Chapter 831: Experiment

Since Gong Xiansheng had left, only the Shengnyu remained alone in the center of Wan Shen Gu.

In truth, her knights had gone to see the guest off and returned quickly, but they did not enter the inner valley, remaining instead in her reception room to wait. If she had need, she could summon any one of these loyal and brave knights to run errands at any time, but she did not want to call a single one.

Beside the abandoned construction site of the Great Ship, the Shengnyu had a workshop of her own; she had worked and directed operations here when the ship was being built, serving as the chief technical officer. Back then, she was so busy she could not get a full night's sleep for days, yet it was a period of time she missed dearly. During that time, she did not have to worry about anything else at all, only focusing on the research she loved most; she had whatever resources she needed, whatever assistants she required, any idea she had was immediately verified by someone, and any breakthrough could be put to practical use instantly—those were truly dreamlike days.

Therefore, after the Great Ship sailed away, she did not dismantle the studio, but instead used it as her private laboratory, moving her most precious instruments and materials inside. When she had nothing to do, she would soak here alone, conducting independent research. Because almost all the technicians besides her had to go do follow-up work on the Airship project, there were no professional assistants to help her; at most, she would occasionally ask Gong Xiansheng to lend her a hand. As for those brawny knights, the Shengnyu spent more than half her time staring at them to prevent them from acting recklessly whenever they came in.

Today, because Gong Xiansheng was helping her do the most difficult tasks, she had dismissed her visitors in less time than usual, and instead managed to carve out a little time for herself. After thinking it over, she took out the experiment she hadn't finished yesterday to continue working on it.

This was not a complex experiment, merely the study of a new material. This material had been newly sent by Gong Xiansheng, who said it was found over in the Human World, to see if it could be broken down and added to the Divine Martial Medicine to develop a new type of medicine.

In truth, the Shengnyu was a bit curious as to why Gong Yubai was still focused on the Divine Martial Medicine at this late hour; that was originally intended for creating "pseudo" Divine Martial Artists within the Holy Moon Sect. Gong Yubai himself said that the Holy Moon Sect could not compete with the official side in terms of the number of Sword Guests, and only by creating enough Divine Martial Artists could they contend with the Sword Guests, launch an uprising, overthrow the Human World Imperial Court, establish the Divine Martial Dynasty, and then step by step push back into the Suiyu, launching a pincer attack with the Lingjie to destroy the Sword Guests' rebel stronghold, Jianshan, in one fell swoop.

This plan sounded feasible, especially since she had been to the Human World; the Human World was currently very chaotic, and although there were many powerful Sword Guests, they were each fighting their own battles and were too busy destroying themselves to care about anything else, making it almost impossible for them to unite against a common enemy when threatened. At such a time, if a Divine Martial army were to intervene forcefully, perhaps they really could destroy their leaders and succeed in one stroke.

However, even if things went smoothly, it would take several years to create enough Divine Martial Artists to form an army. Currently, the Divine Martial Medicines were still experimental products; each batch had different effects, and three or four out of every ten could be called deadly poisons. It could be said that the formula hadn't even been finalized, let alone stable mass production.

At this point in time, with the world set to be destroyed in just over a month, what was the point of creating a few more Divine Martial Artists, even if they were powerful ones? Could it be that the gods of the Lingjie would let those second-rate Divine Martial barbarians board the ship just because they were also Divine Martial Artists?

But Gong Yubai was still actively pushing for development, providing several new ideas and sending over new materials. The Shengnyu happened to have some free time, and since Gong Xiansheng was out doing things for her, it was only right that she help him out a little at home.

Thus, she took out a huge Mirror and began to study this piece of pure black material.

"This looks... not like earth or stone, but a biological material, right?"

In the Mirror, which was capable of magnifying her field of vision a hundredfold, she faintly sensed a breath of life, though it was very well hidden.

Hidden...

Yes, it was as if it had been covered up.

She pondered for a moment, put on her Spider Silk Gloves, and used tweezers to touch it slightly, nodding as she said, "Sure enough, this black layer on top is an outer coating."

Adjusting the angle, she observed the coating closely and found it to be very uniform and thick, tight and without gaps; it could not be scraped off by ordinary scraping, and required some forceful means.

By this time, she was already somewhat attracted to the research itself; even if this material were useless, her curiosity drove her to want to peel off the outer layer and see what was inside.

"What kind of thing has Gong Xiansheng picked up?" She used a scraping blade made of the hardest material to carefully scrape it, but it barely moved, and she had to use other means, rubbing, drilling...

After using various methods, she had to admit that worrying about damaging the material was overthinking it; being able to destroy this object was the real skill.

"Honestly, if I don't use a bit of strength, you wouldn't even know I'm a Divine Martial Artist."

When the Shengnyu did experiments alone, she liked to talk to herself and would even engage in roleplay, just like a little girl playing house; it was a cozy relaxation for a lonely person.

Wrestling with this material took up her entire afternoon, and she kept channeling her Divine Martial Spiritual Power, only seeing a glimmer of hope by evening.

"Huh... is it actually this color? How strange!"

