Chapter Seventeen: Harvest (Wednesday—Please Continue Reading)

“Clap, clap, clap!”

No sooner had Song Chi finished speaking than a round of applause erupted from behind him, before Sun Hao could respond.

The two turned to see that the one applauding was none other than Wang Yuan, the only other student in Class 5 besides Sun Hao to have awakened the White Spark of Flame.

Wang Yuan stood up from a rear seat, smiling as he praised, “Well said. There are gains and losses—your views align perfectly with mine.”

With that, he squeezed his way to stand beside Song Chi and Sun Hao, striking up a conversation with familiar ease.

“Sun Hao, Song Chi, greetings. For various reasons, our exchanges over the past decade have been minimal. But now is different. Only sixteen students in our class successfully awakened their flames, and after this latest benefit exploration, only fifteen remain…”

Song Chi listened silently to these empty words, calmly yielding his seat and choosing another place. He could tell that Wang Yuan was here mainly for Sun Hao, not him.

As for Wang Yuan’s intentions, having lived two lives, Song Chi could guess them with his eyes closed: to persuade the class to band together. As one who had awakened the White Spark of Flame, naturally he would be the leader of this group, using it to elevate his status and social network, thereby acquiring more resources and benefits.

Song Chi had no interest in this, but he bore no ill will. Without power or backing, wanting to advance through unity was understandable.

…

Jiangyuan First Flame Academy, auditorium.

Nearly two hundred students sat below as the Dean spoke passionately from the stage.

This was the final assembly for the graduating students. After this, they would disperse and go their separate ways.

Some might soon perish in the subsequent alien domain explorations.

Some might cease exploring alien domains altogether, choosing instead to spend their days cultivating at the psychic energy training platform aboard their flitships, accumulating time and stepping into the first tier, living happily for two centuries.

Others might soar high and vanish like dragons diving into the sea, destined for limitless achievements.

But no one could ever return to this moment again.

---

Song Chi felt distracted. As soon as the assembly ended, he declined the invitations of Sun Hao, Wang Yuan, and others, eagerly rushing home.

Once in his bedroom, he immediately entered the Multiverse Bazaar.

In the bazaar’s stall area, what had been an empty space was now piled high with various ores.

Not only mythril and purple copper, but also electrum, cold iron, and others—though none in large quantities, mostly under ten tons, except electrum which was about thirty tons.

Altogether, including the initially mined mythril and purple copper, their value hovered around 350 strands of zero-tier floating land essence.

Three hundred fifty strands of zero-tier floating land essence may not sound like much, but remember: a single alien domain expedition on a Flame Civilization flitship-class flame battleship typically yields only about 100 strands. Besides, he hadn’t even accounted for the “atomic fusion nuclear engine,” a purple-tier component.

Speaking of the atomic fusion nuclear engine, Song Chi immediately summoned the Sky Sovereign. Several hours had passed since his return, but he hadn’t had a chance to inspect this purple component’s detailed attributes, which had been gnawing at him.

Atomic Fusion Nuclear Engine Lv0

Quality: Purple

Trait: Additional 20% power supply efficiency increase

Consumption: 5 units/s

Power supply: 36 units/s

Overload buffer: 30 minutes

Energy pool: 5000 points (can store 5000 energy points)

Convertible to: Level 1 Floating Land Essence Core Fusion Body

Upgrade requirements: 5 strands of floating land essence (zero-tier), 500 energy points, 5 life core nuclei (zero-tier)

Song Chi’s eyes gleamed as he studied the engine’s stats.

No wonder it was a purple-tier component. Even without enhancements, its attributes already surpassed a level 7 psychic energy engine, especially with that unique high-quality trait—an extra 20% increase in power supply efficiency. Clearly, as the component’s enhancement level rose, this trait’s bonus would become increasingly remarkable.

---

After a brief thrill, Song Chi’s gaze shifted to the “Convertible to” section. This indicated the original strange artifact form of the “atomic fusion nuclear engine” component. As mentioned before, every colored shipborne component is necessarily transformed from a starsea strange artifact.

The level 1 floating land essence core fusion body, once absorbed by a flame battleship, converts into a shipborne component. Likewise, when removed, it can revert to its original strange artifact form.

After reviewing the attributes, Song Chi did not rush to replace the standard psychic energy engine with this purple engine component. It wasn’t because it lacked psychic energy; though it seemed more like a nuclear engine, unrelated to psychic energy, this was simply because it hadn’t yet been installed. Once integrated into the battleship’s slot, the Flame Seed would instantly convert its output into psychic energy.

His reasons for not swapping immediately were twofold: first, the alien domain expedition had just ended, and the next would not occur for another month, so there was no rush. Second, there were currently no high-energy-consuming components aboard the Sky Sovereign, so the psychic energy engine was sufficient.

Most importantly, he was about to launch his first Multiverse Bazaar trade and wanted to see if any other starsea intelligent beings might offer a higher price for this level 1 floating land essence core fusion body or the like.

Though unlikely, it never hurt to try.

Clearing his mind of current needs and conditions, Song Chi began carefully planning the preparations before the Multiverse Bazaar opened.

Since the ultra-long-range spatial gate random deployment platform was completely unpredictable, he had no idea which civilizations’ beings might enter the bazaar once it opened, so he needed to prepare accordingly.

For example, he would first purchase a batch of widely praised, cost-effective Flame Human Civilization goods.

Like the tungsten battle shield and tungsten spear from before—durable and inexpensive weapons.

Or the gene optimization serums now universally promoted, which were cheap and highly effective even for species that had never used them.

Or life core nuclei, widely accepted materials throughout the shattered starsea.

Of course, Song Chi’s thorough consideration and planning was not out of benevolence toward these “fortunate” alien civilizations. All these pre-bought goods would be marked up at three to five times their usual price. After all, trading with alien races from different starsea regions was all about “arbitrage.”

After an hour of meticulous planning and confirming no details were overlooked, Song Chi summoned the Sky Sovereign again and began transferring the ores stored in the bazaar.

Currently, he had only a few dozen strands of zero-tier floating land essence left. Purchasing stock required capital, and with insufficient funds, he naturally had to sell the ores in hand—especially since they were meant to be sold anyway.