Chapter 1163: Chapter 596: Stealth Arrival and Mountains of Alloy Materials (Part 2)
Staggering, after a whole half month, he finally saw the Star Gate leading to the Holy Castle coordinates.
This was the largest Star Gate Li Ming had ever seen, standing tall in the void.
Every metal edge of the hexagonal framework was showing a constantly changing color scheme, and the azure blue vortex inside was almost the size of a star, constantly engulfing numerous spacecraft.
This kind of large-scale Star Gate that can directly traverse half a year’s journey can only be manufactured by the Three Great Civilizations.
Similarly, apart from that Star Gate, all the fortresses and outposts here were made using Rune Technology.
There were three X Level Life Forms stationed here, all with energy levels exceeding 1500X.
And an old acquaintance, King of Frost, Nokes.
Evans was responsible for the handover with him, frowning at the wary Nokes, saying, “Do I still need to undergo detection?”
“It’s procedure…” Nokes’ voice was indifferent.
Evans had no choice but to suppress his body’s instinctive reaction, connecting to the spiritual state detector, wordlessly saying, “You really fear Azure Dragon has infiltrated here, the core transport routes are all dominated by Rune Technology, he is helpless.”
“Better safe than sorry.” Nokes said in a muffled voice.
A large amount of materials were being transported, quickly loaded onto the spaceship without any delay, then instantly conveyed into the Star Gate.
“The materials are uninterrupted… It’s estimated that a batch of metal materials has already been transported in.” Li Ming had once again switched to possessing the Spiritual Puppet.
The central control responsible here should also be the Spiritual Power Center.
This was a kind of pseudo-intelligence created by a Spiritual Body, with no underlying code.
Thus unable to be remotely hacked by Vermilion Bird.
And he estimated that he only had one chance to act, after acting, the opponent would surely change all transportation plans.
“When acting, first the Star Gate must be destroyed…” As he pondered, a crazy idea emerged in his mind.
“Instead of intercepting here, it would be better to go directly to the Holy Castle, where surely a large amount of material has already been accumulated…”
As soon as this thought emerged, it surged uncontrollably.
“No, there would definitely be Titan Holy Artifacts guarding, acting rashly could truly lead to disaster…” Li Ming warned himself, yet couldn’t help but think, “But, as long as I’m cautious enough and quick enough…”
His eyes flickered, he decided to wait a bit more, if he could wait for a large batch of metal materials then he wouldn’t have to take too much risk.
He opened the smart terminal, finding the new Controlled Object—the [Metal Material Detector]
Though he hadn’t anticipated the situation with Rune Technology, he had considered that this infiltration might not be convenient for probing, so he created this gadget.
Its ability [Metal Detection], can detect metal resources within a certain range, according to his experiments, S-level can detect up to 1 billion metal energy.
As for whether to upgrade it to X level, he was rather hesitant, as this thing’s versatility was quite low.
It might only be used once, wasting a portion of the Blood of the World and 1 billion metal energy for it would truly be not worth it.
“Forget it, wait and see…” Li Ming suppressed his thoughts.
As a Spiritual Puppet, he stayed and continued to wait.
In the following period, various materials came in one after another.
Some contained quite a few metal materials, but the largest batch only contained 600 million metal energy.
Moreover, materials would not stay here, as they were directly transported into the Star Gate, making it difficult to accumulate a large amount of metal materials.
Li Ming realized this, as he was moving the metal boxes, the dull sound of footsteps reverberating in his ears, his consciousness locked onto that Star Gate again, “Either go back, or go in…”
For this, he had almost delayed nearly two months’ time, if he were to return empty-handed…
After contemplating several times, he resolved, “Do it, if it really goes south, I can just ask the Observer for support…”
He pondered for a bit, having some backup measures, the problem wasn’t too big.
As he resolved to act, Li Ming once again swapped his possession to a Spiritual Puppet, following the rune warship transporting materials, slipping into the Star Gate route.
This time, the transition distance was extremely far, even through the Star Gate route, it took nearly a day of sailing to come out from the other side.
Dense arrays of warships, and fortresses equivalent in size to regular planets, almost filled the whole area. Here, it wasn’t just Rune Technology, but also Mechanical Technology, and other peculiar technology routes were present.
