A mere iron spade could not dislodge the crystal ore directly—it was unyielding as a mountain. The only way was to loosen the soil around it and excavate the entire embedded crystal ore.
This posed no great problem, save the toil it demanded of Nolan. Mining was laborious work indeed.
And try as he might to avoid it, at times the spade would strike a stubborn rock, sending jarring forces up the shaft to numb his hands—for every action meets its equal opposite reaction.
Unable to aid in the digging, Ellin sought instead to gather the slime condensate from the pool where Fischl and Nolan had defeated the aquatic slimes.
However, when Fischl and Nolan defeated these water slimes, they were in the water, so now their drops were also at the bottom of the pond.
Due to the clear water quality, it was apparent that the pond was quite deep, probably about thirty to forty centimeters.
Fortunately, Eileen was wearing shorts, so as long as she took off her boots, she could easily collect the slime condensate without getting her clothes wet.
"Oof,~ It's cold!"
Finding a relatively dry rock, she took off her boots and socks, then waded into the water.
The stagnant water in the cave, without sunlight for years, was unusually cold, feeling like just-melted ice blocks. After taking a few steps, she regretted it a bit.
But the loot was right in front of her, within reach. If she gave up now, Miss Fischl and Mr. Nolan would look down on her. So, gritting her teeth, Ellin continued to endure.
She leaned her upper body forward, reaching into the water with her fair palm. With a slightly strained expression, the elemental ores, emitting a faint glow from the water element, shone brightly in her hand.
Finally, Ellin successfully touched the slime condensate, grabbed it, and hastily left the pond as if escaping.
When she returned to the shore, her feet were already red from the cold, and her sense of touch was somewhat dulled.
"Oh dear, Miss Ellin, are you okay?" Oz noticed Ellin's condition and asked with concern.
"I-I'm fine."
While speaking, Ellin's voice trembled slightly with her teeth chattering. Then, unable to hold it in, she covered her nose and sneezed, causing her orange ponytail to sway.
"Uh, looks like I caught a bit of a cold." Ellin looked at her damp palms caused by the water from her nose and said to avoid further colds, "I'll go warm up by the campfire over there!"
"Alright, go ahead!" Oz nodded.
With Ellin's task completed, Nolan finally dug out a whole piece of crystal ore.
Judging by its weight, he estimated that it was equivalent to about three standard kilograms of crystal ore commonly found on the market, valued at around six thousand mora.
This wasn't a small amount, and there were about four similar pieces.
Fischl approached the dug-out crystal ore, squatted down, and with her semi-transparent black stockings snugly fitting her legs, she pressed her fair hand against the clear and transparent crystal.
The purple Vision flickered slightly, successfully turning this piece of crystal ore into dots of light and storing it.
Her Vision had a load of over thirty kilograms. Besides some food and drinking water for a few days and essential outdoor items such as tents, there was also spare carrying capacity specifically used to store exploration gains.
Therefore, it was no problem to load all the crystal ore here.
Nolan took a slight breath and then continued to mine other crystal ores.
Clink, clank!
In terms of mining, an iron shovel was not as efficient as an iron pickaxe, and the efficiency was a bit too low. However, Nolan possessed the talent [Abundant Life], which accelerated his stamina recovery.
For an ordinary person, using an iron shovel to mine for such a long time would have probably exhausted them long ago!
Nolan looked at the only digging artifact in theEvernight Kingdom that was completely worn-out, and somewhat helplessly looked towards the Ruler of Ashen Darkness.
"Hmph!"
Fischl crossed her arms beneath her chest covered by a black skirt, slightly pretending to be angry as she turned her head away, revealing her fair ears under her golden hair.
Watching Fischl's proud appearance, Nolan gently smiled and comforted, "Well, this divine weapon can also be upgraded now. As a member of the Evernight Kingdom, it retires with honor in its shining glory. The princess should be happy for it!"
"Hmm, what you said makes sense." Fischl touched her fair and soft chin, pondered for a moment, and nodded in agreement.
[Fischl Has Developed Good Feelings Towards You, Obtained 90 Affection Points. Current Affection Level: Lv. 7 (290/700)]
After Fischl collected all the ores, Nolan hesitated as he looked at the elemental ores in the pond.
Because elemental ores couldn't be collected with ordinary tools.
Just like the ore containing lightning elements, the electric crystal, to collect it, one needed to use pyro elements to attack it and cause an overload reaction to easily obtain it.
Similarly, water elemental ores, according to the records of the Adventurers' Guild, were similar to electric crystals and required a corresponding element to collect them smoothly, which was the ice element.
Forcing other methods was entirely a thankless task.
Like electric crystals, it would also be harmed by water elements upon contact, and of course, ice elements were not the only way to collect water elemental ores.
As long as one was strong enough, they could directly break it with their hands.
But obviously, Nolan hadn't reached that level, so he could only use the method of attacking with ice elements.
When adventurers encountered water elemental ores during exploration, they would generally use ice cubes or catch a small cryo slime to solve the problem.
Unfortunately, Nolan had none of these.
The elemental potions he had were all pyro and electro elements, and looking at Eileen roasting above, it was apparent that she didn't have anything related to ice elements either.
So Nolan finally turned to Fischl, who was the last possibility among the few present.
Otherwise, they could only temporarily miss out on these valuable water elemental ores and collect them later.
"Sigh~" Fischl sighed pretentiously, slightly lifting her fair chin, placing her hands on her waist, and lightly touching her soft abdomen tightly covered by the black silk bodysuit. She said somewhat proudly, "It seems this princess's intervention is required once more!"
"Oh?" Nolan cooperatively showed a puzzled expression, "Does the princess have a solution?"
"Of course!"
Fischl took two steps closer to Nolan and the pond.
The purple-black intertwined hem of her skirt swayed slightly, revealing her thighs covered by the over-knee strap-style black silk stockings. Even in the dimly lit cave environment illuminated only by firelight, they couldn't conceal their snowy whiteness and softness.
She raised her palm slightly, and a blue flower emitting a faint cold air appeared in her palm.
"This is the ice mist flower that the young miss collected some time ago. The cold air on it is well preserved in her Vision and has not completely dissipated. It should be no problem to use it to collect these water elemental ores!"
Oz, flapping his wings and flying, explained for his young miss.
(End of Chapter)
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