Chapter 64: Labyrinth Star (Part 1)
Mingyu: “…”
Mingyu still followed behind Mu Baixing, using his tall stature to block the wind and board the aircraft.
He didn't say another word until he sat in the co-pilot seat of the aircraft and fastened his safety buckle.
"Brother Mu," Mingyu said seriously, "I know I'm good-looking, but you look like a gangster."
Mu Baixing couldn't help laughing when he heard him praising himself so confidently.
But this fact does not need to be refuted.
"Sorry." He only looked away briefly and apologized for his gaffe with a very sincere attitude.
"No need..." Mingyu whispered, "Just don't stare at others like that next time!"
Mu Baixing curled the corners of his lips.
"Okay," he said.
There is no one else but you.
For fear of angering the young man, Mu Baixing did not say this out loud.
Mingyu knew nothing about this and naturally changed the subject, "Brother Mu, do you have a star map of the resource area? Let me see it first. And this exploration ship, is it the same as the one in the mining area?"
"Just like the mining ships in the mining area, they have been modified according to your drawings." Mu Baixing said.
He started the aircraft, activated the autopilot, and then sent the star map to Mingyu.
Maze Star is huge.
The irregular circular area closest to Maze City 1 is called Area A. It is entirely an official mining area equipped with twin mining equipment. The environment is relatively safe and has not yet been opened to the public. It is the venue for the first round of the Star Navigation Competition preliminaries. Private mining ships are currently not allowed to enter by descending altitude.
But they can quickly cross from the high-altitude channel above area A and enter the wild resource areas classified by directions from B to F.
Mu Baixing and Mingyu's first target, the hot rock ivy, lives in the high-temperature hot rock area designated as Zone E. Over the past two months, several exploration teams have reported sightings of ivy branches, but no one has actually found the main body.
Mingyu had done his homework before coming here and knew that the activity area of the Hot Rock Ivy was in the extremely hot underground canyon on the Maze Star.
He slid the light screen and clicked on the message description that Mu Boxing had previously noted on the side.
"Judging from the thickness and color of the branches, it's an adult plant of Grade A or below..." Mingyu said suddenly, "No wonder no one has come down to collect it despite seeing it so many times."
Hot Rock Ivy is a special plant mineral that withers and dies if left out of the soil for too long, causing the energy crystals to dissipate and become useless. To obtain this, the collector must leave the starship and don an exoskeleton to dive.
Adult plants of grade A or higher can increase the mental endurance of a grade C to near grade A, but cannot raise the endurance of an grade A to A+ or S. Gathering ivy requires the user's presence. Unlike ordinary resources traded on the market, obtaining this ivy requires a significant investment and the hiring of specialized personnel for personal protection. Even then, there's still a significant risk of injury or even death.
Awakened humans with endurance below A-rank aren't typically exceptionally talented, and taking the risk and spending a fortune to increase their endurance doesn't significantly improve their overall level. They lack the drive and need to seek out lava ivy.
Mingyu is an outlier.
He wants to become stronger and has the potential to do so.
Similarly, although he said that "I have Brother Mu to protect me", he was also prepared to bear the cost of failure.
That night, Mingyu and Mu Boxing slept in the Interstellar Hotel. The hotel was better than Mingyu had imagined. The single room, while cramped and unable to accommodate anything but a bed, did have its own private shower. Mingyu, not even accustomed to sleeping in one bed, got a good night's rest and returned to the Starship Modification Workshop the next day.
The silver-gray mining ship had been modified, and the exoskeleton, adjusted to Mingyu's body data, was also complete. Mingyu tested it and found no problems, so he put the entire exoskeleton back into its fixed slot, closed the box, lifted it up, and put it on the starship conveyor belt.
The mining ship was lifted by a robotic arm and transported to the small private starport built above the transformation factory. Mingyu climbed the stairs leading to the upper starport and turned to Mu Baixing, saying, "Let's go - Brother Mu -"
Mu Baixing was still standing at the lower steps, signing an agreement with Uncle Hua granting special permission for the use of the energy gun in the energy zone. He signed his name twice, gently tossed the silver energy gun he had just legally purchased, and with a satisfied look on his face, he tossed it forward to Mingyu.
Mingyu was startled, afraid that the gun would go off accidentally, so he quickly reached out to catch it, looked down, and let out a low "wow".
