Chapter 174: Plunder (2)

Su Chen stowed away the diary, then walked out of that room and went into another.

The research lab was huge and had many rooms. Su Chen searched them one by one, looking for all the books he could find and taking them regardless of whether they were useful or not.

Upon arriving at one of the rooms, Su Chen discovered to his delight that it was actually a library filled to the brim with books.

In this day and age, it was very difficult to find ancient Arcana records, particularly those that had been completely preserved.

After flipping through a few of them, Su Chen discovered that most of the books were expositions on the fundamental theories of Origin Energy.

These theories weren’t anything like Origin Skills. They wouldn’t increase a person’s strength in the slightest. Rather, it was an analysis of the natural world and, more specifically, Origin Energy. These books would allow a person to gain a deeper understanding of Origin Energy as well as any ensuing changes that might come about.

To other people, these books would be useless, but to Su Chen, these books were priceless treasures.

There wasn’t much material available about Origin Energy. The human race prioritized practicality, while the Arcana Race prioritized knowledge.

In terms of Origin Energy applications, the humans had created contemporary Origin Skills, which surpassed the Arcana Race’s own Ancient Arcana Techniques. However, the Intelligent Races’ understanding of Origin Energy’s intrinsic qualities hadn’t advanced in the past thirty thousand years; rather, their understanding had regressed

Undoubtedly, finding all of this information on the Arcana Race’s study of the fundamental properties of Origin Energy was a great help to Su Chen.

In his eyes, no ten-thousand-year-old herbs, powerful Origin Tools, nor amazing cultivation techniques, could compare to these foundational knowledge.

They were just like Brooke’s Formula and the Origin Talisman Energy Formation. They gave Su Chen the ability to create.

When the door of knowledge is opened to you, the possibilities are limitless!

Thus, upon seeing so many books, Su Chen was overjoyed. Numerous air tentacles stretched forth and wrapped around those books, carrying them into Su Chen’s Origin Ring. In the blink of an eye, the entire room was cleaned out.

Ji Ruoyu had also discovered something on his end. When he ran over and picked something up, he yelled excitedly, “Cosmic iron! Look, it’s cosmic iron!”

He held a pitch-black metal in his hands. If he hadn’t known about it in the first place, it would have been really hard to tell that this chunk of metal was actually cosmic iron.

Cosmic iron didn’t contain any Origin Energy; in fact, it was an insulator of it. Thus, this type of metal wasn’t used to construct Origin Tools but suits of armor. Armor fashioned out of cosmic iron had extremely high defensive properties against Origin Skills. In the contemporary era, this chunk of cosmic iron was likely worth at least a million Origin Stones.

Truly, there were many valuable things within the research lab.

“Not bad,” Su Chen praised when he saw it. Then, he walked out of the library.

Upon seeing that Su Chen didn’t seem to care that much, Ji Ruoyu’s excitement was greatly dampened. He muttered, “I really don’t get why you like books so much. You don’t even pay such a valuable treasure any mind. Forget about it; even if you don’t want it, I do.”

He hurriedly stowed it away in his Origin Ring.

After walking a certain distance, the three of them arrived at an open-air courtyard.

Ji Ruoyu saw this and began to yell excitedly, “There are spirit medicines here!”

The courtyard wasn’t big, but it was packed with herbs growing everywhere.

Most importantly, no Origin Formations were present in the courtyard. These spirit medicines had grown smoothly and were basically at their peak lifespan.

Because these herbs were bred within the research lab, their quality was also better than herbs just growing in the wild. Thus, there was no lack of thousand-year-old herbs.

Herbs like Jade-Stemmed Cane, Thousand-Eyes Flower, Black Acid Grass, and Dragonberries were all extremely precious in the outside world. Here, however, they grew in large, flourishing patches. Ji Ruoyu was about to go mad with excitement.

Su Chen nodded. “Not bad. Now we have something we can turn in to the higher-ups. Ruoyu, go harvest those herbs for them.”

“Okay!” Ji Ruoyu excitedly hurried over, harvesting all of the herbs present and stowing them away carefully.

As he harvested the herbs, he couldn’t help but ask, “Senior Brother Su, are you not planning on saving some for yourself?”

Su Chen replied, “These are all going to be given up anyways. Do I need to be that active about it?”

Long Sang Country didn’t spend a lot of energy to send everyone here so that they could gorge themselves. Items that could be used immediately were an acceptable loss, but anything they took out with them would be turned in. Long Sang Country wouldn’t coddle them so selflessly.

