Chapter 368: Chapter 78: Struggle of Destiny! Winds Rise in Falling Eagle Gorge

... 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

In the small deepwater port, a young man in his twenties had already been leading a group waiting there. Though his appearance was not striking, there was an air of calmness and competence about him.

As soon as he saw Wang Shouzhe come ashore, he immediately led the group to greet him, cupped his hands, and said, "Wang Gui greets the Patriarch."

There was a touch of excitement in his voice.

Indeed.

This young man was none other than Wang Gui, the servant who had grown up alongside Wang Shouzhe.

After Wang Shouzhe got married, it was no longer suitable for him to stay in the courtyard. Wang Shouzhe simply dispatched him to establish a secret production base and organize the investment and production.

Having grown up together, coupled with his lineage from the Wang Family’s collateral branch, Wang Gui’s loyalty was beyond question. Even when handling affairs outside, no one dared to underestimate him.

Now, he was the Chief Steward here, indirectly presiding over the major affairs on behalf of Wang Shouzhe.

"No need for formalities."

Wang Shouzhe was quite happy to see Wang Gui.

He glanced at Wang Gui and noticed that compared to their last meeting, Wang Gui’s aura was much more stable and refined, clearly having made a breakthrough in Wang’s Profound Origin Technique.

Wang Shouzhe’s face showed a slight smile as he praised, "It seems you’ve been diligent in your cultivation lately, reaching the Seventh Layer of the Qi Refining Realm. But you must continue to strive, to cultivate to the Spirit Platform Realm soon, so you can accumulate more future resources for your children."

"Yes, Patriarch."

At the mention of children, Wang Gui also showed a contented smile.

Years ago, Wang Gui used to think about Wang Mei.

But as Wang Mei’s power and status grew, along with her nature beyond his control, he gradually gave up.

Finally, with Wang Shouzhe as a matchmaker, Wang Gui married a collateral woman with cultivation talent from the Yingxiu Lu Family.

Over the past six or seven years, the couple bore two children, the elder of whom was already attending classes in the Clan Academy, while the younger was still nursing with his wife caring for him at home.

"Patriarch, please come inside."

After exchanging pleasantries, Wang Gui led Wang Shouzhe inside.

He walked with his head slightly lowered, half a step behind Wang Shouzhe, occasionally responding to questions posed by Wang Shouzhe.

Evidently, as the Chief Steward of this secret production base, he had been very diligent, answering every query with proficiency.

Even though Wang Shouzhe’s last visit to this secret base was before his trip to Purple Mansion Academy, about eight or nine months ago, with his control power, no event, big or small, within this secret base escaped his notice.

Passing through the corridor, the view suddenly opened up.

It was a gorge.

This gorge had originally existed semi-naturally, and with Wang Family’s continuous excavation, development, and site leveling, its scale had become increasingly large, increasingly industrial in atmosphere.

On either side, some mountain bodies had been excavated with numerous cavities to store water-sensitive raw materials and finished materials. In fact, many rock chambers were used for people to live.

On the open ground, several large storage buildings were built against the mountains, storing heaps of raw materials like a mountain.

Most importantly, several large kilns stood impressively within the gorge.

The kilns were coal-fired.

In this world, coal wasn’t valuable because besides firing kilns and forging, coal had little use.

In the winter, commoners used charcoal for heating, and noble families used the finest smokeless charcoal.

But indeed, if coal were used to heat water in a boiler, then circulate the hot water through pipes and radiators to form central heating, it would be much more effective than using a charcoal stove.

Wang Shouzhe had already instructed the craftsmen to first build a small boiler heating system in their spare time for a trial in his own room.

Otherwise, the winter weather being constantly damp and bone-chilling caused discomfort.

Though Spirit Platform Realm cultivators already had extraordinary physiques, comparable neither in cold nor in heat tolerance to mere mortals, why not make oneself more comfortable if possible?

Setting that aside for now.

Currently, this secret base almost operated around the clock, producing "foreign cement." The cement kilns burned yearlong, day and night, without pause.

The cement production process, to be honest, wasn’t complex.

It only required grinding limestone, iron ore slag, and clay into powder, then mixing them proportionally, using a coal kiln for high-temperature calcination, and finally grinding it into powder again to become clinker.

Afterward, mixing the clinker with a certain proportion of gypsum powder resulted in ordinary cement.

This is known as the two-grind one-calcine process.

And limestone, iron ore slag, clay, coal, and gypsum powder were all extremely cheap raw materials, seemingly ubiquitous.

After processing, however, cement’s market price could reach half that of grain crops, and the profit was immense.

Moreover, before shipping raw materials to this processing base, limestone and iron ore slag were pre-ground into powder, thus here only needed calcination and other follow-up processing techniques.

Unfortunately, the only downside was the production capacity.

Despite joint production efforts by the Lua Family, Liua Family, Gongsun Family, and Wang Family, now, the entire cement system’s annual output could only reach 100,000 tons.

100,000 tons sounded like a lot, but compared to Earth, such output was tremendously backward.

Wang Shouzhe vaguely recalled that before his transmigration, Huaxia’s per capita annual cement consumption was about one and a half tons. The disparity was as vast as the heavens and the earth.

Nothing could be done.

Current cement production technology in all facets was still quite backward, especially in raw material extraction and grinding; most production methods were fairly primitive, still temporarily using animal-powered gear grinding cars.