It was a desolate mountainous land, with dry land, numerous cracks, potholes, and an unusually barren land, where there was little greenery in the mountains in the distance. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

Desolation is the only synonym here.

When the sun was rising, the blazing sun scorched the earth, and it was hot and stuffy, like a steamer, steaming, and the earth was empty, and even the beasts were silent.

At this time, the temperature is too high, too hot, at least forty degrees, standing under it, less than five minutes, you will be soaked.

Huangyan City, located in the westernmost part of the Dalan Empire, is located in a remote area, all mountainous, the transportation is very inconvenient, coupled with poor resources, the living conditions are very poor, except for the Huangyan ore, there is basically no other available resources.

Therefore, there is basically no government system here, and the ruling force in the dark is not the official government on the surface, but a force named Xuyangmen behind it, who is the largest force in Huangyan City to resell Huangyan iron ore. Even the people in the government are in high positions in the Xuyang Gate, and the officials protect each other and oppress the mountain villagers within a radius of 100 miles.

If officials and businessmen are in the same stream, they will naturally be polluted, and then oppress the people, which has almost become an eternal thing.

Thirty miles away from Huangyan City, in a hot and steaming mountainous area, here is different from the quiet of other places, and it can even be said that it is diametrically opposite, here is completely a hot scene, lively and extraordinary, shouting, percussion sound one after another, the sound of people boiling, one after another, the sound is deafening.

From a distance, there were nearly 100 samurai in armor standing on the barren mountain, all holding earth-colored broadswords, with a strong face, patrolling the edges of dozens of huge pits that were tens of zhang in size and seven or eight zhang deep.

Dozens of large and small huge pits occupy a radius of more than ten miles.

The pit was full of people, some of whom were digging mountains with mine hammers, and some were carrying the yellow-colored iron ore smashed out of the mountain walls into bamboo baskets and transporting them to the designated location. There were also some fierce-looking overseers with leather whips, and from time to time they beat those who had slowed down due to exhaustion, and each whip brought out a bloody mark, and even some flesh.

Wails are naturally indispensable, and the wounds are burned by the scorching sun, and the stinging pain is even worse, many people have blood cocoons on their bodies, and what is even more staggering is that some wounds have begun to be red, swollen and pus.

All of them are ragged, with yellow faces and thin muscles, and their blood and sweat are muddy, which is really miserable!

But no one dared to resist, and even their eyes were tamed, silently bearing these whips and scoldings, and desperately gritting their teeth and working harder under the scorching sun!

......

These are the mine slaves, and they are also the most simple mountain people within hundreds of miles of Huangyan City, but the world is not good, and they are forced to be taken here by those unscrupulous profiteers, and forced to work for the ruthless and bottomless desires of high-ranking officials and nobles.

Originally, they were ordinary miners who had been mining for a living for generations, living in the mountains and wilderness, with their own wives and children, mellow and simple, but now they are full of servility, and they have long lost the ability to resist, struggling on the edge of survival, only a little bit of home, family longing in their hearts, and they dare not be angry or speak.

Pathetic and pathetic.

This is the largest Huangyan mining area found in the history of Huangyan City, the Huangyan ore in it is enough for them to mine for decades, the number is extremely large, and the weapons created can completely allow everyone in Huangyan City to have a set of weapons and armor refined from Huangyan iron ore, not to mention that they can build more than 100,000 sets, which is naturally worth a lot of money.

If it hadn't been deliberately concealed by the county order, the Dalan Empire would have sent someone to take care of this place a long time ago.

Although it has been mined here for four years, it has only mined less than 12 percent of the total here, which is the most valuable asset for Huangyan City, which makes a living from the Huangyan mine, and of course the largest source of business and economy for Huangyan City in the future.

This led to the five major forces in Huangyan City, which made a living by selling Huangyan ore, secretly colluded with the government to first control the Huangyan mining area in the name of joint development, and then squeeze the mountain people to achieve the purpose of enriching their own pockets.

