novelraw Chapter 119 : Song of Sand and Mirage
Chapter 119 : Song of Sand and Mirage
The analyst in the black-gold mech's eyes brightened. The mech hadn't yet turned around when her hand lifted the spear slightly, gripping the front end firmly. In the surrounding space, an energy fixed point had an extremely strong presence. She positioned her spear, piercing through the surrounding air, thrusting fiercely through.
"Squelch—"
The spear tip, as the Sand Armor Beast's scales fluttered, directly penetrated its outer skin, piercing through flesh, stopping at the energy.
"Zhou Chen, keep his mouth open!"
Zhou Chen swung his Four-sided Mace, lightning flashing, making Chen Sui's eyes twitch: "Don't use your lightning."
Her spear was still stuck in the Sand Armor Beast's body; lightning striking down could conduct to her.
Zhou Chen also realized: "Oh! Right!"
The Four-sided Mace quickly tapped in his palm, Black Arrow Hawk circling and flying around once. The lightning dissipated, and the black hawk in mid-air, following the black-gold mech's eerie movement, directly rushed to the Sand Armor Beast's face. As the Sand Armor Beast opened its mouth to roar, the Four-sided Mace was directly inserted into its mouth.
The mech stepped on the Sand Armor Beast's lower jaw, prying the Four-sided Mace upward: "This thing is too sharp, my foot hurts!"
The Sand Armor Beast's sharp teeth directly pierced into the mech's foot. Zhou Chen's foot in the cockpit moved a few times involuntarily; the sensing device was really too advanced.
Gu Qinxue's fire drove away the surrounding small Sand Armor Beasts. Xie Chunshi broke through, his energy-reducing knife cutting a cold light, chopping directly down at the Sand Armor Beast.
"Roar!"
The Sand Armor Beast struggled, but with its life core threatened by the cold spear, its attack point blocked by the Four-sided Mace, facing this sharp blade light, the Sand Armor Beast had nowhere to escape. It could only shake its body continuously, sending out wave after wave of sound, its black bean-like eyes looking ahead.
The small Sand Armor Beasts' offensive slowed down, seemingly hearing some information from its voice. Puluo and Gu Qinxue intercepted the small Sand Armor Beasts. When the sand was covered by a layer of fire, the small Sand Armor Beasts, contrary to their usual behavior, no longer attacked the mechs but plunged into the ground's flames.
The three people extracting teeth didn't notice this situation. Xie Chunshi's energy-reducing knife's circular ring vibrated. When energy attacks came from around the Sand Armor Beast, the energy-reducing ring vibrated, driving the surrounding water attribute energy fluctuations, with water mist floating around.
The sea sprite confined in Xie Chunshi's mental domain got another opportunity to dash out.
Its figure restored to human-like hugeness, its long tail swaying invisibly in the black-gold mech, the fish fins at its cheeks flapping, water mist rushing toward the Sand Armor Beast's energy fluctuations, directly breaking apart clusters of earth-yellow energy pillars.
The water mist swept over, shattering the energy pillars like ice sculptures.
The Sand Armor Beast let out a miserable cry as the energy-reducing knife approached its eyes.
The sharp blade reflected silver light in its black bean eyes.
Cutting its sharp teeth didn't take much effort.
The teeth were indeed extremely sharp, but the soft flesh of the Sand Armor Beast's upper jaw didn't have much toughness.
As the sharp teeth fell to the yellow sand with flesh attached, Chen Sui's spear thrust forward.
"Clang—"
The energy crystal collided with the Sand Armor Beast's hard outer shell.
Chen Sui's eyes flashed, looking somewhat surprisingly at the Sand Armor Beast's shell.
Green energy enveloped the energy crystal, directly cutting off the energy crystal's supply to the energy body. The Sand Armor Beast's shell, losing energy support, became like paper. The spear pierced through again, directly breaking through the shell, flicking a yellow-earth colored crystal to the other side.
The Sand Armor Beast, losing its energy, its black bean eyes losing their light, collapsed on the yellow sand, gradually losing life. Its body, with the fluttering yellow sand, gradually merged into the wind and sand.
Zhou Chen and Chen Sui put away their weapons and rushed toward the sharp teeth on the ground. Xie Chunshi shook his head somewhat helplessly, picking up the energy crystal from the ground.
