This Game Is Too Real
Chapter 733: The "Laid-back" Empire and the "Rice Bucket" of Ideal City

Chapter 733: Chapter 733: The "Laid-back" Empire and the "Rice Bucket" of Ideal City

"The potatoes are all eaten."

"!!"

"So sad."

"Damn corporations."

"Ideal City, you bunch of gluttons."

"Grilled meat with rice isn’t bad, I recommend it."

"Give it a try."

"..."

"It’s really good."

"Not bad!"

"Indeed not bad."

"Content."

"!!!"

...

At the entrance of the canteen.

Watching the Alphas bury their heads in their meals, a group of soldiers from the 100th Mountain Division were dumbfounded.

"Wow, one person eating three bowls?!"

"Are these guys pigs?!"

Seeing them wolfing down the food, a young lad couldn’t help but swallow his saliva.

"What’s so fragrant?"

As he hesitated, the lads beside him were already eager to give it a try.

"Let’s get a bowl and try it..."

"I’ll have one too."

"Wait for me!"

Before long, a long line formed at the food counter.

Residents from the Free State and other settlements, seeing Ideal City residents lining up, also joined the queue.

As everyone knows, things from Ideal City are the best, and anything that makes its residents queue must be a delicacy.

Even if the canteen prepared a lot of dishes in advance, it couldn’t withstand the thousands of people crowding for those few items.

Thus, under a trend that formed inexplicably, everyone soon polished off a large platter of grilled meat.

Those who got their food enjoyed it deliciously, while the rest swallowed their saliva.

A bunch of people just stood there waiting.

Some who couldn’t wait, ordered some other dishes to fill their stomachs and found them surprisingly tasty, which made them look forward to the sold-out signature dishes even more.

Today’s victim was cumin-flavored grilled meat mixed with rice.

However, to everyone’s surprise, what ran out wasn’t the grilled meat but the mixed rice’s grilled meat sauce and cumin...

...

"Eat, eat, eat, all you gluttons do is eat! What else can you do besides eat!"

On the open space outside the military base, stood a row of soldiers with a depressed look and dirty faces.

A few Rat Tribe members wanted to speak but didn’t dare, they could only hang their heads in silence.

The officer was right.

He also felt that he wasn’t cut out for battle, let them scold.

But the problem was they hadn’t even eaten!

The Ideal City gluttons had meal cards worth 3000 silver coins, theirs were only 100 silver coins.

And the only reason they had 100 was due to a minimum recharge threshold for card activation, below which they could not get a card.

Thank heavens for that threshold, otherwise, they had no doubt that General Babita wouldn’t even give them the 100 silver.

There was no edible Red Soil here, nor any villages to rob, those horse-riding traders looked more capable of fighting than they did...

Watching these guys look so dejected, General Babita was so angry she almost wanted to tear the belt off her belly and whip them with it.

These were the men under Thousands of leader Modrick, those who had fled from their positions just yesterday.

But what really enraged her wasn’t just their cowardice which had cost Thousands of leader Modrick his life, it was another incident that had happened yesterday.

She was dining in the canteen at the military base when she saw the Army’s Airship Commander—General Lucien.

Intending to greet him smilingly as allies, she immediately approached with her plate, but before she could sit down, she got a barrage of scolding.

"Utterly useless, did McCullen teach you that? What a disgrace! Better off not showing up at all! I can blow away more in one cannon shot than you can kill in half an hour! Pah, couldn’t even hold out for half an hour, worse than my clones can fight!"

The guy’s voice was extraordinarily loud, echoing throughout the entire canteen.

Babita was caught off guard and her face went from green to white.

Although he was cursing McCullen, she still felt deeply aggrieved.

She hadn’t even blamed this guy for dropping the shells on the yet-to-retreat Thousands of leader Modrick’s head.

But since the Weilante People were the emperor’s friends, she ultimately didn’t dare talk back and under the watchful eye of everyone, she left with her plate in dejection.

There was no other choice.

Having been humiliated outside, she could only vent her frustration on her own people.

After roaring for a while, General Babita caught her breath, unscrewed a water bottle for a drink, and continued her rant.

"...What a bunch of useless idiots! Rats will always be rats, expecting you to win a battle is unrealistic. You’d do better planting something here to save on food!"

Speaking, he wagged his index finger and shook his head as he turned his back.

The officer standing beside him hurried forward to take over his position, standing in front of the group of Imperial soldiers, and yelled at the top of his lungs.

"From today on! I am your Thousands of leaders, Kumar! Since you can’t be good soldiers, then return the guns to His Majesty and get lost to the farm! This barren land beneath your feet is your task, I need you to till this soil and plant cabbages and potatoes here! This is your last chance to prove you’re of some use!"

When several hundred soldiers heard this, they exchanged baffled glances, clueless about what to do.

