The Legend of Fangren

Chapter 158 Black Gold: You Won't Recognize Me After Washing My Face

Ever since he first used a grinding wheel, Fang Shi had always wanted to complain about one thing: of the three storage spaces on the left, the second one always seemed redundant.

While one of the functions of the grinding wheel is to combine broken tools into a more durable tool, the Block Man can actually do this himself. Every tool has a crafting recipe of the same type, but it just cannot retain the enchantments and other special effects on the tool.

However, the same applies to the grinding wheel. Therefore, in the eyes of most block players, this function is quite useless. The extra little bit of durability is often ignored, so the function of the grinding wheel is basically only for exorcism. This makes the empty second block very redundant, which is different from other functional blocks. Other functional blocks often make full use of their blocks, each with its own function, like the combustion block of the furnace, which can decompose fuel items into the furnace's heat.

Following this logic, Fang Shi also thought that the square on the bottom left side of the grinding wheel should have more uses.

Verification is also very simple: the function block will automatically search for items corresponding to its function. In the game, the grinding wheel cannot be put into other items, only tools and equipment.

Therefore, Fang Shi only needs to take out all kinds of items and try them one by one. Once an item can be put into a square, it means that the item can be used.

He immediately rummaged through his belongings and took out a bunch of things, stuffing them into the grinding wheel one by one. In the end, only two of the items he had managed to fit into the grinding wheel.

One is a book, the other is a bucket.

Regarding books, Fang Shi immediately thought of a variant of books called [Enchanted Books]. Combining this with the power of the sand wheel to remove enchantments, he figured that the sand wheel could transfer the removed enchantments onto the book, turning it into an enchanted book.

But why can an iron bucket fit inside? Buckets aren't easy to enchant.

Fang Shi quickly thought of another item in the game called the Enchanted Bottle. This item could be thrown and smashed by the player to release experience orbs, making it a kind of experience storage container.

I never imagined that reality would be so compatible, expanding the concept of a bottle into a container.

"Give it a try!"

Practice is the sole criterion for testing truth, so Fang Shi immediately picked up the azure black gold and ground it on the grinding wheel.

"Bang!"

The grinding wheel exploded again, and the contents fell out. Fang Shi automatically sucked it into his backpack. Upon closer inspection, he saw that the [iron bucket] had turned into an [experience bucket], which was filled with a yellowish-green glow.

"Now I don't have to let experience cloud my judgment anymore."

Fang Shi quickly thought that using iron barrels to store them seemed a bit extravagant. After all, metals in the Xuan Realm have always been precious and are strategic resources. Even ordinary iron is not readily available. Digging in the mountains would be tiring and the probability of finding it wouldn't be high. He couldn't just dig up an entire mountain every now and then, could he?

"So it seems that glass bottles are indeed the most economical option."

Glass bottles are made from glass blocks, which are then smelted from sand blocks. Sand is much more common than metal. In the game, three glass blocks can be combined to make three glass bottles by arranging them in the same way as iron buckets. This means that the capacity of an iron bucket is only equivalent to that of three glass bottles. Given the same amount of materials, bottles are undoubtedly much more cost-effective than iron buckets.

Fang Shi rummaged through the box for a while, but found only a few grains of sand. He wouldn't usually dig for this stuff; he would only think of it when he needed it.

"Oh well, let's just make do for tonight."

Fang Shi had no choice but to continue letting experience cloud his judgment.

the next morning.

Fang Shi got up from the bed and made up his mind to only sleep on the bed from now on. Putting everything else aside, the soft backrest, quilt and pillow of the bed were much more comfortable than the wooden plank beds in the inn outside. In the mortal world, that would be a good bed that only rich people could afford.

Before going out for breakfast, Fang Shi took out another fish bucket.

Embarrassingly, yesterday when he was cleaning up the fish, he forgot that he needed a fish bucket to take the black gold out of the spiritual platform. He was so anxious that he decided to try anything, so he threw a bunch of fish meat and spiritual medicine into the water and then used a fishing rod to fish.

Unexpectedly, he actually caught a fish. However, using this method to convert fish was obviously not very cost-effective. He threw in the meat of three fish, but could only catch one first-level fish. Perhaps the pool in the spiritual space was poor in material, just plain water, so the fishing rod had to use some of the material in the water to construct other parts, resulting in a lot of consumption.

Fortunately, the azure black gold, after being ground down by Fang Shi with dozens of grinding wheels, had completely lost its previous heavy weight. With his current strength, he could pick it up with one hand and even spin it around a couple of times with his fingertips. The price was that he sprained his nail, which made him roll around on the ground several times in pain.

"This deep blue ebony is so beautiful."

Fang Shi exclaimed in admiration as he pulled the black gold from the fish's belly.

At this point, the black gold had completely lost its black color, and the azure color was not intense, but closer to white. The pale blue metal looked very common, but after being hit a few times with the best tools available, it was still as difficult to dissolve as before, which shows that its hardness was not a problem.

Thinking of He Bao's happy face, Fang Shizhi, with a smug grin on his face, went out the door.

"Hezi, what do you think of this piece of metal?"

"Hmm? Oh!" Luo He turned his head sharply, his eyes blinking rapidly. Once his gaze fell on the black gold, he couldn't look away.

"Junior Brother Fang, you've managed to get this piece of metal for Junior Sister Luo in just a few days."

The senior and junior sisters took a look and could not detect any mysterious energy from the stone. Moreover, it looked very light when Fang Shi held it, almost like a piece of ordinary iron.

In fact, Fang Shi thought the same thing after he polished away all the profound energy in the black gold yesterday.

This piece of black gold is frighteningly light. Let alone holding it now, if it were forged into a weapon later, it would be incredibly light to wield, almost as light as a tree branch picked up from the roadside.

Because the contrast was so great, he once thought he had ruined the metal and regretted that he should have left some of his magical energy behind.

But subsequent tests reassured him about the strength of the metal.

Soon, Lao Gang, who had received the news, rushed to the weapon-forging room. As soon as he entered, he said, "Good lad, you've finally found the right materials. Everyone else's Xuan weapons are already in the final stage of being activated, but this little girl's is still nowhere to be seen. If she exceeds the time limit and you still want me to forge a Xuan weapon, it will cost a lot of money."

He strode forward casually, glanced down at the black gold Fang Shi was holding, and at first didn't pay much attention, but then his eyes narrowed as he looked at it from left to right, and finally asked him suspiciously, "You're holding that piece of metal, isn't it that piece of azure black gold?"

"How could that be? Master Gang, didn't you say that the profound energy within is difficult to separate? I just bought that black gold and then tricked someone into exchanging it for a piece of high-grade metal. How much money can I save anyway?"

"Yeah, that's true." Old Gang didn't know that Fang Shi had been staying in his room these past few days. He thought Fang Shi was looking for buyers down at the Fire Platform. Besides, even if he did know, he didn't think a kid could handle that piece of black gold in his room.

So Lao Gang praised him again: "What a shrewd businessman!"

Don't be fooled by the fact that I spent over a million on black gold. When it comes to high-quality metals of the third or fourth tier, as long as they have exceptional properties, each one can fetch hundreds of thousands. If they are in short supply, the competition among buyers can easily push the price up to several million.

Now this kid has traded some fancy-sounding but useless black gold for useful metals. Isn't that a good business sense?

After receiving the transformed black gold, Lao Gang didn't think much of it and began to ponder its nature.