Chapter 63
◎ Small Boat Upgrade ◎
The mine cave was located deep in the forest.
“Listen up, we only have one week,” Yu Chi said seriously, holding up a finger. “Now there are only four days left. How many crystals we can mine depends on our own abilities!”
“Okay, okay,” Li Feng clapped his hands and leaned lazily against a large tree. “As expected of our alliance leader. Are you already boosting morale?”
“…” Yu Chi’s ears turned red. She put her hands on her hips and said with a forced composure, “In short, if you guys get captured again, I won’t care anymore!”
“Understood,” An Jin said with a grin and a salute. “Let’s set off. I can’t wait.”
Of course, it was not that simple to cross this forest. Countless giant creatures would come to block them. Even if they avoided the battle and ran away, they would always encounter the next powerful creature around the corner.
The beasts were not the most annoying. The worst were probably those giant insects. They came in swarms, and even if they were exhausted, they might not be able to break out.
“What is it this time?” Yu Chi panted, and once again swung her Frost Blade to attack. A few insects in front of her were cut in half, but soon the insects behind them filled the gap.
Li Feng inserted his long spear into the head of a giant mantis, pulled it out, and then turned to stab into an ant. He looked up. “Bees.”
“The feeling of having my abilities restricted is really not good,” An Jin pouted. The two swords in his hand had already become seven. They kept flying out and flying back, and each time they would reap a pile of heads.
For them, these insects were not strong. Although they were not used to it when they first entered this island, they were now able to counterattack easily.
However, the quantity was a big problem. No matter what, they were still human, and their stamina would eventually be exhausted.
Zuo He had pulled a branch from somewhere and was waving it casually. Because he was worried about friendly fire, his suona was forbidden to be used.
“We can’t fight anymore,” he said calmly. “These insects are endless.”
Yu Chi gave each of them a batch of fatigue-clearing candies and ate one herself. The fatigue in her body was instantly cleared, and she was full of energy again.
However, this candy was not a panacea. Compared to the beginning, the effect was significantly weaker now. Although it had no side effects on her physical strength, her body would also develop antibodies with continuous use.
“I almost forgot about this,” Yu Chi took out a few Smoke Fruits from her space and smashed them at the swarm of bees.
“Bang!” Thick smoke instantly obscured their vision. She shouted loudly, “Run!”
The four of them used the smoke as cover and rushed into the dense forest. The angry buzzing of the bees came from behind, but they were soon left behind. An Jin looked back as he ran, and suddenly his foot went empty—
“Ah!”
The ground collapsed without any warning, revealing a deep pit three meters in diameter. Yu Chi’s eyes were quick. She threw out a vine, wrapped it around An Jin’s waist, and pulled him up. The dense sharp thorns at the bottom of the pit glinted coldly in the moonlight.
“A trap?” Li Feng poked at the disguised grass leaves on the edge of the pit with a branch.
Zuo He squatted down and picked up some soil with his fingertips: “Fresh. The Federation people may be nearby.”
As if to prove his words, the crisp sound of a branch breaking came from a distance. Yu Chi immediately signaled everyone to hide. Through the gap in the branches and leaves, she saw five people in uniform uniforms walking towards them.
And the person walking in the very middle had a face that was exactly the same as Zuo He’s!
“Should we kill them?” Li Feng mouthed silently.
Yu Chi was a little conflicted. “I’m not sure about their strength yet.”
The Federation had many strong people. They would definitely not let go of this kind of crystal that could provide EXP.
An Jin suddenly took out a metal ball from his backpack: “Use this.” He pressed the bulge on the ball and rolled it towards the Federation team. The metal ball silently cracked open, releasing a light purple mist.
“Sleeping gas, a dose that can knock out an elephant,” he winked proudly.
A series of muffled thuds of heavy objects falling to the ground were heard in the mist. It was not until the smoke dissipated that the few of them walked out from behind the cover.
