The entire prison was empty.
"Let's go down and take a look."
Xu Xin immediately walked down the spiral staircase that he had walked last time.
It was the first time for Xu Ying and Li Wenxi to come here, and they didn’t know what to do, so they could only follow Xu Xin and continue walking down.
"Brother, in this underground prison, apart from us... there is no reaction from other lives." Xu Ying said, looking at the cells on both sides of the stairs.
"Let's go down and take a look."
The three of them soon reached the lower level of the prison.
Along the way, all the prisons were empty.
"My God... They even use gold-grade meteorite iron..." Xu Ying exclaimed as she walked, "This entire underground prison is too luxurious..."
"Meteorite iron, is it a very rare thing?" Li Wenxi reached out and grabbed the prison railing, feeling the texture of this special metal.
"Very rare!" Xu Ying nodded vigorously. "Extremely rare. How should I put it? The status of meteorite iron in alien technology is equivalent to titanium alloy and beryllium alloy in our earth technology."
"... Aerospace technology?" Xu Xin turned around and looked at Xu Ying.
"Yes. At least 60% of the total weight of the alien invaders' spacecraft is meteoric iron. Gold-grade meteoric iron."
Xu Ying nodded and patted the metal wall of the underground prison. "This gold-grade meteorite is the highest quality meteorite. Meteorite is a special metal resource. It is not an alloy, but is directly mined and smelted. Both mining and smelting are extremely difficult. I never thought that there would be an underground prison built entirely of meteorite."
"Is it difficult to smelt? My furnace can do it." Li Wenxi grabbed a metal railing of the prison and looked inside. Not finding anything, he turned back and said with some boredom, "Before I left with you, I had already smelted several pieces of meteorite iron, but for now I can only smelt purple-grade ones."
"It's really difficult. At least among us humans, only you have the technology to smelt meteorite iron, sister-in-law." Xu Ying said with an innocent expression, "Besides, it took you nearly three hundred years to research the method of smelting meteorite iron in the last few years before the collapse of that world. Ah, I mean my sister-in-law."
"That sister-in-law..." Li Wenxi pursed her lips, "It sounds strange. That's really difficult. Then... after you finally figured out the method of smelting meteorite iron, didn't you refine more?"
"Yes. Of course. Most of our special weapons that I will hand over to you are made of meteorite iron, but the quantity is... a little small, and it can't equip many people."
Xu Ying sighed, "That's why we didn't give up on mass-producing Earth weapons and built arsenals in the underground world. It's a pity that something like that happened down there..."
Xu Xin glanced at her.
Speaking of which, the last time Xu Ying met him, she seemed to have said that the underground world might have been secretly invaded by alien invaders.
After they came up, I never asked them what happened afterwards.
Forget it, I’ll ask later, let’s first figure out the situation here.
However, now they have reached the bottom of the prison, and the entire prison is indeed just as Xu Ying said, empty and with nothing in it.
There was not even a hair left, it was so clean that Xu Xin couldn't help but wonder whether those guys did a thorough cleaning and took away all the garbage after evacuating from here.
This is so clean.
Is that so civilized
"Why aren't meteorite weapons mass-produced?" Li Wenxi was puzzled. "From my speed of smelting meteorite iron, although it's not fast, if it's on a large scale, there shouldn't be any problem in mass-producing meteorite iron, right?"
What she meant was that although the smelting speed of one furnace was very slow, as long as hundreds or thousands of furnaces worked together, the overall smelting speed could achieve a qualitative leap.
"It's not that easy." Xu Ying rubbed her hair in distress. "It was not easy to build a large-scale factory in our situation at that time. And most importantly... meteorite iron ore is too scarce. This metal does not exist on Earth at all. It was brought by those alien invaders."
"After they took root on Earth, this metal was not enough for them. In order to solve the problem once and for all, they used some unknown method to attract asteroids rich in meteoric iron to hit the Earth many times. Only then did we know about this metal and call it 'meteoric iron'."
This is how meteorite got its name.
but…
Guide an asteroid to hit the Earth?!
Xu Xin and Li Wenxi both looked at Xu Ying in amazement.
Seeing the two people's expressions, Xu Ying was stunned for a moment, then she knew what they were thinking and laughed: "Hey, you heard that an asteroid hit the earth and thought it must be very powerful, right?"