The Sand Armor Beast's sharp teeth were treasured by Zhou Chen as he collected them, still somewhat dissatisfied: "Too few. There are more Sand Armor Beasts, let's go—"
He turned his head to see Gu Qinxue's mech leaning against Puluo's shield umbrella, the huge energy shield raised as a parasol. The surrounding fire slowly retracted, the ground was clean, with no trace of any Sand Armor Beast.
"Where, where are the Sand Armor Beasts?"
Zhou Chen looked down, scanning. The Sand Armor Beasts were just slightly smaller than the mechs; he really didn't need to scan the yellow sand inch by inch. It was just that Zhou Chen couldn't believe it.
"The sharp teeth I was about to get are gone?"
Zhou Chen's face collapsed, immediately feeling like he'd suffered a great loss.
"They ran away," Gu Qinxue spread her hands.
Zhou Chen said in disbelief: "Ran away?"
He had fought so many energy bodies, and which one didn't fight to the death when they charged up? This thing actually ran?
Puluo nodded, "Even with the energy pipe out, they were unwilling to come out."
Zhou Chen gnashed his teeth: "So cowardly, what kind of energy body has such little courage!"
"Alright," Chen Sui patted him amusedly, consoling: "These are enough to fix your butt."
The Sand Armor Beast's sharp teeth weren't used for mech shells; Chen Sui said this just to smooth Zhou Chen's feathers.
[I'm telling you, Zhu Jing Fu, that's enough]
[Just now not one of you gave the energy crystal a glance, all focused on materials, right?]
[Aren't energy crystals worth more than these few teeth?]
[Actually, no. Generally speaking, attack materials, especially materials from incompletely evolved energy bodies, have high market prices]
[I noticed, Zhu Jing Fu only took the sharp teeth, not giving the super high-defense outer shell even a glance]
[Unless Chen Sui's □□ can't open the Sand Armor Beast's shell, she won't consider taking any defense materials. Generally, Zhu Jing Fu won't give defense materials a glance]
[Fine, fine, fine, Emperor Sui: This level of defense material doesn't count as defense material]
[Alright, Zhou Chen, take your profit. The Sand Armor Beasts ran so fast just now, first time seeing energy bodies run so nimbly]
[The energy bodies in this energy field are quite smart, knowing to run!]
[Song of Sand and Mirage has many bred star beasts. After evolution, their intelligence level should be higher than ordinary energy bodies]
Zhou Chen, having his feathers smoothed, reluctantly stopped thinking about it, stored the sharp teeth, and squeezed under Puluo's shield umbrella, blocking the high temperature. Psychologically, he really did feel a bit cooler.
The red sun's temperature was too scorching. The star hanging at the horizon spread layers of halos, its edges blurred by the high-temperature air. Even the mechs, looking into the distance, felt the distant scenes were somewhat distorted.
"Finally saw an oasis, but why hasn't this temperature dropped at all?" Zhou Chen, learning from his previous lesson, now didn't dare set his temperature regulation too high. As he walked, he kept touching his butt.
Chen Sui found it extremely amusing: "The temperature in Song of Sand and Mirage is a bit abnormal, but the energy attributes are normal. Mechs staying in this high temperature for too long might not withstand the wear and tear. When we reach the base station, let's see if we can make a high-temperature resistant coating."
"Can this be made on the spot? Hand-crafted? Little Sui, you're getting more and more impressive."
He looked at Chen Sui with an extremely admiring gaze, as if she could magically produce a high-temperature resistant coating out of thin air without basic raw materials.
Chen Sui was somewhat speechless: "Daydreaming? Of course we need to find coating materials first."
Even skilled craftspeople can't cook without rice; she just repairs mechs, she's not a magician.
Zhou Chen received an eye-dagger from her. Although he couldn't see it through the mech, Chen Sui's head-turning motion was obvious. Zhou Chen could almost imagine her expression, immediately feeling somewhat embarrassed.
"What materials do we need? Find them at the base station?"
Chen Sui nodded: "Once we get the base station radar signal and map, it should be much easier to find."
Going to the base station to get the energy field mining area and resource distribution was better than aimlessly searching now.
Xie Chunshi nodded slightly, raising his hand toward mid-air. The sea sprite and Black Arrow Hawk were circling in the sky. He had become much smaller, sitting on Black Arrow Hawk's back, being carried around by Little Zhou for a few circles.