“Is it that easy?” Yu Chi kicked Saeki’s body in frustration. In her understanding, the normal course of events should be like this—
They used the sleeping gas, thinking that they could easily solve the other party, so they were smug. But they found that it had no effect on the enemy.
The few of them were shocked and had to fight a big battle with the enemy. In the end, they used all their means to win the battle, find the location of the mine cave, and get the final treasure!
“Your imagination is too big,” Li Feng tapped her head with his spear shaft. “So, do you want to kill him directly?”
Although it seemed very simple, the strength of these people was not weak, and the other party’s vigilance was too low. It seemed that they only treated the giants on the island as enemies and did not think that there would be people hiding in the bushes.
An Jin’s sleeping gas was a rare-grade item, and it was also a precious one-time use item. If he hadn’t given them the antidote in advance, they would probably have fallen asleep together.
There were many people in this world who failed because of accidents. Li Feng did not think that this had happened so incredibly.
Yu Chi looked at Zuo He. “You decide.”
Everyone could see that the relationship between Zuo He and his brother was not right. There should be some enmity between them.
Zuo He lowered his eyes and looked down at the man lying on the ground who looked exactly like him, his expression uncertain.
Yu Chi rubbed her chin. In fact, they had only known each other for a short month or two, and they didn’t know Zuo He at all.
However, to personally kill a twin brother was probably a very difficult decision… right?
Yu Chi’s pupils shrank. A long sword accurately inserted into Saeki’s heart on the ground, and was then lightly pulled out. Zuo He looked up and smiled. “It’s really simple.”
This matter is actually so simple.
Blood kept coming out of Saeki’s mouth on the ground. He woke up in great pain. He opened his eyes, raised his hand, and struggled to say, “Save… save me…”
However, no one here paid any attention to him. Saeki’s vision was blurry, and his last impression was the indifferent look on that familiar face.
It’s this guy…!
Saeki was Zuo He’s older brother, if he was worthy of the word. The few of them heard a very simple story.
In a poor and backward village, twins were regarded as a symbol of misfortune. The child who came out first received all the cheers and gifts, while the child who came out a step later was met with being burned to death.
“My mother saved me,” Zuo He sat cross-legged on the ground.
They had already found the mine cave. Thanks to the few people from the Federation, the location of the mine cave was completely exposed. Yu Chi was asking the treant and the silver wolf to mine, and the other few people were sitting around the bonfire, roasting meat, and by the way, learning about someone’s past.
“Later, she was also burned to death,” Zuo He’s words were not many. Although he had told them his past at the request of the few of them, his words were very brief.
Hearing this, one would probably think that his mother was the only one who had given him warmth. But in fact, his mother was not very good to him either.
In his impression, that woman seemed to be cursing him every time. Because she had a moment of compassion, it had led to her own eternal damnation.
Of course, Zuo He did not blame her. He even felt a strong grief when he knew that the other party had died, because from that moment on, he had become alone.
He had grown up in the forest and would occasionally go to the village to pick up trash. The village had little contact with the outside world, but it was not non-existent.
One day, he had found a tattered book in a garbage heap. The female lead had suffered countless difficulties and tortures, but in the end, she still got a happy ending.
Zuo He had read this book countless times and finally decided to walk out of the mountains.
“Your village is really strange,” Yu Chi flipped the roasted meat and sprinkled the secret seasoning from her space. Soon, the fragrance filled the entire mine cave.
Zuo He nodded: “The children in the village don’t need to go to school. They have to learn witchcraft every day.”
“Huh?”
As soon as he said that, he immediately received three shocked faces.
“Saeki is very strong in this aspect,” Zuo He said calmly. “He found me after I left the village, cut my face, and became me.”
He and Saeki did not look the same. At that time, he had already become famous by fortune-telling. After Saeki came out, he did not want to start from scratch. It was clearly not difficult for him with his strength.
