Golden Miner

"So, it seemed my bargain-bin parents, whom I had never even met, might have hidden quite a few secrets..."

Jiang Ran's thoughts drifted beyond the nine heavens.

Su Xue's reappearance proved many things.

First, the name Jiang Ran had likely been completely cleared of suspicion. In the police's eyes, he was absolutely the image of "a good kid who wasn't good at studying."

Second...

The police were looking for something, and it was very likely the same thing the demonic cultivators were after.

However, the danger had temporarily passed. Every sign indicated that no one knew where that thing actually was.

Jiang Ran searched through his memories but found nothing useful.

His predecessor's parents had left behind no useful information. Their deaths had been sudden and clean-cut.

"Whatever. It probably has nothing to do with me..."

Jiang Ran shook his head and stopped dwelling on it.

The demonic cultivators had abducted so many children. Clearly, those people did not know exactly whom they were looking for either.

For now, mining to make money and cultivating properly were more important!

Jiang Ran carefully pulled a jade stone from his waist. The two-finger-sized stone radiated a soft, lustrous glow.

—A Spirit Stone.

This was a standard low-grade Spirit Stone, priced at one thousand Tianlu Coins.

He opened the rear compartment of the red impact drill and solemnly stuffed the Spirit Stone inside.

"Big baby, I'm counting on you..."

Jiang Ran stroked the drill body, then followed the instructions and sent a strand of spiritual power into it.

"Bzzzz..."

The Dexi impact drill activated instantly, its red drill bit spinning at high speed.

[Power: Level 1]

[Remaining spiritual energy: 99.9%]

Jiang Ran did not hesitate, his face full of excitement.

He found an exposed chunk of Vermilion Dense Iron ore and pressed the drill against its edge.

The drill bit spun madly, throwing off faint sparks.

With remarkable ease, the bit broke through the surrounding earth and rock, rapidly chiseling and shaking them loose.

Vermilion Dense Iron itself was a Qi Assimilation spiritual material, but most of these Vermilion Dense Iron ores lay exposed.

There was no need to dig too deeply. He only needed to break apart the surrounding earth and rock to remove them.

In less than twenty minutes, a complete piece of Vermilion Dense Iron ore had been fully excavated.

"Awesome!" Jiang Ran held the ore in his hands, ecstatic beyond measure.

Not long ago, he had sold three pieces of Vermilion Dense Iron ore to Lin's Ore Language at Immortal Industry Department Store.

Those three ores had weighed about the same as the one in his hands, yet they had sold for the lofty price of twenty-six thousand Tianlu Coins.

In other words, Jiang Ran had earned another twenty-six thousand in just twenty minutes!

This was way too good. It was no different from picking up money off the ground.

He checked the display: [Remaining spiritual energy: 93.2%]

"It burns through it that fast..." Jiang Ran frowned slightly.

The impact drill's spiritual energy consumption was proportional to its intensity of use.

Although he already knew that a low-grade Spirit Stone would not last long, this enormous rate of consumption still startled him.

Nearly seven percent of its spiritual energy had been used in twenty minutes.

By that calculation, one low-grade Spirit Stone could at most mine a dozen or so larger ores.

"Enough, enough. A man can't be too greedy!"

Jiang Ran smiled, his fighting spirit rising once more.

One piece of raw ore was worth twenty-six thousand. A dozen or so pieces meant earnings of at least three hundred thousand.

A finished low-grade Spirit Stone cost only one thousand.

Three hundred thousand in profit off a thousand in costs... what more could he ask for?

He got straight to work. Seeing no one around, Jiang Ran let loose and began mining.

It had to be said that the Dexi drill truly deserved to be called a high-end product made by a top-tier corporation.

Its superior performance was not only reflected in its formidable drilling power, but also in all manner of small details.

For example, a special weak-force formation had been inscribed at the rear of the drill body. This offset the recoil from striking spiritual materials, producing almost no vibration.

Jiang Ran moved quickly, growing more skilled the more he dug.

The afternoon passed in the blink of an eye, and more than thirty ores of varying sizes had piled up before him.

With a wave of his hand, all the ores vanished, stored within the Chaos Space.

The Cross-Boundary Gate gave off a hazy purple mist, with the ores piled before it.

This was another use Jiang Ran had discovered—storage.

Storage artifacts were not uncommon in Pingjiang. Any artifact shop sold them, but their prices were extremely steep, often starting at over a hundred thousand.

The Chaos Space could store items, saving Jiang Ran a very real amount of money.

"About enough."

He looked at the drill in his hand: [Remaining spiritual energy: 21.1%]

Mining more than thirty ores in one afternoon had naturally consumed a tremendous amount. This was already his second Spirit Stone, and its spiritual energy was nearly depleted.

Spirit Stones were being consumed faster than he had imagined.

The deeper he dug, the more deeply embedded the ores became in the earth and rock, and the harder they were to excavate.

At times, he even had no choice but to raise the impact drill to "Level 2," which naturally consumed even more spiritual energy from the Spirit Stone.

"Enough, enough. I'll switch locations and dig again tomorrow!"

Jiang Ran was in incomparably high spirits.

The Hundred Yue Sect had assigned a heavy mining task. Everyone had to hand in sixty jin of ore within half a month.

But for him, it posed no difficulty at all. Sixty jin was at most the weight of two or three large ores.

Even after setting aside sixty jin for the assignment, he still had more than three hundred jin of ore in hand.

Converted into Tianlu currency... it was worth at least five hundred thousand!

One man, one afternoon, one drill, five hundred thousand.

Amazing. It was simply amazing.

In Pingjiang, money could almost represent everything.

Cultivation techniques, potions, artifacts, Spirit Stones, even Spirit Roots...

All of them could be bought with money!

Jiang Ran had already begun imagining the future.

"First, I'll buy a hundred thousand Spirit Stones and cultivate while lying on top of them. Then I'll buy a top-grade spiritual artifact!"

"Oh, right. I absolutely have to replace this with a Superior Spirit Root too!"

Five hundred thousand a day, five million in ten days, and in a year...

Jiang Ran packed up his belongings, found a relatively well-ventilated corner, and began meditating to cultivate.

Mining was important, but cultivation was even more important.

It was not that he did not want to mine more ore.

The truth was that the Spirit Stones in his pocket were far too limited.

He had earned over twenty thousand from selling ore. After keeping some funds in reserve, he had exchanged the rest for Spirit Stones, obtaining only fifteen.

On top of that, three Spirit Stones had been among the care package Officer Su Xue brought him.

His entire fortune amounted to a mere eighteen low-grade Spirit Stones.

In less than half a day that afternoon, he had already used nearly two Spirit Stones.

If he truly went all out, he could use at least four Spirit Stones in a single day. Eighteen Spirit Stones would last him no more than four or five days.

And the Cross-Boundary Gate's cooldown lasted a full seven days...

"When I return to Pingjiang this time, I have to stock up on more Spirit Stones."

Jiang Ran gradually settled his mind and entered a state of cultivation.

At his waist, a faint azure spiritual radiance swayed gently.

Vaguely, it seemed to mingle with the spiritual power circulating within his dantian.

It was qi—the seventh-rank True Qi, Ice-Lake Spirit-Water Qi.

The steward of the Hundred-Yue Immortal Sect had once explained that keeping True Qi on one's person at all times could benefit cultivation.

At this moment, Jiang Ran seemed to have truly formed some kind of resonance with the True Qi.