Thunderstones are generally smooth, with sizes very close to each other; the largest is merely twice the size of the smallest. Moreover, each Thunderstone contains faint threads of thunder power. This led Luo Feng to speculate that these Thunderstones were likely a unique type of stone born during the creation of the “Inner World.”
128,926 pieces!
Even if one could grab 100 stones per second, it would still take nearly 1,300 seconds. Let alone the fact that although the Moyun Vine extended many tendrils, even smaller branches, the need to drill underground consumed a significant amount of time.
“This Thunderstone gathering is going to take quite a while,” Thunder God sighed from within the underground cave.
“We have the Moyun Vine, so we’re relatively fast. If warriors were to search for them purely by themselves, even with Mentalists, drilling underground would still be troublesome. It would probably take thousands of people to match the speed of a single Moyun Vine,” Luo Feng laughed. As a plant, the Moyun Vine naturally had roots adept at penetrating soil, and with its thin structure, it could drill underground quickly.
If it were a person, given the hardness of the soil and rocks in the Inner World, it would indeed take a long time.
…
Luo Feng and the other four waited slowly inside the cave, leaving all the work to the Moyun Vine.
After more than two hours.
“All done!” Luo Feng was extremely excited. He couldn’t help but touch a section of the vine coiled around his arm. “Moyun, you’ve worked hard. We’ll need your help for the next few days. Come, have a Woodya Crystal.” Luo Feng tossed a Woodya Crystal to the Moyun Vine, and the extended tendril immediately twisted excitedly.
Because it had been tamed by Luo Feng after its first evolution,
the Moyun Vine was very attached to him, just like a child to its parent.
“This is the Thunderstone,” Luo Feng flipped his hand, revealing a Thunderstone.
It was a smooth stone, faintly containing a trace of thunder energy, though the energy was very minimal.
“Let me take a look,” Thunder God said curiously, taking it.
“Over 120,000 Thunderstones,” Hong couldn’t help but exclaim. “Such an opportunity is truly a stroke of extraordinary luck.”
“Let’s hurry. Now, time equals Thunderstones! Time equals treasure!” Luo Feng laughed and urged, leading the way to the surface.
“Go, let’s head up.”
The five of them quickly reached the surface.
“Luofeng, the Thunderstones in this area are estimated to be spread over more than 20 kilometers. Check around,” Babata’s voice echoed in Luo Feng’s mind.
“I understand.”
The five of them began moving rapidly around the area.
“There are 16,924 Thunderstones within this 20-kilometer radius.”
“There are 9,156 Thunderstones within this 20-kilometer radius.”
“There are 3,208 Thunderstones within this 20-kilometer radius.”
“There are 853 Thunderstones within this 20-kilometer radius.”
…
“Haha! We’re rich! Luofeng, there are actually 159,835 Thunderstones within this 20-kilometer radius—nearly 160,000!” Babata shouted excitedly.
Indeed.
The Thunderstone distribution area spanned approximately a hundred kilometers in diameter, with two main concentrations. One was the first area where Luo Feng and his group had mined, containing 128,926 stones. The other area, discovered later, had nearly 160,000 stones. Other areas had varying amounts, some over 10,000, some less than a hundred.
Thankfully, with Babata’s detection, everything was clearly mapped out.
“This is truly a great treasure,” Thunder God said excitedly.
“So many treasures,” Tie Nanhe and Ao Gu, the two servants, couldn’t help but exclaim. These Thunderstones represented invaluable treasures highly valued even by World Lords. If sold, they could easily form a powerful legion of elite warriors.
“Start digging,” Luo Feng’s eyes gleamed as he gave the order.
Instantly, the five of them began burrowing underground.
Using the Moyun Vine, they rapidly began extracting the Thunderstones.
Fortunately, this area was far from the core region. Luo Feng and his group had flown nonstop from daylight until deep into the night to reach here. Meanwhile, the other 10,000 plus adventurers mostly stayed near the core area to search quickly. After all, there were many Thunderstone regions.
Comparatively speaking, 10,000 adventurers were really quite few.
“Mo Yun, thank you for your hard work,” Luo Feng felt his blood boiling with excitement.
This time, it took over eight hours to completely dig up all the Thunderstones in this area, not leaving a single one behind!
“How many?” Hong couldn’t help but ask.
“Third brother, how many Thunderstones do we have now?” Thunder God also couldn’t resist asking.
“Adding the initial 128,926 we dug up, our total Thunderstone count is…” Luo Feng smiled, “396,201.”
“Wow, nearly 400,000?” Thunder God’s eyes widened.
“Indeed, we’ve struck gold just from this one area,” Hong laughed.
Indeed.
For other teams, mining all the Thunderstones in this area would be very difficult. Some were densely scattered, some sparsely. Thanks to Babata’s detection, Luo Feng managed to dig up all the Thunderstones. Acquiring nearly 400,000 stones at once, even a fifth-tier primal weapon like the Tianhuo Wheel only required 100,000 stones.
“Let’s go, hurry, to the next location,” Luo Feng urged.
Earlier on the way here, Babata had discovered two locations along the way. This was only the first.
“Right, next location,” Thunder God’s eyes gleamed like a beggar seeing a golden mountain.
…
It took nearly ten hours to reach the first excavation site from the core area, and nearly eleven hours to complete the excavation.
Luo Feng and his group continued flying.
After nearly thirty-eight more hours, they finally arrived at the second excavation site located in a mountainous region.
…
The sky was pitch black.
This was a continuous mountainous area, covered with lush vegetation and trees.
“According to the rough map of Thunderstone distribution, there are two Thunderstone regions within this 20,000-square-kilometer range. However, 20,000 square kilometers! Each area would take considerable time to explore. Ordinary detection equipment is completely ineffective. Only the top two sets of equipment can work. With these two sets, covering a diameter of 20,000 kilometers, how long would it take?”
