New concept of the mysterious way to ascend to immortality

Chapter 238 Energy Crisis, Scientific Refining

"It's dawn again?!"

After another sleepless night of cultivation, Yuan Zhu was startled by the sound of rain hitting the windowpane when he finished his half-asleep, half-awake practice of the [Tiger Demon. Dream Replenishment] secret technique.

Looking up, a hazy light shone in from the outside. Switching to human form, he carefully sensed the surroundings and realized that he had successfully brought the progress of the 'new ability' nurtured by the [2 Seals] to 4/5 last night.

He had a premonition that if he persisted in refining 5-6 more [Small Pumpkins], he would be able to fully see the true nature of this [New Holy Light Skill], which was definitely related to [Spatial Attributes]!
I'm just not sure how exactly to express it. I look forward to the day when I can create [space equipment] by hand.

By then, your net worth will skyrocket, and you'll be able to achieve financial freedom simply by 'selling equipment'.

Snake retorted, "I don't really want Boss Ning to awaken [Space Creation], because the input and return are too mismatched! A mere 30-odd cheapest [Little Pumpkins], with a raw material cost of over 1000 points in the [Exchange List], can actually create the ability to create [Space Equipment]? How is that possible! If it really happens, there will most likely be terrible side effects, such as temporarily granting a closed container space expansion effect, but only lasting for half an hour or something like that."

Yuan Zhu: "You usually speak so sweetly, why are you being such a spoilsport today?"

"Because I wouldn't lie to you, boss! Based on my understanding, the extraordinary power of this spirit is always accompanied by huge hidden dangers and flaws. How could I let us gain such a big advantage?"

Yuan Zhu: "I estimate that if we stay up all night, we'll find out the answer. I hope your 'broom mouth' doesn't come true."

"Pah, pah, pah! Children's words are innocent, let the wind blow them away. My Lao Da will surely have all his wishes fulfilled, smooth sailing, and everything going well! Congratulations on your opening, and may you have a son soon..."

After checking the progress of the [Seal Casting], he then glanced at the progress of the [Human (Insect) Pillar] in [The Universe Within].

因为12只一起炼化的缘故，任务总进度只完成2/3。若当初选择拆分成独立任务，那么现在应该能炼成5到6根。

Overall, refining multiple batches together is more cost-effective.

...

After finishing his cultivation, Yuan Zhu saw that it was raining again, so he didn't rush to summon Nie Yin to accompany him out to wade through the mud. Instead, he chose to inspect the "haunted house" and take stock of his personal belongings.

Every time he does this, he feels a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment as his assets slowly accumulate and gradually increase.

If I had to pinpoint any regrets, it would probably be that the nature of this estate is too sinister, too shameful to be seen in the light of day, so I can only secretly revel in it.

He began his inspection from the attic of the haunted house, the highest point of the villa, which served as its central hub and control center. Four eggplant-headed ghosts guarded this spot daily, monitoring and protecting the mirror that led to and from the "Garden of Disease."

After more than a month of refinement, Yuan Zhu's "Data-Driven Soul Intelligence (Barrier) Program," built on the "Brain Eggplant CPU + Soul Memory" for the Eggplant Ghosts, has become increasingly mature.

While they still lag behind in 'independent thinking', their 'execution and action' capabilities have skyrocketed.

Yuan Zhu placed an external [Brain Eggplant CPU] on each of their heads; Snake was responsible for writing programs through the [Immortal Scripture], and then transmitting, downloading, and uploading data through the [Memory Stick], constantly practicing and optimizing.

Initially, the behavior of the eggplant ghosts was distorted by their tiger-like instincts and the corrosive influence of pollution on their souls, resulting in their mania, irrationality, and incomprehensibility.

But after being repeatedly beaten by Yuan Zhu, and through repeated behavioral corrections and small-data training, the four "brain-eating" individuals would exchange databases precisely at midnight every night.

Whenever Yuan Zhu returned to the haunted house, the snakes revealed the potential of the Immortal Scripture in the field of soul data, helping them to upgrade and optimize.

Now, the four eggplant-headed ghosts have become increasingly intelligent and perceptive, their spirituality has soared, and they have become more and more human-like!