There are nearly 14,000 miners here, all of whom are nearby villagers or mountain people who have been forcibly abducted by the five major forces of Huangyan City in recent years, or mountain people who are hiding in the mountains, and almost all the villages within a radius of hundreds of miles have been swept away. Most of these people are in the prime of life, and only a very small number of teenagers and old people are naturally the backbone of a village.

Most of them are coercive and lure miners, using government edicts as a guide to recruit them to work, promising to pay them a lot of money, but in fact they are captive and have no remuneration at all, using the army to control them, squeeze their surplus value, fill their pockets, and do everything they can.

In the past few years, let alone make a group of people from H County, the five major forces led by Xuyangmen, make a lot of money, exceeding all the profits in the previous two or three decades.

In the past four years, nearly 7,000 miners have died here, dying of exhaustion, disease, heat, and beating......

Anyway, there are all kinds of ways to die, but the same thing is that in the end, it is nothing, and the corpse is exposed to the wilderness, or buried on the spot, and the bones are not cold.

Someone goes, and naturally someone comes.

Every once in a while, a group of miners who have been deceived or forcibly taken from here come here, enter the pit of the dire waters, and begin a dark slave life.

Their deceptive and bully-like behavior definitely belongs to the category of heinousness, but unfortunately no one dares to uphold justice, because the other party is the official government of Huangyan City, and the idea has been ingrained since ancient times, and the officials do not fight with the people.

......

"Qiang Qiang ......"

In Pit No. 7, one of the oval caves one foot high and two feet wide, five shirtless men were wielding their hammers to hammer the pointed iron chisel held in their left hand and digging into the mottled and variegated stone wall!

The chiseled stones flew wildly, with a whirring sound, some of them crackled against the stone wall, like small firecrackers, and some of them made a dull sound on the body.

Plop Plop Plop ......

The five seemed to be accustomed to this level of pain, and repeated the tapping motion without saying a word. Sweating like rain, panting like a cow, and the muscles trembling with the movement of the arms.

"Ho...... Ho...... Ho...... Ho"

Heavy pantings were mixed with low shouts from his chest, one after another.

Four of the five were adults in their thirties, with well-developed limbs and burly builds, and every blow was so perfect that they looked like veterans in the mining industry.

The thirties are the time when a person is in the prime of life, and his energy is also the best time. Not to mention the four people whose whole body is abnormally muscular and bulging.

The only difference is the man in the middle, he is only 1.5 meters tall, and although his muscles are also very good, he is obviously a few sizes smaller against the other four.

Judging from his countenance, it is not clear how old he is because of the dust, but judging from his resolute eyes, which cannot hide his youth, he should not be very old.

Because of the reason for being in the mine all the year round, this short man was covered with gray all over his body, but his eyes were bright, and he could barely see that he was a person with very good skin when he looked carefully on his gray face, and he was also the kind of good skin that only children have.

Strangely, however, the shortest man was the fastest and fastest of the five. Each hammer is very rhythmic, not in a hurry, with the breathing, very rhythmic.

These five people are the best high-grade miners in the No. 7 pit, not only with great strength, but also the best durability, and naturally the best efficiency.

People who are good in all aspects will naturally be responsible for more projects.

For example, digging mountains and catching up with the schedule.

The short man, who was actually only ten years old, named Qin Mu, was the youngest miner in the mining area, and the first child under the age of sixteen after Huangyan City discovered the largest Huangyan mining area four years ago.

He was only six years old when he was tricked! It was beyond everyone's imagination, even the villagers who had been mining the Huangyan mine for a living did not dare to imagine that they would be a small man only one meter tall in the future.

I'm afraid that the mine hammer weighing more than 20 catties is enough for him to drink a pot.

However, his performance later made everyone even more jaw-dropping, he was able to endure hardships beyond imagination at a young age, and the strength contained in his thin body was even more chilling.