She saw that the wound she had scraped open was actually a bright Luse, and she could not help but be very surprised; apart from the green shoots of early Spring, ordinary ores would not have such a vivid green, and even malachite was not as bright as this.

But then she discovered that wasn't all; as the wound extended further, it quickly turned from green to yellow, a very distinct apricot yellow, and extending to the other side, the green turned into an equally vivid violet.

In the end, after spending quite some time scraping away a small half, she discovered that the inside was actually a riot of colors.

It was just like oil floating on water, reflecting colors when illuminated by the sun—variegated and dazzling. It was even more dazzling and dense than that.

Such vivid and intense colors looked particularly "full," making one feel a bit uncomfortable; it was probably related to human instinct, feeling that such a bright and changeable object was poisonous and should be avoided.

However, the Shengnyu did not have such concerns; having done experiments for years, she had handled many extremely dangerous materials—some deadly poisonous, some corrosive, and some radioactive, which would cause harm just by standing there, even if she did nothing.

So she had long since moved this material into an isolation vessel, inlaying a circle of Strange Stone on the outside. Strange Stone was a very powerful insulating material, and no radiation could penetrate it.

However, this limited her view; the Strange Stone was dull and opaque on all sides, and she could almost only observe it through the transparent Mirror on top.

"If the Holy Spring could make the Strange Stone transparent, that would be great." She thought that even today, the Holy Spring's material modification could not precisely specify a direction, and she thought that might be caused by the incompleteness of the Holy Spring's power. Once Gong Xiansheng returned with the Holy Fire and the Holy Spring was upgraded again, perhaps she could truly achieve "turning stone into gold."

She continued her experiment, wanting to cut off another sample to drop into different medicinal liquids to see the changes in properties, but it became increasingly difficult; while the outer layer could still be scraped away a little with effort, this multicolored core was extremely hard, and no material could damage it.

"If you push me too far, I'll go find a sharp sword to try you out! They all say their swords are indestructible and can cut through anything, I wonder what would happen if you two touched?"

She was just saying it; she wouldn't really take a sword. For one, she couldn't find one. In truth, after fighting the Human World and the Lingjie for so many years, there had been many captures. There were many captured swords, but they hadn't fallen into the hands of the Lingjie people. Because swords were the gods' favorite offerings, all gods needed swords. Any captured sword was offered to the gods, and according to divine law, privately hiding a sword without offering it was a grave sin against the gods. Therefore, there were very few swords publicly visible in the Lingjie, and no Lingjie person dared to become a Sword Guest privately; the Shengnyu did not have one here either. Even if Gong Xiansheng was from the Human World side, he was not a Sword Guest; he only had the strength comparable to a top-tier Sword Hero through special methods.

But even if there were one, the Shengnyu would not want to use it. Like other Lingjie people, she did not think swords were all that powerful. If they were so powerful, why were they still being suppressed by them? Moreover, in the Shengnyu's view, a person being chosen by a sword and having their cultivation path dictated—having to align with the sword's will in order to cultivate—was inherently stupid. It was far inferior to the freedom of Divine Martial. So she intended to use Divine Martial Power to "open the eyes" of that strange thing.

She was currently practicing the "Sacred Heart Pure Intent Method," a Divine Martial technique exclusive to the Shengnyu. With a movement of her heart, her tweezers were wrapped in pure Divine Martial Spiritual Power—a white so pure it was without a single flaw. Unlike the Qi of the Human World, which was almost solidified like a solid, Divine Martial Spiritual Power was always flowing, flowing slowly and silkily like mercury; it was more agile than Qi, yet contained power that was second to none.

But when her Divine Martial Spiritual Power wrapped around the tweezers and reached in from the top, making slight contact with the multicolored material, it suddenly froze, and her complexion changed drastically—

She clearly felt that her Divine Martial Spiritual Power, and even her entire body's strength, energy, and even her more essential life force, were leaking out along the tweezers like a floodgate being opened!

No!

Stop quickly!

She immediately wanted to pull her hand away to cut off the channel through which her power was leaking, but the tweezers were as if welded to the material, and no matter what, she could not pull them away, while the power was leaking faster and faster, so fast that she quickly lost the strength to free herself.

In fact, at the very beginning, she still had a chance to call for help. As quiet as this place was, it was hard to say it was foolproof; to protect the Shengnyu and those precious materials, a distress device was installed just one step away inside the room. She didn't need to walk; as long as she leaned over and stretched out her arm to reach for it, a group of knights would rush in to save her in an instant. However, her first reaction was to struggle free herself, and with that struggle, her power leaked out even faster, and she immediately went limp, no longer having the strength to reach out. She swayed as she raised her hand, but it fell back down after only being raised halfway.

I... am I going to die?

Just like this?

What kind of monster is this...

Why... did you send this kind of thing to me?

Her consciousness gradually blurred, and her mind went blank.

Suddenly, there was a flash of golden light before her eyes, and the table in front of her, along with the container and the material inside, were swept away!

She suddenly lost her support and fell, but someone caught her.

"Y-you are..."