Forty millenniums of cul.., p.200
Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 200
"But right now, there is no time for any further researches. They have to make do with whatever technologies they have at present, however immature the technologies are.
"To glue so many immaturely synthesized Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures together into a crystal suit, its performance might be amazing, but the robustness and the fault rate will be appalling!"
Chapter 291: Crucial Question |
"What I'm saying is that we should not be affected by interferences. On the surface, the Tiger King Battlesuit does look great. However, our Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit has its own advantages.
"Firstly, the main framework of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit is based on technology dating back to the era of the Star Ocean Imperium. They have been tested in battlefield countless times and are well beyond the perception level of the Heaven's Origin Sector at present, which is also why we haven't been able to fully comprehend it although we devoted most of our time to it.
"Secondly, everyone here is an expert in grassroots refining. We all have abundant experience in MP magical equipment. Maybe our work is not as glamorous as that of the elite ideology believers and the specifications of our crystal suit might be boring, but we are definitely the best in the regards of production stability and fault rate!
"Thirdly, although pricing is not the decisive factor, a crystal suit with similar performance to theirs but only half cost is still very attractive.
"I believe you've all heard a thing or two about this over the past month. The spiritual tides in the Dark Desolate Domain are more frequent and intense than before.
"Just as the sea tide is the rise and fall of sea levels caused by gravitational forces, the intense spiritual tides indicate that our world is being attracted to another world, now more than ever.
"Which means that the distance between the Blood Demon Sector and us has been shortened.
"Maybe in the next few years, a semi-permanent wormhole will appear between the Heaven's Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector which will allow a large number of troops to pass through.
"It is the most important reason why the military is purchasing standard crystal suits in such a hurry.
"At the cost of the same war budget, five crystal suit legions can be built up if the military choose to buy the Tiger King Battlesuit; but if they buy the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, ten or even fifteen crystal suit legions will be able to be established. This is our advantage!
"So, let's work together!
"Hadn't we already anticipated that Deep Sea University and the Gold Armor Clan would bring out a crystal suit with second-to-none performance? But as it turns out, it's only just so-so. My confidence is stronger now than before. The Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit is definitely going to beat the Tiger King Battlesuit!"
Yuan Manqiu's remarks ignited everyone's passion.
The grassroots refining ideology had been suppressed by the elite refining ideology for decades.
For no other reasons, they had to forge the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit just to prove that the path they had embarked on was the right one.
"Ms. Yuan is right. The most distinguished characteristic about the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit is that its mainframe employed technology from the Star Ocean Imperium which is far more advanced than our current ones. Its likelihood of survival is much higher in a battlefield!"
"We've made great progress in the power system…"
"The preliminary distribution of the probe magical equipment has been sorted out…"
The professors and the experts started a heated discussion.
The only exceptions were several experts of materials and experts of the crystal reactor, who hid themselves in the corner silently and didn't open their mouths until others had finished talking.
"There are still some problems concerning the Super Compressed Crystal Reactor. We've tried to refine it with almost a hundred different kinds of materials. However, their hardness did not meet our demand. Although it won't explode again in the laboratory like the previous accident, it will still risk being wrecked or even set off in a real battlefield when it suffered corrosion or a major strike."
The words tossed a bucket of cold water on the participants of the project.
But they were aware that the crystal reactor was the most troublesome component to refine in a crystal suit after all.
There had been no crystal reactor in the Star Glory Federation that was devoid of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures.
90% of the Tiger King Battlesuit was made of synthesized materials, but it still required authentic Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures for its crystal reactor.
That was because the crystal reactor had a high requirement for hardness and tenacity.
Was the Grand Desolate War Institution able to do what Deep Sea University couldn't?
"It is not a problem!"
Yuan Manqiu knocked the desk and said firmly, "We still have half a year and we are going to find a way out. Let's call it a day here.
…
The sun set, and night fell.
Sitting below the statue of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit and watching the stars over his head lighting up one after another, Li Yao meditated.
With the reconstruction of the Refining Department, most of the ruins had been cleared away. More than ten tall trees were implanted around the statue from other places, transforming the place into a small park.
The gentle wind was breezing coolly.
Li Yao liked to contemplate beside the statue of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit.
Every time he came here, he felt his head was clear and sharp with a lot of amazing ideas popping up.
He had a feeling that the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit was connected to him in a way he can't comprehend and that it was destined to be born in his hands and cruise in the cosmos with him gloriously.
"The Tiger King Battlesuit is indeed marvelous!"
On his crystal processor, Li Yao played and replayed the press conference of Deep Sea University, especially the demos of the Tiger King Battlesuit.
The more he watched, the more he felt that there was a fire burning in his heart.
It was not easy to defeat such a formidable enemy. Although the professor mentioned that there were many hidden problems about the Tiger King Battlesuit, Deep Sea University would certainly try to fix them in the half year to come.
