My health recovery is incredibly fast.

The control panel and energy piping system must be alchemy tools for safety reasons.

The former is more reliable due to its mechanical structure.

The latter helps Xia Zuodai manage some mechanized energy operations, such as replenishing toilet tanks with water and dynamically adjusting the temperature and humidity inside the tower.

The energy pipeline system can also put the tower into overload and quiescent states, effectively managing energy leakage in the beam energy field. In emergency situations, the energy stored in this system can become a backup energy source for the beam energy field.

Needless to say, Xia Zuo needed to eat to fill his stomach until he could condense an elemental body.

After acquiring an elemental body, he could have it consume energy blocks, allowing the elemental body to provide life force to his physical body and combat the negative effects of hunger. If he learned an illusion spell that could suppress hunger, he could completely ignore physical hunger.

According to Christo, there are quite a few people in the inner sanctuary who use this method to achieve fasting.

Moreover, since illusion magic can alter the information received by the senses and stimulate the recipient to experience pleasure from consuming delicious food, many people in the inner sanctuary have completely given up on enjoying food with their physical bodies.

For this type of person, as long as they cast an illusion on their elemental body and relax their mind and guard so that the illusion can work properly, they can experience various pleasures that can only be felt by the physical body.

This is a practice that is highly controversial in terms of ethics and morality.

A virtuous person is cautious even when alone.

The more secluded and unseen a person is, the more strict they should be with themselves, ensuring consistency between their words and actions.

The tower is a mage's private space, and the elemental body can help mages break free from conventional laws and regulations. With all these factors combined, the temple's control over the mages in the inner sanctum will be greatly reduced.

Thus came the second ceremony of loyalty, and a whole set of self-discipline regulations specifically for Inner Temple mages. These two regulations were designed specifically for Inner Temple mages who controlled vast resources and possessed extremely high magical skills.

When Xia Zuo signed the long-term contract with the Temple today, the Temple's representative also offered to help Xia Zuo perform a second loyalty ceremony.

There are two reasons.

One reason is that Xia Zuo will be stationed in the Western Continent, which is inconvenient for him to travel back and forth. Conducting the second loyalty ceremony in advance will save Xia Zuo from having to make another trip.

Another reason is related to the annual quota of 10 billion.

In the Eastern Continent, this amount of money is roughly equivalent to the expenses of a regular army of mages for more than half a year, and is also the average level of funding for research projects led by the alchemy masters of the outer hall.

In the Eastern Continent, 10 billion is not a very large amount of capital.

But if this were in the Western Continent… well… Xia Zuo could use this money every year to build two branch campuses of Starry Night Academy, the kind with complete facilities, including a cafeteria and single student dormitories.

Out of careful consideration, and in order to ensure the smooth progress of the Temple's plans in the Western Continent, the Temple's representatives proposed that Xia Zuo accept the second loyalty ceremony.

"Agreed, no problem." That was Xia Zuo's reply.

His experience of living two lives deepened his understanding of the evil in human nature.

To be frank, Xia Zuo felt that if the evil in human nature were like a shallow stream, then the good in human nature would be like the stones in the stream. The stones would protrude above the water, but would eventually be swept away by the current.

Only by constantly reminding oneself of the dark side of human corruption and depravity can one achieve self-reflection and self-discipline; this is Xia Zuo's principle.

Accepting a second ceremony of fidelity is simply putting a safety net on his own moral compass; there is no reason to refuse.

And so, Xia Zuo reached a pact with the temple, bringing back a large amount of materials, which enabled him to realize his tower design.

As for the second initiation ceremony, the temple scheduled it for more than a month later, to be held with the next batch of newly promoted high-ranking mages.

Anru is among this group of mages. Like the other mages, she will first undergo a ceremony of loyalty before embarking on her journey to meet the Pillars of Creation.

...

After settling down the household chores, Xia Zuo threw himself into the work of constructing the high-tower beam capacity field.

Xia Zuo's goal is to construct a binding force field with a shield value of 3600 million points.

But as he was starting out in this job, he decided to be cautious and leave himself some room to correct his mistakes.

After careful calculation and repeated weighing of the trade-offs between free attribute points and mental attributes, Xia Zuo decided to first construct a binding energy field with a shield value of 360 million points, and then further expand the binding energy field when the mental slots become more plentiful.

Xia Zuo spent his days in the academy's training room, meditating and casting spells at his desk with the blueprints and drafts, meticulously refining every detail of the energy field, striving to complete it in one go without rework or starting over.

After more than a month of tinkering, a towering energy field, over 8 meters tall, appeared on the flat ground in the center of the training room.

Countless blue lines depict the walls, floor tiles, furniture, internal pipelines, energy circuits, energy hubs, and numerous sophisticated alchemical devices within the tower's energy field.

The next step is to fill the energy field with energy of the corresponding type and install the alchemy device in the designated location.

The next step is to check the operation of each module to see if there are any conflicts between them.

The next step is the exciting trial run. Xia Zuo needs to find a secluded place to test the entire process of summoning, controlling, and disbanding the tower.

Before this, Xia Zuo had to stop the construction of the tower and go to the temple with Anruer to perform a ceremony of loyalty.

Chapter 126 Another World Portal

This loyalty ceremony was once again held in the outer hall's teleportation hall.

Xia Zuo stood in front of the colossal crystal, gazing up at its pure white crystal shell, imagining millions of light elements swimming inside. His feelings were very complicated.

After learning about the Pillars of Creation, the Starry Sky Demons, and other such things, it would be difficult for any mage to fully believe the assertion that the super-large crystals are products of nature.