"You can't use it carelessly outside the resource zone. Remember to get the permits if you want to take it off-planet." Uncle Hua turned and shouted, "You all only have temporary hunting permits - I'm not responsible if anything goes wrong -"
"This is real..." Mingyu couldn't let go of the energy gun. He looked at it over and over again, then put it on his waist and assured with a smile: "No problem! Thank you Uncle Hua for the reminder."
"Let's go." Mu Bai walked to Mingyu and went up side by side with him.
Before boarding the starship, he stood on the starport platform and confirmed with Mingyu again.
"Are you mentally prepared to face danger?"
Mingyu blinked.
"Of course," he said, "I'm not just talking about my preparations!"
A sly glint flashed in the young man's eyes, and he said with a smile, "Brother Mu, let me show you something! Stand still! But release some mental power."
Mu Baixing stood obediently in place, with golden mental power flowing out of his fingertips.
At the same time, Mingyu's bright blue spiritual power appeared, surrounding Mu Baixing, transforming and dispersing into small balls of spiritual power, wrapping the gold inside, and then...
"Bang!"
The blue mental power suddenly absorbed the gold, shrinking it to a size that was difficult to capture with the naked eye in an instant, and then exploded in front of him with a bang.
The change was so sudden and so fast that Mu Baixing subconsciously took a step back.
If it were someone else, a golden mental shield would have already fallen in front of him in the first second of the incident.
But because the other person was Mingyu, Mu Baixing was completely off guard and didn't want to be on guard either, so he just widened his eyes slightly.
Those were a bunch of small explosions that had no killing power.
But it was the mental bomb that Mingyu wanted to achieve in the previous qualifying match.
The young man's control was flawless, unleashing fireworks in front of Mu Boxing that resembled the New Year's fireworks a child might play with. The energy explosion sent a gust of wind that brushed away the strands of hair from Mu Boxing's forehead.
Mu Baixing: “…”
Mu Baixing paused for a moment and looked up at Mingyu.
"Look, it's completely harmless now! That's because I controlled the power of the explosion!" Mingyu's expression was bright. "I succeeded—Brother Mu—! I've been practicing diligently these past few days while sailing! Now I have a stable success rate of 99%! I'm an observer with some self-protection skills! I'll blow up another one for you to see!"
Mu Baixing: “…”
Mu Baixing stood where he was, letting Mingyu explode 360 degrees around him, with a hint of smile in his eyes.
"Awesome." Mu Baixing said with a smile, "Next time I draw the design, I'll add a special gun barrel for myself."
"Of course!" Mingyu was eager to try. "I've actually had some ideas these days, but I haven't fully thought it through yet..."
As he spoke, he was the first to enter the starship.
It's a nice day today.
Many starships departed from the official starport of Labyrinth City and various private starports. After leaving the city, they headed towards their respective destinations and soon dispersed.
This mining ship uses an engine redesigned by Mingyu, and is very fast. It passes through Area A, which is currently unable to land, at high altitude.
Ming Yu's mental power extended outward, and he saw a large mining area data transmission device hovering low in the sky. Several asteroid ships bearing the Central Star Region Government's insignia were conducting commissioning and inspections near the transmission device.
This virtual mining area was vast, and even at full speed, it took them over twenty hours to completely cross it. Mingyu checked the energy tank and was relieved to find that their energy had only decreased by less than one percent.
Far less than Mingyu expected.
He stared at Mu Baixing with wide eyes and couldn't help asking, "Brother Mu, what level of energy are you using to only go down so little? S-level?"
The size of a starship's energy compartment cannot be expanded at will.
Without improving energy quality, carrying more energy means adding more weight, which in turn increases the required engine power and increases energy consumption.
The most energy-efficient method is to use high-grade energy ore. Expensive Grade A ore can store dozens of times more energy than ordinary Grade C ore of similar weight and volume.
Mu Baixing hummed, "We found a small energy mine on our last voyage."
By the way, I made a lot of money for the relocation of the base and... the idea of living with Mingyu in the future.
As he spoke, he lowered the starship's altitude, changed its course according to the instructions on the star map, and turned towards Area E.
The color of the sky slowly changed as the starship sailed, from its original pale white to a light red. A few hours later, as the starship's altitude dropped again, Mingyu saw tiny red sand particles suspended in the lower air, forming a thin red mist.