However, for the Grand Desolate War Institution, the most crucial problem about the crystal reactor was like a mountain standing in the path of everyone and blocking all hope.
Leaning against the wreck of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, Li Yao closed his eyes and started pondering.
"A crystal reactor has two critical parameters. One is the hardness. Only with enough hardness could it withstand the super pressure from inside and the intense impacts from outside.
"The other is the tightness of spiritual energy. By no means should the spiritual energy be leaked through the tiny gaps in the material that makes up the shell.
"The second point is easy to fix. It is true that the density of ordinary materials is often unsatisfactory. However, there are certain special dyes and rune arrays that can help lock the spiritual energy.
"But as for how to improve the hardness of materials…
The Hundred Smelting Clan from 40,000 years ago had several secret techniques that could bring up the hardness of the ordinary materials to the extent of the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures by repetitive tempering.
But the secret techniques all required manual work which could take an extraordinarily long time with a very low success rate.
With Li Yao's current ability, it might take him several months to forge a highly precise component such as the crystal reactor with ordinary materials, and there would be a lot of defects in the final product.
Such a low efficiency was far from enough to meet the demand of mass-production.
Therefore, Li Yao only noted a few refining methods and rune arrays that could strengthen the ordinary materials and planned to discuss with the professors and experts about them.
As for the manually-made component, he could only use them on his own crystal suits. It was not applicable to the MP crystal suit model.
Pondering for a long time with little yield, Li Yao was irritated.
He turned back unintentionally and suddenly felt something.
The remnants of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit had been standing here for over a year and were weather-beaten. Although it was made of metal, it looked somewhat lackluster now.
"It's not like I can figure it out within a moment. I might as well maintain whatever's left of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit to better learn its inner structure.
After the spiritual tide explosion, the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit had been shattered. The framework had been twisted, and many of the components had been melded together.
Few refiners in the entire Star Glory Federation could maintain such a crystal suit.
But for Li Yao, it was not a problem, because he had maintained crystal suits that were in much lousier conditions in the Thunder Training Camp.
Now was as good as any time. Li Yao took out almost ten delicate maintenance tools from his Cosmos Ring. He played them in his hands and they danced among his fingers like butterflies.
After he returned to the Grand Desolate War Institution, the first thing he did was to refine a set of maintenance tools of 325 different kinds with the materials he'd retrieved from the Dark Desolate Domain.
Take tweezers for example. For different usages, Li Yao refined 12 different pairs.
The tools were all crafted by hard work with consideration of his father's teachings and the lessons from Ou Yezi's memory fragments.
There wouldn't be a second set of such tools in the Heaven's Origin Sector.
As the saying went, 'he who does his work well, first sharpens his tools'. With such a set of maintenance tools, Li Yao was like a tiger who'd grown two wings.
Climbing up the pedestal, he clutched the left shoulder of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit with his left hand, while he tore down the components of the crystal suit with his right hand at an amazing speed.
After a moment, the crystal reactor on the back of the crystal suit was revealed.
Thinking for a second, Li Yao tore the crystal reactor down. He held it in his arms like a watermelon and sat down cross-legged. Under the bright moonlight, he started observing the crystal reactor.
The hardness of the material that constituted the crystal reactor was higher than that of the materials of other components. Therefore, the crystal reactor was not broken but only deformed in the spiritual tide explosion.
Almost a thousand runes were engraved on the top of the crystal reactor. Connected together, they were a rune array that covered the entire surface of the crystal reactor.
A long and narrow hole was ripped open on one side of the crystal reactor; it looked like a black eye.
Li Yao knew that it was the reason for the spiritual tide explosion.
The super compressed spiritual energy had been furious enough to rip open the shell of the crystal reactor, through which it surged out and breached another several walls until it reached the warehouse of crystals where a tremendous explosion was triggered because of the chain reaction.
Staring at the crystal reactor, Li Yao suddenly felt that a cold wind blew through his heart, which caused numbness all over his body. He sensed that something was eyeing him in the void.
Li Yao blinked his eyes. For some reason, he felt that the 'something' was not malicious. On the contrary, it was warm and friendly, as if it were a companion going to the same destination as Li Yao.
Searching for a long time, Li Yao's eyesight stopped at the hole of the crystal reactor.
A weird light glimmered in the hole, making it look like a winking eye.
Chapter 292: Phantom Entities |
Greenish light blinked like a spark dying in the winter wind and then vanished into thin air.
Holding his breath, Li Yao extended one of his spiritual threads into the crystal reactor.
However, when it was entering through the hole, it was weirdly blocked by what seemed to be a thin film.
"Bo!"