Just for this simple reason, he had willfully cut his face and become him—there would not be an identical face in this world, so the condition for activating the face-changing was to destroy the other face.
“This guy is actually so strong?” Even Li Feng was shocked.
Yu Chi followed and shook her head. “I can’t tell at all.”
Zuo He: “I have a bloodline witchcraft on me. I can never attack him. But this restriction disappeared after I came to this world.”
He said this story in a very calm tone, as if he were stating someone else’s past. The fact was also true. He did not have much fluctuation in his heart. Even when he was killing Saeki, he only felt a little surprised.
Zuo He’s perception of the outside world had always been very weak, even for things that had actually happened to him. But he had put all his emotions into the book and would even be in pain for a long time because of a story.
He had killed Saeki only because the other party had once wanted to kill him.
“Is there really witchcraft? Even in modern society?” An Jin touched his chin.
“Yes, but whether it’s witchcraft or other things, those ancient existences are all disgusting,” Zuo He smiled again.
Yu Chi found that although this guy said he didn’t care and his tone didn’t show any emotion, after personally killing the person named Zuo He, he had actually smiled several times in a short period of time.
The other four people, besides Saeki, were tied up and interrogated by them. They found out the method of using these crystals, but they could only verify it after they went out.
“Alliance Leader,” Zuo He suddenly called out.
Yu Chi didn’t react at all that he was calling her. She was busy eating the fruit that An Jin had just picked.
It was not until Zuo He called again that Yu Chi pointed at herself: “Me?”
Zuo He: “I’ll come to Giant Island again. My prophecy tells me to try to get on good terms with these legendary existences.”
“You decide for yourself,” Yu Chi tilted her head, not understanding why he was telling her this.
“I’ll probably offend the Federation then,” Zuo He said. “Does it matter?”
Yu Chi thought for a moment. “No, I guess.”
Zuo He: “Mmm.”
The few of them transformed into super miners and dug in this mine cave for four days without sleep. During this time, they disguised their faces and drove away a batch of giants and two batches of players sent by the Federation.
After returning to the boat, Yu Chi slept for two days before she recovered. This trip to Giant Island was not very tiring, but after all, her spirit had been tense for a week, and she had not been sleeping very well.
However, the harvest was very rich.
First were the crystals that had been mined. A rough calculation showed that she, the treant, and the silver wolf had mined about 5000 crystals in total, and the other three had probably mined about 2000.
Yu Chi followed the method she had interrogated and injected her Spirit into the crystal. The next second, she only felt an abundant magic power pouring into her body, and the crystal in her hand immediately turned into powder.
She opened the system panel and looked. A palm-sized crystal could probably increase her EXP by 1000 points. By this calculation, 5000 crystals could increase her EXP by 5 million.
Yu Chi was already level 17 when she entered Giant Island. When she left the island, a week had already passed, and her normal form had already reached level 23.
These 5000-plus EXP crystals. She left 1000 for backup and evenly distributed 2000 to her human and elf forms to absorb. As the crystals continued to turn into powder, the system prompts kept coming:
【EXP +1000】
【EXP +1000】
…
【Level up to 32 (human form)】
【Level up to 30 (elf form)】
The rapid increase in level brought about a rapid increase in strength and speed.
Yu Chi stood at the bow of the boat, feeling the surging power in her body. The level 32 human form and the level 30 elf form put her whole person in a strange state of imbalance.
“This is too exaggerated…” She tried to swing her Frost Blade, and the blade actually brought a sharp whistling sound as it cut through the air. The originally light scimitar was now as light as nothing in her hand, and it almost flew out of her hand.
“Bang!”
Yu Chi clumsily hit the ship’s rail, and a big bump appeared on her forehead. She gritted her teeth and rubbed the injured area, suddenly realizing that she had just jumped three meters with a light leap.
On Giant Island, those guys could easily jump onto a branch with a light leap. Now she should be able to do it too.
