Alexei might not have been an expert at childcare, but he knew the universal truth: kids liked candy.
"Here," he said, pulling a handful of assorted sweets from his storage pouch and dropping them into Mengyao's waiting hands. "Knock yourself out."
The variety included both hard candies and soft ones.
Speaking of which, the furnace had been completely drained of spirit stones days ago, but it still functioned like a normal furnace if you fed it spirit fire directly. The furnace could also store energy, which was convenient. Same principle as a battery.
Filling the fuel reservoir to capacity required about sixty percent of Yan's total spiritual power. Once the stored energy depleted, the furnace could still operate normally by drawing directly from the user's spiritual power, though Alexei had never tried that himself.
According to her calculations, the furnace's previous debuff, Spiritual Energy Blockage, had increased energy consumption by roughly twenty percent per level. Now that it had been replaced with Spiritual Energy Circuit, consumption decreased by twenty percent per level instead.
Net result: spiritual power consumption had dropped by forty percent compared to before.
Not that it mattered much to him. He was still just using Yan's stored energy anyway.
Over the past two days, he had also finished crafting a diamond shovel.
[Diamond Shovel:
Efficiency V
Unbreaking III
Auto-Repair III
Fortune III]
One more tool and he would have a complete diamond set. He just needed a diamond hoe, though honestly, that seemed like a waste. An iron hoe worked fine for the minimal farming he did.
These days, shaping the land had become second nature to him. He carved through mountains, bridged rivers, and reshaped the terrain as he pleased. He had even considered renovating the stone steps that led up the cliff to his courtyard, adding proper railings and lanterns to make the climb less hazardous.
"Do you want to see the fish?" he asked, pointing toward the newly constructed pavilion beside the pond. "They are pretty big. You probably have not seen fish like these before."
The formerly square pond had been expanded and reshaped to look more natural, with water lilies floating on the surface. It still looked somewhat geometric, but that was just how Minecraft aesthetics worked.
Mengyao looked curious, her gaze following his gesture.
"Come on."
Alexei led the way into the pavilion, and Mengyao followed a few steps behind. They leaned against the railing and looked down into the pond.
Mengyao froze.
The water below was a roiling mass of black shapes. Fish crowded so tightly together that the water itself was barely visible between them.
"If you want to eat fish, just scoop some out. There are more than enough."
Mengyao stared.
So these were not ornamental fish.
She glanced sideways at him. He had that expression again. Before she could think better of it, she reached out and poked his cheek.
Alexei's expression went flat. "What was that for?"
"You looked smug," Mengyao said simply.
"I was showing you the fish pond. That is not being smug."
"You were definitely being smug."
They did not stay in the pavilion long. The conversation petered out into silence again, and Alexei was running out of ideas for entertaining a kid.
The mooshrooms and bees were already familiar to her from previous visits. The single chicken was not particularly interesting. So Alexei pulled out a fishing rod and decided they might as well fish together.
Unfortunately, having too many fish turned out to be a disadvantage. Every time he cast the line, it hooked a fish immediately, which reduced efficiency instead of improving it.
He had briefly considered taking her to see his mining tunnels, but the mental image of explaining to Yan why her disciple had fallen off a cliff was enough to kill that idea.
It was safer to stick with fishing.
Mengyao sat beside him on the custom fishing bench he had built in the pavilion. Her eyes were fixed on the water's surface.
"Ah, another one."
Splash.
Alexei lifted his fishing rod.
What emerged from the water was an enchanted fishing rod.
[Fishing Rod:
Lure II
Mending I
Curse of Vanishing I]
He stared at it for a long moment.
"...Useless."
His current fishing rods were already fully enchanted with much better combinations. Mending was decent, sure, but Curse of Vanishing was detrimental. Even deconstructing the rod would not remove the curse, it would just transfer to the enchanted book.
"Deconstruct."
[Stick ×3]
[String ×2]
[Enchanted Book ×1]
After several hours of fishing, his babysitting duties finally came to an end.
Mengyao had been well-behaved and easy to manage, but Alexei still was not used to it. He was not exactly built for childcare.
He watched Yan leave with her disciple, then headed back to his mob farm to continue the grind.
