"An area with a five-digit number!"
Li Yao was slightly surprised. Although he had sensed from the suffocating air that he must be very deep below the surface of the ocean, he did not expect it to be so unbelievably deep.
Any habitable planet with stable geological conditions that was suitable for human beings usually boasted a triple structure made of a core, a mantle, and a crust. The capital planet was certainly no exception.
Such a habitable planet was like an enormous egg. The core was the yolk, the mantle was the white, and the crust, which was almost fifty kilometers thick, was the thin "eggshell".
Although the crust was only a thin layer, it was the main living area and resource collection area for human beings below the ground.
In the mantle below the crust, there were magma of high temperature and pressure. A random hole would lead to a magma eruption that would destroy everything. There were also rocks that were even denser than superalloy plates. Even the most advanced drilling magical equipment might not be able to drill too deep after consuming astronomical amounts of spiritual energy. Also, the energy triggered by earthquakes was often dozens of times more powerful than the energy released by the most powerful crystal bombs of human beings. The destructive pressure and tearing force of the tectonic plates was not something that any human expert could resist, either.
In short, the mantle was a dead area that was both dangerous and unprofitable. Although the tentacles of the civilization of mankind had swept across the thousands of planets in the three thousand Sectors, they had only touched the "eggshells" on the surface of those planets. They had not, and it did not seem necessary, to delve deep into the mantle yet.
On the capital planet of the Imperium of True Human Beings, all the towns were classified into six levels according to the altitude and the development of the civilization.
The first level was the cities on the ground that had names. For example, the central government district where the Council of Elders was located was named "Black Star City" after the title of the founding emperor.
There was also "White Stone Special Zone", the center of heavy industry where Li Yao and Long Yangjun once fought fiercely. All in all, as long as a city had a name, it was usually a metropolis with a high civilization where the Immortal Cultivators were the mainstream.
Although the underground towns didn't have names and only had numbers, one could still tell the difference based on the size and number of digits in the numbers.
From "0" to "9", the ten underground towns numbered by single digits were the most important underground fortresses and military fortresses of the capital. All kinds of magical equipment, fuel, and training facilities were available. The defense system was even more rigorous than that of the cities on the ground. When the enemy came and the ground could not hold on any longer, most of the Immortal Cultivators could retreat underground and continue their resistance.
From the tenth district to the 99th district, the two-digit towns were often the residences of the destitute Immortal Cultivators and the brainworkers of the hominoids. There were also all kinds of large public facilities, such as hospitals, schools, and ventilation bases that delivered fresh air to the underground world incessantly.
Dongfang Renxin had chosen to establish his secret research institute in a two-digit town because only a two-digit town could support a hospital of such a large scale. The level-four areas from the 100th district to the 999th district, namely the bottom-level towns where the industrial workers and the manual workers of the hominoids lived, were not capable of supporting a large hospital at all.
However, the three-digit districts where the industrial workers and the bottom-level laborers lived were not the most miserable and barren areas.
Below their feet, in the underground mines and rocks more than five thousand meters deep, there were also four-digit and five-digit towns. Those towns were like forgotten corners that had been completely abandoned by the upper class of the Imperium. They did not even have the value of exploitation and were left to fend for themselves.
Li Yao had once been very interested in the four-digit and five-digit districts that were built at least five thousand meters below the ground. He tried his best to collect the materials in that regard, but what he found in the end was only a few words. It was said that the remnants living in the abyss had a civilization that had long deteriorated. Even their basic intelligence was gone. They were like the "wolf children" who had been abandoned in the jungle when they were young and raised by wild beasts. They had the appearance of human beings but the soul of wild beasts. The existence of such ignorant, ignorant creatures proved that "true human beings" and "hominoids" were not the same species. "Hominoids" were essentially beasts that resembled human beings. That was all.
The Immortal Cultivators treated the abandoned people below the ground like elephants treated ants in the mud below their feet. They completely ignored their existence and were not even interested in stomping them to death.
He did not expect that Long Yangjun would establish her nest in a five-digit underground town. What were the residents here who had been "abandoned by the civilization" like? What was Long Yangjun's so-called "scheme"?
Li Yao's head began to hurt again. Slightly frowning, he struggled to crawl out of the medical pool. Under the service of Li Jialing, he wiped himself clean, put on the mustard-seed combat suit, and put on all the Cosmos Rings, making sure that the Crystal Suit could be activated and equipped at any time. It was not until then that he was refreshed and asked, "What … is this place exactly? Where did Dongfang Mingyue go?"
"I don't know how to describe it. I've been living on the ground and on starships before. I never knew that such a place existed in the civilized world and that human beings lived in such a way."
