Wow! The item-dropping rate is really high!

"Is there any other place with food besides this one?"

"Perhaps it has some sort of preset that decides to starve itself to death if it's discovered a certain number of times?" Miss Aryan casually tossed out an irresponsible guess.

And with that, the entire hall fell silent in an instant.

In the world of humans, to prevent one's creations from being stolen by others and to avoid unnecessary losses, it is quite normal to have a setting that locks an account or device after several incorrect password attempts.

If such a higher being possessed a similar setting… it would make sense.

"..."

"No way... right?" Minister Eric, pulling at his not-so-thick hair on the top of his head, sounded somewhat uncertain.

However, the air fell into silence.

Until the "beep beep beep" sound once again dispelled everyone's bad hunches.

"Phew~" Miss Aryan, who was the first to scramble to the central control console to check the area that had been tampered with, let out a huge sigh of relief.

'Thank goodness, thank goodness…'

She had almost jinxed it with her words.

"A1."

The very edge of the entire underground control room.

"Do we continue to scare it away?" Bai E asked, turning around after arriving at the area.

"Of course," Lord Pansen replied without hesitation.

This was their carefully planned strategy; they couldn't abandon it just because of a small hiccup.

This was only the first day. If they gave up on their plan now, they would fall back into the same agony as the day before, stuck in an endless stalemate, waiting to see who would be the first to break. Find your next read at My Virtual Library Empire

Since they had decided to execute the plan, they had to follow through with it for at least a few days, until they had "starved" the opponent to a sufficient degree, only then would the opponent's next "feeding" time be long enough.

"Let's go."

The plan was in motion!

Five times…

Ten times…

Twenty times…

Fifty times…

They interrupted again and again.

The virtual world did not rest, and thus Pansen could not either. Almost every one or two hours, he had to respond to an attack.

Minister Eric and Miss Aryan, responsible for monitoring the central console, naturally began to take turns on shifts.

It wasn't until the evening of the fourth day, feeling it was about time, that Pansen finally stopped the disruptive actions.

Even though they had ascertained through several days of probing that the virtual world didn't have logic akin to humans, Pansen still sensed the opponent's "impatience" from the increasingly frequent attacks—sometimes happening every half an hour.

With a shortage of energy, the virtual world would recklessly initiate one assault after another.

"Beep beep beep~"

"Here it comes!" Pansen, who had been meditating with closed eyes, opened them sharply.

The bloodshot in his eyes was somewhat frightening.

After several consecutive days of sleep deprivation, and having to summon Spiritual Energy every short interval, even though there was sufficient rest in between, the frequent depletion and meditation recovery had not even matched a natural rest. His mind felt as if it were being churned by a red-hot iron rod.

Since the end of the last disruption, he had been determined that this would be the last time!

The continuous days of probing and deadlock would end today!

The grand Spiritual Energy swept across the 4x4 space, and the virtual world that randomly appeared in some corner could not escape.

Coming as close as possible directly below the target, Pansen closed his eyes and exerted his Spiritual Energy from his brain to the outside with all his might.

This time, there were no reservations!

The ultimate battle, do or die!

The milky white Spiritual Energy tendrils moved at a measured pace along the edges of the dark mirror. Bai E, who was watching from a distance with his spiritual senses, maintained a calm demeanor as he quietly watched the event unfold, while the other half of his alert will also kept a close eye on the time in the real world—

One minute...

Two minutes…

Five minutes…

Ten minutes…

The spread of the Spiritual Energy tentacles wasn't fast, but it was steady.

After consecutive days of honing his own Spiritual Energy and becoming familiar with the process, Pansen's control over Spiritual Energy had become increasingly adept.

As long as enough time was given, it was just a matter of patience for the capturing net to completely envelop the "black mirror" of the virtual world.

And obviously, for someone who could rise to a second-stage Spiritual Energy user through sheer effort, and even after becoming a third-stage practitioner still had the patience for a prolonged war of attrition with a target, patience was the least of his concerns.

Entangling and weaving, threads forming a net.

The net of Spiritual Energy ultimately enveloped the "black mirror" completely, resembling a thin silkworm cocoon that seemed to have a breathing-like twitching within the Spiritual Power World.

'Success!' Bai E thought with a silent sigh of relief in his heart.

"It's done!" Pansen clinched his fist as he finished the capture, his will manipulating the Spiritual Energy to tighten the "ropes," slowly pulling his newly acquired prey towards him, towards his own foundation in the Spiritual Power World—his storage space.

Only there, could he decisively say that this intangible thing in the Spiritual Power World had become his own private property.

However…

"Boom!"

Bai E only saw the virtual world covered by the capture net slowly falling into a misty space surrounding Pansen.

The next moment, a thunderous roar echoed throughout the Spiritual Power World.

Endless winds buffeted Bai E's spiritual senses, mixed with countless sharp fragments that felt like glass scraping across his cheeks.

Through the split-second direct contact, Bai E realized what these glass-like shards truly were—

Pieces… of a storage space.

Pansen's storage space had exploded!

A storage space was directly connected to one's will, almost a physical manifestation of personal will within the Spiritual Power World. Although it did not represent the personal will itself, it was closely related to it.

Yue Ying had never mentioned to Bai E what the consequences would be if it ever exploded, as such an incident seemed unprecedented in her understanding. But clearly… Pansen, right in front of Bai E's eyes, demonstrated the unexpected outcome.

"Pfft!" Pansen in the real world suddenly spit out a mouthful of blood.

His entire aura weakened in an instant, and the abundant Spiritual Energy around him rapidly shrank and collapsed towards himself to stabilize his being.

Bai E, who stood to the side, immediately reached out to catch Pansen in his arms as Minister Eric's panicked voice loudly inquired nearby, "What happened? Are you alright, my lord?"

"I'll take him to the medical room!" Bai E carried Pansen and ran, showing the responsibility inherent in his position.

"We'll go together!" Minister Eric followed closely behind, his face full of tension.

Last time Lord Pansen had bled from all seven orifices right here, and now, once again, he was bleeding from all seven orifices right here...

Eric didn't understand the Spiritual Power World; he only felt that the wheel of fate might be turning at this moment… or perhaps it had started turning since the last incident.

In the medical room… it was all chaos.

The base's personnel were all sent over by Bai E in two troop transportation operations. Among the first group, Bai E possessed the best medical skills. The second time, they brought professional doctors planning to stay for a long term, but without various modern instruments, the doctors could only rely on their own experience and skills to temporarily stabilize Pansen's vital signs.

"Keeping him alive is already the limit of what I can do; I don't understand the Spiritual Power World," the doctor informed truthfully.

Minister Eric, who held the highest position besides Pansen at the base, nodded somewhat dazedly, "Oh…"

The sudden collapse of Lord Pansen had thrown all of Eric's thoughts into disarray. The lord didn't give any warning or hint before the mishap, leaving Eric completely clueless about what to do next.

Watching the crowd of figures around the sickbed, Bai E silently retreated to the back of the room.

As he moved further away from the medical room, Bai E broke into a run, heading straight for the underground control room.

The conflict and entanglement of the past several days could not go to waste here.

Pansen had failed!

But that wouldn't discourage Bai E's courage.

The problem lay in the level of Pansen's storage space.

This was the information he had gleaned from the remnants of the explosion in that fleeting moment of shattering.

And his own storage space was considered first-class by Yue Ying's standards.

If Pansen couldn't do it, shouldn't he give it a try?@@novelbin@@