Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

”You are too kind, Dean Wei.”

Li Yao knew that Wei Wenyao was speaking the truth. Real scholars and Cultivators did not have so much time for social activities. It was more usual that they complained that they did not have enough time.

Li Yao had similar experiences, too. If his training had entered the most crucial procedure and he was asked to abandon his work in order to welcome an unfamiliar guest, he wouldn’t have been too happy about it, either.

”Dean Wei, I do not like formalities, either. Just consider me a regular visiting scholar. Miss Xie Anan can stay and show me around, but Master Hou and Miss Long both have new ideas that they are desperate to test out. There’s no need to waste their time,” Li Yao said.

”Oh?”

Wei Wenyao was dazed for a moment. Seeing the ecstasy and eagerness on their faces, he was quite surprised because it was different from what he had imagined.

Hou Zitao, Long Yunxin, and the rest of them looked at each other. They bade farewell to Li Yao respectfully before they nodded at Wei Wenyao and rushed out of the room in the blink of an eye. Wei Wenyao was even more surprised.

Wei Wenyao thought for a moment and asked, ”I wonder, is there any particular project that you would like to work on?”

Generally speaking, common visitors had already reached out to an expert or professor in Flying Star University and discussed the possibility of their cooperation before they came to the college. The experts and professors of Flying Star University often filed applications and invited the visiting scholars to come.

Naturally, before their arrival, their research field had been mostly fixed.

But Li Yao was an exception. Wei Wenyao did not have high expectations for his skill in refining, either. He was merely posing a random question.

”I’m very interested in the studies of middle- and small-sized magical equipment in your department, especially that related to crystal suits. I know several experts in your department to be authorities of the trade. Their laboratories are among the most famous laboratories in the Flying Star Sector. Can I pay a visit to those laboratories first?” Li Yao asked.

He activated the light beam and listed the laboratories that he wanted to visit.

Wei Wenyao glanced at them and coughed. ”Some of them are available, but some of them are conducting important experiments today and will not be open in the coming few days. You can visit them later.”

However, he was not telling the truth.

Although many middle-aged and young refiners in the Refining Department welcomed Li Yao’s arrival, some real big shots did not think too highly of the unfamiliar guest.

Those authorities were as respected as Wei Wenyao in the circle of refiners, if not more. They were quite famous and never in lack of patrons.

Many of them were elders or even previous leaders of certain sects, or the masters of a noble family of refining. They were never short of funding.

Such people valued their honor and integrity more than anything, and there was no way that they would open their laboratories to a barbarian from a godforsaken planet.

Naturally, Wei Wenyao wouldn’t be so blunt as to tell Li Yao that.

He picked several laboratories in Li Yao’s list whose owners he had talked to before. He then settled the visiting hours with Li Yao, before he sent the detailed information and routes to Li Yao’s and Xie Anan’s mini crystal processors.

After that, Li Yao started touring the No. 1 refining center with Xie Anan as his guide.

Flying Star University truly deserved to the one of the two supreme colleges in the Flying Star Sector. The No. 1 refining center alone was larger than the entire Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution in Li Yao’s memory. The myriad of glamorous magical equipment he saw in certain open laboratories could almost have been compared to the booth of the Refining Department of Deep Sea University.

The finely-made tools and facilities inside the professional refining chambers were great eye-openers for Li Yao, who was greatly enjoying himself.

Many of the tools and facilities had been developed by Flying Star University itself. The sophisticated technology involved in them completely hooked Li Yao.

His style was quite a surprise for the owners of the laboratories, too, because it was beyond their expectation.

However, the refiners all secretly chuckled when they saw that Li Yao was so horny that he was about to jump onto the magical equipment. Bumpkins were bumpkins after all! He must have never seen anything so fantastic!

In more than half a day, Li Yao visited nine laboratories with great interest, but he still felt that he was not entirely satisfied.

Xie Anan, on the other hand, couldn’t take it any longer. She apologized to Li Yao, blushing, and hurried to go to the bathroom.

Li Yao roamed in the hallway joyfully, his hands behind his back. Many pictures of classic magical equipment were hanging on the walls of the hallway. They were fine artworks and worth appreciating.

After enjoying three pictures, his eyes suddenly brushed past a close door, on the top of which, two magnificent words were written: ’Ares Laboratory’.

Li Yao suddenly thought of something.

The owner of the laboratory was Xue Yuanxin, one of the top experts in crystal suits in the Flying Star Sector. He had been the First Armadominus in Red Line School, one of the three main crystal suit centers, in his early years and devised quite a few classic crystal suits, many of which were still equipped by a large number of Cultivators even today.

After leaving the Red Line School, Xue Yuanxin joined Flying Star University. He had dedicated himself to the development of Ares Extensions, a different field, instead of continuing crafting crystal suits.