Various blocking devices crisscrossed, the void was full of hidden optical grids, with extreme rigor.
Trying to act covertly here was exceedingly difficult.
Li Ming, silently, followed the guided transport spacecraft and landed on an Interstellar Fortress, nearly at the central region.
There were Spiritual Masters in silk robes accompanying them, using the Spiritual Power Center, controlling the Spiritual Puppet.
As soon as he landed on the surface of the Interstellar Fortress, his heart swelled with tingling sensations, that was the [Metal Material Detector] at work, directly off the scale.
Indeed, this was the place, Li Ming felt a faint excitement, but suppressed it.
Moving the materials, he followed the Spiritual Puppet ahead, entering this Interstellar Fortress.
While the internal blockages of the fortress were much less, many blocking methods still couldn’t penetrate solid objects.
Their batch of transported goods was a kind of advanced material called “Silent Annihilation Star Dust,” passing through multiple metal vault doors along the way.
Based on the responses of the [Metal Material Detector], Li Ming could roughly anchor the storage location of metal materials.
“These metal materials, unsure how much and how advanced…” Li Ming considered, opening the control page.
Then upgraded his [Subspace Folding Ring] from S-level to X-level, to avoid being unable to accommodate advanced materials later.
The internal and strength of the Folded Space naturally expanded significantly, even gaining a new ability.
[Living Storage: You can temporarily store life forms below the control object’s level.]
“It can even store living beings now…” Li Ming looked at the explanation with some surprise, as such static spaces were known in the interstellar as unable to store living beings.
The possessed Spiritual Puppet had entered the storage room, leaving behind the Silent Annihilation Star Dust, and then successively exited.
……
“…The overall materials are almost 70% complete…” Costate nodded at the data summary, saying, “The speed is slightly faster than expected…”
Schmidt and Heins didn’t look happy when mentioning this.
With such rapid speed, the extra manpower and resources naturally couldn’t be exceeded.
“The upcoming materials won’t be as fast, and some may even require temporary refining.” Schmidt emphasized.
“Prioritize stability.” Costate couldn’t help but say, pausing a moment, then added, “Especially safety, Azure Dragon’s methods are unpredictable, with such a big move, he might have already noticed.”
“Using Rune Technology is to guard against him.” Schmidt said, “He is a Mechanical Godsmith, not so knowledgeable about Rune Technology.”
“And about when exactly to act at the Chaotic Star Gap?” Heins impatiently asked, “What is your Holy Emperor thinking, asking for extra manpower at this stage?”
“Our contingency plans have already considered the possibility of Azure Dragon acting, he still isn’t assured?”
“The Holy Emperor must have reasons for doing so.” Costate slightly frowned.
Actually, he himself didn’t quite understand why Adam suddenly became so attentive to the Chaotic Star Gap, even demanding detailed reports on everything.
…
Li Ming had already detached from the Spiritual Puppet, hiding in the shadows of the metal corridor, the detection measures inside the fortress were far less intense than outside.
Entering this mechanical technology realm was familiar territory for him, the first step was to blind the surveillance cameras.
He didn’t dare to use Vermilion Bird for intrusion, estimating that the internal AI system’s strength here was probably no less than Vermilion Bird.
Adhering to the principle that being cautious is better, he carefully navigated to the target metal vault door.
He didn’t dare to use Vermilion Bird to hack, as the strength of the overall artificial intelligence here, he estimated, was probably not inferior to Vermilion Bird’s.
Maintaining caution as the best policy, he carefully positioned himself at the target metal vault door.
Once inside, Li Ming’s breathing nearly halted, his eyes sparkling with the luster refracted from the metal materials.
A dazzling array of metal materials filled the entire space, various cutting-edge alloys were placed in special storage containers.
“Nova Alloy, metal material forged at the moment of a supernova explosion…” He mused, realizing this find could be more significant than he had imagined.
“Void Forged Steel, made at the most intense fluctuations of the cosmic void, containing fragments of wormholes…”
He had never purchased any before, the premium was absurdly high, and now it was piled a meter high,
Li Ming took a deep breath, scanning with his gaze, he estimated this haul could be even larger than he initially thought.