His diamond armor set was nearly complete. Only the boots remained, but his supply of diamonds had been completely depleted.
---
The long-awaited moment finally arrived.
Alexei stood in his workshop, wearing a complete set of diamond armor for the first time.
The armorer had also unlocked enchanted diamond leggings, but the enchantment was disappointing.
[Diamond Leggings:
Projectile Protection II]
Projectile Protection was incompatible with the regular Protection enchantment, which meant it was useless to him. Protection was still the priority, broad-spectrum damage reduction beat specialized defenses any day.
Most of his current armor pieces only had Auto-Repair enchantments so far. The exception was his chestplate, which boasted Mending I, Protection IV, and Regeneration III.
He pulled up his mental notes on armor mechanics.
In vanilla Minecraft, each armor point provided four percent physical damage reduction. A full bar of armor gave eighty percent damage reduction.
However, armor toughness made the calculation more complicated. Strong attacks could bypass part of the armor's protection, reducing its effectiveness. Diamond armor provided eight points of toughness, which helped resist this effect. For every four points of incoming damage, one point of armor protection could be ignored. This reduction had a limit. At most, an attack could bypass four-fifths of the total armor value, which meant no more than sixteen armor points could be negated.
That required at least sixty-four damage to trigger fully, though. After toughness calculations, sixty-four damage would deal fifty-four actual damage, which would still one-shot a player with only twenty health.
However, toughness did not affect enchantments. With a full set of Protection IV, sixty-four damage would only reduce his health by nineteen points. Barely enough to survive.
How effective would this be in the Profound Sky Continent?
He had no idea.
Could cultivators here break through eighty percent base reduction plus sixty-four percent enchantment reduction and still damage a body as durable as diamond?
It was hard to say.
The Foundation Establishment cultivators he had seen in Verdantree City probably could not. They might not even deal the minimum four damage required to reduce his enchanted armor's durability.
He opened his inventory and checked his remaining resources. He had five diamonds left.
After a moment's consideration, he crafted three iron swords at his workbench, then combined them with two diamonds using the More Crafting mod recipe.
The result was a trident.
He vaguely remembered fishing up Loyalty I and Impaling IV enchantments a while back. Time to put them to use.
He returned to his storage building and rummaged through the chest where he kept enchanted books.
[Enchanted Book:
Slaughter IV
Unbreaking II
Quick Charge I
Loyalty I]
[Enchanted Book:
Impaling IV
Bleeding II]
Both Slaughter and Bleeding were mod-added enchantments.
Slaughter could only be applied to swords. Its effect caused friendly creatures to drop additional leather and meat when killed. It was useless unless he intended to slaughter his own mooshrooms, which he did not.
Bleeding, on the other hand, could be applied to any weapon, up to level three. It inflicted one point of damage per second for four seconds. At level two, the duration doubled to eight seconds.
He stepped up to the anvil and began the enchanting process.
He applied Auto-Repair III first. The cost was six levels.
Next, he combined Impaling IV and Bleeding II into a single enchanted book and applied it to the weapon. That cost him another seven levels.
Finally, he combined Loyalty I with Unbreaking II and applied the result. This final step consumed ten levels.
When the process was complete, he examined the weapon.
[Trident:
Impaling IV
Auto-Repair III
Unbreaking II
Bleeding II
Loyalty I]
It was a solid result.
Unfortunately, the Riptide enchantment offered by one of his librarians was incompatible with Loyalty. He could only choose one of the two.
The decision was not difficult. Loyalty allowed the weapon to return to him automatically, regardless of distance or environment. Riptide, while visually impressive, only functioned in water or rain.
Compared to that limitation, Loyalty was far more practical.
He hefted the trident in his hand. The weapon was about two meters long, perfectly balanced, and objectively the most powerful thing he had crafted to date. By his calculations, it weighed approximately 6,200 kilograms. That was 300 kilos heavier than his stone sword, which had already been absurdly heavy by any reasonable standard.
He needed to test this thing properly.
He raised the trident over his shoulder and began charging the throw. The familiar crosshair appeared in his vision, shifting and adjusting as he aimed. The longer he held the charge, the more the weapon seemed to hum.
Whoosh.
BOOM.