“Don’t complain. Just get to work.”
A grand team of over a thousand people was spreading out, searching continuously, and the conversation above was between two of the team members.
Eighteen kilometers away from this team,
Luo Feng, Hong, Thunder God, Tie Nanhe, and Ao Gu were crouched on the ground.
“We’re in big trouble,” Hong whispered.
“The 2 million-strong army has already arrived,” Luo Feng said anxiously. “At least in this forested mountain area, there’s a team of nearly a thousand people.” Just as they were heading to the second excavation site, they unexpectedly encountered a thousand-person team midway, so they immediately detoured. However, after detouring, they encountered another thousand-person team.
Combined with distant aerial sightings of people flying.
They guessed…
There should be a large gathering of nearly ten thousand people in this mountainous region.
Originally, there were only over ten thousand adventurers, so it was impossible for so many people to appear suddenly. There was only one possibility—The 2 million-strong army had arrived! In fact, when the castle publicly announced the treasure list, the vanguard of the 2 million-strong army had already arrived, though they were still in the surrounding areas at that time. After two or three days,
many areas of the Inner World began to see the presence of various units from the 2 million-strong army.
Regarding the “Rough Map of Thunderstone Distribution,” obviously the 2 million-strong army had also obtained it.
“Hurry, keep detouring,” Luo Feng ordered.
In the dark night, within the mountains,
Luo Feng and the other four quickly detoured again. Midway, they encountered another thousand-person team and detoured once more… After flying thousands of kilometers, they finally reached the second excavation site!
…
“It hasn’t been excavated here yet,” the five of them hid in the thorns, extremely excited.
Obviously, this area showed no signs of excavation.
Babata’s detection also indicated that there were many Thunderstones underground.
“Thunderstones are unlike cosmic crystals; they’re very difficult to detect. From what those team members were talking about earlier, this large team only has two top-tier detection devices,” Babata said proudly. “And the Thunderstone distribution map is only a rough one. Across the entire Inner World, spanning millions of kilometers, it only roughly indicates that within a certain range of tens of thousands of kilometers, there are Thunderstones.”
“Start digging,” Luo Feng ordered decisively.
The five of them quickly burrowed underground, with Tie Nanhe responsible for covering the surface of the excavated pits.
Underground.
“There are 210,397 Thunderstones within this 20-kilometer radius,” Babata reported.
“Moyun, it’s up to you,” Luo Feng didn’t hesitate. With a thought, numerous thin tendrils extended from his arm, rapidly penetrating the soil and spreading in all directions.
Babata was responsible for guiding.
The Moyun Vine was in charge of grabbing each Thunderstone. The tendrils extended into the rocks and soil, and when they encountered a Thunderstone, the tendril would quickly sprout leaves and wrap around the stone.
…
20,000 kilometers long, under the terrifying gravity of the Inner World, even a ninth-stage Stellar warrior would take nearly an hour to fly across. Most importantly… a diameter of 20,000 kilometers required repeated flights back and forth. These top-tier devices, because of their detailed detection, had a relatively small coverage area. Babata’s 20-kilometer range was already quite strong.
Even scanning a 20-kilometer radius once, for a width of 20,000 kilometers, would require 1,000 scans!
Flying across once takes an hour, with two devices, it would still take a total of 500 hours to complete the scan.
…
Underground.
After digging for more than three hours.
The thin tendrils rapidly retracted, shrinking and merging into Luo Feng’s skin.
“Good, this area is done. Let’s check the surroundings,” Luo Feng transmitted mentally. “Everyone, be careful not to be discovered.”
“Understood.”
The five of them cautiously emerged from underground and began quickly exploring the surrounding area. Soon, they had scouted the entire region. This Thunderstone area was 96 kilometers long and 129 kilometers wide. Within such a vast area, there were three main concentrations. These three concentrated areas contained 210,397 (the one just excavated), 128,302, and 198,355 Thunderstones respectively.
In other areas, the numbers were below 50,000, with the smallest being only a few hundred.
Overall, this area contained more Thunderstones than the previous one Luo Feng had excavated.
“Let’s move to the next spot with 198,355 Thunderstones,” Luo Feng quickly ordered.
Every second counted!
Each minute represented a large number of Thunderstones being excavated. As Luo Feng and his team worked tensely underground, occasionally some teams flew overhead, unaware that people were beneath them.
“You, go dig over there. This area hasn’t been scanned by instruments yet.”
“Yes, Captain.”
A small team finally headed directly toward the area Luo Feng and his group were excavating.
“Captain! Thunderstones! There are Thunderstones here!!!”
“What? Thunderstones?”
“Hurry, report to the Chief Captain and the World Lord!”
…
Underground.
“Luofeng, quick! Someone is digging down here!” Babata’s voice echoed in Luo Feng’s mind.
Luo Feng’s expression changed.
Meanwhile, the Moyun Vine was rapidly excavating, with the number of Thunderstones being unearthed increasing every second.
“They’ve found the Thunderstones and reported it. Hurry, many team members are coming down. Run!” Babata shouted.
“Moyun, hurry, hurry, hurry!” Luo Feng ordered urgently.
The Moyun Vine quickly retracted, no longer caring about the remaining Thunderstones. In the blink of an eye, it completely shrank back into Luo Feng’s arm.
“Go!” Luo Feng shouted.
“Everyone, be careful. As soon as we surface, follow me and run quickly. There are already thousands of ninth-stage Stellar warriors outside. But since it’s a forested mountain area, we still have a chance to escape,” Luo Feng transmitted mentally to the other four, who nodded slightly.
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