With a certain ability performance, it has naturally become the object of many people's attention and has become the talk of most people after dinner. It didn't take long for Qin Mu's family background to be slowly excavated.

Qin Mu originally lived with his parents in Xianghammer Village, a small mountain village in the remote mountain range far away from Huangyan City, and his life was not rich, but the family lived happily and without worrying about food and clothing, but five years ago, his father Qin Erlang died in an accident because he was looking for Huangyan iron ore in the swamp of the mountain. His mother Qin was already frail and sickly, coupled with the sudden death of her husband, her health became worse and worse, and she had to rely on expensive herbs to regulate her body, and the expenses gradually became larger, and the little savings left by Qin Erlang who had struggled for more than ten years slowly became empty.

In the end, under no choice, Qin Mu, who was only six years old at the time, could only enter the mountains alone and began to do what people here have to do for generations, mining and prospecting.

Although his mother Qin was reluctant in every way, she couldn't help his stubborn temper and cruel reality, so she could only let Qin Mu, who was only six years old at the time, walk out of the mountain village and enter the vicious world.

Coincidentally, at that time, the government of Huangyan City was recruiting mining farmers on a large scale, and the reward was that once hired, the family would have no worries about life, food, clothing, housing and transportation, and if they were sick, they could also be treated by official pharmacists. In addition to these, a lot of silver taels will be given every month, although those silver taels are nothing compared to Huangyan iron ore, but for ordinary mountain people, it is already a great wealth, enough for a family to eat and clothe themselves.

There are such good things in the world! The government beckons the miners, which is equivalent to doing things for the imperial court, and if you are lucky, you may be able to make a good living in the government in the future.

Naturally, there are a lot of people who come to hear the news, and people from all over the country have signed up, and at that time it can be said that as long as people will sign up, Yamen can really be said to be like a city, and the river is endless.

He didn't hesitate at all, so he came on his own initiative.

A child who is only a little more than a meter tall applies for the job, and the result can be imagined, but Qin Mu is not the kind of person who has no self-knowledge.

There are no three, two, three, how dare you go to Liangshan.

He simply showed his hand to the recruiter at that time, but that hand frightened everyone.

He actually wielded a 30-pound hammer in a good way, and even played the set of hammer three-strike striking skills that his father taught him, and smashed a 100-pound boulder with amazing power.

Qin Mu was born with divine power, although he was only six years old, his strength was greater than that of an adult, and his staying power was beyond ordinary people. The old people in the village said that he was a god from heaven, but he fell into this poor country and could only waste his life.

After this demonstration, he was exceptionally admitted.

Originally, he thought that his mother's life would get better and better, as long as he could work well under the government, he would definitely get a good reward, and with his own strength, he would definitely be able to gain a firm foothold here, and he might even break out of his own world in the future.

Unfortunately, it backfired, they didn't work for the government at all, but for that special group of people, like slaves who worked around the clock. In the end, things became more and more out of control, and the government's requirements became more and more demanding, and in the end, there was no even salary, and only a little bit of remuneration was left that had not been deprived, that is, the living security of their family was still there, but it was not as good as before.

But Qin Mu doesn't care about anything else, what he cares about most is his mother's medical security, as long as the medical security is still there, he can rest assured, no matter how hard and tired he is, he can get through!

And because Qin Mu's performance in the mining area has always belonged to the top category of people, the county order of those people to take good care of his mother, and he can get relatively good treatment when he is sick.

It's a blessing in misfortune.

After being away from home for four years, except for the first year, he went home three times, and then the number of times he went home every year was forcibly deprived, and it decreased year by year, and from the beginning of last year, he could only go home once a year, and he could only stay at home for one day at a time, and the maximum number of days back and forth was three days. If he didn't rush back to the mine within the required time, he would be punished, and the punishment was a trivial matter for him, and the most important thing was that he was afraid that if he lost those guarantees, he would not be able to make his mother's life worry-free!

