Chapter 508: Energy Array

He finally understood.

The Energy Conversion Core was responsible for converting and attracting Soul Energy, gathering it around itself.

However, since the gathered Soul Energy was in a free-floating state, it was completely unusable. All he could do was look at it.

The Energy Condensation Core’s method was more of a brute-force approach. It would directly snatch the free-floating energy from the vicinity of the Energy Conversion Core, compress it, and force the Soul Energy to fuse until it reached a usable state.

It sounded simple, but the technology involved was actually quite complex. Otherwise, Li Ziyu wouldn’t have needed to spend a whole month on it.

‘The Energy Conversion Core and the Energy Condensation Core are unlocked. What does that mean?’

‘It means the material bottleneck is gone! The day I can mass-produce Soul Energy Collectors is just around the corner!’

Li Ziyu could already envision a wonderful future where he could create Soul Energy at will. He couldn’t help but let out a sinister cackle…

‘Ahem. My image. I still have to maintain my image.’

Stifling his grin, Li Ziyu calmed himself down, deactivated the Energy Conversion Core and the Energy Condensation Core, and then opened the Warehouse interface.

‘Uh… where are my Void Energy Crystal Stones?’

‘All those Void Energy Crystal Stones I had… where are they?’

Gazing at the pitifully small number of Void Energy Crystal Stones in the Warehouse, Li Ziyu was utterly baffled.

‘Considering the Skeleton Undead have been mining tirelessly around the clock, I should have accumulated a huge stockpile of Void Energy Crystal Stones by now.’

‘Was I robbed?’

‘No way. I’ve never heard of a thief capable of stealing items from within the Mobile Fortress.’

‘Besides, the Undead Fortress has two experts, Bebuta and Damenevsky, not to mention the endless hordes of Undead.’

‘Any living creature that set foot on the Fortress would have been discovered instantly.’

But the fact remained: there were hardly any Void Energy Crystal Stones in the Warehouse.

Just a small pile.

‘This amount is seriously wrong.’

Li Ziyu stroked his chin, pondering for a moment before it finally dawned on him.

‘The Void Energy Crystal Stones weren’t missing. I used them myself.’

For the past month, he had been unlocking all sorts of Spiritual Technology—specifically, technologies related to the Void, all of which consumed Void Energy Crystal Stones.

The amount consumed each time didn’t seem like much, but the cumulative total was staggering.

With no prior stockpile, it was a hand-to-mouth existence; as soon as the Skeleton Undead dug the Void Energy Crystal Stones out of the ore veins, Li Ziyu would immediately use them for his R&D.

‘So, this whole month’s work was for nothing?’

‘Holy shit!’

‘It’s a good thing I have a Void ore vein to back me up. Otherwise, developing Void-related Spiritual Technology would have been completely out of the question.’

‘The amount of Void Energy Crystal Stones this must have consumed is insane.’

The thought alone made Li Ziyu’s heart ache at the cost.

He had a rough idea of the Undead’s mining speed.

The Skeleton Undead worked mechanically. Their speed wasn’t high, but their strength lay in their persistence. Small gains eventually added up to a large amount.

An entire month’s output of Void Energy Crystal Stones had been consumed by his R&D. His plans to return to the Otherworld would have to be delayed yet again.

Sigh…

Then again, it wasn’t a huge deal.

After a month of excavation, the mine shafts had already reached deep into the mountain range. The mining speed for Void Energy Crystal Stones would increase significantly from now on.

The Void Energy Crystal Stones on the surface were small, contained little Energy, and were poor in both quality and quantity. Even though the Skeleton Undead worked hard to gather them, the numbers just wouldn’t go up.

As they delved deeper into the mountains, the size of the Void Energy Crystal Stones and the amount of Energy they contained would steadily increase, leading to a sharp rise in the number collected.

The Void Energy Crystal Stones collected in the Warehouse were automatically processed by the system, changing their appearance into 10cm-sided cubes that looked just like individual Energy Blocks.

Each Energy Block represented one unit of Void Energy Crystal Stone, which contained one thousand units of Void Energy.

Right now, it took several of the newly mined Void Energy Crystal Stones to be fused into a single Energy Block.

‘Looking at it this way, both the Energy Conversion Core and the Energy Condensation Core require a ton of Void Energy.’

‘But as long as I can achieve long-term Soul Energy production, it’s all worth it!’

Li Ziyu stretched his stiff limbs and walked out of his room.

He hadn’t left the room in a month. Even his meals had been delivered by the Skeleton Undead.

‘Time to stretch my legs.’

Arriving on the roof of the main tower, Li Ziyu gazed toward the mountains. The area was a hive of activity, with Skeleton Undead bustling about their work.

WHOOSH—

A figure shot up from below, and Bebuta landed in front of Li Ziyu.

“Hello,” Li Ziyu said with a smile, greeting Bebuta.

“He… llo?” Bebuta replied, looking confused. He didn’t know what Li Ziyu’s words meant, but he understood it was a greeting and imitated him by waving his hand.

“City Lord, are the Void Energy Crystal Stones ready?”

“I’ve fully recovered. We can try opening the Teleportation Gate now.”

Bebuta had come over specifically to ask about this. He had observed the Skeleton Undead hauling a considerable amount of Void Energy Crystal Stones out of the mountains.

He didn’t know if that amount of Void Energy Crystal Stones was enough to open the Teleportation Gate; he would need to run a test to find out.

Unfortunately, Li Ziyu had been in seclusion, and since Bebuta couldn’t access the Warehouse himself, he could only wait.

Now that Li Ziyu had emerged, he had immediately rushed over to ask.

Hearing Bebuta’s question, Li Ziyu’s face flushed with embarrassment.

“Um… not yet. There aren’t enough.”

“Still not enough?”

Bebuta was taken aback. He couldn’t help but turn his head to glance in the direction of the mountains.