Chapter 3 The Third Base

The location of the third base wasn't far from Morraine. The two hundred thousand player mercenaries who had been lingering in the wild received the construction task and returned en masse. After being transported by spaceships, they quickly assembled.

Outside Morraine City, two hundred thousand players formed a dark, dense, and noisy mass, all eyes focused on Han Xiao. Han Xiao once again borrowed the Dragon Throne's imposing attire, sitting on a mechanical throne and hovering in the air… Not that he wanted to show off, but with so many players, he couldn't be seen at all if he didn't ascend.

It had been a while since he had been in close contact with the players. Han Xiao gave them a rough once-over. The two hundred thousand players who had been on Sunil for several months had undergone significant changes in their attire. They could be roughly divided into three categories. The first group wore heavy armor, mostly Sunilian soldier armor, and some wore Worker Bee armor. It was worth mentioning that these players' Sunilian series armor were all Legion products. The Sunilians obviously knew that Han Xiao had stolen their blueprints… But even if they knew, it wouldn't matter.

The second type of players didn't wear armor, accounting for only about one-tenth of the total. Han, the great technician, didn't know if they were poor… or poor. Even martial artists or psychics would benefit from buying a set of armor. Even the vanguards in the war domain wore specially made armor.

However, although these players didn't have armor, they had some mechanical equipment, such as guns, close combat mechanical weapons, shield generators, and the like.

The third type of players also didn't use armor. They wore nuclear magnetic propulsion flight backpacks. It was obvious that they were artists.

In general, all the players were using Black Star Army's products. Their equipment had been iterated and renewed. Now, these players had a sense of being Star Warriors… But in Han Xiao's eyes, they were more like a lush field of leeks.

Sunil was an NPC resource site. Letting two hundred thousand players grow here for several months had accumulated a lot of resources. Every leek grew vigorously, rich in nutrients, and vibrantly green.

Seeing everyone staring at him expectantly, Han Xiao coughed and put on a serious expression. He said in a deep voice, "Thanks to your hard work, the Sunilians' plight has been alleviated. However, there are new obstacles in this mission. We need more help. Therefore, the original plan has been brought forward. We will build a third base on this planet as a stronghold."

"Phillip has sent the specific location to everyone's communicators. Building a new base requires everyone's help…"

Han Xiao said a few generalities. The players had no objections. They followed him to the pre-selected base location and began to clear trees and level the terrain.

[Legion Expansion: Third Base] was a faction series mission, which included many construction tasks that players needed to complete. Each sub-task rewarded experience and faction contribution points. The players were extremely enthusiastic, not only because of the rewards, but also because they were participating in the construction of the base, personally adding bricks and tiles to the faction's growth.

The establishment of the third base would also benefit them. The new stronghold meant that the Legion would store a lot of supplies in the third base. At that time, players would not need to pre-order faction products, but could directly pick them up at the third base. Moreover, since mercenary missions had to be accepted back at the base, in addition to the Golden Gate Star base and the Aquamarine Star base, players had another place to accept employment or settle down. This was the Black Star Army's new base in the vast universe.

Han Xiao notified the interstellar construction team that he had been working with for a long time, and they would arrive on Sunil in a few days. However, the construction team would only build the buildings, and the specific facilities still needed to be improved by his own people. Gathering two hundred thousand players could greatly speed up the construction of the third base.

The Noriosse Financial Group and the Rossos Financial Group both provided some assistance, requisitioning a large amount of supplies through financial channels.

Han Xiao roughly calculated the accounts. The two backers saved him about six hundred thousand Enas in costs. This time, he planned to invest two million seven hundred thousand Enas to build the third base. Now, his total assets on the books were close to fifty million Enas, which could easily bear this expense.

Thinking back to a year and a half ago, he only had three to four million in borrowed funds and spent more than half a year building the first base. In less than two years, his assets had increased more than tenfold, and the speed of development was very impressive.

The players were efficient. Before long, a large, flat open space appeared in the forest. Since the building materials ordered had not yet been delivered, the players could not start construction temporarily after leveling the terrain.

