Chapter 33 Blue Lotus Stone (Part 2)
"This is Mining Area No. 3. The base is under siege by a herd of frog beasts. All power sources have been cut off. Approximately one hundred people are trapped inside. Data exchange with the Star Network has not yet been restored, and logging out is impossible."
"Plus, there are over a dozen starships circling outside, unable to return to base and reach the interactive data interface... Damn! No sound at all! How can this communication even be transmitted?"
Cui Xiaoduo pressed the emergency call button, and his already hoarse voice became even hoarser.
The starship passed over the frog swarm, hovering at a moderate height. It seemed to tease the star beasts below, or perhaps it was a king patrolling its territory. This made the bronze frog beasts anxious, and they all raised their heads to the sky, trying to catch this unusual prey.
After seeing the red tongue so many times, his fear gradually gave way to numbness. Mingyu relaxed a little, feeling that his clothes were soaked.
Mu Baixing: "Did you see it clearly?"
"I can see clearly!" Mingyu said, "There are three A-level frog beasts, and the rest are all B- and C-level. There are no frog beasts below C-level. There are fifty-five in total."
Mu Boxing: "Almost the number of frog beasts in the entire mining area."
"Frog beasts aren't social creatures. They have their own territories, and their staple food isn't humans, but high-density energy ores. You'll usually encounter them deep within the mountains in the mining area..." Ming Yu muttered. "Brother Mu, fly to the base lobby."
The frog beast's obsession with the base hall shouldn't be because it is attracted by the few humans inside.
One hundred people are not enough to fill the gaps between the teeth of fifty-five frog beasts.
"The frog beasts in the mining area have been extremely active lately." Cui Xiaoduo gave up fighting the unresponsive communication line and joined the conversation. "The miner I hired told me that quite a few people have encountered frog beasts these days. Some have escaped, while others have been trapped. He said that the frog beasts in Mine No. 3 used to only roam deep underground, but in the past week, their range has become much shallower, with many appearing on the surface."
Mingyu couldn't help but ask, "Why did you come to the mining area?"
Cui Xiaoduo is a starship designer, and it seems strange that he would come to such a place.
"Looking for Blue Lotus Stone to help Brother Lian increase his mental strength." Cui Xiaoduo scratched his head. "Brother Lian has a birthday next month, and I want to give it to him. It's in high demand, and I saw information about mining in the No. 3 mining area. It's the second week after the Black Tide, so I'm hiring someone to mine it and try my luck. What about you?"
He looked at Mingyu, then at Mu Baixing, and scratched his head.
That extremely handsome man with a cold expression and a very powerful aura... doesn't look like a miner hired by Mingyu at all.
Cui Xiaoduo didn't wait for Mingyu's answer immediately, so he guessed: "You...you came here...Are you secretly dating your boyfriend without telling your family?"
Mingyu: “…”
Mingyu was about to speak, but he almost bit his tongue when he heard Cui Xiaoduo's words.
He wanted to explain, but the starship was approaching the central area of the base. Mu Baixing lowered its altitude, and the frog beasts turned their heads to face them. Mingyu immediately focused his attention on the external environment and no longer answered Cui Xiaoduo's question.
The abnormality at the mining base started with a loud noise.
At that time, the ground shook and sank, as if the foundation had collapsed somewhere, and then the power was cut off and the frogs attacked.
"It looks like there's something underground..." Mingyu murmured.
His gaze focused on the central area, the only area still standing. Deep, inward-dipping pits had appeared on all four sides of the hexagonal central area, caused by the frog beasts' tongue attacks. These frog beasts had formed a tight circle around the central area, yet maintained a distance of over ten meters, not moving forward. Mingyu narrowed his eyes, noticing that the ground in the area vacated by the frog beasts was still sinking.
No. Mingyu immediately rejected his idea.
It is not that the land in the central area is sinking, but that the central area is rising.
There is something underground that wants to rise.
This week is the second week after Kuroshio Day.
Mingyu's mind flashed with what Cui Xiaoduo had just said.
Kuroshio Day, which occurs every January to March, is named for the surge of energy within the circular Kuroshio Tide beyond the star line. Harmful radiation from the Kuroshio Tide surges significantly before Kuroshio Day, reaching its peak on Kuroshio Day itself. Within the safe heart of the star region, Kuroshio Day barely affects life. However, the closer one approaches the star line, the more severe the effects of Kuroshio Day become.
In the Free Star Domain, on Black Tide Day, everyone stays indoors with doors and windows tightly closed. The rich take energy neutralizing potions in advance, while the poor can only rely on the protective paint layer on the outside of the house to resist radiation, and pray that they are not sensitive enough to be killed by radiation.
But the Kuroshio radiation only brings death to human life. For some special energy minerals, the Kuroshio radiation is the nutrition that nourishes their evolution and growth.
