Chapter 103: Forceful Mining

Entering the Orc Valley once again, Donald found it to be almost cleaned up.
Uther cleverly brought in Kelsas, who used his blood mage’s flame powers to burn away all the areas contaminated by orcs. Now, aside from some scorched spots, the valley was much cleaner and brighter.
The valley was roughly the size of a Darkhold estate. Though small, it was sufficient as a knightly fief.
After cleaning it up, Donald thought it was an excellent place for seclusion. Even he couldn’t resist the urge to build a mountain villa here.
However, since it had already been decided to grant it to Uther, it would be unwise to go back on it. Besides, despite its pleasant environment, mining would still take place, making it unsuitable for leisure.
“Master!”
Due to Donald’s order for secrecy, Uther had brought summoned soldiers, who all saluted him upon seeing him.
“Continue with your work. Kelsas, come with me to the cave!”
After a day’s rest, Donald had regained about 80% of his strength. Even a Silver Strongman might not be able to kill him in just a few moves. Still, he habitually took Kelsas along—after all, his own safety was paramount, and caution was never excessive.
In the orc wizard’s cave, Donald summoned two small, green-skinned goblins with pointed ears and long snouts.
These two goblins were even thinner than the usual pot-like goblins and carried some boxes and packages. They belonged to the neutral race of goblin engineers and demolition specialists among magical creatures.
“Determine the best blasting points, plant explosives, and mine the minerals here!”
After giving the orders, Donald saw the two goblins respond in high-pitched voices. They then opened their boxes and began using tools to measure the cave’s layout and corners.
Soon, one of the goblin engineers reported back.
“Master! The blasting points have been found. Shall we proceed?”
Donald nodded. “Go ahead. Let’s leave!”
The latter sentence was directed at Kelsas. The two left the cave and walked about ten more meters before the two goblin engineers followed, retreating while holding gunpowder fuses.
“Master! Preparation is complete. Please give your instructions!”
“Light it!” Donald said.
One of the goblin engineers struck flint in his hand. With a hiss, the smell of gunpowder filled the air as the fuse ignited like a wand, and sparks quickly spread into the cave.

A loud “boom” was heard, accompanied by the sound of rocks shattering. Everyone in the valley felt a slight tremor in the ground, with those nearby like Donald feeling it most clearly. At the moment of the explosion, a large amount of smoke and dust billowed out of the ogre wizard’s cave. Once the smoke cleared, two goblin engineers went ahead to investigate. Donald followed shortly after. The original cave had collapsed by half, but fortunately, the surrounding mountains were quite solid, so the explosion’s force didn’t cause any catastrophic damage. This explosion released at least ten tons of various ores. Donald stored them all in his storage space and then ordered the goblin engineers to plant more explosives. Blue-veined gold wasn’t very hard, but since it formed between hematite and magnetite, it was difficult to extract. For this reason, Donald spent two second-level magic cores to summon two goblin engineers. Goblin engineers in World of Warcraft were the best demolition teams, making them ideal for rapid mining. Once the first batch of minerals was extracted, there would be time to mine more slowly without needing such intense methods. After three such attempts, a total of thirty tons of raw ore was obtained. Although this seemed like a large amount, it was already considered productive if only three to five tons of hematite and magnetite could be refined from it. As for blue-veined magic gold, Donald estimated that at most one kilogram could be harvested. Blue-veined gold was an associated mineral formed where hematite and magnetite met. Though rare, since hematite and magnetite were the two most common metal minerals in this world with abundant reserves, it was often possible to find such intersections in two or three locations within a country. Whether blue-veined magic gold mines would appear depended on luck. As for silver and pure gold, two other extremely rare magical metals, they were associated minerals resulting from the mutation of silver ore and copper ore for unknown reasons, making them even rarer. Once blue-veined gold was mined, his plan to forge magic coins could finally be put into action. The name “Dalaran Magic Coin” alone was exciting—perhaps it would one day become as iconic as Banai Magic Coins. With the ore, Donald returned to his territory alone. Although his teleportation skill had improved enough to allow him to teleport within kilometers, he still needed one more soul level to advance to group teleportation, so he couldn’t take others with him.

