Beneath Mine 382

Roy walked into the Mine Road, which was completely detached from the ore vein. Inside the Mine Road were a group of Half-Elf miners who were so thin they were skin and bones. They wore only a symbolic piece of linen around their waists, sat barefoot in the mine, and had worn-out pickaxes beside them.

The Half-Elf Warrior shared the food they carried with their fellow half-elfs, and soon a large group of Half-Elf miners gathered around them.

They had a limited amount of food, which was quickly distributed.

When the Half-Elf miners couldn't get any food, their eyes lost their sparkle, and they sat back down in their places, conserving their energy as much as possible...

Roy ignored the group of Half-Elf miners who were like zombies and continued walking along the Mine Road with the Gray Dwarf Bandit.

This is a Mine Road that extends upwards continuously. At first, the slope of the Mine Road is very gentle, but gradually the slope begins to increase, and it continues to turn back and extend upwards.

At least several hundred Half-Elf -Half-Elf miners lived in this Mine Road tunnel...

The Mine Road have already been dug and are beginning to take shape.

Roy had already figured it out; this must be an escape route.

Although Roy only took over three mines, each mine had hundreds of Half-Elf miners.

The combined number of Half-Elf miners in the three mines easily exceeds a thousand, and it's worth noting that there are at least a dozen mines of varying sizes on the Pagisto Plateau.

This shows how rampant the slave trade was in the Pattington Plane. Preliminary estimates suggest that at least several thousand Half-Elf were sold to the mines of the Pagisto Plateau. Of course, this does not include the Elf Slaves transported to the Roland Continent by slave ships.

After walking up the stone cave for nearly twenty stories, Roy finally saw the end of the mine that kept winding upwards.

By this time, the mine had reached the Lapis Lazuli layer. The crude pickaxes in the hands of the Half-Elf miners could no longer break through the rock here, and these Half-Elf miners also had little stamina, so the progress was extremely slow.

Moreover, when Roy got here, he found that the air in the mine was quite murky.

Several Half-Elf miners were at the far end of the mine, using pickaxes to chip away at a protruding lapis lazuli rock...

Several Half-Elf miners were leaning against the cave wall, seemingly resting, but their breathing was very weak. Roy walked over and found the Half-Elf miners lying on the rocky ground, barely alive.

The Half-Elf miners were too frightened to approach when they saw the Gray Dwarf Bandit beside Roy, and they all looked like they wanted to say something but couldn't.

Roy crouched down and placed his hand on the artery in the Half-Elf miner's neck; the pulse was rather weak.

Looking at his thin, almost skeletal body, Roy took out a potion bottle from his Magic Pouch, which contained some pure sap from the Tree of Life Sap.

He pulled out the stopper, poured a drop of Tree of Life Sap into the water pouch, then shook the pouch vigorously to mix the diluted Tree of Life Sap. Only then did he pull out the stopper again and feed the Tree of Life Sap to the unconscious Half-Elf miners.

This Tree of Life Sap seemed to work very well; after being poured in, the unconscious Half-Elf regained some consciousness.

Several Half-Elf miners working in the mine also gathered around. Roy looked up at them and said:

"I'm here to rescue you. You don't need to mine here anymore. Come with me and let's leave this place!"

A group of Half-Elf miners looked puzzled; they didn't quite believe what Roy was saying.

Some of the Half-Elf's gazes fell on the Gray Dwarf beside Roy, and they discovered that the Gray Dwarf's hands, which were behind his back, were actually bound with ropes. Only when several fully armed Half-Elf Warrior appeared behind him did they completely believe what Roy had said.

Roy led a group of Half-Elf down the Mine Road. Many of the Half-Elf were supporting each other. Even though they were so weak, they did not forget to bring out their heavy pickaxes, as if the pickaxes had become a part of their lives.

"Many elves must have died while digging this cave," Roy exclaimed, marveling at the winding cave that was at least twenty stories high.

"Um."

A Half-Elf miner pointed to the occasional holes blocked by rubble beside the cave and said somberly, "If you die, you're buried in there..."

Roy then learned that the dead Half-Elf miners could only be buried casually in abandoned mine shafts.

Excavating such a cave would inevitably generate a lot of waste rock, so Roy asked curiously:

"How do you handle the stones you excavate?"

The Half-Elf miner said, "We have to transport it out little by little, otherwise the excavated stones will block up the mine shafts behind us."

After walking down for a while, the Half-Elf miners they encountered along the way almost all followed Roy down. The Half-Elf who could barely walk helped each other, while those who couldn't walk at all asked someone to carry them.

When Roy returned to the mine through the unfinished Escape Tunnel, he was followed by at least four hundred Half-Elf miners.