“…… You’re not wrong.” Ji Ruoyu was stunned for a brief moment, and his harvesting speed became noticeably slower.

Upon seeing his sagging countenance, Su Chen laughed and tousled his hair. “I’m just messing around with you, silly. The higher-ups are going to reward us based on our contributions, and these spirit medicines will be valuable for that. I’ve already made a ton of medicines. I also have a track record of killing our enemies, so I’m not worried about my contributions. You should take the lion’s share of our harvests back with you.”

Su Chen had concocted a bunch of medicines; had single-handedly slain four Ferocious Race youths; had saved many of his comrades; had orchestrated the plan to kill Ferraro and Mendiano; and had established the rendezvous point so that the humans had gathered two days in advance, which they used to kill more than ten Ferocious Race youths. In terms of contributions, he was head and shoulders above the rest of the students, which was why he didn’t place much weight on bringing those medicinal ingredients back for contribution points.

But to Ji Ruoyu, these contribution points were still quite meaningful.

Ji Ruoyu’s eyes lit up. “Got it.”

While Ji Ruoyu was busying himself with finding everything in the courtyard, Su Chen glanced at his surroundings. He found a stone tablet hung on top of the courtyard that said in Ancient Arcana script, “Kaffelot’s Garden.”

Upon seeing this, Su Chen laughed, “You’d better hurry up. This place seems like it was just the private garden of an assistant, not the master of this place. In other words…… there’s even more for us to find later.”

Upon hearing this, Ji Ruoyu’s movements became even faster.

After clearing away all the herbs in this garden, the trio moved on.

They hadn’t gotten far before they suddenly encountered another trio.

It was Yu Mengnan, Duan Jiangshan, and Yue Longsha.

When both parties saw each other, they were overjoyed.

Su Chen greeted them. “Longsha, have you seen Han Linxia?”

Yue Longsha laughed, “I thought you would have asked about Qingluo first.”

Su Chen smiled. “Qingluo is strong and fast. I’m not too worried about her. We just found a garden back there and harvested a few precious medicinal ingredients. If Han Linxia was here, she might be able to extract their medicinal strength and feed it to Old Pi, helping him recover faster.”

“When we fell in, I saw Linxia with Wei Yang and Jiang Hanfeng.”

During the all-out battle, the three of them were being protected at the very rear of the formation. Thus, it made sense that they had fallen in together.

Upon hearing that they were together, Su Chen sighed with relief, “That’s good, then.”

He had to admit that Danba’s strike had given them quite a headache.

Humans were better at fighting in teams, while the Ferocious Race specialized in individual combat.

If the humans were dispersed, the Ferocious Race youths could freely display their individual strength and combat prowess.

The two Temple Warriors were particularly powerful. If they were given an opportunity to show off their strength, the humans would definitely suffer big losses.

Thus, any human who was alone was in serious danger.

Upon hearing that Han Linxia and the others were still together, Su Chen sighed with relief, knowing that they were in much less danger.

But he had yet to finish sighing when he suddenly heard a loud cry of pain.

“That’s Shui Dong!” Yue Longsha recognized the voice.

“He’s over there!” Su Chen turned around and charged into a different hallway.

He ran all the way to the end, only to find Shui Dong lying in a pile of blood, bloody bubbles frothing from his mouth. A huge hole was in the center of his chest.

“Shui Dong!” Duan Jiangshan yelled as he charged over and lifted Shui Dong’s head off the ground gently.

He turned around and yelled at Su Chen, “Quick, save him!”

Su Chen shook his head. “I’m sorry. He’s beyond saving.”

Shui Dong’s heart had ruptured. There was no way he was going to survive.

Shui Dong stared at Su Chen and opened his mouth, wanting to say something. However, the words died on his lips as he closed his eyes and his body went limp.

Everyone felt their hearts hurt from the loss of another comrade.

It was Ji Ruoyu who interrupted the mourning atmosphere. He said, “We don’t have much time left. The void is quickly collapsing on us right now.”

“Let’s go!” Su Chen reigned in his emotions and began to walk down the path.

“Where are we going now?”

“To the research lab at the heart of this complex.”

“But we don’t know where the heart of the complex is.”

‘I do,” Su Chen replied.

“How do you know?” everyone asked.

Su Chen pulled out an item. “Because I looked at the map.”

The library had contained not just books but also a map of the research lab. While Ji Ruoyu had been carried away with excitement over the cosmic iron, Su Chen had been rejoicing over discovering the map.