Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

“yes. he was very famous, until three years ago!”

li jialing also said in a low voice through the private-talking technique, “master jin tianzong was a professor at the refining department of the imperial polytechnical university. he seemed to be also leading a very famous crystal suit laboratory. his main fields of study were the single magical equipment, namely the crystal suits and the colossi. he was one of the best specialists in these fields.”

“oh? he is from the imperial polytechnical university?”

li yao’s eyes beamed with interest, and the eagerness on his face was even more intense.

he was from the refining department of the grand desolate war institution, one of the most famous “nine elite colleges” of the star glory federation.

after encountering su changfa, di feiwen, and other immortal cultivators, he naturally took an interest in the most famous “holy land of refining” in the imperium.

according to the introduction of su changfa and di feiwen, the best refiners of the imperium of true human beings were mainly from three institutions—the imperial university, the imperial polytechnical university, and the imperial advanced college of metallurgy. the refining-related majors in the three academic establishments represented the peak of magical equipment production in the imperium of true human beings.

among them, the imperial university was a comprehensive universe that was one of the best in the imperium of true human beings. it boasted many departments that had a long history and a strong faculty, such as the “archaeology department”, which had monopolized more than 50% of the explorations of the primeval relics. they were perfect partners for the refining department.

therefore, the refining department of the imperial university was the best in the imperium!

the imperial polytechnical university, on the other hand, did not have so many primeval relics to excavate, but it boasted distinguished advantages in terms of industrial designs.

they were more creative and less bound by predecessors and traditions. so, they had produced a lot of bizarre, innovative, and experimental magical equipment. the place was also a “holy land of refining” and a “heaven of magical equipment” for many immortal cultivators in the imperium!

a master of refining in the divinity transformation stage from the imperial polytechnical universe certainly deserved to be made acquaintance with!

li jialing went on, “in the past hundred years, master jin tianzong developed more than fifteen models of brand-new crystal suits and held thousands of patents. he even won the prize of ‘heavenly craftsman’, the highest honor in the circle of refiners of the imperium, for two years in a row. he was one of the few masters who had made such an achievement.

“i remember that even li lingfeng had collected three crystal suits that were polished by master jin tianzong in person. he often brought them out to maintain them in person. from the brilliance in his eyes, i could tell his fondness of the three crystal suits. when i asked if i could take a look at them, he declined my request without any hesitation!

“however, i’m told that master jin tianzong already died three years ago. how did he end up here?”

li yao was intrigued. such a master of refining in the divinity transformation stage was definitely a national treasure. the man would be respected as an honorable guest whichever of the four kurfürst families he visited.

there must be more to the story about how li linghai recruited such a master.

li yao asked, “how exactly did he die according to what you were told?”

“he seemed to suffer heavy wounds in an experiment accident, and he died later in regrets.”

thinking for a moment, li jialing said, “when i went to ‘manjusaka, the city in the sky’ for refinements last year, li lingfeng happened to bring a few crystal suits to wuying lan and asked him to modify it, because wuying lan’s laboratory was quite capable in terms of cutting-edge magical equipment too. after all, there were so many ‘experiment subjects’ that he could test on.

“the two of them chitchatted on the test field and did not avoid me. when they happened to talk about master jin tianzong, they both agreed that it was a shame that master jin passed away. if he had not, the few crystal suits should’ve been modified and adjusted by master jin instead of being brought to wuying lan’s laboratory. they also said that something was seriously wrong, and master jin died probably because he pissed off someone.”

li yao narrowed his eyes. “every master of refining is backed by countless experts. even if he did piss off someone, who dared to do anything to a master of refining in the divinity transformation stage?”

“that i don’t know.”

li jialing said, “i only vaguely heard a theory. li lingfeng and wuying lan said that master jin was best known for his fairness and integrity in the refining department of the imperial polytechnical university. a few years back, he disclosed a large-scale academic cheating event that involved the four kurfürst families, which was a humiliation for hundreds of descendants of the four kurfürst families. it was a great scandal.”

pondering for a moment, li yao shook his head. “such kind of incidents would truly make certain scoundrels hate master jin, but it was not enough to get a divinity transformation stage refiner killed.”

li jialing recalled a moment and said again, “or maybe, it was about the studies that master jin had been dedicated to. li lingfeng and wuying lan said that master jin tianzong had been working on the studies of ‘hybrid’ crystal suit, and he seemed to have made such significant progress. he claimed to have made quite a few crucial results, but a lot of specialists in the circle of refiners said that master jin’s research was completely wrong and that his experimental data were edited and fabricated. for them, master jin was a fraud who only wanted to get famous.

“desperate to prove his research, master jin started extremely dangerous experiments without bothering with anything else. as a result, an accident happened. the leakage of a certain poisonous chemical killed him and his entire team. that… seemed to be his whole story.”

