Liu Changxu stood above the sea surrounding Yellow Mountain Island, his gaze piercing the waves and locking onto the vein deep beneath the seabed that radiated rich metal-attribute spiritual energy.
He drew a deep breath, magic power surging around him, and formed intricate hand seals to unleash his rarely used Mining Divine Ability.
In an instant, an invisible giant hand seemed to press down on the churning sea, abruptly stilling the waves. Then, centered on the vein, the seawater rapidly receded in every direction like an ebbing tide, exposing the bare rock of the seabed. The high-grade spirit gold vein lay fully revealed, its ore gleaming brilliantly in the sunlight.
"Rise!"
Liu Changxu gave a low shout and changed his hand seals.
With a thunderous boom, the rocks on the seabed exploded. Amid flying earth and stone, a towering mushroom cloud rose from the ground and shot skyward with earth-shaking force. Countless chunks of spirit gold ore were swept up by that immense power and hurled into the sky alongside the mushroom cloud, like a golden rainstorm.
At that moment, a boundless expanse of red lotus karma fire suddenly appeared across the sky, its flames roiling with heat intense enough to melt the spirit gold ore.
The airborne ore softened and melted the instant it touched the red lotus karma fire, becoming masses of dazzling golden spirit gold liquid that hovered and swirled in the air.
Then Liu Changxu concentrated power at his fingertips, and a bone-piercing surge of ice-attribute law power swept across the sky. The temperature in the formerly scorching heavens plummeted, as though they had plunged into an ice cellar in an instant.
Enveloped in the cold, the molten spirit gold rapidly cooled and solidified into sharply defined ingots of high-grade spirit gold, suspended in neat rows