I became a god by treasure hunting after arriving 500 years early

But... why must life be so tragic?

Lu Yuan felt terrible and gritted his teeth as he said, "You can go home now, Conch Girl. Stop pretending to sleep and return to your own place. If you keep staying at my place, your mom's going to beat me up."

After all, a charming sleeping beauty like her should awaken from a deep slumber in the manner of a fairy tale.

"This is just a lousy clone, not even the original... I can't do this to myself," Lu Yuan said, gritting his teeth even harder against temptation.

"Well, I can only come back then... You look really tense, Mr. Lu," Conch was happy—your soul is all in that clone; can it even be considered a clone?

A little blue light transferred from the Tree of Life into her body.

After her soul returned to its rightful place, she appeared somewhat exhausted.

Those big eyes no longer sparkled with the same vivacity as before.

Lu Yuan sneakily used the Explorer's Eye to take a quick peek.

[Stranger·Conch, the last remnant of the Green Grass Civilization.]

[Shape: 6.5]

[Qi: 6.8]

[Divine Attribute: 33.6]

[Ability: Mind Control]

[Extraordinary Level: Level 1]

He was shocked to realize that her Divine Attribute had dropped from 34.1 to 33.6.

One shouldn't underestimate this difference of 0.5. It represented 1.73 times the value, meaning 46% of the energy had been consumed by Lu Yuan!

"She said her Divine Attribute didn't drop, but it clearly had some impact," he thought.

"A ten-thousand-year-old ginseng has turned into a five-thousand-year-old one..."

Lu Yuan felt a deep ache; Conch's loss of 0.5 Attribute was more precious than all his own attributes combined.

The girl was really exhausted. She didn't say a word when Lu Yuan held her like this, just smiled weakly, then dozed off with an abnormal flush on her face.

Lu Yuan knew she was significantly weakened, so he took out the "painted skin leather," concentrating his thoughts to command, "Transform!"

The 80-square-meter piece of leather turned into a massive, fluffy, and soft blanket.

First, he fed Conch a bit of Soul Baby Fruit juice, then wrapped her in the blanket before placing her into a large blossom near the Tree of Life.

He also hung the "Nine-Eyed Bead Necklace" around her chest—a trinket pilfered from the Painted Skin Emperor, washed thoroughly with water and even soaked in the Tree of Life's sap for a while to imbue it with a faint fragrance.

"Have a good rest. If the Divine Attribute can't be recovered, the cost will be too high."

Lu Yuan looked towards the distant sky; the dark clouds had long dissipated, replaced by blue skies and white clouds.

The vanished Mandala Empire, like drifting smoke, faded away, but decline is just the flip side of prosperity; it's a preparation for blossoming once again.

Humanity's 18th civilization was drawing from the essence of the empire, resilient as weeds.

"Humanity, hurry up and become strong."

...

...

What followed was a proper time for great development!

Lu Yuan quickly organized a plowing team of over a thousand people and even manipulated the Tree of Life to personally pick up trash.

"Ladies and gentlemen, there is a teacher among every three travelers, and the empire is leading us in certain domains," he declared.

"For anything related to text, runes, statues, or anything you can't understand, please handle it with care."

"All treasures found belong to Green Grass Town! No private hoarding, that's the rule!"

Of course, Lu Yuan also implemented a reward and punishment system to stimulate everyone's enthusiasm for scavenging.

The Mandala Empire might not have been a powerful civilization, but it was a metropolis with a population over a million, leaving behind quite a wealth.

There were helmets and weapons, probably a few thousand pieces, with a total mass of about 12 tons. (Mostly made of ordinary Extraordinary Elements like Black Iron and Mountain Copper)

As for the craftsmanship of the weapons and armor... in Lu Yuan's eyes, it was rather ordinary.

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The Empire lacked engraving technology; the quality of their equipment was at best of Ordinary Level.

They even captured over a hundred creatures such as unicorns, black-headed tigers, and double-horned rhinoceroses, which are mutant creatures. These creatures were still alive, crammed into cages and howling from hunger. Their hides are excellent materials for making leather armor.

