Chapter 38

"Old Luo, I suddenly thought of another question. If I let the team leader or someone else who knows ancient martial arts teach me, wouldn't I not need to buy it?" Lin Xinghai, realizing this loophole, immediately asked.

"In that case, you would be learning illegally. If you can hide it, that would be fine, but if anyone discovers and reports it, not only will you be penalized with double the points, but the person who taught you will also be held accountable."

"In short, the risk is too high."

"Moreover, if you buy the learning from the shelter, they will use a 'memory transmitter' to directly transfer the entire set of techniques and all the details into your mind, which is much more detailed than what others can teach, and you will learn much faster." Luo Jie explained.

Lin Xinghai nodded; he had just asked casually and didn't feel regretful.

The two continued talking as they moved forward and soon arrived at the entrance of the power room.

At this point, the room was already littered with corpses, the metal floor covered with zombie bodies. There were no living zombies left in the power room; most had died, though a small fraction had escaped.

Although zombies aren't very smart, they aren't worse than beasts; they still run when faced with the threat of death.

Of course, this is a rare situation because zombies are much more bloodthirsty than ordinary beasts.

However, the people present, including Lin Xinghai, were almost immune to the sight of zombie corpses. They immediately looked toward the center of the power room.

There was a circular platform of about 5 square meters in the center, and above it, a blue crystal cube.

This blue crystal was already covered with many cracks and even some missing parts, continuously emitting energy from these gaps.

This was undoubtedly the energy crystal.

Luo Jie almost immediately opened the wrist computer in his hand and scanned the energy crystal in front of him.

"1.5348 tons! According to today's latest quote, we can get at least 230,000 points." Luo Jie said excitedly.

The others couldn't help but cheer. The harvest this time was truly enormous. Not only did they successfully obtain the energy crystal, but they also got a 20,000-point iron-zombie corpse, totaling 250,000 points!

On average, they would get 10,000 points for a trip, and sometimes only 6,000 to 7,000, not counting the expenses for ammunition and equipment.

If all expenses were deducted, the average trip would only yield about 5,000 points. This trip was equivalent to 50 trips' worth of harvest.

In other words, it was equivalent to two months' worth of harvest.

Even the most calm mercenaries couldn't hide their excitement.

Lin Xinghai was of course happy for them, but as someone on his first mission, he wasn't as deeply moved.

His gaze soon turned to Fang Tianhe, who was standing in the corner.

Fang Tianhe was looking intently at a hole in front of him.

It was a two-meter-wide hole, dark and deep, leading to an unknown place.

After the mercenaries' excitement subsided, they noticed this and gathered around, their expressions becoming serious.

After all, this was the power room, with a 20-centimeter-thick high-strength alloy floor. It would take ten small missiles to blast through it.

"Team Leader, this..." Wu Yan, holding a shield, looked at the large hole with a serious expression.

Fang Tianhe didn't answer but put on a pair of gloves and gently touched the sticky residue at the edge of the hole.

It was a blood-red sticky substance that quickly produced white smoke upon contact with the gloves, clearly indicating its strong corrosive properties.

"It's a highly corrosive mutated zombie, probably attracted by the energy crystal." Fang Tianhe said.

His voice was light, but to the others, it was like a thunderclap.

Everyone knew how terrifying mutated zombies were.

Especially Lin Xinghai, who had data for comparison, had a clear understanding of how strong mutated zombies were.

Take the iron-zombie, for example; without mechs, all of them, including Fang Tianhe, would be killed with a single slap.

"Don't just stand there, act quickly! The corrosion marks on the high-strength alloy floor weren't caused in one go. This is likely the mutated zombie's lair."

"Right now, it has just left and could return at any moment." Fang Tianhe said again, this time with a more urgent tone.

Everyone immediately sprang into action!

Luo Jie took out a metal disc from his combat backpack. Under the control of his wrist computer, the metal disc extended a pair of rotors and quickly flew above the energy crystal.

Then, white light emitted from a diamond-shaped mirror at the bottom, enveloping the entire energy crystal.

A miraculous scene followed: the cracks on the energy crystal began to heal, and the missing parts smoothed out.

The only difference was that the energy crystal's volume had slightly decreased, but the energy no longer leaked.

"What is this?" Lin Xinghai couldn't help but ask curiously.

"An energy stabilizer, specifically used to stabilize the energy crystal." Luo Jie explained, then took out four metal spheres from his combat backpack and placed them on the ground.

Following his commands on the wrist computer, the four metal spheres rolled around, surrounding the energy crystal.

Then, a crack appeared in the middle of the metal spheres, and red light emanated from inside.

The moment this red light appeared, Lin Xinghai felt a tingling sensation on his scalp, and his senses warned him of the lethal threat.

"Old Luo, what is this?" Lin Xinghai swallowed and asked again.

"Laser cutter." Luo Jie answered succinctly, his attention focused on issuing commands.

Soon, with a tap of the enter key, the four laser cutters simultaneously emitted laser beams.

Lin Xinghai only saw a flash of red light, and the large energy crystal was cut into eight equal pieces.

For a moment, the energy crystal emitted a terrifying energy fluctuation, as if it were about to explode.

But with the energy stabilizer, it quickly stabilized.

At this point, the other members, who had been watching, quickly took out eight folding boxes from their combat backpacks.

These folding boxes, when folded, were only palm-sized, but when unfolded, they could stretch to a cubic meter.

They were more than enough to hold the cut pieces of the energy crystal.

Watching the mercenaries systematically place the energy crystal pieces into the folding boxes, Lin Xinghai let out a sigh of relief and couldn't help but marvel at how effective these future gadgets were.