Free Web NovelChapter 222: Chapter 184: The Treasure-Bearing Creature (Part 2)
The smallest was at least three meters long, while the largest was nearly ten. With the jumble of undulating rock pillars stacked on their backs, they looked like small mountains. No wonder Yin Yi couldn’t pull them all out of the ground in one go.
Dean Wu stared at the struggling turtles with fascination, as if he had discovered a priceless treasure. "Interesting," he said slowly. "We’ll take a few back to study. They might just be a great help to us."
"Besides these black turtles, the three Rock-Breaking Ants have found traces of coal at a depth of nearly 600 meters, 500 meters away from our position. This indicates that this region has at least five million cubic meters of coal reserves."
Five million cubic meters was just the amount discovered in a small, explored section. Han Ning had no way of knowing the total reserves for now.
But at the very least, this much coal was enough to supply an academy of several hundred people for some time.
After this preliminary confirmation of the coal deposit, Han Ning had Yin Yi knock a few of the turtles unconscious. They took them all and returned to the academy.
「...」
Back at the academy, Han Ning handed the Detector over to the old professor. While Dean Wu, Leon and his daughter, and a few other teachers got busy studying the black turtles, Han Ning decided to head back and rest. Using Demonization earlier had taken a heavy toll on his Spiritual Power and Physical Ability, and he was exhausted.
「Building F.」
By now, Yin Yi and Egg Pancake had knocked out all the interior walls of the dormitory, leaving it as one vast, empty space like a large warehouse.
"CHIRP~"
Han Ning’s living quarters occupied just a small area on the first floor. The rest of the space was covered in a thick layer of dry leaves, where Egg Pancake was comfortably rolling back and forth.
Meanwhile, Yin Yi was lounging on Egg Pancake’s back, her legs crossed contentedly.
"CHIRP CHIRP!"
Just as Han Ning lay down on his bed to take a nap, Egg Pancake shuffled over. It carefully held a tablet between its claws and rested its massive head beside Han Ning’s bed.
The tiny tablet looked smaller than a sesame seed in its grasp.
"What’s up?" Han Ning smiled, turning his head to look at the massive creature, whose head alone was taller than a multi-story building.
"CHIRP!" Egg Pancake chirped twice, nudging the tiny tablet toward Han Ning.
"You want the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm to come out? What for?" Despite his question, he had the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm transform into the shape of a delicate small Egg Pancake and fly over to the larger one.
"CHIRP!"
The moment Egg Pancake saw the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm, its eyes lit up. It condensed a very thin, smooth stone stylus at the tip of its claw, expertly unlocked the screen, and tapped it a few times. SWISH SWISH.
An image appeared on the screen: an adorable, anime-style female dragon wearing a black and white maid outfit.
"CHIRP, CHIRP CHIRP!" Egg Pancake chirped excitedly at the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm, pointing at the female dragon on the screen.
"Chirp chirp?" The All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm seemed dazed, but it more or less understood what Egg Pancake wanted.
Then... as Han Ning watched with a strange expression, its body began to transform.
A chubby, magenta body, small curved horns, tiny wings...
In just a moment, a cute little female dragon with a shy expression appeared. Blinking its eyes and fluttering its tiny wings, it flew to Egg Pancake’s side and nuzzled against it.
"CHIRP, CHIRP CHIRP, CHIRP~" Egg Pancake’s grin nearly reached the back of its head. It hugged the little female dragon that the All-Encompassing Spiritual Silkworm had become and chirped nonstop.
"...Egg... Egg Pancake, when did you become such a pervert dragon?!" Han Ning was both surprised and amused to see Egg Pancake’s blissful expression.
’The once pure and innocent Egg Pancake has been totally corrupted by the internet!’
"Chirp chirp..." Hearing Han Ning, Egg Pancake let out two aggrieved chirps.
It explained that on rainy days when it couldn’t go outside, it spent its time watching these cute little female dragons on the tablet.
