Why is my territory in a 2D anime art style?

Chapter 122 First Entry into the Secret Realm

Just one day later, Wang Zhen brought Zhao Feng back again, this time naturally for the matter of mining in the secret realm.

The day before yesterday was the agreed-upon day, but it was the first day the ice fog dissipated, and Wang Zhen's transport team was still very busy, so it wasn't appropriate for him to skip work.

As for Erhu, it has already returned to its territory. It has been three blood moons since the last rift, so it shouldn't have too much of an impact.

Wang Zhen didn't rush to mine in the secret realm. Instead, he loaded supplies from the vehicle and explained the procurement situation to Sui An.

"I've already listed the white, green, and blue blueprints for the intermediate-level walls or city walls you requested on the trading center. I've listed them at a price of 6,000 Origin Stones for the blue quality, and I've indicated that the prices for the other qualities are negotiable. The trading center has already deposited 600 Origin Stones as required."

"I haven't found any clues about the Void Crystal Source Stone yet. Purple materials are generally very rare, and it may not be easy to find clues on the market."

"As for the Yinghua Stone Crystal that you're concerned about, I've learned some information. It seems that the demand for this thing is not high. It exists on the market, but there are only about ten pieces in total. The lowest price is 90 Origin Stones per piece, and the most expensive piece is 140 Origin Stones per piece."

"As for the recipe for Yinghua Stone crystals, I actually asked. This stuff is the same as the dark crystal iron ore we mine. It doesn't need a recipe. Alchemists can just refine the ore directly."

Sui An stood aside and listened silently to Wang Zhen's report. He was prepared that the Void Crystal Source Stone would not be so easy to obtain.

But to my surprise, there are only about ten of these Yinghua stone crystals in the entire Jiangcheng city, not to mention the price. That amount might not even be enough to cover my own ground.

"Is this kind of raw Yinghua stone rare on the market?"

"I asked the seller, and they said that they haven't found many original veins of Yinghua stone so far. There are definitely some original stones, but not many."

Furthermore, Yinghua Stone Crystals are used in very few places; only a small number of builders need them, and other professions basically don't use them. They're also a blue-quality material, so they rarely waste source energy on them.

After speaking, Wang Zhen took two lumps of gray stones from the truck bed and handed them to Sui An: "This is the cheapest Yinghua Stone crystal I bought, which cost 90 source stones. I also bought 100 jin of raw ore for 88 source stones. You can take a look at what it looks like. Maybe you'll come across it yourself someday."

Wang Zhen's answer disappointed Sui An. He thought he had found a treasure trove of blueprints, but now he was being told that there were no raw materials.

He reached out and took one of the fist-sized, gray-white, interwoven stone spheres. Sui An recognized this Yinghua stone crystal because there was a drawing of the material on the blueprint.

As for the large pile of raw ore on the ground, it consists of many irregular crystals that are entirely gray and white. The smallest crystal is no more than the thickness of a finger, and the largest is only the size of a fist. There is a small pile of raw ore weighing a hundred pounds.

Looking at the somewhat silent Sui An, Wang Zhen still comforted him, "If it doesn't work, just collect it slowly. Anyway, your territory won't be upgraded anytime soon, and with your small area, it shouldn't be difficult. Besides, this thing isn't a necessity for you right now. It will only be useful after you reach the intermediate level and develop life skills."

"That's true, we can't rush it~" Sui An put the Yinghua Stone Crystal into the core of his territory, while he called over Fang Nian, who was sunbathing nearby, to deal with the pile of raw ore.

"Try refining it later and see how much it consumes."

Fang Nian ran over, picked up a piece, and examined it closely: "Okay, boss, is this raw Yinghua stone?"

Due to the recent ice fog tide, she had already refined all the materials in the cellar, and had handed over the basic source materials and energy bars to Sui An.

"Do you recognize him?"

Fang Nian's answer surprised Sui An somewhat.

"I recognize it!" Fang Nian nodded and replied subconsciously, "My alchemy knowledge randomly includes some basic material information. This information is not exactly the same for every newly awakened alchemist, and it just so happens that this is in my information."

"Uh, I see~" Sui An scratched his head. So alchemists come with their own material guides. He was actually begging for food while holding a golden bowl.

Have you ever heard of the Hollow Crystal Source Stone?

"Empty Crystal Source Stone?" Fang Nian pondered for a moment, then shook his head. "Never heard of it."

"Okay, this might be a mid-level material, it's normal that you haven't heard of it."

Sui An chuckled and patted himself on the back. He had become somewhat obsessed with asking for materials, even trying to inquire about intermediate-level materials.