Oh, and there were also numerous exquisite decorative items!

Perhaps every civilization likes these lavish decorations. Many Extraordinary Materials were not used where they should have been but instead became tools for the nobles to flaunt their status.

This misallocation of resources is a difficult problem for every civilization to consider.

However, for the impoverished Human Civilization 18, this wasn't a concern for the time being—fiAll the spoils of war were seized by the army!

The soldiers made large hauls almost every day, joyfully traveling back and forth on the "Sky Fortress."

"Today's haul includes three pieces of Outer Heaven Meteorite, all of which are Extraordinary Materials, weighing a total of 9.8 tons! Plus an Extraordinary pear tree, suspected to be a reward from the Empire after completing a Milestone."

This pear tree was like the Cannibal Flower, exhibiting aggression, and was directly dug up and brought back.

"Today's haul includes a piece of ten-thousand-year-old agarwood, weighing 18 tons! A large quantity of ambergris, 200 kilograms!"

"Four pieces of unknown wood and six stones, suspected to have some Supernatural effects!"

"Today's haul..."

Lu Yuan wasn't so greedy as to claim all these riches for himself. After all, stuffing them into his pockets didn't have much significance. (Though he made exceptions for the few that could restore Soul Power.)

This wave of inheritance truly made Human Civilization 18 wealthy, filling their pockets almost instantaneously!

Several owners of craftsmanship talent could finally begin their training.

Lu Yuan was not stingy and let them warm up with materials like "Black Iron" and "Mountain Copper" that could be recycled and reused—Extraordinary Items were still quite useful. If humans had more Extraordinary Items in war, perhaps they could fight more impressively and suffer fewer casualties and deaths.

"Just leave the leather products to me to practice on," he said.

"No problem," they replied.

Of course, there was one big question—what was the deal with Devil·Painted Skin? Where did it come from?

This was related to the secrets of Pangu Continent.

Lu Yuan, Conch, and several Translators searched for a long time in the secret treasury of the palace but did not find any clues about the origins of Painted Skin.

"Captain Lu, there's not even information about the First Emperor; I think it's probably lost through word of mouth," said one Translator.

"If the knowledgeable are dead, the secret disappears too," the Translator added.

Lu Yuan nodded and sighed softly.

He speculated that the ancestors of the Mandala Empire might have used the method of "cutting off inheritance" to stop the Epoch disaster, which is why there was almost no data left.

Moreover, there was another odd thing; they did not find the metal sphere Communicator.

Theoretically, the Green Grass Civilization should have had a Communicator, but they never found one.

At the time, Lu Yuan did not think too much of it. Perhaps the Communicator was damaged from long-term use, or maybe the Green Grass Civilization was so powerful that they didn't need such a device.

But the fact that the Mandala Empire also failed to find one made the situation somewhat subtle. Lu Yuan didn't know whether it was bad luck or if there were other factors at play.

"Maybe they tossed the Communicator after contacting humans and opening the Safe Zone?"

"This thing... its origins are unclear..."

.

Just then, a report came through the walkie-talkie from Sha Kan'er, "Captain Lu, we've almost finished searching the entire city. There might be a little bit of trivial profit left, something we can search for slowly in the future. I'm planning to station three to five hundred soldiers here to scavenge slowly."

"Good work, everyone. Take the Sky Fortress home," he replied.

In the end, Lu Yuan called everyone to also transport the livestock back—truth be told, he wasn't keen on consuming the livestock from this place, given the nuclear contamination. Your next read is at My Virtual Library Empire

Radiation could spread along the food chain, and focusing on that one bite of food could easily kill a person.

As enjoyable as it was to use depleted uranium bombs, now they were causing as much pain!!

But after thinking about it, he decided to bring them back anyway...

Even if the current generation of livestock wasn't fit for human consumption, it could still feed the Leviathans.

And, after breeding another generation, there probably wouldn't be any significant issues, and it could effectively solve the problem of the meat shortage.

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