The forest where Zul'Saroth was located was in a basin, and Yue Nu, suffering from naming difficulties, directly named this basin Saro Basin.
The terrain of Saro Basin resembled a flower, with eight mountain ranges extending into the basin, transforming the surrounding area into eight petals of varying sizes. In the middle of the basin, a tall mountain stood, like a pistil. This peak was also called Pistil Peak by Yue Nu.
To control the entire Saro Basin and to understand the situation around the Saro Basin, Yue Nu had Gale build a lookout tower on Pistil Peak. Dozens of mages on the lookout tower jointly cast Arcane Eye, clearly observing the entire basin's situation.
Coupled with the eight Asunite Eye Stones, Zul'Saroth completely controlled every movement in the Saro Basin.
Saro Basin was rich in resources, with a large number of creatures living there. A rough estimate counted at least three thousand species of animals. This made Gale highly suspect that Saro Basin might also be a Titan testing ground, similar to Un'Goro Crater.
Just as Gale was about to search for any Titan Remains here, the Rangers exploring the south sent back a message.
They had discovered a Thorium Mine.
Thorium Mine's value far exceeded that of Han Tie Mine, because thorium was a magic metal. After being processed into enchanted thorium ingot, it could even be used to create artifacts. As long as this Thorium Mine was extracted, the Kaldorei Empire would possess countless artifacts.
Thinking of this, Gale immediately decided to head south. Such a high-value mine, of course, had to be shared.
Yue Nu and the recently returned Turann High Mage were also quick to act. If it weren't for Gale riding a Proto-Dragon, he might have arrived even later than them. The message about the Thorium Mine discovered by the Rangers was reported to them first.
Standing in front of the Thorium Mine, all three were hesitant to speak. Well, they all wanted a share, but none wanted to speak first. This was an offense to Azshara, and whoever spoke first would face Azshara's wrath.
"Two old foxes," Gale cursed in his heart. Then, he calmly looked at the Ranger beside him, "Tell me how you discovered this Thorium Mine?"
Yue Nu and Tulan's mouths twitched, and they also cursed in their hearts: "This little fox."
However, they couldn't say it out loud, so they could only look at the Ranger, pondering how to find a scapegoat.
The Ranger felt a lot of pressure and quickly said, "We came here to set up scout wards, and then we noticed that the rocks here were unusual. After checking the complete mineral guide, we confirmed that this was an open-pit Thorium Mine."
Gale's mouth twitched. This luck was simply heaven-defying. Unfortunately, this Ranger was not fated to enjoy this immense wealth.
At this moment, the Ranger said, "Actually, we also found many other similar places before, but didn't think much of them. Now that I think about it, they should all be open-pit mines."
"Hmm?" The three were immediately surprised, exchanged glances, and quickly communicated with their eyes.
Yue Nu: "We know about this. Gather everyone in this area."
The Ranger breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing the command and quickly left. In front of these three important figures, he always felt suppressed.
He had no idea that Yue Nu and Tulan had several times considered killing him to silence him. The enormous profits from the Thorium Mine were enough to make them defy the world. If Gale hadn't arrived first, this Ranger would probably have lost his life.
Tulan was a bit anxious, "Gale, what should we do now?"
Multiple open-pit mines, how much wealth was that? If they couldn't get a share of it, they would die with regret.
Gale didn't answer directly but looked at the mountains on both sides.
Yue Nu asked curiously, "What are you looking at?"
"The color of the mountains."
The two didn't understand, "What's wrong with the color of the mountains?"
Gale's heart stirred, and he said to the two, "Wait for me for a moment."
With that, he casually summoned a Proto-Dragon and jumped onto its back. The Proto-Dragon soared into the sky, flying high. Gale looked out and saw an endless mountain range, stretching east to west across the continent. Moreover, all the peaks were made of red stone.
He thought of a possibility: this continuous mountain range should be the ancient Redridge Mountains.
According to the world of warcraft lore, the Redridge Mountains was a very long mountain range. After the Well of Eternity explosion, most of the continent sank. Only a portion of the eastern Redridge Mountains remained. Later, the Dark Iron Dwarves summoned Ragnaros, who destroyed the Redridge Mountains, transforming it into Redridge Mountains, Burning Steppes, Searing Gorge, and the Badlands.
Besides, Dun Morogh, where the Dwarves lived, and the mountains north of Stormwind City, the human city, were also part of the Redridge Mountains. According to Gale's analysis based on the world of warcraft map, the mountain range below was precisely on the extension of these areas.
If Gale's guess was correct, then this mountain range would contain countless metal ore veins. It should be known that the Redridge Mountains were forged by the Earth Spirits at the command of the Titan Kaz'goroth. The small section of the Redridge Mountains remaining in the game had abundant mineral resources, with the Dwarves establishing several digging sites and countless mining tunnels.
And now that the Redridge Mountains was still complete, how many mineral resources would it possess?
Gale's eyes immediately turned red. If all these minerals could be extracted, it would probably be enough for forging engineering for ten thousand years.
But very quickly, Gale sobered up. The idea of excavating all the minerals was truly impractical. Not to mention that Kaldorei lacked the technology, even if Earth Elements were summoned for excavation, they could only dig shallow ore veins.
Deep-seated ore veins were out of the question; countless Earth Spirits lived there. If the Earth Spirits were disturbed, it was likely that even these shallow ore veins would be impossible to mine.
At this time, the Earth Spirits were not the later Dwarves; they possessed rocky exteriors, immense strength, strong magic resistance, and even potentially used giant war machines. Thinking of the large war machines in front of Ulduar, their operation was simply not something the Kaldorei Empire could face.
The Kaldorei Empire had too few people and simply couldn't withstand the attrition. It was better not to disturb the Earth Spirits; collecting open-pit minerals was already very good.
Gale descended, patrolling the mountains near the Saro Basin, and discovered fifteen more open-pit mines in total. Seven were close to the Saro Basin, making transportation very convenient. The remaining eight were in the mountains, separated by large mountains, making transportation difficult.
Of course, the value of these eight ore veins was also higher. Two of these ore veins were metals currently unknown to the Kaldorei Empire, which, based on game experience, were likely kryptonite and nether iron.
kryptonite was a metal with super strong conductivity to Holy Light, equivalent to truesilver for Arcane.
nether iron, on the other hand, had super strong conductivity to souls, and there was a lot of it in Pandaria in the game. But Gale estimated that in reality, it would also be very rare in Pandaria.
After calculating in his mind, Gale returned to the Thorium Mine and landed beside Yue Nu and Tulan.
"We should report these ore veins to the Queen truthfully!"
The two looked at him in shock. He had only been in the sky for a moment, and how did he come back spouting nonsense?
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T/N: While I am an inexperienced Translator, I have a Patreon! While it may seem empty as of now, webnovel will get 2 Chapters Every Day, and advanced chapters will be uploaded on Patreon.
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