"Erm... ’A fair maiden is a fine prize for any gentleman,’ I suppose there’s nothing wrong with that..."
"CHIRP CHIRP!" Hearing this, Egg Pancake quickly explained that it only liked the cute, 2D anime dragons on the tablet, not the big, brawny female dragons in real life!
「...」
「That night, in the Building A conference room.」
"This afternoon, Han Ning, Mr. Leon, Lisa, and I went on an expedition... We discovered a coal mine and a peculiar new type of Soul Beast." Dean Wu, sitting behind the table, briefly explained the purpose of the meeting.
"After half a day of research, we’ve reached a preliminary understanding of this turtle. I’ll let Mr. Leon explain the details."
He gestured toward Leon, who was sitting nearby.
"If you’ll allow me to use the projector for a moment."
Leon nodded to the group, took out a USB drive, and plugged it into the computer controlling the projector. He then opened a PowerPoint file.
The presentation began. The first slide showed one of the black turtles lying on the floor, looking listless.
"This is a type of Soul Beast that lives inside coal mines. I’ve named it the Black Stone Turtle."
As he spoke, he clicked the remote, advancing to the next slide.
The second slide showed the same Black Stone Turtle, no longer listless. The image captured the "little" guy happily devouring a lump of mashed Three-eyed Worm meat offered by Leon.
The slide captured this very moment. ƒrēewebnoѵёl.cσm
"We initially believed that the Black Stone Turtles subsisted on coal, and that without it, they would grow weak and become immobile."
"However, after our researchers ran various tests, we discovered they can also regain their Physical Strength by consuming Three-eyed Worms. The recovery rate is just a bit slower compared to when they eat coal."
The next slide showed a chart comparing data from two Black Stone Turtles of similar size and build as they consumed different foods. freeweɓnovel.cѳm
The Physical Strength recovery rate was not fastest when eating only coal or only the meat paste.
The fastest recovery belonged to the Black Stone Turtle that ate a mix of coal and meat paste. Its Physical Strength recovered nearly 1.2 times faster than the one that ate only coal. When you observed them side-by-side, the difference in their vitality was obvious.
"We originally theorized that the coal on the Black Stone Turtles’ bodies was something they gathered from their environment and that it grew on them after consumption."
"That theory is indeed correct. However, what surprised me was that the Black Stone Turtle could also grow black coal on its body after eating meat paste!"
A relatively short time has passed since we captured the Black Stone Turtles. The screen showed a side-by-side comparison. The image on the left was a corner of a Black Stone Turtle’s shell that was relatively bare of coal growth.
The image on the right showed the same corner, now covered in newly grown, tiny black particles.
"This is a wonderful discovery. It means that if we feed them a specific ratio of coal and raw meat, we can harvest a continuous supply of high-quality coal from the Black Stone Turtles’ bodies."
"As you all know, converting raw coal from a mine into the various materials we need, such as coke, coal tar, or liquefied coal, requires complex screening, purification, and processing. With this high-quality coal, we can bypass those steps."
"So, why do I say the coal from the Black Stone Turtles is high-quality? Here is a series of combustion test data comparing it to ordinary anthracite coal."
Leon pointed to the data sheet with a laser pointer and said,
"As you can see, the coal from the Black Stone Turtle has over 1.3 times the burn duration and combustion efficiency of ordinary anthracite. That’s at least a 30% improvement."
"In other words, we can treat the Black Stone Turtles as mobile, high-quality coal mines."
As we all know, thermal power generation is essentially just boiling water. The water is heated to become high-temperature steam, which then drives a turbine to generate electricity.
"With high-quality, efficient-burning coal, we can significantly increase our Energy utilization rate!"
The more Leon spoke, the more excited he became. His enthusiasm was contagious, infecting everyone in the room. Even the normally placid Lü Xiuning couldn’t help but adopt a serious expression.