They might have some doubts about the origin of the enormous crystal, but no one would voice them; everyone unanimously chose to avoid the topic.

Just as Xia Zuo was lost in thought, the ceremony of loyalty began.

The formal monks who came from all over the country stepped into the pillar of light, accompanied by their mentors, and after receiving the light element, they returned to their respective places.

About half an hour later, all the formal mages, including Anjou, had completed their indignation ceremony.

Xia Zuo told An Ru'er to go back first, because he might stay a little longer.

The second ceremony of loyalty is not simply about receiving a second element of light.

As Rexor previously stated, the Genesis Crystal would reveal more information about the Star Demons to the recipients during the second Ceremony of Loyalty.

Xia Zuo used this loyalty ceremony as a means of obtaining information, perhaps uncovering part of the truth behind the time travel incident.

After all the formal mages had left, he stepped into the pillar of light and was teleported to a glass room located above the teleportation hall.

The sun still shines brightly here, and the sea of ​​clouds stretches endlessly to the horizon outside the hemispherical glass dome.

The last time Xia Zuo came here, he was unable to detect the existence of the elements because his mental state was not high enough.

But this time, Xia Zuo saw a seven-colored crystal in the very center of the room, with as many as 16 facets. In terms of the number of facets alone, it was the crystal Xia Zuo had ever seen.

Xia Zuo placed his hand on the crystal and obtained a small light elemental, as well as an inner palace decree that appeared directly in his mind.

After that, he opened his eyes and found that the scenery around him had changed.

The golden finger sent a message reminding Xia Zuo that he was in a grand illusion scene.

The glass house transformed into a flying machine that soared above the clouds, carrying Xia Zuo higher and higher until they reached the boundary between the stars, and then flew towards the spherical object above the Pillar of Creation.

As he got closer to the spherical object, Xia Zuo's heart pounded harder.

Just as Christo said, the headquarters of the Starry Sky Demon Vanguard was a large fleshy ball covered with tentacles.

However... Christo didn't mention that those slowly writhing tentacles were made up of segments of human and animal corpses.

This is a huge, fleshy ball that is utterly evil to all living beings. Its tentacles, membranes, and chunks of flesh are all a combination of filthy blood and rotten flesh, making it as abhorrent as a giant stitched monster.

The glass house slowed down, but did not stop.

It carried Xia Zuo through the barrier of the tentacles and flew into the gaping maw on the front of the giant fleshy ball.

The surrounding light dimmed, followed by a faint red glow.

One by one, fleshy sacs radiating a bloody glow hung upside down on the fleshy walls, and various kinds of remains were being decomposed inside the sacs.

Avoiding the fleshy sacs dripping with thick juice, continue flying inward, and three portals made of pale skeletons appear before you.

Looking through the circular entrance of the portal, you can see the scene on the other side, which can be described as a mountain of corpses, a sea of ​​blood, and a land full of otherworldly demons.

The illusion abruptly ended, the magical energy dissipated rapidly, and sunlight once again streamed through the glass dome into the room, dispelling the gloom and oppression brought by the Starry Night Demon's Nest.

Xia Zuo took a deep breath, rubbed his throbbing brows, and turned to walk into the pillar of light.

After returning to Poseidon, he sent a secret message to Anjou, and then went alone into the academy's training room.

Xia Zuo stood in front of the 8-meter-high tower beam energy field, feeling as still as water.

The hexahedral crystal display showed three portals, one of which led to a world filled with skyscrapers. This world is now occupied by the Star Demons and has become a breeding ground for them.

Therefore, it is not difficult to draw a highly probable conclusion: the world where Xia Zuo originally lived was very likely the world that was destroyed by the Starry Sky Demon.

For reasons unknown, he escaped the tragic fate of being transformed by the Starry Sky Demons and, with a cheat-like ability, traveled to the world he is in now.

So... the cheat code helped him?

Xia Zuo was puzzled.

Looking back on his previous 20-plus years of life, he didn't seem to have anything particularly special about him; he was just an ordinary office worker who went to work to earn money and then played games and exercised after work.

My parents are alive and well, I am not an orphan, and I don't have any extraordinary life experiences or special abilities.

The only major upheaval in my life was related to my first love.

The two had been in love for a long time and were planning to get married. They had even met each other's parents. But then... the woman was diagnosed with a terminal illness and passed away before the wedding due to a defect in her immune system.

This incident was a huge blow to Xia Zuo, causing him to remain depressed for over a year before he finally left home, found a new job, and started a new life.

After that, life remained largely unchanged and uneventful, peaceful and stable, until the arrival of the Starry Sky Demons...

and many more!

Xia Zuo slapped his forehead and discovered an extremely strange place!

He had no memory of the invasion of the alien demons in the starry sky.

Not right, not right.

Upon careful recollection, he discovered that his memories were stuck on a certain day when he was 28 years old in his previous life.

He was cooking at home when he suddenly felt that the light outside the window was a bit strange. When he looked up, he heard a loud bang, and his whole body suddenly ached. He involuntarily closed his eyes, crouched down with his hands over his head, and quickly fell into a coma.

When he opened his eyes the next second, he found himself in the underground cell of the villainous alchemist.

"So... I died right when the Starry Sky Demons invaded the original world?" Xia Zuo scratched his head, somewhat puzzled.

He sat blankly at his desk, recalling his past life over and over again.

After much thought, unable to find a better answer, Xia Zuo could only temporarily consider himself a survivor from the original world.

Casting aside distractions and focusing his mind, Xia Zuo threw himself into the work of building the tower, suppressing the confusion and bewilderment deep within his heart with fulfilling labor.