They reached Area E, marked as the Hot Rocks Zone, and headed towards the area where the ivy tendrils had been found.
A few hours later, the mining ship's altitude dropped again and was completely immersed in the red sand fog.
Ming Yu's bright blue mental tentacles clung to the hull of the starship, passed through the red smoke, and reached downwards.
"Hiss—" the young man couldn't help but mutter, "It's so hot, is it really that hot in here..."
"Brother Mu, the black rift ahead is what they mentioned several times when they saw the vines."
The starship descended, and the lift engines and propulsion engines were shut down one by one under Mu Boxing's operation.
The silver mining ship sailed close to the ground at the lowest speed and then moved forward.
The black land reaches an end here and collapses downwards, forming a steep cliff with no bottom in sight, bringing an ominous feeling of depression.
The starship sailed into the rift ahead and descended vertically.
The spectacular rift descended into the earth, leaving space for starships to navigate extremely narrow, surrounded by sharp cliffs and grotesque rocks. Far ahead, a waterfall of fiery lava cascaded from a height. It crashed into the depths of the planet, rumbling loudly throughout the rift before merging into a deep, dark river of lava.
The rift was too deep, and at his current height, Mingyu's mental thread could only vaguely see the shape and color of the flowing underground river.
He thought that the hot river flowing underground should be golden red like a lava waterfall, but in the scene seen by his spiritual power, the wide river surface was covered by thick red fog, and a layer of black was spreading from bottom to top.
Mingyu frowned and asked curiously, "Brother Mu?"
"It's the active black tide energy left over from Black Tide Day." Mu Baixing said calmly, "The planet needs time to digest it."
He pulled the aircraft upwards, passed around a rock pillar protruding from the ground, crossed a mountain peak that rose from the ground, and then drove out of a cliff that stretched downwards.
This is the last place anyone saw branches of the hot rock ivy.
Mingyu withdrew his thoughts and let his mental power thread climb up the rough rock wall to check inside. He gasped when he was burned by the black stone.
The rock wall was riddled with holes, some large and some small. Mingyu simply spread his mental force outward, transforming it into a granular mist that drifted into the rock wall and seeped down through the cracks between the rocks.
Mu Baixing raised his eyebrows and turned his head towards him: "Is this the new form you have been practicing recently?"
Mingyu hummed and said proudly, "I just said I made a lot of preparations."
His mental plasticity is S, but before it could only remain in thread form.
Mingyu didn't have much to do while sailing. Apart from drawing the design draft, he read Mu Baixing's notes over and over again. As he experimented over and over again, he suddenly had an idea.
The transformation of the originally thread-like mental power into any other form is not a smooth transition.
For example, when mental power changes from a thread to a ball, the process is that the mental power thread first disperses into material particles and then gathers together again.
First disassemble, then reassemble... the transformation of mental power becomes much more natural.
Mingyu said as he explored the rock wall, "I've been thinking about several mental transformations on the way here these past two days... Hey! This thing is getting wider and wider, and it seems like there's something else... The further you go in, the greater the energy interference..."
He looked at Mu Baixing and coughed dryly, "Brother Mu...can you lend me some of your spiritual power...? I can use it to level up."
Mu Baixing: “…”
"How long have you been thinking about it?" Golden mental power threads appeared in the air along with the man's low voice.
Mingyu coughed dryly but didn't answer. He no longer suppressed his desire, and tightly wrapped the golden threads with a bright blue mist.
Then the blue light became brighter and the world in the spiritual vision became clearer.
The young man couldn't help but relax his body and let out a sigh of satisfaction.
Mu Boxing's mental power is different from any other energy he has absorbed or touched.
The interfering fog, Mingyan's mental power... none of them can be compared with his brother Mu's mental power!
Compared to absorbing Mu Boxing's spiritual energy, absorbing any other energy is either tasteless or so uncomfortable as if eating garbage!
Only this golden spiritual energy can bring such comfortable warmth and an addictive feeling that you can never get enough of.
Only Mu Baixing's mental energy can temporarily increase his mental power level.
"Brother Mu, I have an idea!" Mingyu said excitedly, "Once my mental endurance is improved, we can try a dual mental power hybrid cannon."
Mu Baixing leaned back in the driver's seat, feeling Mingyu's mental power entangled in him. His fingers lightly clasped the armrests of the seat, and he made a low response from the depths of his throat.
