Half an hour later.
Pan Yongnian and Ma Heng, both in experimental uniforms, appeared in another laboratory with more precise equipment.
They walked straight to a circular platform at the center of the laboratory. Ma Heng poked his head over the tabletop, curiosity in his eyes:
“Academician Pan, is this… spirit stones?”
At this moment.
On the tabletop lay over a dozen small stones, entirely jade-green, each about a centimeter in diameter and roughly round overall.
To the naked eye, they looked a bit like… like those elderly people who are old enough to receive eggs — for example, the marbles that those born in the nineties often played with as children.
They were simply piled in a wooden frame, and at the very center clustered a noticeably larger one of the same kind, about the size of a table-tennis ball.
“Mm, the quantity and appearance match what Comrade Lin Yi described. They must be spirit stones.”
Pan Yongnian, a field veteran with multiple direct exchanges with Lin Yi, quickly gave a confident judgment, and added some popular science:
“So-called spirit stones are a common type of spiritual energy carrier in the Tianling Realm, born and nurtured in spirit stone mines.”
“Regardless of grade, all spirit stones are innately round, jade-green little beads. Once the spiritual energy inside is used up, they’re scrap.”
“In the samples Comrade Lin Yi brought back this time, there are thirty-four low-grade spirit stones and one medium-grade spirit stone with about thirty times the spiritual energy storage of an ordinary spirit stone.”
As he spoke, Pan Yongnian reached out and pointed at the slightly larger spherical object clustered in the center. “There, that should be it.”
According to the information Lin Yi provided.
Besides providing the spiritual energy needed for daily cultivation, spirit stones are also the mainstream currency commonly used in the Tianling Realm, with a status more authoritative than gold in the home world.
For this reason, cultivators in the Tianling Realm classified spirit stones into four grades based on quality: low-grade, medium-grade, high-grade, and supreme-grade.
Usually, a medium-grade spirit stone’s spiritual energy reserve is about thirty times that of a low-grade one, and their exchange rate can reach an astounding one to fifty.
After all, medium-grade spirit stones far surpass low-grade ones of the same spiritual energy amount in both volume and supply efficiency. The volume issue is relatively easier to explain, but supply efficiency in many situations is directly a matter of life and death.
Even in the Guihua Sect, the reserve of medium-grade spirit stones is only four at most.
Yesterday, h11’s full transmission consumed over seventy percent of one medium-grade spirit stone’s reserve.
If not for that, Lin Yi wouldn’t have rushed to Jiuwu City to sell the materials for cash.
Of course.
The home world had indeed considered the feasibility of immediately providing economic aid to the Guihua Sect, but after discussion combined with the situation, each was rejected one by one.
For example, technological products from the home world might not have conditions of use or demand in the Tianling Realm; for another, precious metals like gold and silver are valuable among ordinary people, but exchanging them in large quantities for supplies in the cultivation field is very difficult.
To date, the home world hasn’t found a commodity that can earn spirit stones without making Lin Yi too conspicuous.
Therefore, the task given from above to Dawn Base also includes trying to combine technology and cultivation, to see if they can come up with some high-value little trinkets.
“Xiao Zhou!”
Ma Heng then shifted his gaze from the spirit stones, turned to the operator already in position, and said: “Get ready. First turn on the chromatograph to run a headspace analysis and see if any gas or energy is dispersing from the spirit stone’s surface.”
The operator immediately replied: “Received!”
A moment later.
Click—
A white instrument resembling a massage gun extended down from the ceiling, its front end hovering about ten centimeters above the spirit stones as it began working.
About two minutes later.
Xiao Zhou stood up and shook his head at Ma Heng:
“Academician Ma, the results are out. No volatile components were detected.”
Ma Heng’s expression didn’t change much. Before the experiment, he had already braced himself for failure. He then turned his gaze to Pan Yongnian and asked: “Academician Pan, what do you think?”
He wasn’t trying to pass the buck or give up.
Ma Heng was very clear that his home field leaned toward power and energy; described with cultivation-related terms, it was the use and analysis of spiritual energy and spiritual power.
Before this,
how to “force” spiritual energy out of spirit stones—Pan Yongnian’s specialty was obviously more appropriate.
Pan Yongnian obviously understood this too. Even before the experiment began, he had considered this issue:
“Academician Ma, based on the various signs I’ve come into contact with these past couple of days, I believe the essence… or one of the mechanisms, by which spirit stones store spiritual energy should be a kind of highly compressed quasi-energy field.”
“Therefore, to make it spray out spiritual energy, we must apply a sufficiently strong external excitation.”
Ma Heng blinked: “You mean…”
“Let’s use particle beam irradiation,” Pan Yongnian said decisively, waving his hand and making a sweeping motion in front of him. “Hit it with a beam. There might be a surprise.”
Ma Heng thought for a moment: “Alright, I’ll go with you.”
Particle beam irradiation—its full academic name is the tunable particle beam irradiation device.
Simply put,
it is a type of device that precisely controls particle beams to produce different radiation doses for irradiating targets.
In chemical fields and most physics experiments, the so-called particle beam is an electron beam. But in truly cutting-edge frontiers, the types of particles and frequencies used are far more numerous.
For example, this tunable particle beam irradiation device at Dawn Base can even produce narrowband terahertz radiation at the millijoule level, continuously tunable.
If you really can’t understand, think of it this way: an ordinary person can at most write on tofu with a toothpick, while this thing can use a strand of hair to engrave the full original text of “Requiem for Ceasing War”—the Leide King arrives on Earth in three hours—onto ultra-high-strength steel…
The instrument was soon in position.
The operator was still Xiao Zhou, who set the beam energy intensity according to Pan Yongnian’s requirements.
After another moment.
A regular hum of equipment sounded in the laboratory.
Pan Yongnian and Ma Heng stood by the console, watching the developments on the screen.
Ten-plus minutes later.
Xiao Zhou, being leered at—damn, being watched—by the two top bigwigs, wiped the sweat from his forehead and said to the two:
“Academician Ma, Academician Pan, we’ve tried continuously tunable and high-frequency electron beams from 10 kV to 270 kV, but the spirit stones still show no movement.”
“Don’t rush,” Pan Yongnian patted Xiao Zhou’s shoulder, gesturing for him not to be nervous. “Turn on the particle beam injector; try other particles.”
Xiao Zhou swallowed, feeling the pressure on him grow even greater: “Alright.”
Then he entered several commands on the console with a clatter.
Soon.
A relatively small black tube extended from the side, embedded into the tunable particle beam irradiation device, vibrating as it transported hundreds of millions of tiny particles.
The irradiation device started synchronously.
All kinds of data that looked like heavenly script to laypeople jumped and refreshed rapidly on the screen.
Half an hour later.
Xiao Zhou, staring fixedly at the screen without blinking, suddenly snapped his head up and shouted at Pan Yongnian and Ma Heng:
“Academician Pan, Academician Ma, the spirit stones are showing activity!!!!
Chapter 34