Upgrade requirements

He really wanted to know whether tearing the card would actually give him a hundred jin of rice, but he worried that he would have no container to hold it.

He glanced at the regional chat channel and found everyone still complaining about the Silent White Fog around them. No one had mentioned anything like Supply Cards.

"I still have to be the first to take the plunge." Tang Zhixue looked at the Supply Card in his hand with some feeling. "There might be some risk, but the rewards can't be underestimated."

In the end, he did not tear the Supply Card.

Taking his axe, Tang Zhixue left the shelter once more.

Upgrading the shelter required quite a few materials. The Clear Spirit Trees currently within the shelter's range did not meet its upgrade requirements.

He returned to the same spot as before, where the corpse of the humanoid monster he had chopped in half at the waist still lay.

This time, however, he did not start chopping immediately. Instead, he cautiously used the Pure Heaven and Earth Divine Mantra to dispel the Silent White Fog around the Clear Spirit Tree first.

That way, if a monster attacked, he would have enough time to react.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The sound of chopping rang out again.

Whether because of the noise or something about Tang Zhixue himself, a familiar figure appeared again when he was halfway through chopping the tree.

Just as before, the humanoid monster made no sound at all within the Silent White Fog. If Tang Zhixue had not been looking up to check his surroundings from time to time as he chopped, he would never have noticed it.

He picked up the wooden pole and stood where he was, waiting warily for the monster.

"Roar!"

Sure enough!

Once the monster emerged from the Silent White Fog, its roar reached Tang Zhixue's ears, accompanied by that rotten stench.

Whoosh!

He thrust the wooden pole forward with force, sending it whistling through the air.

But the pole met nothing.

Tang Zhixue stared at the monster that had dodged to the side and could not help curling his lip. "Tch, this again."

Whoosh!

This time, he did not simply drop the pole, but swept it sideways.

"Roar!"

The pole did not miss this time. The monster was about to pounce on Tang Zhixue, only to be swept aside.

Although its torso, covered in rotten flesh, was not broken apart, it was buckled, bending backward some sixty or seventy degrees.

The monster had only been pretending to move slowly before. Now it had no choice.

Delighted at the sight, Tang Zhixue raised the pole high and brought it down hard.

"Roar!"

The monster seemed to sense the approaching danger, but its injuries left it able to do nothing except let out an unwilling roar.

Bang! Squelch!

As foul-smelling blood splattered out, a white card quietly appeared.

"Heh, these rotting walking-corpse monsters are pretty easy to deal with."

Tang Zhixue looked at the card, a little thrilled, and reached forward to take it.

[Item: Supply Card]

[Tier: 1]

[Description: Tear the card to obtain one hundred jin of premium charcoal]

"Oh, good stuff."

Tang Zhixue was even more delighted. With this charcoal, he could sleep soundly tonight.

Glancing at the half-chopped Clear Spirit Tree, Tang Zhixue turned and returned to the shelter.

He was dressed entirely in coarse hemp clothing without so much as a pocket, leaving him nowhere to put the newly dropped Supply Card.

Unlike the rice, though, there was no need to worry about where to put the charcoal. He could leave it anywhere.

He went to the corner where he kept dead branches and dry firewood, stacked them together, and cleared a patch of floor.

Riiip!

He tore hard with both hands, splitting the card containing the charcoal in two.

The torn card immediately turned into two streams of white light that fell and finally converged on the floor.

The white light soon faded, revealing a bamboo basket filled to the brim with charcoal.

"It comes with a container?!"

The instant he saw the hundred jin of charcoal, Tang Zhixue grew excited.

It was not the appearance of the charcoal that excited him, but the bamboo basket holding it.

Walking over to the table, Tang Zhixue took out the rice Supply Card and tore it open with force.

Immediately afterward, snowy white rice, also held in a bamboo basket, appeared within the white light.

"Good, good. Now I have a staple food." Tang Zhixue nodded in satisfaction.

With a staple food, he would not get hungry so easily.

It was still early. After putting the rice away, Tang Zhixue took his axe outside once again.

That Clear Spirit Tree was still only half chopped through.

When he returned to the Clear Spirit Tree, the two rotting walking corpses were still lying there, giving off a foul stench.

With disgust written all over his face, Tang Zhixue used the wooden pole to lift the corpses and toss them into the Silent White Fog.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

After he cleared away the corpses, the sound of chopping rang out again.

Crash!

Before long, the Clear Spirit Tree finally fell.

Time slowly passed.

Tang Zhixue spent the entire afternoon chopping and hauling trees, eating some White Melon to tide himself over whenever he grew thirsty or hungry.

He kept at it until the woods gradually darkened.

"One, two, three... seven!"

He had felled one Clear Spirit Tree in the morning and six in the afternoon, making seven in total.

Accounting for the Thorned Strange Black Tree and the time spent clearing rubble that morning, his efficiency was about the same.

Yet as he counted, Tang Zhixue's expression suddenly changed. "Oh no, where am I supposed to put these trees?"

Although these were only the trunks he had specifically kept, each was twelve or thirteen meters long. They would never fit inside the shelter.

"Should I cut them into suitable lengths and carry them inside?"

Tang Zhixue looked up at the increasingly dark woods. "There isn't enough time."

After some thought, he opened the shelter's information panel.

The information on it had not changed. It still showed the same contents as before.

Tang Zhixue walked over to the Clear Spirit Tree trunks in thought and said tentatively, "Well, I'm planning to use this wood as upgrade materials."

The moment he finished speaking, a streak of blue light flew out of the shelter and landed on the Clear Spirit Tree trunks.

Then the trunks vanished along with the blue light.

"Huh?"

Tang Zhixue hurriedly opened the shelter's information panel again.

[Shelter: Blazing Sun]

[Level: 1 (100/100) [Energy full, upgrade available]]

[Upgrade requirements: Provide materials yourself, and the shelter will upgrade automatically based on the materials (Note: Current energy reserves only allow the use of ordinary materials) [Clear Spirit Wood: 7/50]]

[Function: Regional trading]

[Building: Martial Arts Space]

[Effects: Door God Protection · Tier 1, Purification · Temporary]

Most of the information had not changed. Only the upgrade requirements field had gained some additional content.

"Clear Spirit Wood? The name for the timber after a Clear Spirit Tree is cut down? That fits." Tang Zhixue's brows furrowed slightly. "But that's quite a lot. It needs fifty trees in total."

At today's rate, he could fell about twelve trees a day. In other words, he would need roughly another three and a half days to meet the upgrade requirements.