Chen Fan swung himself onto the horse. The saddle adjusted automatically to fit him. He had never ridden a horse before, but the moment he mounted it, he felt a connection with this skeleton horse.
It felt as natural as moving his own arm.
"Giddy up!"
There were no reins, no whip.
He leaned forward. The skeleton horse began to charge. In the blink of an eye, it shot out of Cave No. 2, transforming into a blue meteor skimming the ground, leaving a brief trail of flames in its wake.
The speed was much faster than he had imagined and than his handcrafted tricycle.
...
The instant he charged into the canyon, the vision seemed to constrict abruptly.
The kilometer-long rock walls on either side led bolt-straight out.
A fierce wind howled past his ears.
The sound of the wind became sharp, clashing and overlapping with the thunderous beat of the hooves. Coupled with the raindrops slapping against and stinging his face, an intense excitement flared up within him.
He couldn't help but let out another loud shout.
"Giddy up!"
He needed a whip.
The thought popped into his head. Even though controlling this skeleton horse didn't require a whip, at this moment, he needed to vent his emotions by cracking a whip.
The sights on both sides gradually blurred.
Until the light directly ahead became piercing. That was the exit of the canyon.
It was also the foot of this "Nameless Mountain."
The moment he burst out of the canyon, he saw a large pile of rubble and dirt on the ground. The crocodile must have dumped right here all the dirt from excavating Cave No. 2.
The sea was right in front of the canyon exit, not far away, about a kilometer.
Several dozen seconds later.
"—Whoa!"
Chen Fan rode the horse to the seaside. The horse reared up, the cold white flames in its eye sockets flickering constantly, coming to a halt at the edge of a cluster of rocks.
There was no beach nearby.
Underfoot were jagged rocks standing by the sea. A beach could only be found several hundred meters away.
Huge waves, one after another, surged from the misty distance, crashing against the rocks and sending up sprays of seawater.
He stood alone with his horse on the tallest rock, soaked through, gazing far into the sea horizon. Suddenly, he laughed.
He had been here for several days now.
This was his first time coming to the seaside.
He didn't know what lay beyond the sea.
But it didn't matter.
He would go see for himself one day.
A moment later.
He finally turned the skeleton horse around and rode back to the camp. Through the rain and mist, the outline of the mountain was faintly visible. It wasn't a particularly tall mountain. He returned to the camp along the canyon once more and dismounted.
He examined the skeleton horse with considerable satisfaction.
Its speed was good.
The ride was comfortable and hardly ever jolted him, too.
On the horse's back was a bone groove that opened to reveal an Eerie Stone placed inside---the source of power. Once the Eerie Stone was depleted, a new one could be replenished. It was currently unclear how long a single Eerie Stone could last.
He had just made an excursion and hadn't noticed any obvious depletion of the Eerie Stone.
"Not bad."
Chen Fan consumed another 100 Eerie Stones to craft a second skeleton horse. He called over Zhou Mo and instructed, "There's still some time before dark. Get familiar with this horse today while you go check the old camp's harvest. Starting tomorrow, you resume bringing back resources from those fallen stations like before."
"No problem!"
In his anticipation, Zhou Mo continually rubbed his hands together. Looking at the skeleton horse, his eyes were filled with excitement and fervor. For someone who had fantasized since childhood about being a wandering swordsman, this skeleton horse perfectly matched his youthful fantasy of a mount befitting a hero.
...
There were still two shichen ( 4 hours) until dark.
He planned to first deploy the copper pipes he had accumulated over the past few days.
"..."
From the camp, Chen Fan looked towards that pencil-straight canyon. When he rode away from the camp earlier, the towering rock walls on both sides had given him an idea.
The canyon was about a kilometer long and fifty meters wide.
If the Eerie King led his army to attack him towards the end of the rainy season, or if others came to cause trouble, the only route to this camp would be this canyon.
As the saying goes, the troops from higher ground beat the shit out of any enemies down below.
So...
He planned to set up multiple Cannon Towers at high points on the rock walls of the "Canyon" for intersecting fields of fire. At both the front and rear ends of the Canyon, he would build a city wall each and usually kept them retracted in the ground.
When enemies had marched deep into the Canyon.
The Cannon Towers would be activated, and the walls would rise.
This way, they can take care of the enemies like a rat in a trap.
He named this defense layout the "Meat Grinder."
This plan posed two challenges.
The first was how to dig the holes...
To set up Cannon Towers on the high rock walls of the canyon, he first had to dig holes up there in the rock walls. Moreover, they had to lay copper pipes in the mountain to connect the holes to the camp. This was almost an impossible engineering task.
The Cannon Towers could open up crude, large caves.
But they could hardly be expected to drill holes with precision.
So he hadn't even considered this plan before.
But now...
Chen Fan glanced at the crocodile not far away, lying obediently under the city wall with its mouth open, waiting to be fed. Now there was an extra crocodile that was good at burrowing holes, wasn't there? He'd first give it a try and see if it could complete this complex project.
As the Cannon Towers could only attack creatures in the camp's range, the second challenge was how to bring the Canyon within the range.
He had thought of a solution for this, too.
Lay a large number of Eerie Fire deep in the rock wall. They wouldn't be activated simultaneously through copper pipes until enemies stepped into the Canyon. In that way, the Canyon would be placed within the camp's range.
This would allow for an angled fire barrage.
As for now...
Chen Fan mounted the horse again and activated the "Copper Pipe" he had previously laid in the Canyon. Instantly, a straight, long path within the Canyon became part of the camp. Within the camp's range, he could freely move the "Copper Pipe."
He was going to lay all these copper pipes, as part of his plan to build a network of unmanned outposts.
"Eh?"
The moment the copper pipes were activated, Chen Fan noticed a considerable increase in the horse's speed. As a gentle breeze swept across the path, the skeleton horse could actually benefit from the "Breeze Formation", making its speed several notches faster.
Not long after, almost all the copper pipes accumulated over these three days had been deployed.
...
"Hoo..."
Chen Fan stood alone out on the wasteland, looking at the unmanned outpost he had just built, and let out a soft sigh.
He had coiled copper pipes several times around this place, like a knot on a hemp rope, setting up a small camp.
A 4-meter-long Level 1 City Wall had been built, forming a square blockhouse.
And on the city wall, he had constructed 4 Level 2 Archery Towers.
Apart from that, there were no other buildings.
All this had cost him 160 Eerie Stones.
For ordinary Eerie Creatures, Level 2 Archery Towers were sufficient. As for powerful Eerie Creatures, these city walls wouldn't be able to hold them out whatsoever.
He had built five such unmanned outposts in one go this afternoon with 800 Eerie Stones. Like nodes on a spider web, they were scattered across the wasteland via the copper pipes.
After the Perpetual Night descended, these unmanned outposts, like animal traps, would bring him a continuous stream of harvests.
Even if they were breached, he wouldn't feel any distress.