Chapter 215: Ore, Ore, Crystal

Ping!

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Daily Quest #26 (complete)

Objective: Mine the following ores

Time Limit: 3 Days

1/1 Silver ore

1/1 Gold ore

1/1 Graphite ore

Tutorial here.

Reward: Metal Crafting Skill

Claim your reward here.

Penalty: Deduct 24 hours of sleep upon failure and [Curse of Overtime] until quest is forcefully completed.

===

Exhausted, Rino claimed his reward and prayed that this was the last time he got so lost.

After he left the gold and silver cave, Rino flew in the wrong direction until he left the mountain range to realise that it was the opposite side he should be flying in. That mistake cost him a few precious hours, and after following the mountain range in the correct direction, Rino realised that the whole mountain range was connected on the inside.

He finally understood why probing the dwarven mines did not give him any gold and silver ores results. He had to go a lot deeper than he already was. Rino guessed that the dwarves must have hidden a mining passage somewhere specifically for gold and silver, judging from how deep he had fallen into the underground ravine. He just had to find out where they hid it.

Then again, he might already have an idea. Those traps he thought were grand decoys, distracting everyone from the true entrance to the dwarven mines, might lead him somewhere. Rino should really explore all options before getting swept away by new activities. He never really learned this in his previous life, but the lich hoped that he would learn it in this new world. A small misstep and detour in plans could land him back in the punishment dimension of overwork all over again.

Thankfully, he found his way back to the barrier of eternal night before day came again. Rino had a new quest, but there wasn't enough time to check it out. He also did not know what his new skill did, but he urgently needed to do something.

Carrying so much gold and silver ore in his shadow sack while flying took up so much mana, and Rino promptly hopped onto the closest teleportation pad by the Genesis tree heading for the dwarven mines.

The moment he reached the mines, Rino hitched a hike on a minecart, startling the driver and dropped off at the grand furnace room where he unloaded his ores from the shadow sack onto the floor, startling everyone.

Fronzo, his temporary mine manager,  snapped out of it when he saw the ores piling up with no signs of ceasing. The lesser ghoul was quick to act and told the startled trolls to quickly fetch crates and shovels. Rino did not know which were silver ores or gold ores. They were mixed up, but for now, Fronzo's judgement was right. If they do not start clearing space, the ores will flood the grand furnace room.

With the ores pouring out of Rino's shadow sack faster than Fronzo's team could clear it, the lich decided to have mercy on them and momentarily pause when seventy percent of the grand furnace room's floor was covered in ores. There was still about a third of the ores left in his inventory, and Rino was positive there were some crystals mixed into the pile, but he could get the reliable lad to sort them out later.

Appointing Fronzo as the cave logistic manager was the right decision. Erika came together with Fronzo, and they worked seamlessly, taking care of things before they became a problem for Rino. Kragami and Rina were taking care of matters back in Noir Province, and Rino knew who the first accessory gifts should go to after they sorted out this mess and gave him his river crystal pieces.

The cleaning up of Rino's ore dump took a while, and Fronzo glanced at his master several times while the trolls and some extra hands came to expedite the cleaning process. The storage within the mines was too full, so they left the field crates lying around stacked neatly against the wall in the grand furnace room and even smithing room.

"M-my lord, may I know what these ores are for?"

Thinking that it was a good time to introduce gold and silver to them, Rino gathered the miners and possibly future metal workers to introduce them.

Curious about the ores Rino brought back, the miners gathered round in the grand furnace room. Rino did a quick headcount and noticed that he had less than a hundred miners working in the mines. Semi-automating the mine was a good idea, and only twenty of his subordinates were actual miners. The rest of them belonged to logistics, rail builders and mine cart drivers.

"This," Rino held up an ore that was slightly white in colour from one of the lined up crates. "This is gold."

He rummaged the crate a little and found another dark grey ore, holding it up for everyone to see. 

"This is silver. They are two different ores. If you see something that isn't gold or silver, set it aside in a different pile. Those could be crystals. I need everyone to sort it out."

Before the crowd could dismiss themselves to get sorting under Fronzo's instructions, Rino pulled a fairy and an earth gnome aside.

"I need both of you to work together and help me search for gold and silver ores in the lower levels of this cave. You can dig new probing routes to check for them, be careful of caving floors and ceilings, and listen for water too."

Passing the earth gnome and fairy his bag with the sample ores and stacks of divination spell papers, Rino told them to let him know the results if they found any. Then, the lich monitored the sorting progress for a while and helped the confused trolls identify the right ores. It took the dumb trolls a little while to understand the differences between unrefined gold ores and silver ores. For anything else that wasn't gold or silver, they learned to categorise them correctly.

Confident that the trolls could work independently now, Rino left them to sort the massive pile of ores and crystals. He retreated to the comforts of the stone slab library and checked out the new skill received as a reward for completing his daily quest just in time.

Metal crafting was slightly different from smelting. Smelting was knowledge about separating impurities from a mined ore and turning that into a metal bar by melting the purified metal at high heat and cooled in a cast.

Metal crafting was the work on an anvil. Sure, it was related to smelting but not entirely. Smelting required the use of casts but not metalwork. To be more precise, Rino read through the description, and metalwork was the art of shaping metal into something useful. It was slightly different from tool smithing and blacksmithing, although they were branches of advanced metal works. Rino simply knew how to turn metal bars into things like metal sheets, metal strips, metal wires and hooks with this skill. He wondered if there would be an upgrade to this skill in future or if he had to experiment a little more with it to find out if he could make weapons and complicated machines with the skill.

At the same time, Rino did not forget to check his new quest.

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Daily Quest #27

Objective: Mine 16 types of unique gems

Time Limit: 16 Days

0/16 unique gemstones

Tutorial here.

Reward: Master Crafter Skill

Claim your reward here.

Penalty: Deduct 24 hours of sleep upon failure and [Curse of Overtime] until quest is forcefully completed.

===

No gemstone names were specified here, and Rino wondered if this was because the gods were getting lazier or if the gemstones were known by different names in this world. Not all gemstones might have spawned in this world. The creation of crystals was unique and different environments will inspire different crystal formations.

Sixteen crystals, huh? Rino saw some in that huge underwater cavern, but he wasn't sure how to mine them up. Was it even possible to mine them with such a violent underwater current in the first place? Rino knew that the dwarfs added those bronze pipes and glowing crystals as a guide, but he had no idea if they could mine those crystals even with the help of their mechanical diving suit.

Rino glanced at the deadline. He had sixteen days for this new quest, and honestly, Rino shouldn't take that long to mine crystals because the hardest part of locating them was already done. The process was simply tedious, and Rino just had to wait for his mana to recover before he attempted the crystal mining operation.

Recently, it seemed as if these quests were made specifically for him because they weren't tasks that his unskilled labourers could help with.

Shrugging it off, Rino left to investigate if there were any secrets behind clearing that needlessly complicated dwarven death trap maze. He cleared most of the traps on the lower levels, and some of his shadow clones cleared the higher floors, but Rino knew that there were still unexplored rooms and untriggered traps. Hence, that was his mission for a little while.