Seeing this, the sea sprite tapped its long tail on Little Zhou. The companion seemed to have anticipated; the sea sprite made a crisp call, then floated out a blue light point, falling toward Xie Chunshi's palm.
Just about to settle, its trajectory suddenly changed, seemingly wanting to move toward Chen Sui's mech.
Xie Chunshi's palm closed, blue energy directly pulling it back. @Endless good articles, all in Jinjiang Literature City
"I don't want to—"
The sea sprite's deep blue eyes blinked at Chen Sui, its expression full of grievance, its long tail swaying in the blue energy, body language full of resistance.
His voice was a very clear youth's voice. Chen Sui instinctively turned her head, looking toward the source of the sound.
And she saw Mist's expression.
Xie Chunshi gritted his back teeth: "Go back to the mental domain."
The sea sprite's double fins flapped, the scales on its fish tail displaying brilliant rainbows under the light.
Black Arrow Hawk circled once, landing on Zhou Chen's shoulder. Its hawk eyes looked at Zhou Chen's mech head, a person and a spirit body conversing silently.
Both watching Xie Chunshi's show.
On the other side, Gu Qinxue folded her arms: "The Commander hasn't taught his energy body much, has he?"
Her tone carried some teasing. After speaking, she summoned Xu Bai.
As soon as the lop-eared rabbit appeared, its long ears swayed back and forth. It obediently nuzzled against Gu Qinxue, then hopped and skipped to Chen Sui's front, showing its snow-white belly.
Chen Sui's eyes contained smiles, her mech's hand rubbing Xu Bai.
After rubbing the lop-eared rabbit to its heart's content, it jumped back to Gu Qinxue's shoulder. Its red eyes looked at the deadlocked Xie Chunshi and sea sprite.
Mist, already full of grievance from being confined in the mental domain, now seeing Xu Bai being intimate with Chen Sui, immediately filled its blue eyes with water droplets, looking at Xie Chunshi with pitiful grievance: "Everyone else can come out, only I can't."
Xie Chunshi's hand gesture loosened slightly, vaguely relaxing.
The sea sprite pressed its advantage: "Outside, I can also drive water mist to lower the temperature."
Hearing this, Zhou Chen hurriedly said: "Commander, it's very normal for children to want to play. In these matters, it's better to guide than restrict."
He had a serious face, definitely not coveting the sea sprite's water mist temperature reduction.
Xie Chunshi opened his hand, his words no longer as insistent, gently admonishing the sea sprite: "Be polite."
Can't just stick to someone else's face, especially Chen Sui's.
Thinking of this, Xie Chunshi felt somewhat helpless. He wasn't clingy as a child, was he? Why was his spirit body so clingy?
Mist flapped its double fins, looking incredibly obedient as it nodded.
Xie Chunshi then released his energy constraint on it.
As soon as the blue energy lines dispersed, the sea sprite swished its long tail, rushing directly to Chen Sui.
"You—"
Xie Chunshi's pupils widened.
Just watching the energy body that had agreed so well a second ago, rush to Chen Sui's front, about to stick to her face, quickly asking: "Ah Sui, are you hot? Can I cool you down?"
Chen Sui tilted her head, looking over with confusion.
Then, her cheek felt an extremely soft touch, mixed with the sensation of a somewhat hard object rubbing.
The sea sprite's cheek directly stuck to her mech, fish fins scraping against the mech, the texture somewhat hard.
"Mist!"
Xie Chunshi called sternly.
The sea sprite innocently opened its eyes to look at him: "I asked Ah Sui, this is polite."
Xie Chunshi was tricked by it, speechless for a second.
Chen Sui noticed his verbal slip, immediately laughing a few times. "Commander, your spirit body, haha, is interesting."
The sea sprite heard she was praising it, hurriedly blowing a bubble. That bubble grew larger and larger in mid-air, bursting in front of Chen Sui, immediately dispersing a lot of water mist. The scorching temperature instantly dropped by quite a bit.
Zhou Chen watched enviously, volunteering: "Little Mist, Little Mist, there's also your brother Zhou Chen!"
He stretched out his mech's cheek.
The sea sprite heard the voice, turned to look, but didn't enthusiastically stick to him. Instead, it blew a bubble from Chen Sui's shoulder, floating to Zhou Chen's front.
It wasn't playing favorites; bubbles floated in turn to Gu Qinxue and Puluo.
