Steel torrents pioneering a different world

Chapter 64 Excellent Humus Layer! (Please read on, recommend, and vote!)
"Lula la la le... Lula la la la le, bravely move forward!"

"There are prizes for advancing, I want to be number one!"

Ming Yufei hummed his favorite hit song, his fingers dancing lightly on the joystick.

Accompanied by the familiar sound of hydraulic pressure, the massive bucket cuts deep into the black soil mixed with residual snow.

It was an extreme, oily black, as if you could squeeze out frozen oil from it.

The bucket was raised and poured down, creating a small, fresh mound of humus.

When he first came to this world, every action he took felt like defusing a bomb, fearing that some skeleton's limbs might pop out of the ground and attack them.

Now?

Now all that remains is the peace and contentment of a bountiful harvest.

He, Ming Yufei, an engineer, is already a skilled engineer-farmer in this other world.

Just as he was about to fire another shot to further enhance the experimental vegetable garden at the base, the cheerful melody in his headphones was abruptly cut off by a loud electrical crackling sound.

"Attention, Construction Teams Seven and Eight!"

A calm but urgent voice rang out.

"Strong electromagnetic interference detected, wind and snow intensifying, coordinates XXX area, suspected signs of necromancy, the enemy is 2 kilometers ahead of you, the skeletons may be coming to fight again!"

"Everyone, gather your equipment and evacuate to the safe point! Repeat, this is not a drill!"

Ming Yufei's heart skipped a beat.

"Group 7, Cave 3 has been received and is on its way back!"

He responded swiftly, grabbed the fully automatic shotgun hanging in the cab, tossed the heavy ammunition pouch over his shoulder, and instantly felt a surge of security.

With a roar, the heavy machine turned around in an extremely nimble manner, its tracks rolling over the soft black soil, and sped towards the camp behind it.

The familiar tension has returned.

Not far ahead, a muffled explosion could be heard through the wind and snow from several kilometers away.

Boom!
dong dong!

It's like the earth is beating its heart.

That was the sound of a 155mm heavy gun exploding!

Immediately afterwards, several suicide drones, trailing fiber optic cables, tore through the wind and snow and plunged into the distant forest.

Ming Yufei saw the follow-up support troops in the rearview mirror.

Several extremely ugly-looking mechanical dogs were whizzing past him.

That thing was less like a dog and more like a load-bearing vehicle modified from a children's toy car that costs 99 yuan with free shipping on Pinduoduo. It had a layer of cheap, reflective electromagnetic shielding paper on its shell and dragged gifts and fiber optic boxes as it sped across the snow.

Ming Yufei swallowed hard when he saw the large gift bags strapped to their backs, and stepped on the gas, afraid that these guys would explode at close range.

The mechanical toys are carrying all sorts of old antiques that can only be seen in museums.

Several of them are disc-shaped; they are Type 59 anti-tank mines, meritorious mines that overturned a T-62 tank on Zhenbao Island.

This landmine is older than the grandfather of someone born in the 00s.

It is a copy of the Russian TM-46 landmine, weighs 8.5 kg, and contains 5.7 kg of explosives.

If the 5.7 kg explosive charge is properly detonated, it can blow up tanks weighing tens of tons, making it highly efficient for clearing away skull fragments buried under the snow.

There are also a few square ones, which are Type 72.

These landmines are nearly 50 years old, and although they are old, their explosive charges are still very powerful.

They can be buried in water up to 1.2 meters deep and are mainly used to counter tracked vehicles. They were used in the war against Kochi and were later mass-produced. These old-fashioned contraptions, with their five or six kilograms of explosives, can easily detonate, turning flesh and blood into unrecognizable human beings, and scattering skeletal remains within a 10-meter radius.

Using old artifacts to deal with monsters from another world not only helps clear out inventory but also makes the most of them.

Beautiful!
Ming Yufei could even imagine how the guys in the military industry group back home were completely bewildered as they modified these treasures that had been gathering dust in the warehouse onto cheap mechanical dogs.

But that's how they fight.

Efficient, practical, and... extremely cost-effective.

"After the battle ends, the soldiers will probably be collecting all sorts of fragments!"

Mingyu drove the vehicle to a safe area and watched the combat personnel busy at work.

Several kilometers away, the faint sound of explosions could still be heard...

The fact that the enemy had no means to attack their safe base made Ming Yufei narrow his eyes, his mind wandering. He wondered if his combat unit would be reprimanded for wasting too much ammunition and ordered to do more housekeeping work today.

As I was thinking about it, I wondered if I could have braised pork today.

I don't know why, but I feel incredibly satisfied eating in this world!

"Is this what a great harvest should be like?" Ming Yufei's mind continued to wander.

The communication channel was filled with a mix of coordinate reports and requests for fire support, creating a reassuring sense of order.

About half an hour later, the command center's voice came through the channel clearly.

"Alert lifted. The target area has been cleared. All units shall resume operations as planned."

Ming-Old Farmer-Yufei stretched and drove his beloved excavator back to his fertile black soil.

The wind and snow had subsided considerably. He took a deep breath and plunged the bucket into the humus layer once more.

These things are all treasures.

On Earth, a layer of humus a few centimeters thick can be used to fertilize the land.

This is where the black soil of Northeast China comes from.

Here, the gifts of this forest beneath our feet are measured in meters in depth.

The expedition team said that such a vast snow forest contains at least tens of billions of tons of fertilizer.

It's important to know that although the University of Tokyo is a large and resource-rich place, it still needs to purchase some of its fertilizers from outside.

For example, in terms of potash raw materials, Dongda's potash reserves account for only 5% of the global total, and are mainly low-grade brine mines with limited exploitable resources. In 2023, its self-sufficiency rate was about 32%, with a shortfall of 68%.

Dongda University imports most of its potash fertilizer from Russia and Malaysia, which account for more than 50% of Dongda's potash fertilizer imports.

Since the major conflict there, supplies have been unstable.

Besides this, there's also Canada, the world's largest potash producer, which Dongda University has long relied on for potassium chloride imports. Although a new source of potassium chloride was later found in Laos, the cost was ultimately too high, severely impacting agriculture.
The other world has vast snowfields and forests, enough to mine for decades.

Although large-scale excavation may damage the local ecosystem, the University of Tokyo will not exploit the resources to the point of exhaustion.

They will leave a certain amount of humus layer in the forest.

Ming Yufei's engineering excavation team is currently mainly clearing up safety hazards at the base before conducting almost root-digging excavations.

Later, the engineering team will excavate the humus layer in the low-lying areas.

According to reliable investigations, the other world should have a mild winter. The soil in the low-lying areas is likely due to the accumulation of humus layers caused by rainwater erosion over thousands or even tens of thousands of years, making the soil extremely fertile.

The excavated humus is high-value nutrient soil. Some of it is transported back to the open areas of the base to improve farmland, while some is sent to the modern world to be dispersed and integrated, disguised as soil produced on Earth. It can be sold for civilian use or used to build green spaces and forest belts in Zhurihe New City.

Whether sold at a low price to the Production and Construction Corps or to civilians, it can replenish the military's fuel consumption!
With each shovelful, what comes out isn't soil.

It is food and diesel fuel that give them the confidence to survive in this unfamiliar land!
(End of this chapter)