Chapter 20: Mysterious Crystals

That took a week. I didn't plan for it to last for a week. At most, after three days of constantly pouring those car fuels on them, I'll be burning them to the ground. I didn't expect these plant monsters to be intelligent enough to understand that they were under attack, and they would be constantly doing a lot of weird things to prevent me from filling their entire ground with flammable gas.

I almost freaked out when the ground suddenly hollowed out below me or the time when some of the vines suddenly lashed at my position as if they could see me. Fortunately, staying in the Faded World let me ignore whatever was happening in the real world. I'm really grateful that I have this power!

There was that time when they kept crushing the cans that I manifested in the real world, which I was using as my duplication spot. I felt annoyed at first but then got an amazing idea to exploit that by replicating more and manifesting all of them in the real world. I even went all the way and used the push-up cart in that car dealership building and carried many duplicated cans full of car fuel just to scatter them all around the park. They were going to crush them anyway, so that helped me greatly.

Well, they stopped after a day, but it doesn't matter. It was too late by then. I just had to spend another day sprinkling more car fuel for assurance, and then everything was done.

By the way, I am quite surprised when I feel a warm trickle flowing within my body while I'm spreading these car fuels. I belatedly realized that some of the plant monsters were dying from just the copious amount of car fuel I've been dumping on them. The amount of mana they gave me wasn't that much though, but there was a lot that, after five whole days of just spreading poison to the soil, I got enough mana to stay within the alternate dimension for two whole hours.

Anyway, with all of the setup done, I threw a molotov at them early in the morning yesterday before bunkering down on my base for the whole day. Unlike the time when only trickles of energy entered my body due to plants being poisoned by the fuel, yesterday gave a euphoric feeling as warmth just filled my body. It was so comfortable, as if I were lying on the most comfortable bed in the world while the warmest and most comforting blanket covered my entire body. I think I might have made some inappropriate noise because it really felt that good!

It took until evening before everything calmed down. I still felt warm energy flowing within my body, but it was small enough to stop me from the catatonia of that bliss. I could think and move enough to check outside, though I decided to do that tomorrow and simply ate some food and basically spent all my time in my base.

And now here we are.

Within the Faded World, I am standing in front of the molten slag that used to be a recreational park. Everything was burned down to its roots, and not a single plant remained. Only black soot and burnt charcoal could be seen, and mysteriously, around these burnt remains of the plant monsters, I found something curious.

"What is this?"

There was a thumb-sized crystal lying on the floor. I didn't know what it was because of the colorless world, but the sparkle around it made me notice that it wasn't just a rock but rather some sort of crystal. I grew curious, so I took it and then tried to duplicate it within my mind.

"Whoa!?"

What the!? It took so much of my mana with just a single duplication!?

I looked at the duplicated crystal in my hand. It was a greenish crystal that calmly pulsed with a dim, gentle light. Just at first glance alone I knew this was not of this world!

Then what is this?

"... Is this the thing usually seen in those apocalypse novels? The one that monsters usually drop when they are killed?"

Right, I do remember something like that. Usually in those kinds of novels, monsters generally drop some sort of loot that acts as their core. These cores can then be used to upgrade the powers of the protagonist, improve the capabilities of a person, or simply act as an energy source for their technology.

Is this crystal that? A drop from those monsters?

"Well, if it is, then leaving them alone will be bad. I have to get them!"

I noticed that there were a lot of these crystals lying around on the molten ground. If they are dropped by those monsters, then it is my right as the one who hunted them to get it!

But well, duplicating them costs a lot. What should I do?

"Oh right, there is that option!"

Yes. If doing it within the Faded World was costly, then I might as well get them through an empty alternate world. Unlike the Faded World, everything in the original world was already copied in a mirror world. It also costs cheaper jumping within it compared to staying within the Faded World. The only downside was that I couldn't pass through obstacles like it was nothing, and I couldn't see what was happening to the real world when I jumped into a dead mirror world.

But does it matter? If I could duplicate these special crystals, then I must do so! If they are one of the new things introduced in this apocalypse, then there might be some sort of use to them, right?

But first, I checked around to see if my surroundings were safe. I immediately realized that it's not. There are some zombies lurking around the place and walking towards the molten slag that became of the park.

I can't return to the real world here. I don't want to leave it to chance when I return to the real world while I'm out in the open like this and suddenly a zombie pops out of nowhere and infects me.

But... is that really a good idea?

I have barricaded the entire area with cars. I made sure to drive them and line them up so that it's impossible to walk past them unless they climb up on these cars. Even if they climb up, they still wouldn't be able to open the metal shutters on the door, and if they do, I have already blocked all the entrances and the windows with cars, tables, chairs, and anything I can block around it. I'm essentially blocked on all sides, which is a non-issue because of my ability to jump to the Faded World, but I cannot do that if I just jump to an ordinary mirror world.

What to do?

Hmm... I can just duplicate them. After burning down the park, I got so much mana that I felt like I could stay within a mirror world for twelve whole hours. I haven't tested it yet, but I felt it was like that.

I haven't used that newly acquired mana yet, and it's only been a few minutes since I came here. The cost of duplicating this crystal only amounted to ten minutes' worth of stay in a mirror world. I could spare some of my mana to duplicate all of this stuff.

But it would be a waste if I just duplicated them one by one. Just one was enough for me to duplicate. I could just multiply them by repeatedly going and leaving the mirror world when I'm in the safety of my base.

So then, if I am just going to duplicate one, then I might as well choose the biggest crystal here!

I don't know why these plant monsters drop the crystals and those weird zombies don't, but it doesn't matter right now. I will try and learn about it in the future. For now, I should focus on these crystals.