Specifically, they gradually learn to follow rules and act in a proper manner. They create numerous simple 'behavioral templates' within the [Brain Eggplant], reflecting their behavior and popularity. They can even understand language and establish corresponding behavioral logic.

Thus, the eggplant demons of today are fully capable of fulfilling the duties of the "vicious overseer," whipping the awakened eggplant spirits daily with their shadow eggplant tentacles, driving them through the mirror into the "Garden of Disease," where they collect contaminated crops in the designated "safe zone," and then transport them into the "haunted house," where the shadow eggplant roots that cover the room devour and digest them to obtain nutrients and energy.

This inexhaustible 'disease fuel' sustains the energy circulation within the entire haunted house.

As Yuan Zhu descended the stairs, he saw that all the walls, ceilings, and floors were covered with dense [Shadow Plant Root Energy Channels], like activated blood vessels bulging, pulsating, and transmitting black, viscous 'Shadow Blood' to power the entire villa.

After continuous cleaning, the cracks, mycelium, and pebbles on the original floor were all cleaned up. Instead, 'shadow basil plants' emerged from the walls and ceiling at just the right time, branching out, producing leaves and flowers, but without overgrowing, creating a kind of eerie beauty. Even the air quality improved.

"Not bad, although the underworld is still the same, it looks much better. There's no longer that dirty and chaotic feeling, and the comfort of living here has greatly improved..."

Although the underworld villa was beautiful, Yuan Zhu's eyes still twitched when he saw those semi-transparent, wriggling amniotic membranes (【dormant eggplant essence】) curled into spheres, growing on the ground, embedded in the walls, and hanging from the ceiling, making full use of the limited bedroom space.

I feel both gratified to own so many '007 semi-plant cattle and horses' and uneasy about this underworld bio-battery matrix.

It's too oppressive, too evil! The Holy Lord can't bear to see this scene.

Snake: "The shadow roots of the haunted house keep consuming 'disease crops' every day to increase the power of drawing spiritual energy from the 'shadow layer'; at the same time, it transforms 'polluted nutrients' to nourish the 'eggplant spirits and demonic insects' in the whole building, deepening their erosion."

After making his rounds, Yuan Zhu stood in the large dining room, which had been cleaned and rearranged, with tables and chairs neatly set out and exquisite tableware laid out on the table. Looking at the haunted house, he sighed, "This has reached its limit!"

...

Compared to the "Garden of Disease" which doesn't belong to him, this "Haunted House" is the real private property of him (the "Tiger Demon"), half of the "Shadow Territory".

When Yuan Zhu first came to cleanse the evil spirits, he used the [Tiger Demon] to leak [Shadow Contamination], thus polluting, eroding, and refining the haunted house, which already had a built-in 'closed barrier system'.

After finally eliminating the evil spirit, he took its place and inherited the small, enclosed, independent barrier within the villa.

Afterwards, it planted the Shadow Eggplant, a semi-living spiritual plant that existed in association with the Tiger Demon, throughout the villa. It further hijacked, replaced, and strengthened the original 'barrier foundation,' completely 'polluting' the building with shadows.

Thus, with the growth of the 'Shadow Plants,' the pollution concentration inside the haunted house increased significantly. At this point, the pollution concentration inside the haunted house was directly proportional to the growth of the 'Shadow Eggplant Community.' Later, he peeled off four 'Eggplant-Headed Ghosts,' keeping only the rest, and created them as earthbound spirits, imbuing the rigid and mindless 'plant barrier' with soul, making them four administrators.

The addition of the Eggplant-Headed Ghost revitalized the previously rigid and inflexible 'circulation of shadow energy' in the haunted house, allowing it to operate more efficiently and perform simple daily tasks. (Snake wrote this into the 'Artificial Intelligence Program')
Now, the eggplant demons control the 'goblin laborers,' constantly stealing contaminated crops from the [Disease Garden] and feeding them to the [Haunted House]. They cleverly manage to keep the [Haunted House] at the limit of being able to perfectly digest the contamination without being infected and eroded by the [Disease Contamination].

This external force allows the haunted house to continuously absorb 'high-quality polluted nutrients' while also accelerating the active extraction of more and higher concentrations of 'shadow spiritual energy' from the 'shadow layer'. It no longer relies on the haunted house's shadow barrier to passively absorb a constant low concentration of 'shadow spiritual energy'.

