Translator: flycrane01 Editor: Millman97
Ten days had passed since the Edge Sharpeners' Meeting began.
As the product release conferences were held and more advanced seminars were hosted, the name of the 'Glorious Sunlight Group' was gradually acknowledged by a lot of refiners.
At first, it released the 'Combat Ability Detector', a piece of MP magical equipment very suitable for ordinary people and low-level Cultivators.
Then, together with the Refining Department of Flying Star University, it released the Aurora Chain Gun and the Unparalleled Extension.
The Aurora Chain Gun targeted ordinary people and low-end users as potential customers just as the Combat Ability Detector did.
But, the Unparalleled Extension was designed for the wealthy, high-end users.
One rudimental and the other advanced, the invention of the two pieces of magical equipment showed the research ability of the Glorious Sunlight Group.
However, as for 'Sand Scorpion', the owner of the Glorious Sunlight Group, there were two opposing opinions.
Those who had communicated with him naturally knew Li Yao's capability very well.
But most people still considered him an idiotic magnate who hired a batch of top-tier refiners with the wealth that he had accumulated through the trade between Iron Plateau and space. The so-called products were actually those refiners' work, and he had merely bought them out in order to make himself look better.
The anecdote that he had paid tens of millions of dollars for a worthless stone in the auction was widely known, too, after spreading over several days.
Not only had every refiner learned of the story, even many ordinary people who came to visit the Edge Sharpeners' Meeting had heard a thing or two about it.
Through the people's lips and the gossip columns, in most people's eyes, Li Yao became an out-and-out pretentious magnate.
However, the explosive news yesterday smashed their illusion into pieces!
Xie Anan, a member of the main bloodline of the Xie family of West Rock, had formally acknowledged Sand Scorpion as her master!
It was said that the recruitment ceremony had been quite splendid. Not only had every member of the Xie family who participated in the Edge Sharpeners' Meeting arrived, even the top experts of the trade, including Xue Yuanxin and Huangpu Bo, had come as guests and offered valuable presents for the master and the disciple!
Outsiders might not know what it meant, but the event raised a riot in the circle of refiners.
The Xie family of West Rock was incomparable for the Mo family and the Huangpu family, but it was an ancient noble family that had existed for hundreds of years.
What was a noble family best known for? They were best known for their honorable blood, and they could be quite stubborn and unfriendly. They would die before they were disgraced.
When a descendant of a noble family looked for a master, they had to find a truly excellent one because it concerned the honor of their family.
Even if the family was running to a dead end, there was no way that anyone from the family would succumb to an unscholarly magnate!
Besides, the Xie family had been operating quite well recently. It seemed unnecessary to resort to such a method even if it was trying to cooperate with the Glorious Sunlight Group.
Moreover, even Xue Yuanxin and Huangpu Bo, two renowned experts of the trade, had come to congratulate in person!
It was natural that Xue Yuanxin showed up. Everybody knew that his Ares Laboratory was collaborating with the Glorious Sunlight Group, and the two parties were quite close.
But Master Huangpu Bo had absolutely nothing to do with the Glorious Sunlight Group!
For a moment, there were all kinds of speculations. The 'pretentious idiot' was now wreathed in a halo of mysteries!
However, in the eleventh day, all the whispers were gone, because the main theme of the Edge Sharpeners' Meeting this year had finally come.
After five thousand years, the Flying Star Sector was about to initiate a plan to craft a piece of super magical equipment above the planetary level!
Dwarfed by such an influential event, any explosive news became sparks that were not worth mentioning at all.
…
The main conference hall of the Edge Sharpeners' Meeting was a building half buried underground and half open to the air that looked like a giant crystal egg. It was named 'Great Hall of the Next Millennium'.
The decisions to be made there were indeed going to change the fate of the Flying Star Sector in the next thousand years or even longer!
When Li Yao stepped into the main conference hall, he felt that he entered a boundless universe.
The black marbles on the ground boasted special sound-absorption and light-absorption technology. Together with the brilliant stars on the dome, he inevitably had the feeling that he was just an insignificant being.
Yes, insignificant.
He could be called an expert of refining in many regards right now.
But when it came to planetary-level magical equipment, no refiners would be able to produce them purely on their own, not even the best experts.
The sweat and wisdom of thousands of refiners and the resources of an entire Sector had to be gathered in order to produce a piece of such magical equipment after arduous efforts!
Just think about the defense rings of Iron Plateau, which had been crafted five thousand years ago before the arrival of the apocalypse.
To produce the magical equipment, the entire sector was divided!
Li Yao walked into a small meeting room with Xue Yuanxin and Huangpu Bo.
The Great Hall of Next Millennium adopted a very advanced system that combined reality with illusion. All the participants would enter their respective booth, but they could be connected to each other through the 'Half-Step Grand Illusionary Land'.
That way, they could listen to the presentation of the project proposers while discussing with each other in secret without affecting anybody else.
Today, more than 13,000 people joined the 'Millennium Meeting'.
Other than the refiners, there were also leaders of the major sects and organizations.