Wang Zhen pointed to the bag next to him and said, "The energy bar and loot you gave me sold for 900 Originium. After buying these and deducting the deposit, I have 21 left, which are all in the bag."

F

"Okay~"

Sui An roughly checked the contents of the bag. These were all daily necessities and supplies, since the consumption of four professionals was quite high.

"Tiger, help me carry these into the ice cellar!"

Wang Hu picked up the bag from the side and ran downstairs.

Wang Zhen and Erhu carried the hoes out of the house and were about to set off when Sui An suddenly spoke up.

"I'll go with you guys over there this time~"

As soon as Sui An spoke, the three people playing the erhu all looked over, their gazes somewhat strange.

Erhu nudged Sui An with his elbow and asked curiously, "You have a fever? You can't lift anything, and there's danger there at any moment. What are you going to do?"

"I must have a reason for going, I'll tell you on the way~" Sui An didn't explain on the spot, but went back into the house to get his things.

Zhao Feng and the other two exchanged glances. Erhu simply shrugged; he didn't know the specifics of the situation either.

"If he says he wants to go, then he should go. He's much more afraid of dying than I am, so he won't do anything reckless."

"Erhu is right, I won't do anything reckless!"

Sui An came out of the house and tossed a communicator to Erhu.

"Erhu, you stay here and help me guard the territory. I will raise the barrier. If anything happens, just call me. I'll take over when I get back."

"Ah, are you serious?" Erhu was dumbfounded, never expecting that the task of guarding the house would fall on his shoulders.

"Yeah, you're my brother. If you don't help me look after them, who will?"

As Sui An put on his leather armor, he smiled and talked to Erhu.

Erhu frowned, seemingly understanding Sui An's arrangement. It was definitely not feasible to leave only Fang Si and her brother in the territory. At this stage, even if Sui An trusted them a lot, it was not advisable. The two of them could check and balance each other.

"Alright then~"

Fang Si, however, didn't seem to care and remained seated not far away.

They've known each other since childhood, and there might even be a debt of gratitude for raising them. It's a relationship that can't be compared to someone like me who's only been here for a little over ten days.

As for Sui An's safety, he wasn't too worried.

He had already learned about what happened that night from Fang Nian; Sui An was able to summon the phantom of the goddess, and the phantom had even killed 6...

The Ice Demon is a level-two, and can even communicate with Sui An.

He felt that this thing might be able to follow Sui An in some form, which was why Sui An wasn't worried about any danger over there.

Sui An put on the equipment. Although he didn't have any source energy to trigger it, the basic defensive capabilities of these armors were still much stronger than his own physique.

Zhao Feng, Wang Zhen, and Sui An got into Wang Hu's car, which took them all the way to the location of the secret cave.

Sui An looked at the cave entrance with curiosity. He had never been to this location before, but it was only twenty or thirty meters away from his previous water source.

Although the entrance to the cave is near the riverbank, it is still some distance away from the riverbank, and the cave extends towards the inner bank. In fact, the actual distance between this dimensional gate and my territory is probably less than two hundred meters.

"Is the entrance to the Yuan Secret Realm over there?" Sui An pointed to the way they came.

"Yes, it's about twenty meters back." Wang Zhen jumped off the vehicle carrying a hoe.

"Let's not bring the hoe yet!" Sui An reached out and stopped Wang Zhen from taking the tools.

"I came here today because I had some things that I didn't want to use and it would be a waste, so since you're here, I'll use them."

Wang Zhen asked curiously, "What is it?"

Sui An extended the back of his hand in front of the three people, on which were two peculiar blue marks. After the full moon, Sui An summoned one as soon as the time was up, but in the end, he did not use it.

"A summon that can kill a level 6 Ice Demon. This can only be kept for ten days. Six days have already passed. If it is not used, it will dissipate and be wasted."

"What?!"

Even Zhao Feng, who had been sitting calmly to the side, couldn't hold back any longer and jumped off the car, exclaiming in surprise.

"Really?"

Sui An replied with a smile, "Why would I lie to you? Summoning this thing is very expensive, so it would be a waste to let it go to waste like this. I was thinking of helping you get rid of that Shadow Lizard King."

"Can you summon this thing repeatedly?" Wang Zhen finally couldn't help but look away from the strange patterns and asked softly.

"It requires a two-day interval, and the summoned item only lasts for fifteen minutes. It's also very expensive, so I'll only keep one mark on my person for future use."

After thinking for a moment, Sui An decided to explain the situation to them to avoid any misunderstandings caused by the information gap, which could lead to unpredictable problems.

