the cost, and there are obviously so many mines in the shallow depths, unless they ......."

"Unless they're not digging coal!"

Finally excited, crouched down to observe the bottom of the cliff, carefully controlling the shadow to explore down the cliff wall.

Since awakening the Book of Shadows, he has learned more about witchcraft, and has realized that it is not necessary to summon the power of shadows from the shadow space every time, and that learning to control shadows can do a lot of things.

It's just not clear what the 'cost' is.

Witchcraft that has nothing to do with shadows basically requires special preparation and lengthy spells, and the use of magical curses and attacks on others carries great risks.

If the sorcery is unleashed, the caster will suffer backlash, and the backlash power will be multiplied.

Bill doesn't think there is any cost to using the power of shadows, but he doesn't know what he has to pay for and how much.

The Book of Shadows also states that wizards are born with great powers, and are born and grow with visions such as fire, controlling plants, superpowers, or being able to communicate with animals or the deceased.

These visions can cause great problems for family and neighbors, and the church and witch hunters can easily find them and capture wizards whose magic has not yet fully awakened.

Their parents are also ostracized by others, so when ordinary people give birth to strange children, the common practice is to throw the child into the river or the woods, and the believers will send the child to the church and let the church deal with it.

Anyway, children can be reborn, and it is not so sad to throw one and die another.

Thanks to the dim light, the shadow stretched smoothly to the cavern at the bottom of the cliff, and Bill focused his attention, and the shadow suddenly appeared in the shape of an ear, collecting sounds.

"Can't, do ......"

"We can't ...... Long ......"

The voice was so loud that Bill couldn't hear the full conversation, like a signal jamming on the phone.

"Find ...... New...... Honors ......"

“...... Alive, ...... moving"

“...... You...... Open ......!"

"Ahh

"Giggle ......"

It seemed that someone was wailing, someone was singing, the faint light suddenly went out, and there was a faint tremor under the feet, and the sound was all gone.

Quickly got up and left, his heart pounding, praying that no one would find out that he was eavesdropping.

Back at the coal mining site, the captain of the miners gave everyone food, two pieces of cold bread and salted dried carrots, and no one realized that the ground had just shaken, and everyone was eating their lunch in silence.

The miners have long since lost the strength to speak.

Consciously join the eating queue as if nothing had just happened.

In the deep mine a few hundred meters away from Bill and the others, a group of men and women hurriedly took the cable car back to the surface, their faces unwilling.

Bam was there, too, and his expression was solemn, very different from his usual lazy appearance.