Cave Refuge

Unlike the Hale family, who lived quite a distance away, Mrs. Thompson and the Clarke family lived relatively nearby, as did Mr. Thompson and the rest of the Thompson family. As such, even with the complete breakdown of transportation, the family could still meet up by taking the number 11 bus, a journey that took just over an hour at most.

These past few days, different families came to understand the situation from Mr. Thompson, who remained tight-lipped about Dong Tianyu's whereabouts, only saying that he was temporarily unable to return home due to work arrangements. As family in officialdom were perceived to be a part of the Officials, Mr. Thompson's words were not questioned.

Mr. Thompson had a clear understanding of the reasons for the family visits. Yet, it was not the time for explanations. All he could do was subtly advise them to prepare their clothes, particularly winter wear, and to hold onto the items given to them by Dong Tianyu, indicating that it was not yet time to use them.

Upon hearing this, relatives left with worried expressions that lasted for a while, speculating about Mr. Thompson's remarks. However, the discussions with Hale's father seemed more fruitful, though it resulted in nothing concrete.

For younger folks like Dong Tianyu, it might be puzzling why the older generation often spoke in such roundabout ways. Why not just speak straightforwardly?

Still, one can't really blame the older generation. After all, they lived through times when a wrong word could ruin one's life. Even now, they still tended to speak ambiguously, aimed at preventing others from finding a loophole in their words.

Without cell phones or convenient transportation, not just the Thompsons, but everyone needed to meet face-to-face for communication. This seemed to bring friends and relatives in Pengcheng closer together, eliminating the sense of distance brought about by remote communication.

Although Dong Tianyu had been staying in the Refuge Center, life wasn't easy. Even though the facilities in the shelter appeared to be fully automated, there were still many chores like replenishing fodder and moving eggs to the Shadow Space.

Each task seemed straightforward. However, it was far from easy when all the tasks for more than four acres of land were piled onto a single person.

Upon understanding the purpose of survival points, being lazy was not an option as it was just too expensive.

Importantly, Dong Tianyu realized that his refuge couldn't really be called a mysterious cave mansion. The most crucial element, Spirit Energy, was absent.

To put it simply, to instigate the revival of Spirit Energy within the cave mansion, it needed to have something truly spiritual within it.

There were many ways to activate Spirit Energy, such as cultivating Spiritual Plants, raising Spiritual Animals, or the simplest method of using a Spiritual Stone to activate dormant spiritual energy.

However, items converted from the technological side using his conversion ability didn't work.

This worried Dong Tianyu. Initially, when he didn't understand the use of survival points, he felt he had an abundance of them, unable to spend them all. As his understanding of survival points deepened, he felt a growing scarcity of them.

However, he couldn't simply stop using them, making him feel somewhat distressed.

Junior Plantation: Speeds up plant growth, slightly reduces the likelihood of plant disease and pests. There is a tiny chance that plants will mutate into Spiritual Plants. 100 Survival Points/square meter (minimum ten square meters).

Junior Pasture: Speeds up the growth of small herbivorous animals, enhancing their health. There is a tiny chance of gaining spirituality while growing. 100 Survival Points/square meter (minimum ten square meters).

Junior Forest: Speeds up the growth of animals and plants in the forest. There is a tiny chance for living creatures in the forest to gain spirituality. 150 Survival Points/square meter (minimum ten square meters).

Junior Fish Pond: Speeds up the growth of fish in the pond, enhancing their health. There is a tiny chance for fish in the pond to gain spirituality while growing. 100 Survival Points/square meter (minimum ten square meters).

Aside from the construction that needed to use survival points, Dong Tianyu already had facilities that could produce spiritual items.

Vein: Stable (reduces the impact of earthquakes on the cave mansion), Micro resource area (able to generate various minerals annually, with a very low chance to produce Energy Ore).

However, he wondered if the Vein would only be able to produce spiritual ore after a year. It was quite a long time.

But upon carefully researching the Vein, Dong Tianyu astutely realized that he had accumulated quite a lot of things in his cave mansion like the modular house, automatic plantation, automatic breeding farm etc.

However, these things didn't seem to be recognized by the System and were not shown in the system layout. Besides the Vein, neither the well nor Fish Pond had been recognized by the System.

Considering this, Dong Tianyu went over to examine the information about the well water first.

Clean Well (upgradable): The well water is clear and suitable for drinking.

For buildings not recognized by the System, such as the well, they would only be recognized after their quality was improved using survival points and would then show up in the data layout.

Well with Faint Energy: Drinking the well water can slightly speed up wound recovery and recover a little bit of stamina. (500 Survival Points)

The cost of upgrading the well was relatively low compared to other upgrade projects. It was also possible to reduce the required survival points by using materials.

Unfortunately, Dong Tianyu didn't possess the key spiritual item required for the upgrade. Although the upgraded well would be extremely practical, Dong Tianyu decided to hold off until he obtained a spiritual item in the future.

To Dong Tianyu's surprise, the small pond converted from the oxygen-producing microalgae machine could also be upgraded, and the effect after upgrading was precisely what he needed most.

Spiritual Spring (special building, cannot be upgraded): Makes the Spirit Energy in the cave mansion more active. When the concentration of Spirit Energy in the mansion reaches a certain level, Spirit Energy can be condensed to obtain a Spiritual Energy Crystal. (1000 Survival Points)

Although he couldn't directly obtain spiritual items, the upgrade could directly activate the dormant Spirit Energy within the cave mansion. With Spirit Energy present within the cave mansion, it could barely be considered as having a mysterious side.

Finally having a fallback plan, Dong Tianyu felt much relieved. He continued to check the other buildings inside the cave mansion.

Modular Room (can be upgraded) → Wooden Hut, Stone Cottage.

Automatic Irrigation Greenhouse (can be upgraded) → Junior Plantation.

Small Automatic Breeding Room (can be upgraded) → Junior Livestock Pen.

Ordinary Pond (can be upgraded) → Junior Fish Pond.

(There are two ponds within the cave mansion. One is the special small pond converted from the oxygen-producing microalgae machine. The other one is a larger pond dug for fish farming.)

......,

After a cursory overview, it seems that only the small special pond could be upgraded to a Spiritual Spring.

As the survival points in the data layout rapidly decreased, the originally green pond gradually became clear and transparent, with strong currents gushing from the bottom of the pond, forming a fountain in the center of the pond.

The appearance of the fountain did not expand the area of the pond, but instead continued to shrink it. As the pond water receded to the center, it revealed the landscape fountain that seemed to have always been there at the center of the pond.