Ultra-High Efficiency of the Raging Tiger I Floating Land Mining Vehicle

Ultra-High Efficiency of the Raging Tiger I Floating Land Mining Vehicle

About half an hour passed, and the Fierce Tiger Mining Vehicle's onboard intelligence issued another prompt.

"Radiation from 'Mithril ore' detected on a fragment at left-side coordinates xxxxx. Preliminary estimate: over ten tons."

Song Chi instinctively wanted to ignore it, then suddenly realized what he had heard.

"Mithril? And over ten tons?"

If he remembered correctly, Mithril was an even more valuable resource than Adamantine. Adamantine averaged around one strand of Zero-Rank Floating Continent Essence per ton, while Mithril sold for as much as five strands per ton.

If there truly were more than ten tons of Mithril, it was absolutely worth mining. Fifty strands of Zero-Rank Floating Continent Essence might not sound like much, but it was no small amount.

Song Chi had received a thousand strands of Zero-Rank Floating Continent Essence as starting capital only because he had two parents who were both Kindling captains. For ordinary Kindling Starships that had only recently awakened, the gains from a single Alien Starfield Exploration were usually only around a hundred strands. These fifty strands were already half that amount.

Without much hesitation, he controlled the Cangqiong to turn left and carefully headed toward the coordinates of the small fragment suspected to contain Mithril.

Song Chi was in no hurry. As he advanced, he continued checking the radar display at all times.

After cultivating the Guidance Art to lv4, he had gained more than merely physical improvements. The enhancement to his mental faculties was no less impressive. Multitasking between two things was basic; it was said that once the Guidance Art reached an extremely high level, handling ten tasks at once—or even more—would not be difficult.

Although the standard Sky-Patrol Radar could not detect life-force fluctuations, it could still detect high-level starsea creatures speeding at full tilt, or specialized warships from alien starsea civilizations drawing near.

Still, the odds of encountering high-level starsea creatures or advanced alien civilizations during the first welfare distribution were extremely low. No other mishaps occurred, and the Cangqiong soon arrived at the target fragment.

This was a small fragment dozens of meters long, vastly larger than the Cangqiong. Song Ran did not immediately lower the mining vehicle. Instead, he had the Cangqiong circle the area once. Only after thoroughly ruling out danger did he control the shuttle to land on the target fragment.

After that, there was nothing more for him to do. The onboard intelligence of the Raging Tiger I Floating Land Mining Vehicle automatically controlled the vehicle as it left the Cangqiong's hangar. After reaching the area with the strongest radiation, it began mining on its own.

Inside the Cangqiong, Song Chi waited quietly. Though his face appeared expressionless, he was deeply satisfied. The Raging Tiger Mining Vehicle might have been expensive, but its work efficiency was truly impressive.

If other newly awakened Kindling captains had to mine manually, extracting these ten tons of Mithril would take at least five hours. At the Raging Tiger Mining Vehicle's current efficiency, it would take no more than forty minutes.

The facts proved Song Chi's guess correct. Thirty-five minutes later, the Raging Tiger I Floating Land Mining Vehicle returned to the Cangqiong's hangar carrying ten tons of Mithril, taking less than forty minutes in total.

Song Chi entered the Market Ruins as quickly as possible and piled all ten tons of Mithril in an empty area there. Then, the exploration continued.

Two hours later.

The Cangqiong was still slowly weaving through the fragment belt. Since finding the ten tons of Mithril, it had yet to detect anything worth a second mining operation. Either the value was too low, or the quantity was too small.

However, the more than eight tons of raw Adamantine ore detected by the prospector not long ago did tempt him somewhat. Although some of it would be lost during refining, it could still sell for five or six strands of Zero-Rank Floating Continent Essence. Even a mosquito's leg was meat; it was better than wandering around aimlessly.

Just as he was hesitating, the mining vehicle's onboard intelligence issued another reminder.

"A moderate 'Purple Copper' radiation zone discovered. Conservative estimate places Purple Copper reserves at over five hundred tons. Fragment coordinates: xxxxx."

Song Chi raised a brow and immediately snapped out of his indecision. Detailed information about Purple Copper also surfaced in his mind.

Purple Copper was a low-grade metal resource, usually selling for around five tons per strand of Zero-Rank Floating Continent Essence. It was not particularly valuable.

But quantity mattered. With a conservative estimate of over five hundred tons, mining it all would bring in at least a hundred strands of Zero-Rank Floating Continent Essence.

If other low-grade Kindling Starships encountered it, they would most likely leave it alone. Setting aside whether they carried a Fierce Tiger Mining Vehicle with them, even if they managed to mine it all, transporting it back afterward would be a problem.

But Song Chi was different. With the Myriad Heavens Market and a Raging Tiger I Floating Land Mining Vehicle, he was determined to claim these hundreds of tons of Purple Copper.

He acted immediately. Just as before, after reaching the target fragment, he first made a circuit around it. Only after confirming that there was no danger did he lower the mining vehicle and let it begin mining on its own.

Mining several hundred tons of Purple Copper was not difficult, but it clearly could not be completed in a short time. To avoid wasting that time, Song Chi removed the Mining Vehicle Prospector again.

He planned to use the interval while the mining vehicle worked to survey the surrounding area first. That way, once the Raging Tiger Mining Vehicle finished extracting this batch of Purple Copper, it could immediately begin the next round of work.

Although removing the prospector would somewhat affect the Raging Tiger Mining Vehicle's mining speed, separating the two for a while was more cost-effective when the benefits were weighed against each other.

Before leaving, the still somewhat uneasy Song Chi left behind three Fire Sunflower Soldiers to guard the fragment, lest the considerable commotion from the Raging Tiger Mining Vehicle's work draw the attention of unknown creatures.

Several hours later, hundreds of kilometers away from the fragment where the Raging Tiger Mining Vehicle was located, the Cangqiong's speed faltered slightly as another prompt came from the prospector.

Because there was no onboard intelligence to provide active alerts, Song Chi could only leave the pilot's seat and inspect it manually.

"Mercury Crystal, ten kilograms. This stuff is even more valuable than Mithril, but the quantity is too small. It isn't worth mining."

Just then, the Sky-Patrol Radar on the console behind him suddenly began sounding repeated alarms. Song Chi reacted swiftly and rushed back to the cockpit. His gaze swept back and forth between the radar display and the projection screen.

He quickly identified the source of the radar alert. On the radar display, within a fragment belt thousands of kilometers away, hundreds of fragments that had originally been stationary had shifted noticeably almost at the same time.

This was clearly abnormal. Otherwise, the Sky-Patrol Radar would not have issued an alarm.

Song Chi narrowed his eyes, his expression grave. Causing such a disturbance was clearly beyond what Zero Rank energy fluctuations could achieve.

At that thought, he instinctively shrank his neck, unwilling to go over and join the commotion.

PS: I didn't get this week's recommendation slot and will have to wait until next week, so there will only be one update today.