Dozens of warships that had been waiting on Sunil were moved here, forming a temporary camp. The players gathered here, and Han Xiao also stayed here.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, players came to Han Xiao one after another, wanting to learn skills. Most of them were mechanics. They hadn't seen Black Star, their mechanics instructor, for several months, and now they could be described as having received timely rain after a long drought.

This was exactly what Han Xiao wanted. He had planned it early on. This time, he wouldn't sell knowledge, but blueprints.

He had a specialty from the Scholar sub-class—[Research Theory].

The effect of this specialty was to increase Intelligence by 1 point for every three skills, currently providing about 300 Intelligence bonus, which meant that Han Xiao now had nearly a thousand blueprint skills in total. It had cost him countless experience, which was an astronomical figure for players.

Selling some low-level blueprints had little impact on him. Han Xiao released dozens of low-level mechanical blueprints in one breath.

Most players were already above level 70. At this level, low-level blueprints were no longer rare. Players could fuse them on their own, but because there were many different knowledge combinations, each mechanic player was always unable to fuse the blueprints they needed. The blueprints they knew were different.

And he directly sold various blueprints, indirectly helping players escape the bottomless pit of gambling on blueprints.

Seeing the dazzling array of blueprints, many mechanic players' eyes lit up with golden light.

After working on Sunil for several months, these players didn't lack experience. Although the blueprints Han Xiao gave were not high in technical level, they covered all aspects, including guns, explosives, mechanical soldiers, shields, mechs, energy, vehicles, and so on. Gambling on blueprints was very dependent on luck. It was rare to find a mechanic player who was as comprehensive, so every player could find blueprints that were useful to them and supplement their weaknesses.

Han Xiao wasn't worried that the mechanic players learning the blueprints would affect the sales of the Black Star Army. In terms of cost, players were definitely no match for the mass production line and couldn't achieve the characteristics of high quality and low price of the legion products. Moreover, consuming in the legion could also accumulate contribution points. Furthermore, Han Xiao didn't sell the blueprints for the faction's products. What he sold were similar machines that were half a grade lower.

In fact, Han Xiao's development plan also included joining the material industry, reselling raw materials to players to earn another sum, expanding the Black Star Army's business while also making it easier for players, allowing them to directly purchase the required raw materials from the faction store without having to collect them everywhere.

Among the two hundred thousand people, there were fifty to sixty thousand mechanic players who happily learned the blueprints. Most people learned more than one type.

Han Xiao's experience reserves quickly became abundant, quickly breaking through the one billion mark, and were still growing rapidly.

At this time, the players also discovered that in addition to the low-level blueprints, there was also a high-level blueprint that made their hearts flutter!

The Void Dragon Mechanical Armor!

"This, this is a god-tier blueprint!"

"Damn, this is awesome!"

The mechanic players were overjoyed. They looked at the price, which required 600,000 experience and 2,000 Enas. Many people showed a look of pain, but the awesome parameters of the Void Dragon Mechanical Armor blueprint were like an exposed sexy woman, constantly beckoning the players to come on.

In the players' eyes, the attributes of the Void Dragon Mechanical Armor undoubtedly belonged to the category of divine equipment. Some players with the ability to pay hesitated for a while and gritted their teeth to learn it.

Seeing this, Han Xiao showed a subtle smile. Although this blueprint was advanced, he already had the Mad Ape and no longer needed the Void Dragon, so he might as well sell it to the players.

The Void Dragon Mechanical Armor was extremely difficult to manufacture. Players could barely build it successfully above level 90, and the core material was the Void Dragon Bone. This was the point that Han Xiao valued the most. Even if a player really built it, it was not replicable… What, want to mass-produce it? Okay, ask Ames for her Dragon Tomb, and you should be able to experience a death heavier than Mount Tai.

Within one or two versions, the probability of players building it was extremely slim. Buying it back could only satisfy their eyes. Want to get started? No way!

From the players' point of view, the mech blueprint that best suited their current situation was actually the Flying Serpent that Han Xiao had already eliminated.

With the current ability of the mechanic players, building the Flying Serpent was feasible, and the cost was also within a controllable range. Once the Flying Serpent blueprint was sold, this single-soldier mech would quickly become popular among the player group, and the average combat power of the players would be greatly improved… But precisely because of this, Han Xiao didn't sell the Flying Serpent.