He took out the Source-Tracing Compass from his pocket, placed a Level 3 Source Stone in the gap in the middle, and the compass was immediately activated.

At this moment, within a 100-meter radius, only the marks of the four of them exist. This compass is far less effective than their own detection station; it can only mark, but cannot distinguish levels or anything like that.

However, its advantage lies in its portability.

"Let's go~" Sui An called out after glancing at the two who were still deep in thought.

Wang Zhen and Zhao Feng immediately snapped out of their daze and stopped thinking about the thing.

"I'll lead the way!"

Wang Zhen led Sui An toward the underground cave, and the detection range of the compass in his hand noticeably weakened after entering the cave.

Zhao Feng shifted her gaze from the back of Sui An's hand to the compass in his: "Is this a detection-type artifact?"

"Yes, it's a level three blue one. Aunt Zhao, if you need it, just let me know in advance and I'll lend it to you."

While looking around, Sui An chatted with Zhao Feng. This thing was indeed useless for Wang Zhen's sports car, since the sports car's route was mostly flat, with few obstacles and a wide field of vision.

However, Zhao Feng, who works in the hunting group, is different. They often travel through the mountains and forests, where the terrain and trees are obstacles, and they also frequently encounter weather phenomena such as dense fog.

Zhao Feng didn't stand on ceremony: "Okay, if I'm on a mission, I'll borrow it from you."

As the two talked, they arrived at the dimensional gate. This was the first time Sui An had ever seen one, which surprised him greatly.

He reached out and touched the ornate dimensional portal, discovering that it was real, unlike the feel of an energy creation.

"That's kind of amazing, huh?"

After crossing the dimensional gate, Sui An immediately felt refreshed, as if she had returned to her most comfortable living space.

"The concentration of this energy source is so high that even the architects can sense a huge difference!"

Among all professions, builders who have not undergone extensive tempering with source energy have the lowest sensitivity to source energy.

Even so, Sui An still felt very comfortable.

"Yes, that's why there are so many source energy minerals, source energy plants, and source energy beasts here."

Wang Zhen remained on guard all around. Although there were detection treasures, there might be source beasts that were naturally able to block such detection.

Sui An nodded. By the light of the spotlight, he looked at the underground cave and could see the raw ore shimmering with a blue-white light.

"What are those blue and white raw ores?"

"Fluorite is a very cheap mineral, so we didn't mine it. We mainly mine dark iron ore."

Wang Zhen turned the spotlight toward a wall where there was some dark-colored raw ore; even when the spotlight shone on it, it only had a slightly crystalline appearance.

Sui An reluctantly turned his gaze back: "Alright, where is the passage? Take me up there. I'll try it out quickly so as not to delay your mining time."

Wang Zhen hesitated for a moment, but still advised, "Why don't you summon it first? There could be danger on the ground at any time. The passage isn't long; you can get up in just a few steps!"

"OK!"

Sui An used his mind to communicate with the slightly dimmed talisman in his hand, and instantly a bright, icy blue light burst forth from the talisman on the back of his hand, like countless silver frost chains, weaving into a graceful human figure in front of him.

Wang Zhen and Zhao Feng stared wide-eyed at the figure before them. If they hadn't known that this was Sui An's summoned creature, they would have already retreated.

"How can this sense of oppression be so strong!"

"Even when Captain Zheng unleashes his full power, it doesn't feel like this. Is it because the nature of this power is simply too overwhelming?"

Wang Zhen's voice echoed in the cave. He had experienced this feeling before, when the Sword Star Totem was activated. Although the quantity was not exaggerated, the essence of the power could bring a kind of primal shock.

Lu Ling's cold gaze swept over Wang Zhen and Zhao Feng, her spear trembling slightly.

Seeing that something was wrong, Sui An quickly said, "Friend, my friend!"

Only after Sui An finished speaking did the heavy sense of oppression dissipate from Wang Zhen and Zhao Feng.

The two of them subconsciously let out a long breath, as if they had been so stunned that they forgot to breathe.

Zhao Feng, panting heavily and still shaken, asked, "Could this be a phantom of a deity?"

"In a sense, maybe it can be considered one, albeit barely."

Sui An nodded: "Time is running out, let's hurry up. Shen He, remember to protect me, okay? There's a really big thing on the ground outside, we need your help to deal with it."

Lu Ling remained silent, but made a hand seal, and an egg-shaped shield appeared around Sui An. The shield was transparent, but had a faint icy blue hue.

This surprised Sui An. So this is what the building description meant by protection. However, the shield made him feel a little cold.