Planting?

Are you kidding?

They came to fight, not to be farmers.

But Babita was obviously not joking; he walked to a rented truck and waved his hand.

A dozen soldiers immediately jumped onto the truck and dragged down sacks filled with hoes and shovels, quickly piling them into a small hill on the ground.

This guy was clearly prepared, even buying tools for tilling the land.

However, looking at the old appearance, it was probably some second-hand junk discarded by a settlement.

That Thousands of leaders named Kumar pointed at the spades and shovels on the ground and roared mightily.

"Three acres for each of you! Get at least half an acre done for me today!"

"Finish the work, then go to eat!"

...

Under the berating of the Thousands of leaders, a group of malnourished soldiers had no choice but to start working with their hoes, heads down.

Most of them came from the western parts of Poluo Province.

There, land was filled with noble estates and farms, the people who lived there were either slaves or serfs. Even the few freemen there had worked in the plantations of the nobles.

Therefore, for them, farming wasn’t a difficult task – it was just a matter of having more or less experience.

A few players from the Death Legion watched from a distance with strange expressions on their faces.

"...Wow, has the Imperial Expeditionary Army given up completely?"

Just one defeat and it has come to this.

It can’t be...

Seeing the stunned faces of Labor Youth and Brick, Debt Giant Eye rubbed his chin in thought and after a moment spoke up.

"I think this might actually be a good thing."

Labor Youth and Brick turned to him with a daze.

"How come?"

Debt Giant Eye gave them a meaningful look.

"If you are on the front lines right now, and these guys are behind you, do you think it’s better with or without them?"

Labor Youth and Brick thought for a while and suddenly exclaimed in realization, "Holy shit."

Kind of makes sense!

Rather than having a bunch of unreliable guys behind him, he’d rather face the mutants alone.

While the two were discussing, a familiar wicked laugh came from behind.

"Haha, I knew it would be like this! So I’ve already solved this issue for you!"

Hearing this voice, both turned around to see it was actually Mosquito Brother.

"Mosquito?!"

"Weren’t you at the southern line? What brings you here?"

Hooking his arms around their shoulders with a slap, Mosquito looked up at those Imperial soldiers swinging their hoes and chuckled, saying,

"I was just wandering about... hehe, came here to expand the business a bit, responding to the call of the Manager, making some extra on the side."

The latter was the main point.

A typical player making profit along one line was good enough, but a high-level player like him naturally wasn’t satisfied with that.

Labor Youth and Brick: "Wow, that Thunderbolt Small Plane still wasn’t enough for your earnings?"

Mosquito waved his hand and sighed, saying,

"That didn’t earn much... damn it, most of the profits were taken by those reverse-engineering design bureaus. We just got the scraps."

Seeing his cheeky demeanor, Debt Giant Eye couldn’t resist commenting.

"Be grateful, what else have you got besides your wild ideas?"

Mosquito rolled his eyes, "Do you think setting up a factory is free? Do you think production lines fall from heaven? There are losses too, the successful ones are called Thunder, the failures don’t even have a proper number."

To create that vertical take-off plasma engine fighter, his Luoyu Brothers had crashed countless times.

It was truly tragic.

But earning too little was just a passing complaint for him. After all, he wouldn’t go into a business with no potential profit, at most he’d just burn some money on a one-time venture.

And money earned by the scientific expedition would pay the players who conducted relic recovery missions, unlocking more technologies to create a healthy cycle of production and research.

Labor Youth and Brick: "Enough bullshitting, tell us, what business have you got your eyes on now, share it."

Coming to his senses, Debt Giant Eye also asked curiously, "Oh yeah, almost forgot with you changing the subject, what problem did you say you’ve solved for us just now, exactly?"

Mosquito squinted and smiled, pointing toward the truck in the distance.

"That junk—that’s what I sold to them."

Both were shocked and blurted out,

"Holy shit?!"

"You’re breaking military discipline!"

"What do you mean by breaking military discipline? That excuse for an army can’t even beat goblins!" Mosquito rolled his eyes, "I tied them up here, just count your blessings."

Big Eyes and the construction worker exchanged a strange look, seemingly agreeing there might be some truth to it.

Though it sounded a bit like crooked reasoning.

The young construction worker spoke with some emotion, "But that Babita really dares to buy..."

Mosquito chuckled.

"What’s there not to dare buy? I didn’t sell them anything bad, just some old stuff."

And this was just the first trainload, merely for those deserters to use first, the train behind is hauling thousands, even tens of thousands more!

This stuff is sold by weight in Dawn City, just like those outdated sewing machines.

Seeing the surprised faces of the two, Mosquito continued.