Finally to Xie Chunshi.
The Commander's mech was still gazing at the sea sprite. Mist hid somewhat fearfully behind Chen Sui's neck.
Chen Sui's finger tapped, and green light burst out in the space.
Wood-Born Flower's pet form fell in mid-air, cradled in Chen Sui's hands, held in her arms.
"Master~"
Little Flower called softly and tenderly.
The plant leaves on the wooden stump, receiving the scorching temperature, curled toward the center a bit, but Little Flower's clear eyes were full of dependence and joy.
Chen Sui rubbed her head, putting Little Flower and the sea sprite together. "Alright, you all go play."
Then she looked at Xie Chunshi: "It's okay, Commander. Spirit bodies really need to come out for fresh air from time to time. When I awakened before, didn't you teach me that having a spirit body is like having a little cub?"
Xie Chunshi wasn't annoyed, more embarrassed. He felt that his thoughts seemed completely exposed under his spirit body's antics.
The young man's calm gaze looked at the black-gold mech. He couldn't see the analyst's expression clearly, but seeing Chen Sui watching Little Flower mixed with others' spirit bodies, her whole aura was very peaceful.
Probably... hadn't noticed, right?
Xie Chunshi, while breathing a sigh of relief, also felt somewhat disappointed.
But after Chen Sui's few mediating words, he quickly leveled his mood and continued advancing toward the base station.
With the sea sprite's water mist protection, the five from Zhu Jing Fu briefly escaped the high temperature afterward.
When they entered the surrounding area of complex energy, the spirit bodies obediently returned to their mental domains.
Feeling the emotional state of his spirit body, Zhou Chen rubbed his chin: "This round, Young Master will earn more points, exchange more feeding agents next round. Little Zhou quite enjoys coming out to play."
As the master, he naturally doted on his spirit body.
Zhou Chen proudly looked at Xie Chunshi. In terms of raising spirit body cubs, Xie Chunshi was no match for him.
"Sure, we exchanged quite a few feeding agents this round, right?"
Chen Sui looked at Xie Chunshi. Xie Chunshi, listening to the sea sprite talk about its experiences interacting with friends, heard this and nodded, bringing up the exchange resources: "Except in complex energy areas, spirit bodies can be summoned at other times."
The sea sprite excitedly asked: "Really? Little Chun, can I go out too?"
Xie Chunshi sighed, knowing that before he had to keep it confined in the mental domain. Now that he finally had an energy barrier and could leave the mental domain and play with other spirit bodies, it was extremely happy.
"I fed Little Flower big water droplets. Little Flower sister is so cute," the sea sprite circled joyfully in the mental domain, its face full of delight.
"You can," Xie Chunshi reminded it: "But you must—"
"Be polite!" Mist answered in advance. "I know, can't be too intimate with Ah Sui, you've said it many times."
The sea sprite glanced at him, somewhat puzzled. It was clearly acting according to Little Chun's heart's desire, so why was Little Chun so panicked?
The sea sprite couldn't understand; its intelligence was about the level of a human child and couldn't consider such complex issues.
Xie Chunshi used energy to comfort the sea sprite a few times. Once the spirit body settled down in the mental domain, Zhu Jing Fu began to accelerate toward the distance.
"Hey, I was just saying I wanted to earn more points, where are these energy bodies?"
The black-gold mech stopped in front of a cliff, looking at the narrow mountain pass ahead. Chen Sui's energy fluctuation swept over, and she shook her head.
Zhou Chen's face fell.
Zhu Jing Fu hadn't encountered many energy bodies along the way; the energy body groups were mostly low-level, and the points earned weren't much.
Xie Chunshi looked at the rankings. "Other academies are about the same."
Zhu Jing Fu was actually doing well.
Zhou Chen exclaimed in surprise, "Isn't San Sheng an SS-level energy field? Bring out some high-level energy bodies."
"With the high-temperature surface, energy bodies should all be underground. We need to find the mirage; energy bodies will be attracted by the mirage fluctuations. That's when we'll earn a lot of points."
Chen Sui said.
The mirages in Song of Sand and Mirage are buildings with special energy fluctuations. They generally stay on the surface for a moment, then enter underground, attracting large numbers of energy bodies, before reappearing at random locations in the energy field.
Zhou Chen: "So if we find a mirage, whether we're close or far from the base station depends on luck?"
