Chapter 41 - Depletion

Sarah ultimately didn't follow Professor Sun's advice. In this comfortable environment, she opened up her mental energy and absorbed a strand of the so-called turbulent mental energy into her mental sea.

She felt nothing; Sarah even felt her head had become much more comfortable because of it.

Sarah immediately felt more weathered.

To be honest, she had always adhered to the principle of keeping a low profile. She didn't want to be the center of attention for the whole world.

A low total mental energy could be compensated for.

High mental energy condensation could be explained as a side effect of multiple injuries, still within the realm of what normal people could have.

But how could she explain this deviation value of 0?

Unlike total mental energy and condensation, which would vary based on a person's age, training, or other external factors.

The deviation value could be said to be completely innate!

Was she supposed to say — "Hello everyone, I'm a transmigrator, different from you interstellar people"?

Sarah felt melancholic inside, while continuing to absorb the surrounding mental energy.

Well, it would be a waste not to take advantage of this opportunity. How to solve the problem was a matter for later.

There were monitors on the walls isolating the mining area. The observing teachers outside saw Sarah's expression turn bad as soon as she entered, all believing it was due to the sudden exposure to turbulent mental energy.

Someone sighed, "Looks like this student will be coming out soon."

"At least bring out one Clarity Stone?" Opening and closing the doors to let people in and out consumed a lot of money each time.

Of course, some teachers spoke up for Sarah: "Staying in the mining area and being washed by mental energy several times is also good for the body. Didn't those students who went in a few times in the past come out with more insights into the use of mental energy? As long as it's not like xxx before, who cried in pain and asked to come out as soon as they went in, even if there's no harvest, it's not really a loss."

"Let's prepare to call for someone inside to bring this student out," some were not very optimistic.

Sarah didn't know what these teachers responsible for monitoring safety outside were saying. After calming her melancholic emotions, she began to walk into the mining area.

She knew there were monitoring devices on the isolation walls of the mining area, so Clarity Stones appearing at the edge of the mining area could generally be discovered and taken away immediately. Sarah didn't do this meaningless thing at the edge of the mining area.

Sarah walked while absorbing the surrounding mental energy, feeling strand after strand of mental energy drilling into her brain and setting up camp. But after absorbing for quite a while, apart from her brain feeling more comfortable, she didn't feel anything else.

There was no sense of fulfillment at all, it felt as empty as if she had only eaten one grain of rice after opening her mouth.

So Sarah became even more unrestrained, beginning to frantically absorb the surrounding mental energy without any regard.

After about ten minutes, a teacher monitoring the situation inside looked at the data displayed on his side and scratched his head: "How come my side shows that the chaotic mental energy value in this area has decreased by two points?"

The person next to this teacher looked at the value in his own area: "Mine is very normal."

"Mine too, it's probably just a temporary fluctuation in the area."

That teacher couldn't think of any other reason and temporarily accepted this explanation, although he was still puzzled that the displayed data showed no signs of recovery for such a long time.

Sarah didn't know that she had caused a small data confusion outside. She had just reached the central area of this mining area.

There were other people in the central part of the mining area, and not just one or two. After all, a mine here certainly couldn't be idle, and multiple people could ensure that if something happened to someone, they could be safely brought out.

When others saw Sarah, there was some confusion in their eyes, after all, Sarah was a strange face to them. However, seeing Sarah's age and attire, they weren't too surprised, and nodded from afar as a greeting.

Sarah didn't disturb these other people in the mining area either. After greeting them, she also began to focus on absorbing mental energy... no, searching for Clarity Stones.

Clarity Stones weren't actually a specific type of stone, but a kind of stone that had adapted to mental energy and could store it after being washed by turbulent mental energy fields over countless years.

After these stones fully contained mental energy, they would become clear and transparent, which is where the name "Clarity Stone" came from.

And this characteristic also made Clarity Stones extremely difficult to find.

However, this wasn't a difficulty for Sarah.