"I did the math with that guy, the war will last at least a few months, and food expenses won’t be small. In this kind of land, a single season’s yield can fetch at least seven or eight hundred silver coins, right? If one person reclaims three acres, 20,000 people could reclaim 60,000 acres yielding several tens of millions in silver coins! Spending a few hundred thousand on shovels is a loss? It’s a huge profit!"

60,000 acres is 40 square kilometers, a piece of land 5×8 kilometers.

The entirety of Weifu City is uninhabited, thousands of square kilometers barren, finding a piece of arable land upstream along the Wei River is too easy.

The only tough part is the reclamation work, which will perfectly allow selling a dozen or so dump trucks and tractors for plowing to these guys.

If they need them, that is.

However, the two in front of him were concerned about something else.

"A single season’s yield from one acre amounts to that much?? You’re joking!"

The young construction worker and Worker with enlarged eyes, Debt Giant Eye had the same incredulous look.

"Cough cough, ignore the fertilizer, pesticides, and seeds, there really is that much, maybe even more! I remember the Alliance’s subsidies for agriculture mainly fall into these three categories, but that’s beside the point."

Mosquito chuckled and continued.

"The point is, once they’ve reclaimed the land and are ready to start planting, I can sell these three things to them and make another profit!"

As export goods sold abroad, naturally, there wouldn’t be any subsidies.

But he wouldn’t mark up the prices too much, even selling them a bit cheaper than market prices.

After all, these folks aren’t fools, they don’t have to buy from him, if it’s too expensive they’d just buy from someone else.

The young construction worker and Worker had also thought of this, stroking their chins and muttering.

"Fertilizer, seeds, and pesticides for tens of thousands of acres... Damn, that’s like millions in silver coins?"

"Millions? About that in profits."

Mosquito chuckled slowly, continuing lightheartedly.

"That’s not all, once the crops in the field grow, they’ll have to find someone to sell them right?"

Debt Giant Eye was taken aback.

"Can’t they sell to the canteen?"

Mosquito looked at him as if he were an idiot.

"How is that possible! That’s a military base canteen, not some little store by your house! They have their own supply chains, probably had the contracts signed before even sowing the seeds, why would they buy these randomly grown crops?"

At this point, a scheming smile emerged on his face.

"I bet those fools won’t be able to sell them! By then, I’ll buy it from them at a discount... Believe it or not, these manually cultivated ’organic’ products might even be cheaper than the mass-produced imports from Luo Xia Province."

Actually, this way, General Babita could also make a bit.

After all, his labor costs were nearly zero, just tough on those Rat Tribe beasts.

But it wasn’t too miserable; working in the rear was much better than being minced on the front line.

According to Si Si’s latest post on the official website, aside from the direct Weilante People’s armies and several armies constructed by the nobles in Poluo Province that used a feudal method of supply.

That is, the Emperor provides the money, the general spends it.

This includes logistics material procurement and military pay distribution, all handled by the latter.

Although the Empire’s Expeditionary Army had trained with the Army, having deviated too far from the Empire’s logistical system, with "infrastructure connectivity" too low, even unable to reach Silver Moon Bay, they still used old methods of direct payments.

Regarding this, Mosquito was well-informed, otherwise, he wouldn’t have targeted this seemingly dry but actually fat sheep while everyone else was focused on scalping corporations, armies, and academies.

The two stared at him with wide eyes.

Holy smokes.

Such an insider...

"That dude’s so rotten!" Debt Giant Eye couldn’t help but sigh, "Hang him on a streetlamp!"

"What are you saying?" Mosquito glared at him, "If I don’t spend their money for them, they’ll just pocket it and bring it home, right? Is that appropriate?"

The construction worker and Worker just sighed like Big Eyes.

"Absolutely rotten!"

Mosquito: "...@#%#!"

At this moment, neither the Rat Soldier busy with their hoes nor the players enjoying the show noticed that a few curious soldiers from the Free State were also glancing over here, whispering secretly.

On the distant tarmac, four Tiger Whale Transport Aircraft, trailing bright blue arcs, landed.

A group of burly men, with their heads held high, stepped out of the aircraft cabins.

They all wore lime-colored exoskeleton suits, which, by their design, were clearly products of United Human styled like those from Ideal City, though their darker tint wasn’t as bright and shiny as the "Pioneer I Type" exoskeletons of the Mechanized Mountain Division No.100.

General Modlin, standing beside the airport smoking, gave these men a couple of glances, his mouth slightly curling.

"It seems the East Coast also has some capable guys."

He was the Ten Thousand Leader of the Thirty-first thousand troops, had commanded the battle the day before yesterday, and had witnessed first-hand how tough the green-skin mutants and their pet goblins were.

The Torch Church had used Prosperity Epoch technology to forcibly elevate these barbarians to a level they originally couldn’t reach, and even his men, not new to battling mutants, still felt strained.

It was precisely because of this, although the equipment of the Mechanized Mountain Division No.100 wasn’t bad, he didn’t think highly of that bunch of incompetents.