”The damage of normal crystal suits cannot satisfy my imagination now. Only the Ares Extensions can possibly realize my dream of blowing up a starship with one punch!”

That was Xue Yuanxin’s answer when the reporters asked him.

Crystal suits were Li Yao’s specialty, too. He also had firsthand experience on building an Ares Extension on Iron Plateau. However, he had never learned the arts of the Ares Extensions systematically after all. The ’Apocalypse Extension’ he had refined last time were merely a simple amalgamation of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, which was the biggest reason Yan Xibei had destroyed it so easily.

If all the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures had been carefully concerted and a real Ares Extension crafted, Li Yao estimated that Yan Xibei would’ve been suppressed by him directly.

Therefore, this Master Xue Yuanxin was on the top of the list of experts that he wanted to communicate with.

It was a pity that Master Xue was in the middle of an important experiment today, and his laboratory was closed.

Li Yao sighed, not without regret. He was about to leave, when he suddenly sensed very weak shaking.

He sniffed and smelled a vague uncanny scent.

Advanced laboratories were mostly soundproof and fully-enclosed. If he could feel weak quakes in the hallway, an enormous shaking must have taken place inside the Ares Laboratory. Together with the uncanny scent and the violent spiritual energy of the fire class, Li Yao inferred that a small explosion had occurred inside the laboratory.

As he expected, a moment later, the red light on the top of the Ares Laboratory started blinking, and the door glided to the sideways. A cluster of white smoke mixed with flames flooded out of the room.

Many refiners who had dust all over their faces ran out while coughing. Some of them were spraying foam and water with antifire magical equipment. The flames were quickly put out, but the vaporized water made the spot even foggier.

The practice of refining could be really dangerous; explosions were nothing but normal. The refiners were anxious but not disordered. They extinguished the fire in a neat fashion according to the standard procedure.

Li Yao did not want to interject. Every laboratory had its own regulations and exigency plans in case of explosions. Who should run away, who should hide themselves, and who was responsible for putting out the fire were all listed clearly in the plans.

If an outsider barged in recklessly, not only would they be of no help, they would also disrupt the pace of the team.

However, while he was watching them doing their job, he suddenly felt weird waves from inside the laboratory. A sense of danger pierced through his soul like an invisible venomous sting!

”Not good!”

Li Yao’s pupils suddenly constricted. He stomped on the ground so hard that his boots turned into powder and left two shallow traces on the floor, before he turned into a streak of darkness and darted into the laboratory!

The laboratory was almost a thousand square meters, with a hollow in the middle that was more than twenty meters deep. It occupied quite a few floors of the refining center.

A ball-like furnace was revolving slowly under the influence of the magnetic field in the hollow at the center of the laboratory, supported by anti-gravity rune arrays.

It was ’Gold Ball XII’, an advanced floating furnace and one of the top-tier furnaces in the Flying Star Sector. It was most suitable for refining solo magical equipment such as blades, crystal suits, or strengthening components.

But at that moment, a crack more than two meters long had appeared on the left side of ’Gold Ball’, from which colorful steam was jetting out. Li Yao couldn’t help but feel pitiful, seeing the miserable appearance.

In the middle of the smoke, many refiners wearing heatproof suits were spraying foam with cylinder-shaped antifire magical equipment. The purple foam contained abundant spiritual energy of the water class and could neutralize the high temperature. They were very mild and wouldn’t affect most Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures.

One of them glared at Li Yao. ”It is dangerous here. Get out!”

”Of course, it is dangerous!”

Having no time to explain anything, Li Yao summoned his spiritual energy to form a cluster of high-pressure gas around him to avoid the invasion of heat, before he condensed a thin layer of spiritual energy around his body as if he had put on a silver shining armor.

While everybody’s exclaimed, Li Yao dashed into the gold ball in a streak of brightness.

”Ah!”

Everybody exclaimed once more in shock.

Right now, the temperature inside the furnace was still more than 1,000 degrees. Even iron would be melted. But the man had rushed into it even without a crystal suit. He was merely committing suicide!

However, how could they have stopped him even if they wanted to with their capability?

Before they came back to themselves, Li Yao had already crawled out of the gold ball, with two objects about to be melted in his hands that were enveloped in his spiritual gas. He kept them far away from each other while he shouted at everyone, ”Spray the cooling liquids!”

Li Yao’s voice contained unstoppable strength like a sharp axe. Everybody shuddered and sprayed cooling liquids on the objects.

It was not until the two objects were enshrouded by purple icy fog and the irritating spiritual energy inside of them gradually calmed down that Li Yao took a long breath in relief. His clothes had been soaked in sweat, and he found it hard to stand on his feet.

It was too dangerous. That one second just now had been even more dangerous than the moment when he confronted Yan Xibei!