When Donald appeared at the lord’s manor, William, who was at work, was not surprised at all. Having seen the lord appear suddenly many times before, William and his close subordinates had long become accustomed to it.
“How many blacksmiths are there in the territory now?”
Hearing the lord’s question, William, who continued working, replied, “My lord, there are four blacksmiths in the territory now. Two of them have only been blacksmiths for a few years and can only craft farming tools and simple weapons, so they were assigned to Windbell Village and Graywood Village. The other two, though not as skilled as the renowned blacksmiths in Giantstone City, each have their own specialized techniques and can already make high-quality weapons. As you ordered, they have been assigned to work in the town’s blacksmith shop, along with a few apprentices.”
After hearing this, Donald remembered that two months earlier, he had given William several orcish weapons captured from the battlefield, asking him to have the territory’s blacksmiths remelt them to extract metal. The Northwest Wasteland had poor soil but abundant metal deposits, including some metals rare in human kingdoms. The orcs, with their inferior smelting techniques, could not forge excellent weapons. However, human blacksmiths, though not as skilled as the dwarves reputed to be the best at forging, were clever and came up with many innovative methods in material refining and mold making—skills that even the dwarves had to admire.
“Very good. Now send someone to take me to the workshop to meet these two blacksmiths. I have new tasks for them!”
William quickly sent a servant from the lord’s manor to lead Donald to the town’s blacksmith shop. The two blacksmiths had grown up together and were as close as brothers, so they opened their shops next to each other for easy communication and collaboration. As a result, unlike other blacksmiths who guarded their secret techniques closely, they made rapid progress. Both being in their thirties, their skills already surpassed those of most older blacksmiths.
The blacksmith shop was warm and filled with the sound of hammering and the apprentices’ loud commands.
When Donald saw the two blacksmiths, he noticed that they were carefully refining a rare metal, copper, from a furnace of molten iron.
Seeing that both blacksmiths were fully focused and operating with great care, Donald quickly raised his hand to signal the apprentices present to stay silent.
One of the blacksmiths added wood to control the flame temperature, while the other used tongs to slowly stir a copper rod in the molten iron. With each turn, a layer of golden-colored molten metal coated one end of the rod.

After the two blacksmiths collected all the molten metal into a crucible to one side, they finally breathed a sigh of relief, turned off the furnace, and wiped the sweat from their brows. Turning around, they saw Donald standing in the workshop, and the two blacksmiths quickly bowed in greeting. “My lord!” Donald waved his hand. “No need for formalities. Are you refining metal?” The two blacksmiths exchanged a glance, and the one named Wigen, as Donald remembered, said, “My lord, we were just refining pure copper mixed with other metals!” Pure copper is a type of rare metal. Donald knew quite a bit about it because the precious magical metal, pure gold, originated from the transformation of pure copper ore—just like graphite turning into diamond; a change in shape results in two completely different substances. Pure copper is very hard but much more brittle and not suitable for crafting weapons on its own. However, adding a little to weapons made of black iron enhances their toughness while also greatly improving their sharpness and durability. “Oh? So copper rods can attract pure copper, and that’s why you melted the metal to extract it!” Donald still understood some scientific principles from his past life. After observing for a while, he roughly grasped the blacksmiths’ method of refinement. The two blacksmiths were astonished upon hearing this and exclaimed, “My lord is truly erudite! Even our blacksmith’s secret methods are known to you. Truly worthy of being a mage!” In this world, aside from mages who specialized in alchemy and blacksmiths, almost no one understood chemical principles, let alone the mysteries of metal displacement. To put it simply, it was insignificant, but to most ordinary people who couldn’t comprehend it, it was truly magical. Donald, unbothered by modesty, asked again about their progress. At that moment, the other blacksmith, Val, said, “Orcs are foolish. They mix many types of ore metals when crafting weapons, resulting in heavy and hard products that cause great trouble for us when remelting them. Most of the common metals have now been refined and separated, but a few still can’t be melted due to insufficient flame temperature.” After saying that, he led Donald to inspect the materials that had been separated earlier and were piled up at the back of the workshop. Donald saw pieces of metal of various colors. Although most were common metals like hematite, black iron, and copper, there was also a small portion of rare metals that could be used for crafting weapons, equipment, or magical items—pure copper was among them, though he couldn’t identify the names of the others.