If ten was the perfect score, those people had demonstrated individual soldier quality that barely reached four.

Due to some overly amateur details in their performance, he couldn’t help but suspect that these guys weren’t regular troops at all, but rather new recruits hastily summoned to fill the ranks, and they weren’t even as capable as the Waste Land Wanderers from the River Valley Province.

However, these guys who had just disembarked from the plane did look somewhat soldier-like.

Perhaps these were the real elite of the corporation.

"These are mercenaries from the Province of Yúnjiānxíng," said the aide next to him with a smile, though his face held a hint of mocking disagreement, "A bunch who would sell their lives for money."

"It doesn’t matter why they sell their lives, those who dare to risk their lives are fierce," Modlin dropped his cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it with his boot, he spoke indifferently, "Don’t underestimate them."

As the group of soldiers headed towards the barracks, at the nearby shooting range, a group of young men from the 1st battalion, 2nd company of Division No.100 were receiving their final adjustments before taking the field.

They held G9 assault rifles in their hands, firing point shots at the lush green targets.

Equipped with the most elite optical sights and their helmets set to noise reduction, each one of them was a sharpshooter, with only the occasional shot missing the mark, but almost every bullet hit the bullseye.

However, the instructor walking behind them in a military green vest was clearly not satisfied with their performance.

His face as dark as iron, he yelled loudly.

"Sharpen up!"

"Your opponents are mutants that eat people without spitting out the bones! And those green-skinned types!"

"They’re stronger, more patient, and more brutal than those fishmen with scales! If you fall into their hands, don’t think about paying ransom to come home, you better pray they give you a quick death!"

The rough shouting was something these young men were now accustomed to.

But there were also some show-offs among them, emptying their magazines early and yelping.

"You’re right, sir! But we won’t fall into the hands of those idiots—"

He didn’t finish his sentence before he caught a boot in the backside, and he sprawled onto the Table, nearly flipping over into the shooting range.

The instructor grabbed him by the back of the neck, lifting him up like a little chicken in front of himself.

"Request permission before you speak!"

"Yes, sir!"

"I told you to report!"

"Report! Reporting!"

Looking at the fearful eyes before him, the instructor narrowed his eyes slightly.

He was a soldier from Assault Team No.26, who had followed the tracks and signals of the Pioneer, walking all the way from the Province of Yúnjiānxíng to the Great Desert.

Unlike these guys who signed up for the frontline after playing a couple of rounds of "chicken," he had not only seen what Waste Land was like and how the mutants looked, but also what those hapless victims killed by mutants looked like.

However, he didn’t say anything. He just gave that trembling fellow a meaningful glance, then released the grip on his collar.

Watching the new recruits who stopped their activities and looked this way, he yelled.

"What are you looking at me for! Focus on the weapon in your hands! Fix your eyes on your target! Pray it doesn’t move, because when you’re on the frontline, don’t pee yourself!"

His foul-mouthed voice echoed in the training field, even drowning out the loud bangs of the gunfire.

After training concluded, a swarm of people bustlingly left the field, heading towards the cafeteria.

Though they had been scolded thoroughly, it did not dampen their appetite in the least.

"Damn it... after being scolded for three months, tomorrow we’re finally heading to the frontline!"

"Haha, my big knife is itching for action!"

"Wait till you see the sniping skills of P City when it’s showtime!"

"I wonder if they sell the LD-47 here, that gun’s got some serious power!"

"Truly, the G9 assault rifle is too weak! It doesn’t suit my exoskeleton at all!"

"I’ll borrow one from a brother in the Alliance in a bit..."

At the entrance to the training field.

Watching that noisy bunch, Edge Shoveling looked bewilderedly at Su Ming standing next to him and swallowed before asking.

"Are these guys... really going to be okay?"

Although they themselves were often just as noisy, that was because they wouldn’t actually die.

And considering those grueling three days, most people would still bring their A-game when it really came down to fighting.

Clearly.

These NPCs weren’t.

They seemed like they didn’t even know where they were going tomorrow or what they would see once they got there.

Su Ming’s expression was somewhat awkward, and he cleared his throat before saying.

"Don’t look at them like that... they also went through three months of training in the rookie camp, they won’t drag their feet."

Edge Shoveling tentatively asked.

"... Virtual reality training field?"

Su Ming tried to explain.

"That only accounts for fifty percent of the training duration... we also do live ammunition training and physical training."

Edge Shoveling paused.

Damn.

It actually made up fifty percent!

But fair was fair.

The council was still pretty good to these rookies, the bullets they fired today were almost more than he had used over two years before he transferred to be a firefighter.

Looking at the excellent equipment, Edge Shoveling felt somewhat envious, much like how those corporate youngsters looked enviously at him.

Being rich was definitely better...

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