The line ahead moved quickly. In the blink of an eye, it was Qi Heng and Yun Jiu’s turn.
Qi Heng extended his hand, wearing the same submissive expression as all the other Zerg.
He had already used the system to scan the identification tag. There was no chip or similar component inside it, and the system had detected no wireless network anywhere in District 49.
An identification system that could not connect to a network was easy to exploit.
Therefore, Qi Heng suspected one of two possibilities: either the tag served little practical purpose, or its real function lay in some area he had not yet encountered.
The one-horned man holding the scanner looked Qi Heng up and down.
He could not remember seeing this female Zerg before. With such an outstanding appearance, there was no possibility he would have forgotten him.
Qi Heng stood calmly and allowed the one-horned man, whose chest badge read “One-Horn 28,”to examine him. Taking advantage of their proximity, he instructed A1 to scan the device and determine its function.
【Overlord, this instrument is a metal detector capable of identifying metallic components.】
One-Horn 28 passed the device over the identification tag on Qi Heng’s wrist.
A green light appeared, accompanied by a soft beep.
That was enough for him to pass the inspection.
This was good news for Qi Heng. At the very least, he would not need to resort to his backup measures.
After passing the check, he gripped a rope beside the entrance and descended into the mine shaft.
After dropping more than ten meters, his feet reached the ground. Several dim mining lamps illuminated the surrounding area.
When Yun Jiu saw him, he walked over and lowered his voice.
“Why did it take you so long to come down?”
“Sorry,” Qi Heng replied.
The space beneath the shaft was enormous.
With a quick glance, Qi Heng counted at least six or seven excavated tunnels. Numerous crooked baskets had been discarded nearby.
“Forget it.”
Yun Jiu shook his head, took Qi Heng by the arm, and led him toward one of the tunnels. Along the way, he handed him a basket.
“Take this vine basket. Put the ore you dig out inside it, then carry it back up later.”
The basket seemed to have been woven from some kind of specially treated vine possessing extraordinary flexibility and durability. It reached approximately to Qi Heng’s thigh.
He estimated how much it would weigh once filled with ore.
Someone without considerable strength would struggle even to lift it, much less climb more than ten meters vertically while gripping a rope.
“Stay close to me,” Yun Jiu said as they walked. “There are many tunnels inside. Since this is your first time here and you don’t know the paths, it would be easy for you to get lost.”
Qi Heng knew that the system made it impossible for him to lose his way, but he still answered:
“I will.”
Yun Jiu had promised Yan Ning that he would take care of Qi Heng, and he intended to keep that promise.
Furthermore, Qi Heng had left him with the impression of being good-tempered and obedient throughout the journey, so Yun Jiu did not mind offering additional advice.
“These tunnels were dug by female Zerg who mined here before us. Most of the accessible ore has already been removed. To find anything now, you have to dig farther into the rock.”
“But the deeper you go into the mine, the more dangerous it becomes. The terrain inside is complicated, and some tunnels are unstable. If one collapses, it’s easy to be buried…”
Yun Jiu spoke of cave-ins in an entirely ordinary tone, as though accidents of that kind happened frequently.
“So the first thing you need to learn is not to be greedy.”
Qi Heng had been thinking about the one-horned man, but Yun Jiu’s warning drew his attention back.
“I understand.”
“No matter how rare the ore may be, it isn’t more important than your life.”
Yun Jiu carried a mining lamp in one hand. Hearing Qi Heng’s answer, he turned to look at him.
“It’s rare to meet a female Zerg who thinks like you.”
“Is that a bad way to think?” Qi Heng asked.
“No. It’s a very good way to think. Far better than treating your own life as worthless.”
There was clearly more behind Yun Jiu’s words, but he had no intention of elaborating.
“I’ll teach you how to dig out the ore and tell you which kinds are worth the most.”
Yun Jiu led Qi Heng through several winding turns until they reached a tunnel with relatively few Zerg inside.
“Watch carefully.”
Yun Jiu had Qi Heng hold the mining lamp. He then took the stone spear from his basket, gripped it firmly, and struck the tunnel wall with considerable force.
Female Zerg could see in darkness, so the dim conditions inside the mine did not affect their mining speed.
Qi Heng’s body, still undergoing fusion, was neither truly human nor a female Zerg. However, it possessed some of the Overlord’s natural abilities, allowing him to see Yun Jiu’s movements clearly.
After watching for only a short while, Qi Heng realized that the rock on both sides of the tunnel was extremely hard.
Every one of Yun Jiu’s blows carried considerable force.
Only after more than a dozen strikes did the portion of exposed ore begin to loosen.
Yun Jiu then inserted the sharpened end of the short spear into the newly formed crack and pried forcefully.
A dull black piece of ore broke free from the wall.
“Did you understand?”
Yun Jiu held up the fist-sized stone.
“I more or less understand what to do,” Qi Heng answered. “Is ore like that valuable?”
“This is the main ore produced in this area. There are also several associated minerals. Some earn more points than others.”
“This one gives the best return for the effort.”
“Does it have a name?”
“I don’t know. We call it black stone because most of it is black…”
“I see.”
Qi Heng nodded while inwardly ordering A1 to scan the ore.
