There had never been a person like Xu Yun in the gold mine, so both the Chinese employees and the local miners were completely shocked.
No one in the gold mine dared to go against the mercenaries. Even the big boss of Hua Xia was very polite to these mercenaries.
This politeness was definitely not a pretense. It was because he had a certain level of fear towards their armed forces. That was why he was so polite.
Xu Yun held the black mercenary and walked straight to the elevator. The people next to the elevator consciously made way for them. Watching Xu Yun open the elevator, Xu Yun did not hesitate at all and walked directly in.
The speed of the elevator in the gold mine was still very fast. There was a platform a kilometer underground, and it only took more than a minute to reach it.
There were only two people in the elevator, Xu Yun and the black mercenary. After entering the elevator, the black mercenary was terrified.
"I was wrong. Please forgive me. I will never dare to be disrespectful to you again." The black mercenary said, "If you have anything to say, you can talk to the towers. Everything we do is his idea!"
Xu Yun completely ignored him and pressed the button on the elevator. "I'll talk to the towers about the problem between me and him, but now it's a problem between you and me."
The elevator began to buzz and descend, and Xu Yun directly let go of the black mercenary. The black mercenary wanted to resist, but he was powerless in front of Xu Yun.
The elevator soon arrived at a platform, and Xu Yun pushed the black mercenary out.
Xu Yun had a certain understanding of the structure of the mine, so he was very clear about what was inside. But the black mercenary did not know. When he saw the dim light, he was scared.
Xu Yun pushed him for a few minutes and walked to the next elevator in another alley. This elevator was responsible for sending the miners to the deepest operation point.
There was someone next to the elevator in charge, and he was surprised to see the two of them.
Xu Yun's aura was enough to let people know that his words were authoritative. The two of them sat on the elevator again and began to descend.
The black mercenary's mind was in a mess. He was really afraid that Xu Yun would let him die here.
Soon, they reached a deeper place. When Xu Yun brought the black mercenary out of the elevator again, all kinds of thick pipes were fixed on the walls of the alley, sending water, fresh air, and electric wires underground.
The miners and their equipment, as well as the ores, were all transported through the tunnels by trams. Apart from the tracks, the ground of the tunnels was covered with dirty bugs, which was very disgusting.
Over the din of generators and trams and other machinery, the miners shouted to each other in the local language. Some of the miners even carried broken plastic bottles with them, which were filled with local wine. Sometimes, working in such places required a sip of wine to refresh oneself.
Inside the mine, the horizontal tunnels extended in all directions from the central shaft to various mining surfaces. The diameter of the main tunnel was seven to eight meters.
The walls and ceiling were made of reinforced concrete, and the steel bars were firmly fixed to the surrounding rocks.
However, the closer they got to the active mining surface, the worse the environment became. The tunnels became narrower and narrower, and the miners had to bend over to pass through. Their headlights would constantly scratch the ceiling of the tunnel.
In the end, everyone had to lie on the ground and crawl forward on their knees. The dim light fell on the stairs that connected the different tunnels, and it looked like the entrance to hell.
A lot of dust filled the air, and rust-coloured sewage seeped out from the cracks in the walls …
The working environment in this place was definitely the worst in the world.
However, the miners who mined gold here were paid extremely low wages. Some of them only needed to be paid ten dollars a day.
On the continent of Africa, this kind of cheap labor was probably the richest thing.
At the mining surface, at the end of the tunnel, the ore body appeared. The gold was mined in these places. The thickness of the ore bed could range from a few centimeters to one or two meters.
The exposed surface of the ore bed was smooth and covered with quartz and pyrite spots. Although it looked like gold, it was called "fool's gold" by the miners.
The real gold ore was hidden in the darker stones. These ores would be blasted into billiard-sized stones by the miners and transported to the surface through the transport tracks. Then, the workers on the surface would deal with the crushing and refining.
Only when the process was completed step by step would it end up in the underground vaults of major banks, or become a "running chain" on the necks of some hooligans.
The thicker the gold necklace, the better it could be used to pay back the hooligans when they were in trouble. It was convenient for them to escape when they needed it, so it was called a "running chain".
The black mercenary was a little confused. Xu Yun pushed him into the midst of the workers. "Do your work here for twenty-four hours, then come out."
"What?!" The black mercenary was stunned. What kind of request was this?!
"If you don't want to do it, that's fine. If you don't want to accept the punishment, I'll let you die a quick death now," Xu Yun provoked.
The black mercenary's legs went soft. He knew that he couldn't beat Xu Yun.
One good thing about mercenaries was that they were very self-aware. If they knew that they couldn't beat someone, they would never try to be brave.
"This is your punishment. In the future, if you mercenaries don't respect me, I'll send you here!" Xu Yun: "You better work hard. If I hear anyone say that you're slacking off, you'll continue for another twenty-four hours until you get a five-star rating. Then, I'll let you come up."
"Then what do I eat?"
Xu Yun spread his hands. "Whatever. I don't know if the cockroaches here are super high in protein."
"I …" The black mercenary was completely speechless.
Xu Yun pointed at the mine worker and said, "Follow him and learn from him. Quickly find an air drill and start working! Don't let me see you being so bored again. "
The black mercenary had no choice but to follow the instructions. He picked up an air drill and slowly walked to the mining area. Then, he lowered his body and crawled until he reached the mining surface.
The miners used the hand-held air drill to drill a small hole two to three centimeters in diameter on the surface of the mine. Then, they filled the hole with ammonium nitrate as the basis of explosives. After the ground crew confirmed that it was safe, they detonated it remotely.
When drilling and detonating extremely deep underground, the most important thing for people to overcome was the high temperature and increased rock stress.
Usually, engineers would think of a way to send a large amount of cold water to the bottom of the mine every day. When the water temperature rose, they would pump it back.
The air conditioning system thousands of meters underground would circulate more than five hundred liters of water per second. In order to reduce the amount of water consumed during the cooling process, some engineers used ice.
However, this process still consumed a lot of electricity, so this method wouldn't be used to cool the workers down in such a small gold mine.
In the eyes of many people, Africans were very resistant to heat. Even if the temperature was close to 50 degrees Celsius, they could still work.
In addition, relieving the stresses in the rock has proven to be far more difficult than maintaining the proper temperature in the mine. In Africa, there are so many earthquakes, both small and large, caused by underground explosions that seismologists from all over the world often travel to African mines to collect data that can help them understand earthquakes.
The deeper the miners drilled and blasted, the greater the stress in the rock. In addition, because a large amount of ore was taken away, the remaining rock was also under a lot of pressure.
When the accumulated stress reached a certain level, the rock would violently explode and suddenly release the energy. This process was as fast and violent as a taut bowstring bouncing back. Those who worked at the mining surface would have a hard time surviving.
Therefore, it went without saying how dangerous this place was.
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