Chen Sui glanced at him, sincerely: "Are you still afraid of relying on luck?"
Lucky King, you already control luck, isn't this your domain?
Zhou Chen was speechless, not knowing how to refute.
He savored for a moment, suddenly feeling Chen Sui's words made sense, so he loudly said: "Then I hope the mirage sends me directly to the base station. I don't want to try anymore."
Chen Sui always believed in his verbal magic, but sometimes felt Zhou Chen's words were too outrageous.
Before entering the mountain pass, she looked up at the scorching sun, finger tapping slightly. "It's still daytime, dream a little less."
She acknowledged verbal magic was real, but this was too much daydreaming.
Zhou Chen spread his hands, already tortured by the increasingly rising temperature. "Dream if dream, I really can't take it anymore. I feel like I'm about to self-combust."
Just after he said this, he walked into the mountain pass. The wind-eroded cliffs on both sides presented a strange shape, full of hollows and wind-eroded caves, extending outward to standing rocks, and beyond that connecting with sand dunes.
The central mountain pass was shaded by the high cliffs on both sides. Sunlight was blocked by the mountains, and as soon as they entered, they could feel the surrounding temperature drop considerably.
The scorching heat suddenly dissipated.
Zhou Chen finally felt alive again. After letting out a sigh, he couldn't help but look up. With just one glance, he froze completely.
"Holy shit!"
Chen Sui instinctively looked back: "?"
"This this this—mirage?"
His tone carried some delight, looking at the earth-yellow stone temple-like building standing behind the mountain pass. The huge temple gate on the outside had four extremely thick pillars, carved with exaggerated reliefs, with a door ring hanging in the center of the gate.
From the mountain pass corner, they could see the full view of the temple. This building seemed to cast a soft light in the glaring world, with its edges all filtered to blur the angles, as if integrated with the surrounding world.
Chen Sui's energy perception swept past, detecting a fluctuation that came and went. She looked at Zhou Chen: "It really is a mirage. Lucky King, your verbal magic is impressive."
Chen Sui was somewhat surprised. When they entered the mountain pass, she hadn't sensed this fluctuation yet; it must have appeared very recently.
Zhou Chen proudly raised his head, saying proudly: "This is the Lucky King!"
The Zhu Jing Fu team quickly left the mountain pass, completely disregarding the sun's scorching heat on their mechs, directly rushing into the mirage.
Touching those stone pillars, they could feel the projections of gravel. Pulling the door ring, the temple gate opened inward, revealing the scene within the temple.
A huge outer hall, facing a long corridor.
Above the inner hall, the building was piled up layer by layer. Standing at the door, looking up, they could see a huge lion statue in the distance occupying a large area. The lion was lying on a high platform built from the stacked buildings. Its two heads looked to the left and right, with another identical dual-headed lion statue on the other side, both in guardian postures lying on the ground.
Behind the two huge lion statues, at the very top, there was also a sacrificial altar-like divine platform surrounded by stone pillars, making it unclear what statue was placed within.
Chen Sui's gaze distantly observed the huge lion statues: "They're energy bodies."
"Energy bodies from the SSS-level energy field [Arena], the Sun Dual-headed Lion."
Chen Sui looked at the outer hall. In the four corners, there were four huge stone pillars, each carved with many scenes. With one glance, Chen Sui could see many familiar energy bodies.
She named each energy body one by one.
Zhou Chen, listening, pressed his lips together, saying somewhat nervously: "Damn, where did this energy field get so many energy bodies?"
"So weird."
"It should be memories devoured by the main energy body of Song of Sand and Mirage," Xie Chunshi explained. "Poplar Star is the hall of many artists. It houses collections related to ancient star civilization. Poplar Star is influenced by this culture; the entire planet has developed mural, stone sculpture, and earthenware craftsmanship, with a strong artistic style."
"When Song of Sand and Mirage was born, among the affected groups were many famous Star Alliance artists."
The main energy body learned from the artists' memories, building such a temple. The murals don't depict Star Alliance culture but rather the culture belonging to the energy bodies themselves, such as their energy body kin.
Zhou Chen breathed a sigh of relief: "Scared me, I thought—"
Xie Chunshi turned back to look at him: "Don't say it."
Zhou Chen shuddered, immediately shutting up.
He almost forgot, he was a pure jinx.