Hesitating for a long time, Li Jialing did not know what to say. He simply said, "All in all, Brother Yao is awake now. You can take your time to look around. That … Sister Dongfang specifically told me before she left that Brother Yao was free to go wherever you wanted and see whatever you wanted. It didn't matter if you wanted to go to her. All in all, you were free to do whatever you wanted.
"However, let's not bother about that for now. Brother Yao, are you sure that you are fine? Do you want to take a look at yourself with the medical magical equipment? Sister Dongfang told me the whole picture of the battle. I did not know that Brother Yao was so tough that you could blow away Blackstar the Great in one blow. It's really … really … "
Li Yao glanced at the rusted, dusty medical magical equipment nearby and shook his head. "There's no need to take a look. I should be fine. Even if I'm wounded, it won't matter for a few days … Speaking of which, why have you been staring at my head?"
"Nothing, nothing."
The little lion shook his head hard and said in a hurry, "I only want to say that you can take care of your wounds, Brother Yao. If you have any trivial matters that require careful deduction and calculation, just leave them to me. Don't destroy your brain cells for no reason. However gifted and distinguished you are, you must take good care of yourself!"
Li Yao blinked and stared at Li Jialing suspiciously. "What's the meaning of this?"
"Nothing. I'm just … telling you to take good care of yourself!"
Li Jialing hesitated for a long time before he said, "If I don't take good care of myself, how can I fight Blackstar the Great next time?"
"Right. Speaking of which, I wonder if Dongfang Mingyue has told you —"
Li Yao said in a hurry, "After the battle ten days ago, we have confirmed that your mother was haunted by Blackstar the Great's remaining soul when she was exploring the Supreme Emperor's mausoleum decades ago, no, more than a hundred years ago. It was only in the recent decades that her illness slowly took effect. So, she couldn't have meant to kill you in the beginning!"
Biting his lips, Li Jialing said in both relief and sorrow, "I know. If possible, I will certainly banish Blackstar the Great's remaining soul from the queen's body!"
Li Yao shook his head and said, "Banishing it is not enough, because you are likely to be a carrier that he carefully prepared for himself. Should he escape from the queen's body and sneak into your body, the consequences will be even more severe.
"Thankfully, Blackstar the Great's remaining soul must've suffered heavy wounds in the battle. I estimate that his scheme will be delayed for a while, giving us some time to catch our breath. We will be able to figure out what he is up to exactly and figure out a solution!
"But first of all, let's sort out how many cards we have in our hands. Since this is Dongfang Mingyue's nest, is there a refining workshop with advanced facilities that can repair a Colossus?"
Li Jialing shook his head quickly. "No. There is only a small refining workshop here that can repair the Crystal Suit but not the Colossus."
"Fine."
Li Yao thought for a moment and realized that it did make sense. A super refining workshop that could repair a Colossus not only required enormous space, but also a steady and continuous supply of spiritual energy, as well as the support of precious resources and an entire technical team. It was indeed not something that could be found in Long Yangjun's secret base.
"Then, what do we have here?"
He asked helplessly.
Before Li Jialing replied, someone knocked on the door softly.
It was a girl in a gray cloak who pushed the door open and walked in. She had a face that was almost transparent because it had never seen sunlight before. The veins on her face were clearly visible, and her pupils were slightly red and immediately congregated into two red beans, as if they were not used to the light. But there was not the slightest expression on her face that was as delicate as porcelain. She bowed at the two of them at first and then placed an enormous tray before them, before she said, "Please enjoy, honorable guests."
Li Jialing thanked her. The girl did not say anything else but walked out of the room expressionlessly.
The girl had lived tens of thousands of meters below the ground all year round and had never been to the surface of the planet or touched real sunlight. Her appearance was already subtly different from the people on the surface of the planet and the shallow underground.
The tone was monotonous and ethereal, like the sound of water dripping from the stalactites deep underground on the rocks that were as smooth as jade. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock. It was both pleasant and weird.
Li Yao considered the girl's identity and the habits of the underground people with great interest. Judging from the girl's fluency of "please enjoy, honorable guests", he could tell that she was definitely not a "human-shaped beast" that the Immortal Cultivators made up.
He looked at the enormous metal tray before him. It should've been a very flat industrial product, but after thousands of years of use, it was riddled with bumps and hollows, but the edge was polished so that it could reflect the light clearly.
On the metal tray was a large bowl of paste that was even thicker than porridge, as well as a fragrant beast leg in the shape of a pipa. The skills of roasting beast legs were not to be underestimated. It was often possible to tell the development level of a civilization through the complexity of food processing.
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