Sarah quickly and accurately dug out two Clarity Stones from the ground and threw them into her basket.

It was difficult for others to find because they couldn't use mental energy and could only rely on their eyes. Sarah didn't have this limitation. She just needed to absorb, absorb, absorb, and then when she found an area where she could absorb a lot of mental energy but couldn't take it away, she knew there was a Clarity Stone there.

Sarah dug several times, and quickly filled a small basket with Clarity Stones.

Remembering Professor Sun's encouragement earlier, saying that as long as she dug out three pieces, the enrollment would be settled, Sarah looked at the thirty-odd pieces in her basket.

Well...

Let's just say she had good luck. She noticed that others were also continuously digging.

After seeing the total number of Clarity Stones in her basket clearly, Sarah began to deliberately slow down her digging speed.

She didn't want to go out so quickly.

It was rare to have a place where she could freely absorb mental energy, so of course she had to absorb enough before leaving.

Secretly absorbing from Clarity Stones was ultimately improper behavior. Although both the Dean and Professor Sun would turn a blind eye to it, it was better not to do it if possible. But the chaotic mental energy in this mining area was definitely free to absorb.

After all, these weren't valuable.

Sarah didn't know how much she had absorbed, but she felt nothing even after absorbing freely for a long time.

It seemed that the quality of these strands of mental energy wasn't very good.

The researchers who were also searching for Clarity Stones in the central area looked around in confusion.

They felt that the painful and unbearable feeling on their bodies had suddenly eased a lot, and the force of mental energy colliding with their mental seas also seemed to have weakened.

Had something happened in the Clarity Stone mining area?

Yes, something had indeed happened in the Clarity Stone mining area.

Ten hours ago, the teacher who had said it was just a temporary fluctuation in the area now stared blankly at the display in front of him, which showed that the chaotic mental energy value had decreased by ten points.

And it wasn't just his display, the displays of other teachers also showed varying degrees of decrease in this value.

The most had already reached thirteen points.

The chaotic mental energy value represented the total amount of raw mental energy in this mining area. The higher the total chaotic mental energy in this mining area, naturally the more Clarity Stones it could produce.

Such a rapid decrease of ten points in such a short time was a huge nightmare for them.

"Why hasn't the Dean come yet?! The Clarity Stone mining area has entered a rapid depletion period!!" a teacher shouted, his face pale.

This was the treasure of their Card Engineering School!

It had only been developed for just over a hundred years, it was still a very young small mine!

In the mining area, Sarah, who was diligently pretending to mine, sneezed, feeling as if someone was talking about her. She wondered if it might be Professor Sun thinking she had stayed in the mining area for too long?

Professor Sun had reminded Sarah several times not to push herself if she couldn't bear it, saying it would be more embarrassing to be carried out.

But Professor Sun hadn't told Sarah how long she should stay, probably worried that if Sarah knew the time, she would stubbornly refuse to leave.

So now Sarah wasn't sure what her level was and how long she should stay in the mining area.

She looked around, it seemed to be the same people, not much had changed.

And their mental state seemed fine, she even saw several people start to whisper among themselves, not knowing what they were talking about.

After all, this was a test for school admission. Although Sarah already had more than forty Clarity Stones in her basket so far, she didn't want to appear too brief in terms of time spent.

Moreover, she didn't know if her mental energy total was enough to reach five hundred after absorbing for so long.

Sarah, who already felt her mental sea was about eight-tenths full, estimated it should be enough.

She couldn't be that bad, not even reaching a thousand points when filled.

However, to be safe, she decided to leave when it reached nine-tenths.

She wasn't greedy! Hehe~

Sarah, preparing to continue idling and freeloading, lowered her head, but a series of alarm sounds came from above.

"Emergency situation, emergency situation, the Clarity Stone mining area has entered a rapid depletion period. Researchers inside, please leave quickly, leave quickly!!"

Sarah: "Huh?"