Roy brought all the Half-Elf to the shaft entrance. The Dark Moon Elf Warrior were still hunting down the Gray Dwarf in the mine. There were a lot of Gray Dwarf in the mine, nearly two hundred in number.

The gondola can only carry a maximum of thirty Half-Elf at a time, so there are still a large number of Half-Elf miners waiting at the entrance of the shaft.

They seemed terrified of the Gray Dwarf Gray Dwarf; even seeing them chained to the rock face, they dared not approach them...

The Half-Elf Warrior gave all the food they carried to their nearly starving brethren, and then followed the Dark Moon Elf Warrior into the mines to hunt down the Gray Dwarf.

Roy then remembered the Dark Moon Elf Prisoners in the mine, so he asked the group of Half-Elf miners:

"Where are the Dark Moon Elf in the mine?"

After questioning several Half-Elf miners, it was only from one knowledgeable elf that the Gray Dwarf Bandit drove the Dark Moon Elf to the other side of the mine, demanding that they exchange ore for food.

Watching the group of half-elf Half-Elf on Elf Biscuit and fruit, Roy could only sigh softly.

He actually regretted not coming to the Third Mine sooner.

These Half-Elf miners should have been rescued sooner...

The Assassin Squad's warriors were hunting down Gray Dwarf Bandit throughout the mines. Although they only had twenty members, under the leadership of Timothy and Tennyson, they were practically robbing those Gray Dwarf Bandit who were like headless flies.

They quickly found over a hundred fellow Dark Moon Elf in the mine, where they had their own territory.

The Dark Moon Elf miners were in a slightly better situation than the Half-Elf miners, but they still lacked food and clothing. Especially after the Mine Owners of the Third Mine ran away, the Gray Dwarf almost completely cut off the food supply to the Dark Moon Elf.

The reason we were able to survive these many days was entirely due to the food reserves we had saved up and the moss and other things we had found in the mine.

They only had a few pickaxes and were no match for the Gray Dwarf, so they were driven to a corner of the mine by the Gray Dwarf.

Upon hearing that most of the Gray Dwarf in the mines had been captured, the Dark Moon Elf clapped and celebrated...

The number of Gray Dwarf Bandit captured by the Dark Moon Elf Warrior has risen to over 170, but the Gray Dwarf leader has yet to be seen.

Some of the Gray Dwarf Bandit tried to resist in the mine, but the Dark Moon Elf Warrior were highly experienced in combat. Almost all the Gray Dwarf who tried to resist were killed by the Dark Moon Elf Warrior. Soon, the remaining Gray Dwarf Bandit gave up resisting, and there was no way to escape from this mine...

The Gray Dwarf Bandit, strong and sturdy, were defeated by the superior equipment of the Elf Warrior. Now, they were bound tightly with ropes and humiliated, squatting in the cave with their heads buried between their knees, fearing that they would be recognized by the elven miners and suffer another beating.

Roy was tending to a wounded Half-Elf Warrior when Captain Timothy rushed back, his body reeking of blood.

"Boss, we've found the hiding place of the Gray Dwarf Chieftain. There are more than a dozen Gray Dwarf hiding in a mine. They've blocked the entrance with ore. We need people to break through the cave," Captain Timothy said to Roy.

"Take me to see it."

Roy bandaged the wound and stood up, saying...

Roy, leading a group of Half-Elf, followed Captain Timothy to a break in the mine. The mine, which should have continued forward, was completely blocked by a large amount of abandoned ore.

Several Dark Moon Elf are trying to clear the passage.

Captain Timothy pointed to the collapsed mine shaft and said, "Those Gray Dwarf Bandit have sealed themselves inside."

Roy had Captain Timothy find a Dark Moon Elf miner familiar with the layout of the mine shafts and asked him, "Where does this mine lead? How much further in is it?"

Without hesitation, the Dark Moon Elf miner replied, "This mine is a dead end, not connected to any other mines. It's about two hundred meters further in. Because of the water source, it became a place for the Gray Dwarf to cultivate mushrooms. This section of the mine isn't made of shale, so it often collapses. The Gray Dwarf used some supports to create a passage. They must have destroyed those supports, and the falling rubble blocked the Mine Road. It will probably take some time to reopen it."

The Gray Dwarf Chieftain sealed off the mine, so Roy wasn't in a hurry to open it up.

Because there were simply too many things to deal with, he instructed Captain Timothy:

"We don't have enough manpower to clear the Mine Road for the time being, so let's have people take turns guarding this place and watching for any activity in the surrounding mines to prevent them from digging through other Mine Road to escape."

"Understood, Boss!"

Captain Timothy assigned two Dark Moon Elf Warrior Dark Moon Elf Warrior to guard the area, then led them to continue their pursuit of the Gray Dwarf in the mine.