"Ah, this... isn't it?" Li Wenxi blinked, "An asteroid hit the earth!"
"Uh..." Xu Xin had the same idea.
According to research, many mass extinctions of species on Earth were caused by asteroid impacts.
The large dinosaurs that dominated the earth for hundreds of millions of years became extinct because of this.
So, when he heard this term, and heard that alien invaders could control asteroids to hit the earth, it would be strange if he was not surprised.
"Of course not. Asteroids hitting the Earth is actually a very common occurrence, much more frequent than you think."
Xu Ying raised the corner of her mouth and explained.
"It's very common. Even on Earth thousands of years ago, there were asteroid impacts every year. But the asteroids in the asteroid belt are not that big. Some are only a few meters in diameter. They are just big rocks."
“…Ah? That’s also called a planet?” Li Wenxi was somewhat speechless.
"The big rocks in the asteroid belt are all planets. You've all seen meteors, right? They're pretty much the same thing. However, most meteors are completely consumed when they pass through the atmosphere at high speed. A small portion that is not consumed and falls to the ground are called meteorites."
"I understand that." Xu Xin immediately asked, "How big is the meteorite that the alien invaders can control?"
"Not very big. After being consumed by the atmosphere, the entire size when it falls to the ground is probably only a few hundred meters in diameter at most."
Xu Ying tapped her lips and thought for a moment.
Then she waved her hand: "The meteorite that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs was more than ten kilometers in diameter, and created a crater with a diameter of three hundred kilometers. This is not even on the same scale."
"... A meteorite several hundred meters in size can easily destroy us..." Li Wenxi was a little panicked, "It's still very strong..."
"You said they are guiding meteorites to attack us? That's impossible." Xu Ying laughed, "It is also very difficult for them to guide meteorites. If they don't want to take over the unowned floating resources in the universe, they won't do this."
"If an asteroid with a diameter of several hundred meters hits the Earth, can the damage range be tens of kilometers? And they can't accurately guide the location, so it's better to use nuclear weapons directly. Earth technology can do better. Da Yiwan would laugh when he saw this power."
Xu Ying spread her hands.
That being said, that’s true.
Although guiding meteorites to attack is very powerful, it is really a thankless task.
"But, does that mean there are already meteorite iron ores on Earth?" Xu Xin asked.
"Well... yes, there are, but they are all under the complete control of the other party. We really don't have the ability to obtain them." Xu Ying sighed, "It's difficult without resources."
"We still have some meteorite iron ore." Xu Xin said, "We got it from here, in the underground space below."
"Then let's go down and take a look."
Using the same method they had used to go down before, the three of them arrived at the underground warehouse.
The huge warehouse below was still empty.
There were some shelves there before, but now there is nothing.
Completely emptied.
"What on earth is going on?"
Xu Xin frowned.
It's completely empty here.
"Didn't they evacuate after your last 'underground world exploration activity'?" Li Wenxi speculated as he looked at the empty underground warehouse.
Xu Xin shook his head slowly: "No, no, after the World Tree matured, Lou Feier and I came down once. At that time, there were still groups of petrified creatures trying to attack us."
At least at that time, there was no way this place could be empty.
Later, he and Ji Chaoyang came down again and quickly went out to explain the situation. Only about ten minutes passed outside.
Ten minutes outside, almost a day inside.
And when he and Ji Chaoyang came down that time, there were no petrified creatures attacking them, and they were completely invisible.
Then, after the two of them went out, the explorers discussed and decided to bring all the survivors into the inside of the World Tree.
Xu Xin slept outside for three and a half hours, causing the time inside the World Tree to flow for half a month.
… And the time in this underground world also flowed for half a month.
In other words, this prison should have been emptied during this period of time!
Why…
Are they scared because of the strange flow of time here
Because they know that this is under the mature enemy world tree, so they dare not stay here
"Although we don't know why they left, isn't this a good thing?" Xu Ying grabbed their wrists again, "At least we don't have to chase them away ourselves."
At the same time, the three were teleported into the prison passage again.
Xu Xin brought the two women to the control room.
“…Is this place empty too?”
The control room, which was originally filled with complex mechanical control consoles, is now empty.
Following the narrow passage they had walked through before, the three men walked out of the prison and came to the space outside the prison.