I roam around the burnt park while occasionally swinging my golf club and using Invisible Strike to crush their soft jelly heads. Sometimes, there are some zombies whose heads are quite hard, though a few thwacks kill them, and with me having a lot of mana, I don't need to be reserved. Even if these zombies only give two seconds' worth of stay in the mirror world, it is still an increase in my mana, which is important, so as much as possible, I'll have to constantly kill these monsters.

I'll try to find the source and burn them after I'm done with this.

"Found it." After walking around for a while, I finally found what I'm looking for.

On a large burnt husk of what used to be a giant tree, there was a large slab of crystal in it the size of my torso. I was just going to try and get it when I noticed a few zombies approaching it.

Why are they going to that crystal?

I looked around and saw a few zombies also reaching out to other smaller crystals lying on the ground and clutching them in their rotten hands. That made me raise an eyebrow, and I got suspicious.

Are these crystals important to these zombies?

If it was important to them, then letting them get it might be bad!

As that thought came to mind, I saw a few zombies touching the slab and pushing it away to somewhere.

"No, you don't!"

Having my suspicions confirmed, I quickly worked to prevent them from taking it away. I brandished my golf club and swung it with all of my might, enchanting my club with Invisible Strike, and cleaving the heads of the row of these zombies with a single swing. The force of my strike blew their heads as if a bomb just exploded, and quickly I tried to reach out to the crystal before stopping as realization hit me.

Right. I'm just going to duplicate it. The original item itself won't vanish just because I made a copy of it. How can I prevent these zombies from taking it to wherever they are planning to take it? There is no way I'm going to confront them in real life!

Should I try wiping them out? Though that means finding out where they originated! I've tried killing a lot of zombies at the condominium, and it doesn't work out because somehow they were reproducing like crazy!

I have a suspicion that they might have originated from those mountains of flesh, but it's all conjecture without any proof, so I can only roll that idea within my mind.

Wait, maybe there is another way!

Lately, I either used Rewrite if I wanted to manifest something I'm holding into reality or Duplicate if I wanted to copy what already existed in reality to the Faded World. I haven't tried anything yet because I got busy dealing with those flower monsters.

Now that I have a lot of money, I think it was safe to attempt this experiment at least.

What if I bring an item from the real world to the Faded World even when I'm still at the Faded World? I always brought items from the real world to the Faded World whenever I started my dimension hop. If I could do the transfer without needing to return to the real world, then it would be useful for me!

Well, I haven't tried this yet because I thought it would be useless. I already have Rewrite and Duplicate. Just taking an item from the real world to the Faded World felt like a waste of mana at the time, so I simply dismissed the idea when it came to my mind. Now though, it would be useful for me!

With that idea in my mind, I immediately started my experiment. I pointed my palm at that large slab of crystal and willed it to be transferred to the Faded World. As I thought of that, it happened. The colorless crystal suddenly gained color as I felt a sudden chunk of my mana lost. It wasn't a big deal. It only took five minutes' worth of stay within my mana reserves.

The good news was that the crystal slab was fully transferred here. It wasn't a duplicate. It was the real version being dragged in this monochromatic world.

"I succeeded!"

I pumped my fist high after that success. With this, I became more proficient with the use of my powers. With this much mana, I could do more experiments without worrying about my mana reserves.

But that could wait. For now, I have to prevent these zombies from taking these crystals.

All of those crystals came from my week of hard work. I won't let these walking corpses take it from me!

____________________

It took me an hour before I retrieved all of the crystals that I could find around the park. I didn't know whether I got everything or some had been taken by the zombies, but it doesn't matter. My bag was already heavy with the amount of crystals I put in it. It was like hefting wood blocks as I carried it on my back while I dealt with the zombies. After I was done taking anything I could take, I jumped back to my starting point in the real world and found myself inside my base.

The interior of this building was lit up by countless amounts of duplicated power lamps. One lamp was connected to a generator, so I could just duplicate it when these lamps lost their light. I put the bag down after I got here and then quickly checked my haul.

Let's see... these crystals are mostly green in color, though there were some who either had a deeper hue in their glow, while some were either pinkish or brownish. I took one of the smaller ones. I picked up a light green crystal the size of my thumb and rolled it around my fingers.

"What can these crystals do?"

I just took them because they looked important, and those zombies seemed incredibly interested in them, but how could I use them? There has to be something I can do with it, right?

Like, for example, can it be used as an energy source? Or maybe enhance myself?

Hmm... most manhwa and manhua that have an apocalypse survival theme in them usually have their characters eating whatever the monster dropped. Usually, it was either the blood of the monster or the crystallized core within their body that they'll just swallow without hesitation.

I always question the sanity of those characters whenever they do that. How could they just swallow something like that? Are they crazy? Or maybe the author was a psycho?

Now that I am faced with that same situation, I gazed at it while feeling a mixture of disgust and bewilderment.

Do I need to eat this to get the advantages from this crystal? What if there is another way to use it? Like using it as another energy source for gadgets and other appliances? Or maybe I can turn it into a powder and sprinkle it on some weapons to enhance their striking power or something?

I don't really know. Do I have to experiment on my own?

"Well, if I am going to experiment on it, then why not just think of absorbing it with my mana?"

It's just a comment without thought behind it. I'm just messing around when I utter that. That was why it took me by surprise when I just tried doing that and suddenly succeeded!

I tried reaching out to the crystal with my magical senses and imagined moving my mana within my body, guiding them into my hand until it touched the crystal. Then I thought of absorbing it. It was shocking when I easily achieved the results. Seeing the glow of the crystal dimming until it turned into a dull, colorless one as I felt the familiar sensation of a warm energy entering my magical core.

"... It's a mana battery!"

This crystal can recover my mana!