Chapter 92: Boom!
Leo stared at Fisha, desperately wanting to twist her canine head off.
“Do you call this invention? This is plagiarism!”
Leo had been studying black powder for some time, but the process required vast amounts of saltpeter. After a week of painstaking collection, he managed to produce a batch of gunpowder that merely sparked—without even a pop. Of course, Leo was being cautious in his experiments, testing only tiny amounts and simply igniting them to observe the effects. At most, he could make a firework for the mice to watch, never daring to attempt a real firecracker.
He had no desire to become some otherworldly Nobel, sending his family skyward.
Yet Fisha’s barrel of gunpowder was clearly superior to anything Leo had managed to make himself. She had obviously spied on his formula, found higher-quality materials, and devised a method to make it explode.
She simply packed the gunpowder into a barrel!
Fisha seemed utterly oblivious to any problem with her plagiarism; instead, she was thrilled. “Leo invented gunpowder! Fisha invented boom-boom! Fisha is smarter!”
That didn’t seem entirely wrong. For a kobold, packing gunpowder into a barrel was already a monumental innovation.
Was the invention of black powder a turning point in history? No, blowing people up was the turning point!
But Leo wasn’t focused on that. He was intensely curious about how this explosive barrel was detonated.
The barrel, as large as a human head, had no fuse.
Fisha noticed his curiosity, proudly took the barrel, raised it high, and shouted, “Boom-boom!”
“Boom-boom!” The kobolds below erupted in fervor.
Fisha pointed to one of them and handed over the barrel. “You, light the boom-boom!”
“Woof?” The excited kobold suddenly went slack-jawed, took the barrel dejectedly, grabbed the torch handed to him, and walked toward the opposite cliff.
He wedged the barrel into a crack in the cliff, placed the torch on it, and then turned and bolted!
Leo swore it was the fastest he’d ever seen a kobold run—like a cheetah!
Yet he wasn’t fast enough. He’d barely gotten ten meters before the shockwave from behind flung him through the air.
A thunderous explosion echoed through the valley, reverberating endlessly as smoke and dust billowed.
When the smoke cleared, the cliff across the way had completely collapsed, exposing a gap more than ten meters wide. The interior, dug out by kobolds, was in complete disarray—like a mountain riddled with wormholes, all laid bare to the sun.
Brand-new iron ore gleamed coldly in the sunlight.
Shards of rock scattered for dozens of meters, and many kobolds within the blast radius were struck by debris, clutching their heads and groaning in pain.
Yet the remaining kobolds, witnessing this miracle, cared little for their kin’s casualties. Their hearts were seized by awe at the barrel’s unparalleled power.
To dig such a massive breach would require a month of toil from the entire kobold mining tribe; yet with the barrel, it was done in a second.
Amid the wild cheers of the kobolds, Leo stood dumbstruck, unable not to be impressed.
“You’re right, you are smarter!” Leo raised his thumb in praise. “The patent for the explosive barrel belongs to you!”
At least until a fuse is invented, Leo would never let his people handle an explosive barrel!
While praising Fisha, Leo didn’t miss the chance to instruct the little mouse. “See that? Never try it yourself!”
The little mouse, terrified by the destruction and casualties, nodded frantically.
She also felt dejected. She’d been spying on Leo’s experiments alongside Fisha, but while she’d learned nothing, Fisha already had such a breakthrough.
Fisha was immensely pleased, her tail wagging frantically, proud to finally have outsmarted Leo.
Taking advantage of her triumphant mood, Leo pressed her, “Tell me, where did you get so much saltpeter?”
“Follow me!” Fisha led Leo deeper into the valley.
They arrived at Fisha’s dwelling—the kobold chieftain’s cave—where Fisha dragged out a large wooden chest she’d hidden away.
“It’s shiny stones!”
Opening it revealed all kinds of colorful minerals.
Fisha took them out one by one, delighted as a little girl sharing her treasure.
The little mouse who had followed them looked on enviously, wishing for her own chest full of jewels.
“Yellow shiny stones!”
“White shiny stones!”
“Golden shiny stones!”
“Red shiny stones!”
Leo took each mineral Fisha handed him and identified them: gold ore, crystal, calcite, beryl.
But most were minerals he couldn’t recognize.
Finally, he took a lump that looked like sand clumped together and hesitated, “Is this... saltpeter?”
“Yes, the shiny stone for boom-boom!” Fisha grabbed it, stuck out her tongue and licked it. “Salty, but don’t eat it—it’s poisonous!”
She offered the saltpeter to the little mouse, inviting her to lick it as well.
“Salt! Kobolds eat it to get stronger!”
The little mouse tentatively stuck out her tongue, but Leo stopped her and continued, “Where did you find this?”
At the bottom of the chest was a thick layer of granular saltpeter, giving off a strange odor.
Clearly, Fisha had once stored much more, but had used most for making “boom-boom.”
Fisha, licking the saltpeter, pointed west. “The great swamp! Dangerous! There are crocodiles!”
Leo picked up the gold ore and asked, “And what about this?”
Fisha shook her head. “The kobolds found it, but I don’t know where.”
Leo tossed the gold ore aside, disappointed. He’d hoped Fisha had a hidden gold mine.
If it were gold ore, Leo wouldn’t mind buying it at a price higher than iron ore!
Sadly, that wasn’t the case. No one knew where the kobolds had found that piece.
Given the kobolds’ love for shiny things, even if they didn’t know the value of gold, they wouldn’t ignore it.
The good news was that the kobolds’ territory wasn’t vast, so the gold mine likely wasn’t far. Perhaps someday, Leo might really find a gold mine.
Leo stood up and said to Ivan, “Take the little mouse back.”
Then he turned to Fisha, “Take me to the great swamp.”
Fisha shrank back, muttering, “The great swamp—there are crocodiles!”
Leo encouraged her, “You are the king of the kobolds! How can you fear crocodiles?”
Fisha agreed, “Clever Fisha, king of the kobolds—and now we have boom-boom!”
Spurred on by Leo, Fisha led a squad of kobold warriors and the last explosive barrel, crossing the kobold valley toward the great swamp where saltpeter was found.
Previously, most of Leo’s attention had been on the threat from Wolfbane Plain across the Anzeno River, leaving the western forest unexplored.
This was originally kobold hunting ground; after clearing out the bandits and settling the ogre, the scouts from Riverbend had patrolled the western woods a few times, but rarely ventured beyond the abandoned watchtower where the ogre lived.
Like Wolfbane Plain, this region lay beneath the majestic barrier, with the foothills stretching outward for over a hundred miles, beyond which lay the World Tree Avenue leading to the western lands.
From the western outpost, following the World Tree Avenue west for two hundred miles, stood the vast Borok-Bak Mountains, extending straight south for a thousand miles from the majestic barrier.
The World Tree Avenue passed through a mountain pass there.
Beyond the pass lay the empire's western frontier.
And the great swamp Fisha spoke of was nestled in the foothills between the Borok-Bak Mountains and Riverbend.