——If the players got to where they needed to be in one step, how would he use the Sunilian series armor to harvest leeks round after round?

Therefore, Han, the great technician, chose to teach the Void Dragon Mechanical Armor blueprint, drawing a big cake for the players. There was no difference between a person without dreams and a salted fish, and "dreams" could just happen to circle a wave of benefits.

However, he didn't want to pit the players too badly… At least the price of the Void Dragon Mechanical Armor blueprint was far below its intrinsic value. In theory, a mech blueprint of this level could even fetch a high price of tens of thousands of Enas in the interstellar world.

In this wave of harvesting, Han Xiao's experience soared again, easily exceeding the 3 billion mark, and he couldn't help but show a smile of harvest.

Maple Moon also learned the Void Dragon blueprint and quickly browsed the materials, muttering, "Void Dragon Bone… Huh, it looks a little familiar… Isn't this a specialty of Dragon Tomb!"

As a player who followed Han Xiao in version 1.0, Maple Moon had personally been to Dragon Tomb. She was the first person among all the mechanic players present to have a clue.

It lasted for more than half a day. In the evening, the mechanic players dispersed one after another, returning fully loaded.

Han Xiao's experience reserve reached 9.4 billion!

The average price of low-level blueprints was around 40,000. There were about fifty to sixty thousand mechanic players, and each time they bought more than one blueprint. Moreover, several thousand people bought the Void Dragon Mechanical Armor. All in all, they harvested about 9 billion experience.

"This wave is fat enough." Han Xiao was quite satisfied. Some useless blueprints were exchanged for a lot of experience, which was still quite worthwhile.

With enough experience, Han Xiao didn't delay. He returned to the training room on the spaceship, opened the panel, and invested 3 billion experience, leveling up three times in a row.

[【Virtual Mechanic】 has been upgraded to Lv20 (max), Stamina +350, Agility +3, Endurance +3, Intelligence +6, you have obtained 6 free attribute points, you have obtained 1 potential point]

[The main class level has reached the upper limit. You can continue to level up after completing the class advancement requirements]

[Class Advancement Requirements: Intelligence greater than 1300, Mechanical Affinity greater than 580% (excluding active skill bonus)]

"Randomly rolled attribute requirements?" Han Xiao's eyes lit up.

Ordinary players' stat distribution was more miscellaneous, and it was often difficult to meet the class advancement attribute requirements. They would be forced to learn a sub-class.

But for Han Xiao, this kind of class advancement requirement was the simplest. The main class advancement requirements were mostly related to the characteristics of the class itself. Core attributes like Intelligence and Mechanical Affinity had always exceeded the normal standards of Han Xiao's level.

For the Intelligence attribute, he threw all the free attribute points he had just obtained into it, and the base value reached 1536 points, which had already exceeded the class advancement requirements. In addition, with the +10% bonus from the Calamity Grade tier and the more than 300 points from [Research Theory], the actual Intelligence value was close to 2000 points!

And the base Mechanical Affinity, plus the specialties and passive skills, totaled 686%, which also exceeded the class advancement requirements.

This meant that Han Xiao didn't need to learn a new sub-class, and his own attributes already met the class advancement standards.

"Yo, I've been lucky lately." Han Xiao rubbed his hands excitedly. Was the effect of touching Fordring constant?!

Since he met the requirements, Han Xiao didn't hesitate and directly invested experience to level up again, completing the class advancement.

His brain had a burst of stinging pain, producing many new insights.

[Class Advancement Requirements have been met!]

[You have obtained the new class 【Star Sea Mechanic Lv1】, Stamina +180, Strength +1, Agility +3, Endurance +3, Intelligence +8, you have obtained 6 free attribute points, 1 potential point]

[You have comprehended the skill 【Master-Level Mechanical Affinity】!]

[You have comprehended the skill 【Ultra-Fast Virtual Intrusion】!]

[You have comprehended the skill 【Quantum Network Matrix】!]

[You have obtained the specialty 【Mechanical Theory Summary】!]

[The effect of your specialty 【Virtual Technology Specialization】 has been strengthened!]

[The effect of your skill 【Smart Defense Enhancement】 has been strengthened!]

[The effect of your skill 【Intrusion Calculation Enhancement】 has been strengthened!]