“hybrid crystal suit?”

li yao’s heart was suddenly racing, and his pupils were almost reduced to the size of needle tips. managing to hold back the excitement deep inside his heart, he asked, “does it mean to highly combine the spiritual energy within an exos and the spiritual energy inside the crystal reactor to realize the single output of a hybrid engine system?”

“seems so.”

li jialing said, “i don’t quite understand the details. they are too sophisticated.”

“not just sophisticated. this is a universal dilemma!”

li yao was so thrilled that he was almost yelling.

“hybrid crystal suit” was indeed a groundbreaking, revolutionary idea and also a super conundrum that countless specialists of refining believed could not be resolved.

all the popular crystal suits in the civilization of mankind today, in the star glory federation, the imperium of true human beings, and even the alliance of the holy covenant, and be they the most low-level engineering crystal suits, the beginner-level battlesuits plugged with skill cards designed for ordinary people, or the special crystal suits tailor-made for the divinity transformation stage experts—they all belong to the same category if classified by the power output—parallel engine system. two power sources were in function at the same time and provided impetus together.

after some training, the ordinary people could jump to almost ten meters tall, blow up a giant rock with a single punch, or run dozens of kilometers in an hour without panting after putting on a crystal suit. what was the power that boosted them to be faster, higher, and stronger? naturally, it was not the energy stored inside the human body, but the energy provided by the fuel cabin and the crystal reactor. the muscle and nerval reactions of the human body only provided the power of micro adjustments at best.

if there were still fuel and crystals in the crystal reactor, the crystal suit would continue to work incessantly. if the fuel ran out, the crystal suit would be wasted garbage and might even crush the user in it.

the logic naturally worked for the ordinary people, because ordinary people were relatively weak. how could they uphold the crystal suits, which weighed hundreds of kilograms, to move and fight with their own strength?

even if they gritted their teeth to do it after the injection of excitants, they would die of exhaustion in no more than five minutes.

therefore, for the ordinary people, crystal suits were the same as armed shuttles and crystal tanks. the power output was solely dependent on an external source, namely the crystal reactor. from that point of view, crystal suits were more like “vehicles” than “suits”.

however, for the trainers, especially the high-level ones, the case was entirely different.

the high-level trainers had powerful souls and abundant spiritual energy in their bodies, which equaled many minor “reactors” in their abdomens, spines, or other parts of their bodies.

both the cultivators and the immortal cultivators were capable of soaring to the sky, diving to the ground, or breaking the mountains with the “reactors” in their bodies in the first place.

after they put on crystal suits, as a battle unit, they actually had two power sources, one being the reactors inside their bodies and the other being the crystal reactors in their crystal suits.

here came the question. which of the two power sources was main and which was secondary? and how they should be coordinated.

after all, it was not an armed shuttle or a starship with two power units, whose distribution and output efficiency could be adjusted randomly. one of the power sources here was embedded inside the body that even the trainers could hardly change. it was exactly like a normal person could not change the place of their heart.

the two power sources were like two legs, one of which was real and the other was false. sometimes, one of them was longer than the other. how could the person walk or run with those legs?

the higher one’s level was, the more complicated the question would be.

the “reactors” of the high-level experts were powerful enough themselves, and their output was astronomical. the crystal suits they wore were extraordinary products too, with remarkable output from the crystal reactor. there would be dire consequences in the case of the discoordination of the two power sources.

the beginner-level crystal suits often enabled the function of the mode switch, which could change the power source between the crystal reactor and oneself. only one of them would be used at a given time.

when the crystal reactor outputted power, the user would hold themselves back.

on the other hand, if they were going to use the crystal suit by burning their life and soul, the crystal reactor would be put on hold.

it was not hard to imagine that whoever had higher pursuits would not accept such a simple and crude pattern of power output.

then, in the advanced crystal suits, many delicate circuits and rune arrays would be adopted, with a high demand on the architecture of the crystal reactor, to ensure that the crystal reactor and the trainers themselves could output spiritual energy at the same time in a coordinated way. in the end, the two power sources would help each other so that the user could “run with both legs”.

the more advanced a crystal suit was, the more considerate the power output models and the unit architecture would be. for the crystal suits tailor-made for the experts in the divinity transformation stage and the divinity branching stage, it was often the case that a brand-new power distribution would be designed from scratch according to the features of their cultivation arts and their fighting skills.

but all the polishing and designs had the same purpose, which was to coordinate the two power sources to the point that they were 100% synchronized.

that was the so-called “parallel” power output pattern, also known as “double-action” or “linkage”.

but “hybrid” was a completely different concept. it overthrew the popular power output plan in the past ten thousand years in terms of fundamental mechanisms and created a new, unique path!