The trident left his hand like a railgun projectile. The air itself seemed to tear apart, a sharp whistling scream that made his ears ring. The weapon crossed more than ten meters in what felt like a fraction of a second and buried itself in the stone wall of his courtyard.
Rumble...
"Oh shit."
The wall began to shake. Cracks spread outward from the impact point like a spiderweb, stone fragments breaking free and scattering across the ground. The structural integrity was clearly compromised.
CRACK. BOOM!
The entire section of wall exploded.
Chunks of stone flew everywhere, some pieces crossing the ten-meter distance back to where he stood. They struck his diamond armor and shattered into powder on impact, not even scratching the enchanted surface.
At least his armor worked as advertised.
Through the cloud of stone dust and debris, a blue phantom streaked toward him. Before his brain fully registered what was happening, the trident was back in his hand.
"Well," he said, examining the returned weapon. "That is one way to demolish a wall."
He looked at the destruction he had caused. The wall was just gone.
He moved quickly to fix it. He mined the scattered rubble, crafted replacement blocks, and rebuilt the wall piece by piece. The entire process took less than two minutes. Minecraft construction had always been efficient.
Then he headed back into his courtyard proper, where the grass was looking noticeably patchy.
"Seriously? Again?"
One of the mooshrooms had escaped its pen and was happily munching random spots of grass, leaving bald patches everywhere it went. The creature looked up at him with a piece of grass hanging from its mouth.
"Who let it out this time?"
Either Qingxue or Mengyao had opened the pen and forgotten to close it. He suspected Mengyao, the kid seemed to like the mooshrooms.
"Go back to Bessie."
He gently pushed the creature back into its enclosure and secured the gate properly this time.
With that handled, he walked to the edge of his courtyard, right where it overlooked the sea of clouds below. This was a better testing ground. Plenty of open space, nothing important to accidentally destroy.
"Time to see how far this thing can actually go."
The noise had drawn attention. He heard footsteps behind him as Yan, Qingxue, and Mengyao emerged from the pavilion where they had been talking.
All three of them were staring at his armor.
To be fair, it probably looked ridiculous. Diamond armor did not exactly match the aesthetic of cultivation world equipment. Its sky-blue surface lacked the intricate engravings and symbolic patterns common to spiritual equipment. Its design was simple and geometric, almost crude compared to the elegant craftsmanship cultivators valued.
"Let's see..." He raised the trident, aimed at the distant horizon, and charged the throw to maximum.
"Here we go!"
FWOOOOSH.
The trident left his hand with a sharp burst of sound, transforming into a streak of blue light as it shot across the sky and vanished into the distance.
He waited.
Five seconds passed.
Then ten.
Then fifteen.
"...Huh."
Only then did he remember something important. The Loyalty enchantment required approximately 0.35 seconds after impact before it could recall the trident. That meant if the weapon had not hit anything yet, or if it had struck something extremely far away, the return would be delayed.
He looked around at the endless sea of clouds surrounding the mountain sect.
"That might have been a mistake."
Also, his Loyalty enchantment was only level one. The return speed would definitely be much slower than the throwing speed. He probably should not have charged it to maximum.
"What are you wearing?" Yan asked, walking up beside him. She reached out and tapped his helmet with her knuckles.
"Diamond armor," Alexei said.
"It looks awful."
"Thanks. That is exactly what I was going for."
Yan grabbed the sides of his helmet and tried to lift it off his head. The helmet did not budge at all.
She frowned, clearly not used to being unable to move something. She increased her grip strength.
Alexei felt his feet leave the ground.
THUD.
He landed hard enough to make the earth shake slightly, and Yan immediately let go, turning her face away as if nothing had happened.
"Did you just—"
"I do not know what you are talking about," Yan said, examining her fingernails.
Mengyao covered her face with one hand.
"Something is approaching," Qingxue said suddenly. Her eyes were focused on the distant sky.
"The trident is coming back!" Alexei said excitedly. He could not see anything yet. "Where is it?"
"About three kilometers out."
"...Oh."
That was going to take a while.
A moment later, a figure materialized in the air above them.
It had a humanoid outline formed from drifting grey mist. Its shape resembled a person, but no clear features could be seen. The mist constantly shifted, dispersing and reforming as it floated closer.