Yu Chi opened the system panel and found that her strength attribute had skyrocketed by nearly 50 points. Even if she relied on bandages and adhesive bandages to continuously increase her EXP, it would still take a long time. After all, the higher the level, the more EXP was needed.
However, these were not upgrades obtained through combat. To bring out the full potential of her body’s abilities, she still needed more effort.
Yu Chi temporarily put this matter aside and began to take stock of the other harvests from this trip to Giant Island. She had collected many rare plants and materials.
“Moonlight Reed, Luminous Mushroom, Exploding Fruit…” Yu Chi counted the sorted plants and suddenly found that there was a patch of silver-shining grass in the corner.
【Starlight Grass: A rare plant that only grows under the moonlight on Giant Island. Can be used to make high-grade Spirit potions.】
“Where did this come from?” Yu Chi asked the little flower fairy in surprise.
The little flower fairy pointed at the patrolling silver wolf and made a digging motion. It turned out that when they were mining, the silver wolf had accidentally found it and brought it back.
“Well done, Ah Yin!” Yu Chi rubbed the silver wolf’s head, and the latter raised its head proudly.
However, it was a pity that these crops could not grow in the [Two-Sided Mirror] space. After Yu Chi entered the Two-Sided Mirror, she suddenly found that all the materials she had obtained from Giant Island had already been planted by the little flower fairy.
“Didn’t you say they can’t grow?” she raised an eyebrow in surprise.
The little flower fairy flew over, her little face flushed. She gestured to Yu Chi that if they were planted directly, they would wither, but if these plants were allowed to adapt in the [Two-Sided Mirror] for a period of time before being planted, the success rate would be higher.
It was just that they could no longer maintain their giant size and could only become a normal size.
However, this was already a pleasant surprise. Yu Chi hugged the little flower fairy and gave her a big kiss.
【Mushroom No. 1】: They said they want to meet you and then decide whether to join.
Yu Chi’s private message rang. She opened it and saw the message from An Jin.
Now, including her, there were a total of 6 members in the alliance. Besides Li Feng, Zuo He, and An Jin, the other two were shills that An Jin had found—not just random people, but trustworthy shills.
After all, they were about to set foot on Giant Island. They didn’t have that much time to spend on this. Once they found a real new member, the two shills would immediately withdraw from the alliance.
【DazedFish】: No problem. You ask them when they’re free.
She was quite curious about the two people An Jin had found. She had heard that they were a pair of twin sisters. Yu Chi was already a little impatient.
However, she still had a lot of things to do now.
First and foremost was the upgrading of the small boat.
She was not short of materials. Yu Chi directly chose to submit the materials. Every upgrade of the small boat meant that her little home would become luxurious again.
This matter could not be delayed!
【Confirm upgrade to a level 5 boat? Requires: Iron Ore 500, Stone 1000, Rope 100, Vermilion Bird Wood 300, Special Crystal Stone 100, Purification Crystals 10 million】
Yu Chi took a deep breath and clicked “Confirm.”
In an instant, the entire boat was enveloped in a dazzling white light. The deck began to extend, and the hull emitted a metallic hum of transformation. Yu Chi had to retreat to a corner, squinting to observe this transformation.
When the light dissipated, a streamlined luxury yacht appeared on the sea. The original wooden structure was completely replaced by a translucent blue crystal that shimmered with a mysterious luster in the sunlight.
“Is this my boat?” Yu Chi’s mouth fell open.
【Level five yacht upgrade complete.】
【Current area: 400 square meters】
【New areas: Training ground (50 square meters), alchemy workshop (20 square meters), greenhouse (30 square meters), underwater viewing cabin: can dive to a depth of 500 meters, weapon system: equipped with crystal energy cannons x2 (3 shots per day)】
Yu Chi walked up the widened gangway to the deck, a solid feeling under her feet. The original 40-square-meter deck had now expanded to 80 square meters and was divided into a leisure area, a planting area, and a combat platform.