He seemed to have punctured a soap bubble. A long and deep sigh came from inside the hole, followed by an eruption of greenly shining spots that looked like flickering dandelion seeds which danced to the rhythm of the wind under the night sky.
Li Yao was dazed. He had never seen anything as weird before.
They were like translucent fireflies, bunches of flying roses, and ember spirits that had been awaken.
They danced around Li Yao in an unpredictable pattern, sending out mysterious messages.
Li Yao extended more spiritual threads from his spiritual root and pierced into the green fires.
"BOOM!"
In a moment, hundreds of fireballs of information exploded inside his brain, making him 'see' and 'hear' countless stuff.
He seemed to have been surrounded by thousands of pictures at the same time.
Most of them are obscure and complicated experiments and refining procedures. A few of them were some people exclaiming wildly with joyful tears.
"The Project Mystic Skeleton is finally going to be completed!"
The sentence echoed and echoed in Li Yao's brain, which was followed by rounds of gleeful laughter.
He could even feel intense pride, excitement, and relief himself.
"This is—"
It was not until Li Yao stood still for over an hour to read and absorb all the information that he discovered that a lot of experimental data and refining processes related to Project Mystic Skeleton had been added to his memories.
The concepts and conjectures that had been fuzzy to him were all obvious now. All the details of the Project Mystic Skeleton had been circuited together and formed a coruscating skyscraper inside his brain.
It was as if inspiration from hundreds of people had exploded in his head like brilliant fireworks.
The fireflies in the sky had disappeared without him knowing.
Li Yao rubbed his face hard to ensure that he was not hallucinating.
He extended his spiritual threads into the crystal reactor again.
The light of the translucent fireflies was extremely weak now. The silence of the grave had taken over the place. Li Yao could even feel that the spiritual energy contained in them were dispersing fast.
It wouldn't be long before the fireflies were gone with the wind.
Li Yao's heart was beating fast. He felt that he might be onto a big secret. So, he reached out to his professor hurriedly via the mini crystal processor.
Ten minutes later, Yuan Manqiu arrived.
She took the crystal reactor and sank her telepathic thoughts into it with her eyes closed while she listened to Li Yao talking about everything that had happened.
"I've been fond of meditating beside the statue of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit since more than half a year ago, because I felt that my brain was extremely sharp and my thoughts were well-organized when I was here. Sometimes, the ideas popping up in my head even shocked myself. I felt like countless experts of refining were communicating with me in this place.
"As time went by, the feeling grew more and more intense. I even had the illusion that the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit here was not a statue or a pile of wreckage, but a – no – hundreds of living human beings!
"In the meeting today, I found that we were stuck on the refinement of the crystal reactor.
"So, while I was sitting here, pondering how to solve the problem, I thought I might as well dismantle the old crystal reactor and study its structure in case I could found something. As it turned out—"
Li Yao told her his amazing experience just now.
To his surprise, there was no amazement, delight, or confusion in his professor's face, but only vague grief, as if someone had torn away her scab and freed her painful past that had been caged for a long time.
Li Yao hardly ever saw such an expression on his professor's face.
Yuan Manqiu was always energetic at whatever she was doing. When something unexpected happened, she was always calm enough to cope with it. She never lacked determination, either.
Therefore, although her expertise was not the greatest, many grassroots refiners were still willing to push forward the Project Mystic Skeleton under her leadership.
He had only seen the expression once before, when the floating mountain of the Refining Department exploded, and Professor Mo Xuan sacrificed himself.
"Professor, do you feel it?"
Li Yao was somewhat anxious.
Yuan Manqiu shook her head and replied bitterly, "No."
"You don't?"
Li Yao was dazed for a moment. Then he took the crystal reactor over and closed his eyes again.
Although their light was very weak now, the fireflies was still gleaming in the darkness.
If he could sense them as a Refinement Stage Cultivator, there was no reason why his professor, a Building Foundation Stage Cultivator, could not.
"I believe in your feelings. They're not your hallucination. I assume they're Phantom Entities."
Yuan Manqiu's voice was somewhat lonely.
"Phantom Entities?"
Li Yao blinked.
He had heard about the term before, but he did not know much about it, nor had he ever come across any in his prior Cultivation.
Yuan Manqiu seemed to have lost her strength. Holding the pedestal of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, she sat down slowly and said, "Have you ever seen ghosts?"
Li Yao nodded his head.
"Of course I have. I have several good ghost friends. Besides, aren't there quite a few spectral Cultivators in our school?"
By good ghost friends, he was referring to Ding Yin and Wei Qingqing.
A year and a half ago, on his way to the Grand Desolate War Institution, the crystal train that he was on met a beast tide outbreak. Seven Cultivators sacrificed themselves to protect the ordinary people on the train. Only two of their souls were able to survive and turned into spectral Cultivators, who were Ding Yin and Wei Qingqing.