"It's really useful!" Mingyu said, his attention turning back to the cave inside the rock. He whispered, "But it's still a little unclear..."
The black rock is magnetic, which greatly interferes with the mental judgment of the internal situation.
Mingyu's keen mental power sensed the energy fluctuations from the organism deep within the cave, but it was still unclear. He manipulated the mist of mental power to continue inward. Since he couldn't see clearly, he pushed the mist forward and brushed against a cold, slimy object coiled within the cave.
The bright blue mental force threads touched its slippery scales, protruding, dense fangs, and tiny feathers on its tail.
A bird-tailed rock snake, nestling deep within the cliff face, sensed the threat and suddenly reared up, opening its maw in the darkness and biting down. Continuous streams of blue spiritual energy merged, simultaneously stretching outward like a web, avoiding the serpent's dense fangs and entangling its body.
The prey in the net suddenly doubled in size, nearly filling the cavern. It twisted and writhed, trying to break the entangled mental net and escape deeper into the cavern. Its grip was astonishing, and the mental net lines squeezed and rubbed against its rough scales, breaking instantly. The pain was so severe that Mingyu immediately broke into a cold sweat.
The next moment, the slender and strong golden mental power shot into the cave with the sound of breaking through the air.
Mu Baixing didn't even use the gun barrel of the mining ship. His golden mental power was like a quick arrow, piercing through the blue mental power net and hitting the vital point below the snake's head. With a light "puff" sound, he killed the snake in one blow.
The snake's swollen body suddenly relaxed, like a black balloon punctured by a needle, shrinking rapidly to its original size. The front end of the mining ship lifted upward, and then extended a scalable harvesting manipulator, reaching into the cave and grabbing the dead prey.
Mingyu exclaimed in disbelief, "Brother Mu! We're so lucky today! It's a bird-tailed rock snake!"
This is a star beast that lives deep in magnetic caves and is extremely difficult to detect and capture! They are rare and good at hiding. Even S-level observers need a little intuition and luck to detect their energy fluctuations.
The bird-tailed rock snake's beautiful feathers are an extremely valuable decorative luxury. Their fangs contain a special toxin with high medicinal value. Their skin can be used to craft special items...everything about them fetches a high price!
Mu Baixing glanced at Mingyu and said calmly, "Does it hurt?"
The pain from having his mental strength crushed was fading, but still palpable. Mingyu groaned and replied sincerely, "It hurts."
His mental power is sharper than Mu Boxing's, and he feels pain more clearly.
The young man subconsciously turned to the driver beside him while speaking. After he finished speaking, he pursed his lips slightly and unconsciously lengthened the ending of his voice, revealing a subtle, coquettish tone.
The golden mental force then allowed the bright blue mist to become thicker and submerge them.
"Call me earlier next time."
"Okay." Mingyu responded obediently, "Then Brother Mu, get ready. There should be more nearby..."
He then explored more carefully and found several more bird-tailed rock snakes.
Mu Baixing followed the same pattern and hunted them one by one, while the mining ship's robotic arm was busy non-stop.
Mingyu took a break while the robotic arm was collecting rock snakes, looking out the window, but his attention was gradually attracted by something else.
His peripheral vision swept across the valley floor filled with red mist.
The rift valley was still filled with rumbling sounds, coming from the Fiery Falls in the distance and the sound of the flowing river below. Everything seemed no different from when they had just entered.
Mingyu, however, felt that the oppressive feeling that had existed since he entered the rift valley had become even stronger.
It was like a rope was stretched so tight that it was about to break.
The thread of his mental force hanging outside the starship subconsciously extended downwards until it could no longer stretch and stopped, staring at it for a while.
There seemed to be a terrifying energy hidden beneath the red mist, making it difficult for him to discern, and it didn't seem to be coming from the black tide energy threads...
Mingyu couldn't explain its specific direction, couldn't describe its wavelength, couldn't discern its intensity, and couldn't know when this energy would emerge from the unknown...
gushed out.
Maybe we have to wait until the next day, or maybe it will happen in the next second.
The bird-tailed rock snake was lurking in a very deep place, and the robotic arm was pulling out the prey one by one and sending them into the storage box at the back.
The longer Mingyu looked down, the more his hair stood on end. The energy seemed to have overwhelmed him, causing him to break out in cold sweats and subconsciously hold his breath.
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