The new underwater viewing cabin was a completely transparent spherical cabin connected to the main boat by a special passage. Yu Chi couldn’t wait to drill in. Through the reinforced glass, she could clearly see the beautiful underwater world.
It was a pity that there was nothing at the bottom of her sea now.
“But this is simply…” she pressed against the glass, thinking of putting a sofa and a table here in the future. “Too awesome!”
The kitchen was upgraded to a professional-grade cooking area, equipped with automatic cooking equipment; the bedroom became a deluxe suite with its own bathroom and study; and even the storage room was expanded three times, with a constant temperature and preservation function.
Yu Chi walked around the new boat and stopped in front of the new crystal energy cannon at the stern. The cannon was a deep blue, with a streamlined shape, and the operation interface was simple and clear.
【Crystal Energy Cannon: Consumes 100 units of crystal energy, with a range of 5 nautical miles, and a power equivalent to a full-strength attack of a level 50 player.】
“Now let’s see who dares to provoke me,” Yu Chi patted the cannon barrel proudly.
The alchemy workshop and the greenhouse did not have any outstanding features. Both of these rooms required her to prepare a lot of facilities herself. Yu Chi just browsed through them and focused on her training room!
She knew it. The central island was not suitable for training at all. After all, you could only go there once a week, and it was mostly for actual combat.
It turned out that the training room was waiting for her on the boat.
The 50-square-meter training ground was designed as a multi-functional high-tech training space, divided into 5 areas: strength testing, agility training, combat simulation, special ability development, and an auxiliary system.
Yu Chi walked into the training ground and first came to the strength testing area. The first was a huge stone that could test strength. It had a maximum tolerance and could be repaired or adjusted for the maximum tolerance with crystals.
Then there were adjustable dumbbells, with 20 levels of adjustment from 100kg to 5t.
Finally, there was a simulated gravity environment. The first 1-3 levels of gravity were free, and the later 4-10 levels of gravity also required crystals to be used.
Although it would cost money again, Yu Chi had no complaints. If all of these were free, she would probably feel that her life was about to end.
The second agility training was specially for training speed, with high-speed moving virtual targets, a light net that needed to be dodged and passed through, and a floating balance board that randomly changed its tilt and rotation… all kinds of material facilities.
Of course, there was also a free quota, but these were all small problems.
The third combat simulation area could simulate different battlefields such as jungles, deserts, and glaciers, and then simulate combat puppets. Although there was still a certain gap with reality, it was completely enough for training.
The 4th was the special ability development area, which could help players master their skills and even materialize their Spirit. Yu Chi had only taken the system’s magic training class. As for the players’ skills, everyone had just stumbled upon them.
She didn’t know how this area would help players train.
The last auxiliary system was a holographic recorder, which could record and replay the training process, making it convenient for players to improve and reflect, and could even point out areas for improvement in the training.
The ceiling in the training ground simulated a soft natural light, and the floor was made of a special elastic material that could not only withstand bursts of force, but also provide just the right amount of counterforce.
“Let’s test my strength,” she walked to the huge stone for strength testing, and the Frost Blade drew a flower in her hand.
The moment the blade touched the stone, the holographic data immediately unfolded in the air:
【Impact force: 7421 pounds】
Yu Chi raised an eyebrow. This force was completely enough to cause fatal damage to a person, and it was higher than she had imagined. After all, this was her not using her full strength.
“I’ll try it properly later,” Yu Chi walked out of the training ground and began to prepare for the upgrading of her territorial sea. She had already gathered 10 species of marine creatures.
As for the precious ocean crystals, Yu Chi directly bought 10 from her dad. This thing was very precious, especially when it was closely related to her and the upgrading of her territorial sea.
Before, one ocean crystal had even cost over a million. Now, besides being sold by the system, it was said that the Yanhuang Alliance had already found an ocean crystal mine, so the price had dropped a lot.
【Do you want to upgrade your territorial sea?】