【Overlord, this is unrefined Obsidian Crystal.】
After organizing the surviving database information concerning Obsidian Crystal, A1 reported meticulously:
【Quality: SL1 grade. Hardness: B grade. Purity: 70%. Applications include jewelry production, tempering stellar artifacts, and weapon manufacture. Associated minerals include Black Crystal and Dragon-Crystal Chalcedony…】
“All right. Don’t waste any more time. Start digging.”
Yun Jiu did not notice that Qi Heng’s attention was divided.
He pointed toward another empty section of wall.
“I’ll dig over there. You can use this area.”
“If we fail to fill at least one basket, the one-horned people above will forbid us from entering this mine again.”
Qi Heng listened to both Yun Jiu and A1’s analysis.
By the time A1 finished and Qi Heng prepared to respond, Yun Jiu had already walked away.
Qi Heng swallowed the words and focused on the rock wall before him.
After a moment, he raised a hand and tapped the stone.
[A1, I remember Obsidian Crystal being considered a type of high-energy crystal.]
【Correct.】
Within the game, Obsidian Crystal had been a mineral resource of moderate rarity.
Because it had been relatively easy to develop during the early game, Qi Heng still remembered it.
He said it only “counted” as a high-energy crystal because it barely qualified.
Obsidian Crystal contained a small amount of elemental energy, but it was far inferior to true high-energy crystals containing stellar energy.
Among its associated minerals, Dragon-Crystal Chalcedony, which contained traces of stellar energy, was considerably more valuable.
[Can it replenish the system’s energy?]
【Theoretically, yes.】
Qi Heng ran his fingers across the rock wall and quickly found a protruding section.
Imitating Yun Jiu’s movements, he struck the wall and removed the embedded ore.
[How do I absorb it?]
【Imagine yourself absorbing it.】
Qi Heng moved according to the instruction.
The energy inside the ore was extracted, and the stone cracked into several pieces in his palm.
【Energy absorption complete. Energy replenishment progress increased by 0.0000000001%.】
Qi Heng already knew that the system required an extremely high grade of energy.
Ordinary energy sources would contribute almost nothing after being converted into the form the system required.
He had originally thought that insufficient quality could be compensated for with quantity.
At this conversion rate, however, even consuming the entire mineral vein might not replenish much energy.
Qi Heng did not even want to count the number of zeros.
He was not disappointed. He had never placed much hope in the idea to begin with.
As he began working on the rock wall, he said:
[Does the system contain a map of Tianyun Star’s mineral deposits? Bring it up if it does.]
He could not forget the actual work he had come here to perform.
The ore still needed to be mined.
Qi Heng glanced at the map displayed by the system.
[Mark the Obsidian Crystal veins.]
【Marked.】
There were not many Obsidian Crystal deposits on the map.
Aside from several scattered locations, the largest and richest vein lay near the center of Lan City on Lan Continent.
Qi Heng had not previously been certain where he was on Tianyun Star.
Now, however, he knew there was an eighty or ninety percent chance that he was somewhere near Lan Continent’s Obsidian Crystal vein.
Most civilizations riddled their own planets with mines while developing technologically.
The Tianjia Civilization had done the same elsewhere.
Tianyun Star, however, was different.
Before developing the planet, the Tianjia Civilization had already mastered long-distance space travel. There had been no need to hollow out Tianyun Star to support technological advancement.
Furthermore, because Tianyun Star occupied a unique position within the civilization, its mineral deposits did not need to be exploited to support Tianjia’s development.
Instead, enormous quantities of resources required by the planet had been continuously transported there from elsewhere.
A vast, medium-to-high-quality Obsidian Crystal deposit that could be mined for generations narrowed the possibilities considerably.
Even without the system’s analysis, Qi Heng was now seventy percent certain of the mine’s location.
Qi Heng struck the wall with force, but the new clues caused his mind to begin analyzing the Zerg’s circumstances once again.
From the information A0 had provided, he knew that the Zerg had been defeated and suppressed by other interstellar civilizations.
The Stellar Alliance, led by the Mora Civilization, had classified them as a slave species and confined them in captivity.
Qi Heng still did not know why those civilizations were keeping the Zerg alive, so he mentally placed a question mark beside that issue.
The only thing he could confirm was that this deeply suspicious slum was probably one of the areas where the Zerg were being confined and exploited.
He had still possessed some uncertainty before.
The appearance of the one-horned man erased his final doubts.
Qi Heng had personally given the Zerg the trait of extreme xenophobia.
A one-horned heteromorph could never have appeared freely on a native Zerg planet.
Therefore, the one-horned man standing at the mine entrance was clearly an outsider.
Qi Heng had not expected to encounter a member of the One-Horn race here.
The civilization that had artificially created the One-Horn race had once offended the Tianjia Civilization.
Qi Heng had responded by sending an army to wipe out both the civilization and its home star system.
The fact that One-Horns still existed meant the purge had not been sufficiently thorough.
Someone from that supposedly exterminated civilization had slipped through the net.
Had they simply escaped through extraordinary luck, or was there another reason?
Qi Heng favored the latter explanation.
If it had been easy to escape a cleansing campaign carried out by the Tianjia Civilization, then the Zerg would never have earned the title of “calamity.”
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