Alexei narrowed his eyes. "Wait. That is not my trident. Is that..."
"A wraith scout from the Ghost Sect," Yan said, her expression turning cold. "Its strength is at the Core Formation level."
She already suspected as much. Qingxue had been ambushed during her tribulation, and although she had not revealed everything, the Ghost Sect's involvement was obvious.
Yan raised her hand and summoned a small fan. It was crafted from white jade and threaded with golden silk, measuring about thirty centimeters in length.
The flying sword she normally used was just transportation. This fan was her real weapon.
----------
[POV: Ghost Sect Outpost]
The overseer was having a bad week.
For years, his position as regional overseer had been comfortable. He delegated the work to his subordinates while he collected bribes and indulged himself. Life had been easy.
Then that red-haired bastard showed up.
The man was an inner sect deacon, someone whose authority he could not challenge. He barked orders and demanded results without pause. The worst part was not even the added workload. It was the complete absence of compensation.
He had spent decades building his little kingdom here. And now, some outsider from headquarters treated him like nothing more than a servant.
Could he do anything about it?
No, he could not.
So he smiled, nodded, and did what he was told. Because once this deacon left, everything would go back to normal. He just had to endure.
The current mission was simple enough: scout the Aureate Summit Sect and confirm whether a specific woman was present. Easy work, in theory.
The problem was his Grey Fiend Art had atrophied from decades of disuse. His spiritual perception had degraded to maybe 200-300 meters range. To actually see anything useful, he had to position the wraith directly above the sect.
He guided his wraith forward, ignoring the cultivator as she prepared an attack below. She was at the Spirit Condensation stage. Powerful, but not a true threat. Grey Wraith forms were immune to physical damage. Only spiritual techniques could disperse them, and most cultivators relied on flashy sword strikes instead of effective spiritual methods.
Then he realized his mistake.
Oh.
Fire erupted from the woman's fan.
"Shit."
He tried to pull the wraith away, but he was too slow.
BOOM.
The wraith detonated in a violent explosion, and the grey mist disintegrated instantly under the overwhelming heat.
---
Back at the Ghost Sect outpost, the overseer gasped as the wraith connection severed. His face went pale, sweat beading on his forehead.
The wraith was destroyed, but the soul anchor remained intact. As long as the fragment of his soul stored in the technique survived, he could rebuild the wraith infinitely. It just took time and spiritual energy.
He immediately began the restoration process, channeling power through the secret method.
"What happened?" The red-haired deacon sitting nearby did not even look up from his tea.
"Nothing to worry about," the overseer said with a smile. "The enemy destroyed the wraith. I am restoring it now."
The deacon finally looked at him. "Did you at least confirm the target's location before you lost control?"
"Yes." The overseer bowed slightly. "The woman from the portrait is confirmed to be inside the Aureate Summit Sect."
----------
[POV: Aureate Summit Sect]
Alexei watched Yan obliterate the wraith scout with a single strike of her fan and had to admit it was impressive.
Flames consumed the grey mist instantly, leaving nothing behind but fading embers.
Mengyao seemed lost in thought, probably piecing together what it meant for the conflict between the Aureate Summit Sect and the Ghost Sect. An attack without warning or negotiation suggested this was not the first clash between the Aureate Summit Sect and the Ghost Sect.
Yan, however, was still frowning. She could not kill the wraith permanently. The Grey Fiend Art allowed infinite reconstruction as long as the soul anchor remained intact. This was only a temporary solution.
"Something else is approaching," Qingxue warned.
"More scouts?" Alexei asked as he scanned the horizon.
A small black dot appeared in the distance. It grew larger rapidly, cutting through the air as it flew straight toward him.
It was his trident.
The weapon tore through the fading grey mist where the wraith had been destroyed.
Pop. Pop-pop-pop-pop.
Experience orbs materialized out of thin air and rained down from the sky.
"No. No no no..."
Alexei stared in horror as several of them rolled straight past him. Some slipped over the edge and vanished into the clouds below. He rushed forward and grabbed what he could, but most were already gone. At least a dozen levels' worth of experience had disappeared beyond his reach.
"Blyat," he muttered. "That was at least fifteen levels."
The trident returned to his hand.