With this extra 'powerful driving force,' Yuan Zhu was able to transform the haunted house into a fully automated factory, processing batches of living goblins. He would then mold them into semi-vegetarian '007 working goblin spirits,' before putting them into a dormant state to maintain their activity long-term.

The whole process was absolutely perfect!
Yuan Zhu doesn't need to waste any effort; all he needs to do is optimize the program daily to obtain a continuous stream of 'working eggplant essences and shadow eggplant fruits', as well as various 'refining materials for quasi-spirit companions'... His assets are accumulating and increasing automatically every day.

But at this moment, he discovered that the period of value appreciation and expansion of the "haunted house" had ended, and its utilization rate had reached its limit!

Based on Tiger Demon's control over the [Haunted House], and Snake Snake's calculations using data from the [Immortal Scripture], this [Shadow Haunted House] can no longer sustain its current functions by consuming more 'disease-causing crops' to support more 'goblins, demonic insects, and orcs'.

Once the ingestion of 'disease-causing foods' disrupts the balance, the purity of the 'haunted house's' shadow will also be disrupted.

The house has gone from being polluted by disease to being corrupted by the "Disease Garden," causing the entire "haunted house" to gradually become diseased.

Comparing the size of a "haunted house" and a "disease garden" is like comparing the difference between a shipping container and a cargo ship.

If a haunted house is captured by the Disease Garden, it will be flooded with disease-related pollution, invading the human world. Yuan Zhu could only harvest a small amount temporarily and then run away with his bucket.

If the number of new (living) goblins supplied from the outside breaks the balance while 'feeding' is suppressed, the currently stored [Eggplant Goblins (136)] will fall into a state of insufficient power supply (energy), accelerate death, stop transformation, or be unable to revive from hibernation, awaken consciousness and attempt to destroy and escape.

The interior of this haunted house is already operating at its maximum capacity. If the uncontrolled malevolent spirit disrupts this balance from within, the energy consumption will increase dramatically again, triggering a chain reaction.

If we curb our eating and stop consuming goblins, maintaining our current state, we will also face a new problem: a power shortage for the [Tiger Demon, Anti-Law] training.

The Tiger Demon also treats the haunted house as a super charging station. Whenever I return home, there is a constant stream of 'shadow spiritual energy' to help me cultivate!
Now, as the [Tiger Demon] grows stronger, its demand for shadow spiritual energy is skyrocketing ([Inner Universe] refining quest); and the human form outside the Tiger Demon, the [Anti-Law. Shadow Fund Pool] has become a new bottomless pit.

It can truly accept [Shadow Contamination] infinitely to amplify the strength of the [Anti-Law.Shadow] law.

...

Yuan Zhu: "Has this haunted house of mine reached its limit? Am I too powerful, or is this villa too lame?"

Upon discovering that his asset appreciation had reached a plateau, Yuan Zhu was filled with immense anguish. Not making a profit meant a loss—a loss of a hundred million!
Snake: "There are two solutions! Either start actively colonizing and developing the [Disease Garden]. Begin by flooding it with [Shadow Contamination] and fight it! Contaminate the entire [Garden] and eventually turn it into the [Tiger Demon's RBQ Garden]."

"However, the difficulty is extremely high. After all, the total amount of 'Shadow Contamination' we currently possess is simply insufficient to devour and backfire on the entire [Disease Garden]. A head-on confrontation will only result in our destruction! The only way is to try the [Shadow Domain]. First, establish a foothold to avoid being counter-killed, then take one city today, two cities tomorrow... and finally, with the help of the [Decompress.Server], turn this place into our lair."

Yuan Zhu decisively shook his head: Pass!

This plan had been proposed before, but was rejected. This was because the [Disease Garden] didn't belong to them at all, and was clearly a time bomb planted in Running City by an unknown force.

His occupation of the garden was tantamount to courting death. That's why he secretly seized the haunted house as a transit point, intending to steal as much as possible before the original owner returned to inspect it.

Snake: "The second solution is to speed up the refining of the [Insect Pillar]. Then, move away from Running City and find a propitious location in the [Misty Mountains] to develop the [Shadow Domain], strengthen its connection with the [Shadow Layer], and increase the power of spiritual energy extraction."