That is the space with the soft giant beast as the ground.
But... it was pitch black.
Originally there was lighting on the top, but it is gone now.
However, the three of them had eaten red berries and had acquired night vision, so they could still see their surroundings clearly.
"It's empty down there...?"
At the bottom of the underground prison, the soft giant beast that was originally "suppressed" under the prison has disappeared.
There was no support underneath the underground prison, and it was directly suspended in the air, which was equivalent to hanging on the main vine bundle outside.
Below the underground prison, there is a giant pit that is more than a hundred meters deep.
"Wow..." Li Wenxi leaned over to look down, eyes widening, "It's so deep down there!"
"Be careful!" Xu Xin pulled her up, "The ground around here is very slippery."
Xu Ying stared at the huge pit below: "Below this, was originally that soft giant beast? Alas, I came a step too late, and it ran away..."
Her face was filled with regret.
"What on earth is that big guy?" Xu Xin looked at her and asked, "I used my telepathic ability to read its mind. It knew me. We were able to escape thanks to its help."
"It's a very strong beast that my brother trained. Ah, not you, but that brother."
Xu Ying pointed to the sky.
“… There’s no need to explain this.” Xu Xin was speechless.
"Oh. I don't know much about it. I only know that it is a giant beast that evolved from a genetic mutation of an insect. It has extremely strong defenses, and its soft and flexible body can dissolve almost all attacks. It can also directly devour the enemies that attack it with its body surface."
What a giant insect.
Thinking about the giant insect's previous behavior of devouring the giant beast, it was indeed as Xu Ying said.
"And, most importantly, this giant insect has a super strong reproductive ability. If it goes at full power, it can lay tens of millions of eggs every few days and hatch them quickly. Their size is probably similar to those giant insects in the underground world." Xu Ying continued to explain.
"Zerg, or Zerg Queen?" Xu Xin suddenly realized.
"Yeah, my brother used to call it the Worm Queen."
Xu Ying nodded.
"Because the genes of the insect queen are relatively chaotic, the characteristics of the insects hatched from the eggs she lays vary greatly. There are those that fly in the sky, crawl on the ground, and burrow into the ground. I even suspect that a large part of the giant insects in the underground world are probably her descendants."
Even the giant worms in the underground world are related to this worm queen!
Xu Xin took a deep breath and looked at the empty pit below, suddenly feeling a pang of heartache.
"If only it hadn't left..."
At that time, the giant insect helped him and was obviously on his side.
If this could be incorporated...
"An endless army of insects." Li Wenxi imagined, "It also has a strong defense that can protect the World Tree... Oh my God, what have we missed!"
"Ah..." Compared to before, Xu Ying was already feeling depressed. She stared at the huge pit below in a daze: "I thought I could harvest this insect queen this time... but it turns out I thought too much."
She looked back at the suspended columnar prison.
"I was wondering what could suppress the worm mother. It turned out to be the 'Dinghai Shenzhen' made of meteorite iron. Only this thing can suppress the worm mother... Alas, now we can only hope that the worm mother ran away on her own and was not captured by alien invaders. Otherwise..."
Insect mother
I didn't expect there was such a giant beast.
"They shouldn't be caught." Xu Xin speculated, also trying to comfort himself, "If they could be caught, they would have been caught long ago, and there wouldn't be so much effort to suppress them here."
That’s right!
The Insect Queen emitted a powerful infrasonic roar at that time, causing everyone to feel chest tightness, shortness of breath, and dizziness.
At that time, Xu Xin did not have the ability to read minds, so Keke translated for him.
What it meant at the time was, don't tease it anymore, otherwise, it will perish along with this place.
And the regulators here are obviously afraid of it as well.
Considering this, the other party probably doesn't have the ability to subdue it and take it away.
Xu Xin breathed a sigh of relief.
"Now that we have a basic understanding of the situation in this underground world, let's go up first and discuss the situation here together. Oh, by the way." Xu Xin looked at Xu Ying, "We should be able to divide the authority, right?"
"Of course, um, let's go back first." Xu Ying grabbed the wrists of both of them.
"Ah? Wait a minute, don't you want to take a look at the minerals here first?" Li Wenxi was a little itchy about the mineral resources in this underground world.
"Go up first, and then you can bring more people down to investigate."
"Oh, that's fine."