Xuyangmen and other five sects and the government control the mining farmers here in this way, coercion and temptation, as long as they work hard, the family will have no worries about food and clothing, but if they don't work, their families will be imprisoned, never to see the light of day again.

This trick is really too ruthless, and the people do not fight with the officials, this is a deep-rooted law, and it is deeply ingrained in their minds, and no one dares to disobey it! Over time, the miners here have become accustomed to this kind of life, and once a year they go home to meet with their wives and children's parents and complain to each other.

For the sake of his family, what is it to suffer a little, as long as he works hard, he can still leave here in his lifetime and return to the arms of his family.

With this thought, servility naturally emerged.

Even the guards here no longer regard them as human beings, both privately and openly, they call them mine slaves, not even their dogs.

And recently, for some reason, several major forces in charge of mining in the mining area have asked them to speed up the progress of mining, which originally only required 12 hours a day, but now it has become 16 hours a day, and the mining volume is also one-fifth more than before.

They are simply treated as livestock, except for sleeping and mining.

The only advantage here is that you don't have to worry about eating, there are enough steamed buns and wild vegetables every day to satisfy your hunger, like Qin Mu, the main force who can do the work of five people, and there is an extra half a catty of lean meat every day as a reward.

The world of slaves is also divided into hierarchies, and those with great fist power have more power to speak. Just like when Qin Mu first came, he also came from being bullied, and after teaching more than a dozen people in a row, he spent the past four years peacefully.

......

The sun sets, and the stars alternate.

The day's work is finally over.

Qin Mu received a dozen steamed buns, a bowl of pickles, and half a catty of cured meat from the overseer, and returned to a fairly clean cave, which was his resting place.

By the time he returned to the cave, there were already more than a dozen mine slaves gathered in the cave three or four zhang in size, each of them with exhaustion on their faces, exhausted physically and mentally after a day's work.

He walked straight into the cave without greeting anyone.

After experiencing the great change of his father's death at the age of six, coupled with his four-year career as a mining slave, he was accustomed to the natural survival law of survival of the fittest, which made his originally lively and cheerful personality become a little gloomy.

He rarely spoke again, sometimes for days without saying a word.

Originally, this cave was a separate dormitory specially arranged by the overseer for a strong man like him, so that he could have a good sleep every day and have the strength to work the next day.

It's just that Qin Mu, as a simple mountain man, although his personality is a little gloomy and not good at talking due to his childhood encounters, he still retains a little kindness in his heart, respects the old and loves the young, and helps others. So his private bedroom was shared with a group of old, weak, sick and disabled, and he gained a good reputation.

But he forgot that in this group of people, he was still a child, and he should have been protected by others, but now he was inadvertently protecting others.

But Qin Mu is not a stunned young man, he also has his own sense of protection, there are too many people with bad intentions in this world, he will naturally protect one or two, in the depths of this cave, he also dug a hole in a hole alone, although it is not big, but it is enough for three or four people to live together.

However, he was not the only resident here, a weathered old man with a drooping old face was also lying on a straw bed made of hay beside him.

The two of them didn't seem to have much friendship, they just gestured with their eyes, and then began to eat in silence, without saying a word, the old man was sluggish, without a little spirit, like a person in the twilight, lifeless, Qin Mu is a tiger in his heart, and his spirit is vigorous, but his temperament is silent and cold, rejecting people thousands of miles away, and the two are two completely different temperaments.

After the meal, Qin Mu didn't fall asleep, but sat cross-legged on the grass bed, his hands forming a strange gesture, looking at his nose and nose, and then a faint air flow slowly emanated from him.

Practice!

Qin Mu actually had a cultivation technique, which was something that everyone in the outside world didn't know.

But the old man was unmoved, as if he was used to it, his eyes were empty and he lay on the grass, his cloudy eyes did not know what he was looking at, his body was motionless, his breathing was weakening, as if he was in a state of sleep.