"It's like creating a mountain gate, constructing a protective array, building a top-tier spirit-gathering array, frantically extracting 'shadow spiritual energy,' expanding our territory as much as possible, and making the spiritual energy concentration at the mountain gate extremely high, which will naturally support more low-level henchmen. Once the [Great Wilderness Immortal Scripture] is decompressed, it will bring about a qualitative change, creating a private base that belongs to us!"

"However, the efficiency of refining the [Insect Pillar] still depends on the [Haunted House] where electricity is scarce. Relying solely on Your Majesty's personal efforts, it will take forever."

Yuan Zhu pondered seriously: "So the current problem is still stuck on the energy shortage in the haunted house, reaching its power limit? Hmm... to solve this problem... indeed, we should sacrifice a batch of goblins to appease the heavens!"

He glanced at the [Inner Universe], which was currently 70% occupied, and immediately gave the Eggplant Demons a new order: to select 60 goblins who had been consuming large amounts of [Shadow Eggplant] for several days.

According to data reports from previous rounds of the [Changgui Refining Experiment], the refining formula for the Changgui contamination plug-in: [Brain Eggplant CPU], involves goblins consuming large quantities of [Shadow Eggplant Fruit], stimulating brain contamination and distortion, and undergoing a failed 'Changgui Refining', ultimately resulting in a 'miniature tomato-shaped external brain'. (Shaped like a Devil Fruit, with brain grooves and folds, tomato-shaped, and black.)
With the support of numerous experimental data, Yuan Zhu this time discarded the tedious and useless parts, allowing the eggplant-headed ghosts to 'remove their heads and extract their brains'. The [Inner Universe] space, originally used to refine a single goblin, can now refine dozens of contaminated and mutated brains at once, directly obtaining [Brain Eggplant CPUs], resulting in a dramatic increase in efficiency!

"This is the increased production capacity brought about by scientific research and development!"

In the Immortal Realm, the ancient and primitive Tiger Demon could only rely on experience to devour goblins one by one and try their luck to create cougars or plug-ins; the scientific version of the [Immortal Scripture] Tiger Demon, through experiments and data feedback, meticulously discovered the 'core formula' and efficiently mass-produced [Brain Eggplant CPUs].

Then, Yuan Zhu added, "Don't waste the remaining torso and head. Use the torso as raw material for the inevitably failed Changgui, and try to refine it into [Transcendent Shadow Contamination] to serve as nourishment for the growth of [Changgui]. Prepare the heads in a unified manner and send them to Mengxi to see if they can be made into [Skull Servant]?"

Snake retorted: "With its brain ripped out and no soul, and being the lowest of goblin heads, does this thing even deserve to be made into a 'skull server'?"

Yuan Zhu: "Let's give it a try. If it fails, we can send it to the Underworld for Sister Xiaohai to practice on and make a spirit herb flowerpot for planting spirit herbs."

Snake nodded in agreement: "That's feasible. The higher the concentration of pollution in the corpse, the higher the quality of the spiritual herbs that will grow. These shadow essences are suitable for growing underworld-attribute herbs in the [Shadow Domain]!"

"One goblin can be used in three ways! Back then, when we caught goblins, we didn't know where to start and could only randomly 'transform goblins' into 'goblin slaves' in groups. Now, we can efficiently and in large quantities pre-produce goblins, then refine them uniformly and classify them precisely... Science truly is the primary productive force."

As batches of sleeping goblins fall victim to the clutches of the Eggplant Demons and are swallowed by the Serpent Demon, a new quest begins.

Yuan Zhu felt as if his career was finally on track. The [Eggplant Essences] he had painstakingly created had not died, but instead accompanied him and their kind in a more durable form (CPU).

The later goblins, each like a Calabash Brother, had a black eggplant on their head and, relying on the [Artificial Intelligence. Ox-Horse Program], instantly became skilled workers. This was how their predecessors protected them with their own bodies.

"【Haunted House】is still too small. I really look forward to the day when the 007 bull and horse eggplant essence production line can be rolled out in the 【Shadow Law Domain】!"

(End of this chapter)