The production of the planetary-level magical equipment required the collaboration of the entire Flying Star Sector. All the sects would have to provide resources more or less.
Li Yao was allowed to enter the meeting room of the highest level together with Xue Yuanxin and Huangpu Bo, two renowned masters of refining, not only because of his expertise in refining, but also because he was a representative of the Glorious Sunlight Group as well as Iron Plateau.
In the small meeting room, the three of them waited solemnly.
Two proposals of planetary-level magical equipment would be discussed in the Millennium Meeting, the better of which would be selected and implemented later.
Of course, if there were too many objections about the two proposals and they were believed to be impracticable, the participants were allowed to modify or put forward new proposals on the spot.
Ten o'clock in the morning.
Hundreds of mystic rays in various colors gradually appeared in the meeting room, transforming one of the walls of the meeting room into a translucent Grand Illusionary Land that seemed like a podium.
Streams of information regarding the background of the Millennium Meeting, an introduction to the Temple of Immortals, and files about the sharpest claws and teeth of the Temple of Immortals—the space pirates—fell down from the top of the Grand Illusionary Land.
A giant map of a space zone popped up in the Grand Illusionary Land, but it was covered in clusters of lackluster dusts. At first glance, although it did not look as rough as the Iron Plateau Space Zone, it was even more mysterious and unpredictable than it.
It was the Spider Den Space Zone where Spider Den, the base of all space pirates, was located, and also the darkest place in the entire Flying Star Sector.
A grey-haired but magnificent-looking old man, who appeared to be made of steel, gradually walked to the podium.
Li Yao's pupils constricted violently. Despite the blockage of the Grand Illusionary Land, he could still vaguely feel that unwavering belief that seemed to be a mountain in the old man's body.
"He is Si Koulie, leader of the 'Star Fighters Alliance'. He is also one of the best experts in the refinement of starships, and he is now in the Nascent Soul Stage!"
Xue Yuanxin said in a low voice, "The first proposal of the planetary-level magical equipment was drawn up by the Star Fighters Alliance."
Li Yao was quite startled.
Compared with battle-type Cultivators, the advancement of creation-type Cultivators was very difficult. Core Formation Stage creation-type Cultivators were already rarely seen.
It meant that Si Koulie must be one of the most awesome refiners in the Flying Star Sector.
It was a pity that their research fields were different. Li Yao did not know much about the construction of starships.
If Professor Mo Xuan were here, he would definitely be very interested in talking with him.
Professor Mo Xuan had been focused on crystal suits, too, when he was alive.
But after he reached the Flying Star Sector, in order to upgrade Sparkle, he and his students had dedicated themselves to the modification of starships day and night and accumulated a lot of experience during the change of research field.
After they became 'Star Spirits', they boasted the uncanny ability of increasing their computational ability by manipulating crystal processors. Therefore, their Cultivation improved quite fast.
Li Yao estimated that Professor Mo Xuan would be at least in the high level of the Core Formation Stage if he were alive.
However, the spectral Cultivators were gauged by a different evaluation system, and 'Star Spirits' such as Professor Mo Xuan were different from normal spectral Cultivators. Even Li Yao did not know how terrifying they would be when they unleashed all their potential.
The Edge Sharpeners' Meeting was very likely to be the Temple of Immortals' target. To avoid unnecessary trouble, Li Yao did not ask the five Star Spirits to come to Heavenly Saints City.
The Star Fighters Alliance was not a sect but an association formed by 28 sects that specialized in the production of starships. It was sort of a 'starship manufacturers' guild'.
It was not hard to guess that the proposal Master Si Koulie was about to present should be some sort of starship.
Li Yao's guess was correct.
However, when Si Koulie projected the illustrations of their proposal for planetary-level magical equipment into the Grand Illusionary Land, Li Yao still gasped.
What appeared in the Grand Illusionary Land was a blue planet.
The planet was named 'Ice King'. It was the seventh planet in the Mystic Ice Space Zone with a diameter of more than 5,300 kilometers and a density slightly higher than that of Iron Plateau. The temperature on the planet was fifty degrees below zero all year round.
The Star Fighters Alliance's plan was to refine the planet into a monolithic starship!
"It is well known that we failed to eliminate the space pirates because Spider Den was an important planet of resources in the Star Ocean Imperium ten thousand years ago. The planet is full of facilities for refining and defense systems. Together with the space pirates' enhancement in the thousands of years, the planet is basically an iron hedgehog right now.
"Also, the natural environment of the Spider Den Space Zone is very complicated. Cosmic dust, space storms, and electromagnetic swirls are everywhere.
"Hundreds of years ago, an enormous fleet of a thousand crystal warships was deployed hoping to annihilate the space pirates once and for all.
"But the space pirates simply waited patiently and waged a war of attrition by relying on Spider Den. After years of tug-of-war, the supplies of the fleet gradually ran out, and the fleet encountered a rarely-seen double disaster. Barely any crystal warship returned from the battle.
"The hard lesson tells us that normal starship cannot expect to compete with such a planet of resources that has been armed to teeth.
"Therefore, the only solution is to modify a planet into a starship and to fight the planet with a planet!"