Chapter 3663: New Discovery

When Ye Chen began to hypothesize that Lin Wanner's gift of his ring might originally have belonged here, Ye Chen suddenly recalled the ring's function.

Whether there are other functions that are temporarily unknown.

But this item has one definite function: after recognizing its master, when the master encounters mortal danger, it will transport the master to the side of the person they miss most.

In other words, this item is for preserving life; even if one suffers extremely severe injuries, at least it can allow one to return to see one's closest kin.

Combining my earlier speculation, if this place truly needed to dispatch large numbers of cultivators like worker ants to scour the world for cultivation resources back then, equipping each person with such a ring would indeed be extremely necessary.

After all, seeking out extremely precious materials inherently carries great risk; one might easily attract the covetous gaze of other cultivators and harbor malicious intent. With this ring, even if one cannot win in a fight, at least one can flee—this gives everyone a fallback option.

Therefore, when the ring is outside, it bears no visible inscription; only upon returning to the headquarters does its number appear.

And perhaps the appearance of this number signifies that this ring was never meant to be personal property, but rather collective assets. Moreover, such assets are not issued one per person, but rather allocated like weapons to soldiers—only those assigned to this post may use it. Upon return, the number automatically appears, facilitating centralized management.

The number on this ring is 2804. Perhaps back then, there were thousands of cultivator "worker ants," each wearing an identical ring, dispatched worldwide to perform dangerous missions.

If this hypothesis holds, then another problem temporarily eludes Ye Chen's comprehension.

Take this Four-Sided Treasure Pagoda, for instance: the timber used internally is all top-grade, hard-to-find precious wood even with lavish spending—indeed, a single beam over ten meters long is carved from an entire trunk of golden-thread nanmu.

How did those cultivators transport these materials here via teleportation array?

Could it be that each time they carried one or two pieces of premium timber through the teleportation array?

This place is only slightly over a hundred square meters in size. If nine teleportation arrays simultaneously delivered people, each carrying two logs ten or even dozens of meters long, there simply wouldn't be enough space here!

Moreover, transporting several logs back via manual labor seems inefficient to an excessive degree.

Upon this thought, Ye Chen unconsciously gazed at the ring in his hand and murmured: "The teleportation array is akin to an efficient transportation tool for those cultivator 'worker ants,' while the ring is like their efficient life-preserving tool. Viewed this way, they should still lack an efficient transport tool. It would feel incongruous for a group of cultivators of extraordinary prowess to carry timber and stone for teleportation, given their formidable cultivation foundation."

"Furthermore, cultivators of that era possessed strength so immense as to surpass even modern technology. Having mastered the construction of teleportation arrays—a great divine ability—they had effectively transcended the limitations of three-dimensional space imposed upon them. The theoretical foundation of teleportation arrays should be that the shortest path between two points is no longer a straight line, but rather an overlapping fold. They established a four-dimensional channel between two points in three-dimensional space using teleportation arrays, overlapping the points of two three-dimensional spaces from a higher dimension. Thus, instantaneous movement between two teleportation arrays becomes possible."

"Since they were already capable of opening a four-dimensional space, they should also be able to open a four-dimensional space dedicated solely to storage. In that era, they needed to transport vast quantities of materials—especially stone and timber, which are extremely bulky. Without a storage space, it would surely be immensely inconvenient! Only by possessing a personal four-dimensional space could they efficiently and swiftly gather and transport various materials to the underground city of Antarctica!"

Reflecting on this, Ye Chen examined the ring engraved with "2804" and whispered softly: "If I were designing this ring, having already integrated the teleportation array into it, I would certainly also integrate a four-dimensional space into the ring—adding a four-dimensional array formation within it to store various materials. In that case, every person dispatched to gather resources would not be alone, but rather a transport unit, capable of carrying vast quantities of materials back to base via the teleportation array—whether dozens of meters of timber, or stone weighing hundreds or even thousands of tons, or precious spirit stones imbued with spiritual energy—all could be effortlessly transported through the storage space."

He stroked the engraved "2804" on the ring with his hand and murmured: "I wonder if those masters of old had the same thought as I do?"

As his words faded, a sudden warmth transmitted from the ring to his fingertips, followed instantly by a heart-method mantra appearing in his mind.

Ye Chen did not know the purpose of this heart-method mantra, but based on his trust in this place, he felt no hesitation and immediately began to silently recite it in his heart.

The next second, his consciousness suddenly appeared in a strange space—so strange it resembled a 3D model built in design software. Although the model's size is fixed, the software's spatial theory allows for infinite expansion: you can shrink the scale so the space fully occupies the monitor's interface, or blow up the scale until the space shrinks infinitely on the monitor to a single pixel too small for the naked eye to discern.

Or perhaps it is simply a chaotic universe—no one knows its true size—but before him lies only this one explored region, surrounded by darkness and void.

And this space exists amidst that darkness and void, with no clear boundaries, no doors or windows, no floor or ceiling—only a uniform, perfect light emanating from unknown sources, like the shadowless lamp on an operating table, rendering this explored space clearly visible without any shadow.

Just how large is this space?

Ye Chen, relying solely on his consciousness, cannot measure it, but within this space he saw vast quantities of materials.

Among them, over sixty trunks of Hainan Huang Huali, stripped of roots and branches, were neatly stacked together. Their thickness showed little variation, and their lengths had been deliberately cut to uniform specifications. Ye Chen estimated, based on bark wrinkles and node proportions, that these Huang Huali logs were at least forty meters long and over one meter, nearly two meters, in width.

Modern Huang Huali trees exceeding twenty-five meters in length are nonexistent; even twenty meters is considered rare. Yet this Huang Huali, after removing the head and tail, has a usable trunk of forty meters from its middle section.

And there are over sixty such logs!

If even one were taken out, Huang Huali enthusiasts worldwide would likely go mad.

Moreover, these Huang Huali logs occupy only a tiny fraction of this space's volume. The space's length is at least twice that of these logs, its width six to seven times greater than the triangular wood pile they form when stacked, and its height at least doubled.

Besides the Huang Huali timber, this space also contains vast quantities of quarried and processed green stone, cut into long strips with nearly uniform specifications, color, and texture. Each piece is at least as long as a person's arm span, with a square cross-section equivalent to forearm length.

Such stone materials are neatly stacked in the space, numbering at least six or seven thousand pieces.

Ye Chen initially thought the space contained only these items, but his consciousness suddenly noticed, in a corner of the space, piles of stones of various shapes and sizes—some as large as a rugby ball, others barely larger than a pigeon's egg. Because these stones paled in comparison to the long stone strips and timber, they initially escaped his notice.

But when he truly paid attention to these stones, he was astonished to discover that these variably sized stones were, in fact, all spirit stones imbued with spiritual energy!