They absorb the Kuroshio radiation, convert it into their own energy, and become a precious resource that can help nourish the improvement of human spiritual power.
For example, blue lotus stone.
At the same time, the additional gravity generated by the Kuroshio ability activity will also reach its peak on the Kuroshio Day, affecting the internal structure of nearby planets and pushing minerals buried deep underground to the surface.
The crazy growth period after absorbing the Kuroshio radiation, coupled with the upward shift of the ore caused by gravity, makes the first one to two weeks after the Kuroshio Day known as the golden time for discovering precious ores.
And energy ore happens to be the latest food that Frogmon has exchanged for.
Mingyu narrowed his eyes.
Could it be that... there is some high-grade ore about to grow out of the ground?
How high a level must it be to attract groups of frog beasts to gather here, as if waiting for its appearance, but it seems that they dare not approach directly and dig up the soil around it. Instead, while waiting, they try to pass the time by eating some appetizers that happen to be gathered here.
Grade A ores and above will produce unusual phenomena when they have completed their growth and matured. These phenomena may not be noticeable when buried deep underground, but if they happen to mature close to the surface, they are usually quite a sight.
The higher the grade of the ore, the more astonishing the energy wave it releases when it matures.
Mingyu didn't know whether the defense of the central area could withstand the energy waves released when the high-grade ore matured, but it seemed that it could no longer resist the attack of the frog group for much longer.
With a sharp sound, the outer wall on one side of the central area, which was concave and deformed inward, had a crack after being hit by the long tongue again.
"Oh my god..." Cui Xiaoduo couldn't help but say, "These people are finished... We are finished too..."
The central area is a circular area, and the most central and protected part of it is a crucial link in the virtual mining area construction system: the data interconnection interactor.
They were currently unable to interact with the StarNet due to a damaged line. However, if even the data exchange facilities were destroyed, even if the data connection was restored, they would be unable to leave the mining area.
They have to wait for rescuers to land on the real-world mining planet and repair the interactive equipment before they can escape. Before that, their real bodies will fall into a deep sleep, while their spiritual projections will actually live on the mining planet.
Without base protection, resource supplies, and defensive and offensive weapons, the starship's energy will be exhausted.
Not only are star beasts active in the mining area, but the climate is also very changeable. After the sun sets, the temperature will drop sharply and energy storms may blow.
The nearest space station is a full day's journey from the mining planet, and repairing the data exchanger will take at least two days to a week. Cui Xiaoduo doesn't know how they will survive.
Frogs don't have the worries of humans.
They smelled the aroma of the snacks inside and excitedly continued their attack on the area they had torn apart, no longer focusing on attacking the starship circling overhead. Mu Boxing lowered the starship's altitude further and, through Mingyu's mental power, also observed the abnormality in the central area.
"How much does your head hurt?" Mu Baixing suddenly asked.
Mingyu: “…”
He didn't know how Mu Boxing had discovered that his mental domain was nearing overload again. Perhaps it was because his mental threads were no longer tightly wrapped around Mu Boxing's mental power as they had been at the beginning. They had loosened their grip, revealing a subtle desire to spread outward and contract.
"A little bit." Mingyu said, judging by the energy he had gained from the last mental overload, "It can still last at least another hour."
Mu Baixing: "Great."
"I'm going to fire," he said.
Mingyu understood what he meant in an instant.
If the starship opens fire, the frogs will be provoked and will turn their attention back to them and launch a fierce attack.
"Okay," he said, "I'll watch!"
He would do his best to prevent the starship from being hit.
With a mechanical sliding sound, the bottom plate of the starship slid open, revealing an inverted triangle mechanical gun muzzle, which lit up with white light mixed with golden light.
Inside the inverted triangle, movable partitions separated the gun barrels into four small triangular muzzles. Under Mu Boxing's control, the muzzle partitions pushed outward, separating the four small muzzles, which then expanded outward and rotated to a thirty-degree downward angle.
The starship lowered its altitude again.
The frog beast beneath the starship, enveloped in shadow, lifted its head. The orange sun was completely obscured by the warship's bulk, while platinum rain fell from beneath the silver-gray steel shimmering with blue.
More intense than the most terrifying summer storm, energy cannon points sprayed outward and fell, melting and penetrating the bronze skin of the frogs.
The frogs felt great pain and let out a terrifying cry.
“Guwaa ...
One by one, the copper frogs opened their eyes and turned towards the sky.
Their bodies were no longer the flawless copper color. Their two enormous scarlet eyes seemed to be the evil eyes of a demon from ancient mythology. The bright red dot in the center rotated, looking towards the starship in the sky.
Bursting out were deep red rays of light that were as concentrated as searchlight beams and seemed to be able to shatter and melt everything.
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