Early the next morning, An Ling woke up early.
Rotating the pendant on her chest, the pale gold cube began to spin rapidly.
**[Obtained Blessing Pendant Buff: Great Luck — Hand of God, gathering has a chance to trigger a 1–10x drop!]**
**[Time Remaining: 18:03:21]**
“Indeed, this pendant isn’t random at all. It provides the optimal solution based on my current needs,” An Ling said, having discovered its pattern.
She could even use the daily blessing to predict what would happen that day. For example, ‘Cripple with a Strong Will’ meant there would be stamina-related actions, while ‘Bullseye’ was likely related to combat.
For breakfast, An Ling prepared a sandwich for herself and brewed a sachet of instant coffee in a wooden bowl.
After finishing the simple meal, she began packing her things, preparing to land on the island once again. With the help of her tools this time, she was sure to harvest plenty of ore. It was also the perfect time to top off all her fresh water resources.
While other survivors were still worrying about fresh water, An Ling had even begun using it to take baths.
The task was simple and would take about half a day, but just in case, she still brought lunch. Today happened to be the last day of the Resource Island exploration reward, so it was naturally best not to let it go to waste.
An Ling pulled up the anchor and set off toward the Resource Island in her small wooden boat once again.
***
Arriving at the all-too-familiar small island, she parked her boat on the side with the ore units this time to save time.
After securing the boat, An Ling landed on the island and began mining. To test the power of the flint pickaxe, she first found the copper mine from yesterday.
*Clang!* As the heavy strike landed, the copper ore’s health bar actually dropped, though the damage dealt was about the same as using a scrap iron pickaxe on iron ore.
In other words, even with a flint pickaxe, mining copper would take at least one hour.
“Forget it. I’ll save it for last. I might not even need this stuff right now,” An Ling said after a moment of consideration, choosing to give up.
She hadn’t even updated her iron equipment yet, so her primary goal was naturally iron ore. If there was enough iron ore on the final day, she wouldn’t consider copper at all. If she finished mining and it was still early, she would try to dig some copper then.
The distribution of these ores was very uneven, scattered here and there, requiring a careful search. As far as the eye could see, An Ling couldn’t judge exactly how much iron ore there was or if she could finish it all in one morning.
Time flew by, and it was soon noon. The blazing sun overhead was still scorching, forcing An Ling to stop and rest for a while. Fortunately, she was dressed quite light today and didn’t sweat as much as she had yesterday.
Throughout the morning, she had spent four hours clearing out almost all the iron ore in the vicinity. There might be a few she missed, but she decided not to care.
In total, she obtained: Iron Ore * 175 and Loess * 66.
The harvest was fairly good, mainly thanks to the blessing. Otherwise, she would have only gotten less than fifty ores from eight iron nodes in four hours, not to mention the two loess she dug up during that time.
Beneath the shade of a tree, An Ling placed her backpack on the ground and sat on it to keep her clothes from getting dirty. She took out the food she had prepared earlier and began eating her lunch.
She had originally planned to finish the Resource Island in the morning, and while she actually had, she now wanted to use the afternoon to get some copper. Otherwise, she felt it would be a waste of the 30 points she spent to locate this island.
After finishing a sandwich and a ham sausage, An Ling took out some tissue to wipe her mouth and stood up, intending to continue her work. She looked up at the sky; the blinding sunlight made her unable to open her eyes. The sun seemed to be stuck in place, unmoving.
“I can’t waste any more time. The island will sink at night,” An Ling decided immediately, resuming her work under the blazing sun.
Of course, she wasn’t foolish enough to let the sun shine directly on her skin. What if her fair skin tanned? An Ling wove a straw hat out of leaves and vines and placed it on her head. Several wooden boards also floated above her, pieced together to form a square shadow that perfectly blocked the direct sunlight.
As for mining, she planned to dig directly with her hands, using her ability to control the wooden boards hovering overhead.
As expected, it took exactly one hour for one copper node.
**[Triggered Gathering Multiplier: 10 — Obtained Copper Ore * 60]**
“Whoa!” An Ling had been mining for so long, and this was the first time she triggered a ten-fold drop. The highest before was only eight.
“This is amazing!” Just one copper node dropped 60 pieces. This wasted hour was worth it.
**[First achievement in Great Luck: Obtained special reward — Random Item Card * 1]**
“Huh?” An Ling had almost forgotten that her blessings also had an achievement system.
It was the familiar silver-white card. She immediately looked at the pattern on the front: a pair of white shark slippers. They looked quite cute.
“Slippers? Not bad. I happen to need a pair,” An Ling said, putting the card away for now.
Every type of blessing had a different way of accumulation. It seemed the condition for the ‘Great Luck’ achievement was triggering the maximum multiplier. From what An Ling currently knew, ‘Bullseye’ and ‘Good Things Come in Pairs’ were triggered by simple frequency.
Meanwhile, ‘Cripple with a Strong Will’ and ‘Stroke of Luck’ had not been triggered yet, and she didn’t know the specific conditions.
The light gold cube of the pendant had six faces, meaning there were six types of blessings. Currently, only five had appeared, leaving one unknown.
‘Since it’s a Blessing Pendant, there shouldn’t be any debuffs.’ Thinking this, An Ling felt relieved and continued mining.
**[Triggered Gathering Multiplier: 1 — Obtained Copper Ore * 6]**
“Alright, fine. You’re really playing with me, aren’t you!” An Ling laughed in frustration. She had just gotten the highest multiplier, only for the lowest to follow immediately. This hour was a complete waste.
Just then, a sea breeze blew past, making An Ling feel a sudden chill. She looked toward the sea and suddenly froze.
The sky had turned dark.
She immediately pulled back the wooden boards and found that the blazing sun that had just been overhead had long since vanished, completely obscured by dark clouds.
“Is a storm coming…?” An Ling dropped the wooden boards and packed her bag, preparing to head to the stream for fresh water.
After getting the water, she had to leave the Resource Island immediately. A storm was coming, and she couldn’t stay any longer. Otherwise, whether she could safely return to the Construction Island in this small wooden boat would be a question. She didn’t want to be trapped here by the storm and sink to the bottom of the sea with the Resource Island.