----------
[POV: Ghost Sect Outpost]
The overseer was concentrating on the restoration technique when something went wrong.
The soul connection snapped without warning.
Pain followed instantly.
A piece of his soul was gone. It had been torn away completely. The fragment he had embedded within the wraith to maintain the connection had vanished, and part of his core soul had been taken with it.
Blood burst from his mouth and splattered across the ritual circle.
"What... what just happened?"
This was not supposed to be possible. The Grey Fiend Art could be dispersed by spiritual attacks, but the soul fragment should have remained intact. That was the entire point. The anchor was supposed to be indestructible except through very specific soul-severing methods.
He tried to stand, intending to report this to the deacon immediately, but when he turned toward the main seat, it was empty.
The red-haired man was gone.
----------
[POV: Aureate Summit Sect]
Yan stared at the space where the wraith had been, her expression shifting from determined to confused.
"The wraith's aura disappeared completely," she said slowly. "It is actually gone?"
She looked at the trident in Alexei's hand.
"Can I examine that?"
Alexei shrugged and handed it over. "Sure. Just don't throw it."
The moment Yan took hold of the weapon, her eyes widened. She estimated its weight at no less than 6,000 kilograms, possibly more. She immediately adjusted her grip and quietly circulated a fraction of her spiritual power to counterbalance the burden.
Even for a Spirit Condensation stage cultivator, this would be a significant burden in combat. Her physical strength was roughly 17,500 kilograms. Using a weapon of this mass in battle would quickly drain her stamina.
She studied the trident carefully, extending her spiritual sense along its length. Aside from its absurd weight, she found nothing unusual. There were no embedded formations, no circulating qi, and no signs of refinement through conventional cultivation methods.
There was only the weight.
And the faint purple shimmer that covered both the weapon and his armor.
"I cannot identify the material," she admitted, handing it back. "Or the enchantments on it. This is beyond my knowledge."
"I see." Alexei said.
But he was not about to let this opportunity pass. If Yan was offering to help test things, he might as well get a full evaluation.
"Since you are here, would you help me test the armor properly? I need to determine its true limits."
Yan thought for a moment, then gave a small nod. "That would be useful information. Qingxue, you should assist as well."
---
The testing process took about an hour.
They tried everything: spiritual techniques, physical strikes, weapon impacts, even having Yan blast him with her fan's flames at various intensities.
The results were frankly absurd.
"Nothing below Spirit Condensation stage can even scratch you," Yan said, sounding almost offended by this fact. "And even low-level Spirit Condensation attacks are barely leaving marks."
Qingxue nodded. "The armor's durability is extraordinary. And the enchantments seem to reduce damage significantly beyond just the physical protection."
Alexei checked his armor's condition. A few points of durability lost on the chestplate, but nothing serious.
"What about with the shield?" he asked.
He pulled out his diamond shield and tested the combined defense.
The difference was dramatic. Attacks that had previously caused minor damage now had no effect at all. Yan had to expend a significant amount of spiritual power just to push him back even slightly.
"Your total weight with all equipment..." Yan calculated mentally. "The trident is 6,000 kilograms. The shield is 2,500. The armor itself is probably another 9,000 or so. That is over 18,000 kilograms just from equipment."
"Eighteen tons," Alexei murmured. "Yeah. That sounds about right."
Qingxue folded her arms. "At that weight, most Core Formation cultivators would only be able to move you through spiritual force. And if you braced yourself with the shield, you would be completely immovable."
The women stood there processing this information even after the testing concluded.
There was, however, a limitation. The equipment only functioned while Alexei wore it. Once removed, it reverted to its original blocky form and became completely unusable. They had already tested whether anyone else could use it.
Yan had tried putting on the helmet, but it simply rested on her head like a lifeless cube, offering no protection whatsoever.
Alexei glanced at her. "Unless you plan to glue it to your skull."
Yan gave him a flat look. "I will pass."
---
Alexei returned to the mob farm in high spirits, ready to continue grinding for resources.
Then he spotted a zombie villager shuffling near the kill platform.
It was not just any zombie villager.
"Is that... a cleric?"
Brown tattered pants, purple robe, yellow belt... That was definitely a cleric profession. He recognized the outfit from countless Minecraft playthroughs.
