Chapter 826: Cubic, Long-term Plan

After entering the hall, Xia Duo cautiously approached the statue closest to the entrance; through the Perception of Infrasonic Detection, this statue was positioned lying down, which differed in form from the three statues coiled around pedestals excavated previously.

However, in his research on the previous statues, he discovered that these statues, with a material close to obsidian, actually possessed extremely rich internal details.

Skin, muscles, blood vessels, bones, organs, and other tissues were clearly layered, as if real Sarukh Mage-Serpents had been turned into stone.

This forced him to make associations; if they were carved, he really found it hard to imagine what technique could carve the internal structure of a statue so finely and so realistically.

Therefore, upon seeing this reclining statue, Xia Duo's first reaction was: could this fellow have been lying down when it was petrified!

But regardless, since these suspected ancient time-traveling immigrants had fallen into his hands, they could only be used to expand his Personal Space.

The reason he chose this reclining statue, besides it being closest to the entrance, was primarily because it had no pedestal.

Currently, Xia Duo's Personal Space was less than one cubic meter; if it had a pedestal, this statue simply wouldn't fit inside.

Although the pedestal and the statue itself were not one piece, it was difficult for Xia Duo to distinguish where their connection surface was, and he was also precisely controlling the overlap between the Personal Space and the statue itself.

Only this reclining statue allowed him to store it in his Personal Space without much effort; perhaps there were similar ones inside, but who told it to be the closest!

……

After approaching the statue, Xia Duo controlled his Personal Space to overlap with a portion of the space around the Main Plane, with the size just about covering the entire reclining statue.

As the Personal Space separated from the Main Plane, the entire reclining statue disappeared from the Main Plane, and a not-so-small void appeared in front of Xia Duo as a result.

Accompanied by the scattered falling of soil from above the void, the Personal Space soon welcomed its first round of expansion!

An indescribable unknown existence flew out from the statue, "exploded" within the space that had become incomparably cramped after accommodating the statue itself, "blasting" out a micro-Plane, but it annihilated and disappeared in an instant.

At the same time, the Personal Space expanded rapidly, suddenly growing to nearly ten cubic meters.

Only after seeing the expansion complete did Xia Duo finally heave a sigh of relief; although the previous three statues could indeed expand the Personal Space, no one could guarantee whether the statue found this time could still expand it before actually trying.

Fortunately, everything went smoothly!

And next, there were hundreds of statues waiting for him!

If even half of the statues could expand the Personal Space, he would be satisfied!

And the fact was, almost every statue could!

Xia Duo was almost going crazy with joy; every time he stored a statue into his Personal Space, he would shout in his heart, "3 Arcane Crystals!"

According to past experience, one Standard Arcane Crystal could expand the Personal Space by about three cubic meters, while one statue could expand it by nearly ten cubic meters.

In other words, every statue he picked up was equivalent to earning 3 Standard Arcane Crystals for free.

And one Standard Arcane Crystal had a market price in Netheril of at least 5000 Gold Coins, and often one couldn't buy one even with the Gold Coins in hand.

If Xia Duo manufactured them himself, with his current Arcane Fire state, the Arcane Crystal produced by storing full Arcane Energy was only about 1/50th of a Standard Arcane Crystal.

And if it were back when he had just successfully advanced, it was only about 1/100th.

That is to say, picking up one statue was equivalent to him repeating the manufacture of Arcane Crystals 150 times, and this was even ignoring the energy required for the Arcane Fire to absorb energy.

If one truly counted the time required for the Arcane Fire to absorb energy, if Xia Duo didn't waste a single bit of Arcane Energy, it would take at least nearly two months to accumulate one Standard Arcane Crystal.

Now, just by picking one up casually, it was equivalent to saving six months of time, or Gold Coins; how could Xia Duo not be crazy with joy!

If he weren't currently in the state of Turn into Earth and Stone, he would have burst into song!

If there was anything in this world happier than picking up money, it should be picking up more money!

……

Soon, under the continuous expansion, Xia Duo's Personal Space finally reached 1000 cubic meters, and at this moment, Xia Duo finally calmed down.

He couldn't continue; although not even half of these statues had been used, 1000 cubic meters of space had long exceeded his normal needs.

And these statues, besides expanding space, might have other uses.

Not to mention anything else, just the micro-Plane "blasted" out by the mysterious existence flying out of the statue was worth his study.

If they were all "blasted" away now, when he thought of wanting to study them later, he might not necessarily be able to find similar statues!

As for why he didn't study them now, Xia Duo wanted to, but his current understanding of the Plane was limited to the surface, and it was also very shallow.

He couldn't even get started with the appearance and disappearance of that kind of micro-Plane; he could only wait until he had more understanding of the Plane Domain in the future to utilize these statues more properly.

Let them stay underground for now!

Xia Duo even released the statues he had previously stored in his Personal Space for expansion; he already had three statues at the Tower of Time, so he didn't mind these hundred-plus ones.

Anyway, whenever he wanted them, he would come back to get them; this was called "take as you need"!

……

Taking one last look at the underground ruins, Xia Duo returned to the Surface with excitement; after turning back into his original form, the smugly upturned corners of his mouth did not drop until he returned to the Tower of Time.

Just this one haul, he was equivalent to picking up 1.5 million Gold Coins for free, and there were still more in those underground ruins!

From his transmigration until now, excluding those intangible gains, all his total harvests combined might not even add up to 1.5 million Gold Coins!

Previously he lamented, "Worked hard for several years, returned to pre-liberation overnight," but now he was truly "the emancipated serf singing a song"!

However, human desires are always hard to satisfy; after calming down, facing this Personal Space that was clearly ten times its original 100 cubic meters, Xia Duo thought of even more!

Currently, his Personal Space only had space; everything else, including air, was "taken" in from the outside world.

What if the Personal Space itself possessed these!

For example, land, for example, air, for example, Water Source, for example, the sky, and even the sun, moon, stars, life, and civilization; by that time, perhaps it would be called a Personal Plane!

Previously, the Personal Space had always been very small, and Xia Duo didn't dare to hope for too much, only able to make some long-term plans, but now that the Personal Space had finally grown, a concrete plan to transform the space into a Plane should also be included in his agenda!

At the very least, he couldn't completely regard it as a fantasy; even if there was only a sliver of possibility, it was necessary to consider it seriously!