Chapter 339 – Silver Sea of Stars

Chapter 339 – Silver Sea of Stars

After finishing the blinding potions, Mo Lan shrouded herself in a silencing spell before moving forward.

This time, no grey-eyed piranhas were attracted to her.

She safely made her way to the base of the cavern where the half-exposed silver-grey gem was lodged.

Now that she was closer, Mo Lan could clearly see the Spatial Magic energy emanating from it.

It was a Spatial Magic gem — though only beginner grade.

Still, something was better than nothing. With her level of Spatial magic, given enough time and enough rounds of reinforcement, upgrading it to Advanced grade would certainly be no problem.

Moreover, the exposed portion of this Spatial Magic gem was already half the size of a fist, meaning the whole thing would be even larger.

The spatial energy contained within was surely considerable, and the spatial magical item ultimately crafted from it would have even more space inside.

No matter how you looked at it, this was a treasure.

Mo Lan wasn’t in a hurry to mine the ore. She first cast the Metal Detection spell from a distance, scanning the surrounding rock layers to see if there were any other mineral deposits nearby.

She hadn’t expected much, but the results nearly made her jump — the Metal Detection spell fed back to her an image of a silver sea of stars.

What did that mean? It meant this entire area was teeming with Spatial Magic gems, as numerous as stars in the sky.

Mo Lan’s breathing quickened.

Were the underground mineral deposits in the outer region really this rich? These were Spatial Magic gems — rare even across the entire Continent of Valen!

Once her initial shock passed, Mo Lan immediately climbed into the cavern and began digging with Mining Magic.

One fist-sized Spatial Magic gem after another fell into her hands.

beginner spatial gem, Intermediate spatial gem, beginner spatial gem…

A small mountain of gems piled up at her feet.

She was digging with great enthusiasm when Mo Lan happened to glance down at the little mountain of gems by her feet. Why did they all seem to be roughly the same size?

The moment the thought crossed her mind, her heart lurched: “No way!”

Mo Lan used the Metal Detection spell again, this time scanning the area containing the spatial gems far more carefully.

The rock between the magic gems seemed slightly loose in texture.

Every single Spatial Magic gem was roughly the same size as her fist — only their shapes and edges differed.

The quality of the gems did vary, with some being beginner grade and others Intermediate grade.

The more she examined them, the more they resembled a mineral vein that had been devoured by Ore Demon Bugs.

It was like having a bucket of cold water dumped over her head. The excitement and elation of discovering a massive cache of Spatial Magic gems vanished without a trace, and she calmed down instantly.

Ore Demon Bugs were an extremely rare species of magical insect that fed on minerals.

Ordinary ores were merely snacks to them — magical ores were their true favorite.

After consuming a magical ore, they would simulate the magical energy of whatever they had eaten, disguising themselves to look like the corresponding magical mineral.

The disguise was undetectable to the naked eye, and even the Metal Detection spell couldn’t pick up any abnormalities. The imitation was virtually indistinguishable from the real thing.

There had once been an incident in the human kingdoms where a noble had added an Ore Demon Bug disguised as a magical ore to their collection, only to have every single magical ore in their entire treasury devoured.

These magical insects only excelled at camouflage — they had virtually no offensive capabilities and weren’t particularly dangerous.

In fact, until they had fully digested the ores inside them, they would maintain their disguised state the entire time, making it impossible to detect anything amiss.

However… the Ore Demon Bugs’ disguise didn’t come from nothing.

For such a massive swarm of Ore Demon Bugs to all be disguised as beginner and Intermediate grade Spatial Magic gems, just how magnificent must the original Spatial Magic gems they had consumed have been!

Mo Lan’s heart ached. She had just discovered a treasure trove, only to find that someone — or something — had beaten her to it.

No! Even if they were Ore Demon Bugs, they were still maintaining their Spatial Magic gem disguises, which meant the spatial gems inside their bodies hadn’t been fully digested yet. There was still a chance to salvage something!

She recalled reading in 《Witch’s Guide to Ore Purification》 that the Advanced Purification spell could extract the magical ore fragments remaining inside an Ore Demon Bug’s stomach.

Combined with the Peak level Metal Shaping spell — which could fuse fragments of same-origin magical ore back into a complete whole — it might be possible to reassemble one or two Spatial Magic gems.

Mo Lan’s Purification spell was already at Advanced level. Her Metal Shaping spell was still some distance from Peak level, but not impossibly far.

It was worth a try — certainly better than walking away empty-handed.

Mo Lan rallied her spirits and continued using Mining Magic to dig out all the Spatial Magic gems she had detected, piling them together.

Then she used the Water Drowning Technique to trap the entire heap of suspected Ore Demon Bug imposters.

As she watched the silver-grey ores transform one by one into fist-sized brownish-black insects, Mo Lan’s last shred of hope shattered.

She really hadn’t guessed wrong. They were indeed Ore Demon Bugs.

Ore Demon Bugs were afraid of water. Exposure to ordinary water would cause them to revert to their true forms, and water magic was outright lethal to them.

Before long, every last one of them was dead.

Mo Lan used the Advanced Purification spell to extract the residual Spatial Magic gem energy from each one, transforming it into tiny, fragmented shards of Spatial Magic gem.

From that enormous pile of Ore Demon Bugs, she managed to extract only a small handful of Spatial Magic gem fragments.

A single small cloth pouch was enough to hold them all.

She carefully used the Metal Detection spell to examine the composition and energy of the Spatial Magic gem fragments: “They all came from the same Spatial Magic gem? Judging by this concentration of spatial energy, it must have been at least Advanced grade!”

Mo Lan felt both heartbroken and grateful.

Heartbroken that if she had discovered this place sooner, she might have obtained an enormous Advanced grade Spatial Magic gem. If she had used it as crafting material for the Book of Cards, she could probably have made spatial villa cards! And if the quality had been even higher — reaching supreme grade — once her Alchemy Magic skills improved, she might have even been able to create greenhouses like the ones in the Academy’s Herb Garden!

Yet she was also grateful that she hadn’t given up just now. A large Advanced grade or supreme grade Spatial Magic gem was out of the question now, but a small Advanced grade Spatial Magic gem was still very much within reach.

If she then reinforced it carefully with Spatial magic, there was still a good chance of elevating it to supreme grade.

The Book of Cards’ creative capabilities were quite flexible. By analyzing a small Advanced grade Spatial Magic gem as source material, as long as she supplied enough card-crafting energy, she could produce Advanced grade Spatial Magic gems of various sizes. The only limitation was that she couldn’t use it to create gems of a higher tier — supreme grade Spatial Magic gems were beyond its reach.

With this in mind, Mo Lan carefully tucked the pouch of Spatial Magic gem fragments into her spatial ring.

Once she spent more time mining down here and got more practice with the Metal Shaping spell, she could attempt to reassemble these fragments into a complete Spatial Magic gem.

She continued deeper into the cavern, scanning for mineral traces in the rock walls with the Metal Detection spell as she went.

The result was disappointing — the surroundings were completely barren. By the time she reached the end of the cavern, she couldn’t find so much as an ordinary mineral, let alone a magical ore.

After returning to the underground river channel and continuing her search, she still came up empty.

Who knew how many years it had been since any young witch had ventured through the underground river’s hidden routes, and even longer since anyone had explored the banks of the underground river in the outer region.

With no young witches around, all the various ores in the vicinity had been left for the Ore Demon Bugs to ravage as they pleased.