The timing, unfortunately, was terrible. He still did not have a brewing stand, which meant he could not restock the cleric's trades. That left him with only the default offers, with limits that would run out quickly.
Even so, redstone and lapis were too valuable to ignore. Curing the villager would be worth the trouble.
The real problem was the zombie villager's health. One stray hit from almost anything and it would die before he could even begin the curing process.
He took his time. He cleared the surrounding mobs first, moving carefully so nothing wandered too close. After several minutes, he placed a boat, guided the zombie villager into it, and rowed it away from the kill platform.
He kept every motion slow and controlled.
One mistake, and the opportunity would be gone.
Alexei spent several careful minutes clearing the surrounding mobs, then used a boat to transport the zombie villager away from the kill platform.
Finally, he had the zombie villager positioned in front of the witch's cell.
The first step was to apply Weakness.
He pulled the lever and opened the trapdoor.
The witch reacted instantly. She hurled a splash potion, and purple liquid burst across both Alexei and the zombie villager. Alexei did not panic. Poison had no effect on undead creatures, and instant damage potions restored a zombie villager's health instead of harming it. There was no risk of it dying from her attacks.
Even so, he immediately shut the trapdoor and reached for the milk he kept nearby for emergencies. He drank it quickly, and the poison effect vanished at once.
He ate bread to recover his health, waited several minutes, and tried again.
Another splash potion struck him. He drank another bucket of milk.
He waited and tried a third time.
This time, the witch threw a different potion. Grey particles spiraled around the zombie villager as the Weakness effect took hold.
"Got it," he said quietly.
He fed the zombie villager a golden apple and moved it into the holding cell he had prepared. Iron bars lined the enclosure, as they were said to speed up the curing process. He did not know whether that was fact or rumor, but it cost him little to find out.
Now there was nothing left to do but wait.
The curing process would take time.
---
While the zombie villager converted, Alexei focused on his next major project: the Nether.
He needed several things from that dimension. Nether quartz for automation. Blaze rods for brewing stands. And most importantly, infinite lava.
Once he had a brewing stand, he could trade with the cleric continuously for redstone and lapis lazuli. Redstone was essential for circuits and automation. Lapis was required for enchanting at an enchanting table.
Getting enough enchantment variety from librarians alone would take forever. He simply did not have enough villagers. The enchanting table was still his best option for diversifying his enchantment library.
But to build a Nether portal, he needed obsidian. At least ten blocks of it.
Which meant he needed lava.
The lava collection setup was crude.
He dug a 3×3×3 pit, placed an MC-ified floating stone block in the center, stacked regular stone blocks on top of it, and had Yan heat them with her fan.
The process was much slower than he had anticipated.
The stone did start to melt, but the lava dripped so slowly that it would often solidify again before reaching the collection pool. After an hour of this, he had collected maybe half a bucket.
"This is not going to work," he muttered.
He modified the design, lining the bottom of the pit with cauldrons. The dripping lava would be caught directly by the cauldrons, and once inside, it showed no signs of solidifying.
The efficiency was still terrible, but at least it worked consistently.
Yan looked distinctly annoyed by his unimpressed expression.
"Do you have any idea how difficult it is to melt stone with controlled fire? Blasting it apart and melting it are completely different processes."
"I know. You are doing great."
"You do not sound convinced."
"I am very convinced."
Yan's eye twitched slightly. She was definitely planning revenge for this.
Alexei suddenly felt a chill run down his spine. He looked around, but nothing seemed out of place. He turned back to the cauldron, which had just finished filling with lava, and scooped it up with an iron bucket.
[Lava Bucket ×1]
A Nether portal required at least ten obsidian blocks. So far, he had collected four.
Assimilating lava also cost two levels of experience per bucket. But MC-ified lava and water could create a cobblestone generator, producing infinite unassimilated cobblestone. But the cobblestone generator could wait. Once he opened the Nether, there would be infinite lava available. He could build as many cobblestone generators as he wanted. He would achieve complete lava fuel independence.
One bucket of lava could smelt 100 items in a furnace, far more efficient than even a block of coal. The only downside was that lava buckets could not be stacked, which made collecting them tedious.
But that was a problem for future Alexei.