Chapter 122: Gas

I really needed to sleep. I don’t recall falling asleep, just falling into my bed. Exhaustion demanding its dues as always; sometimes, I wish I didn’t need to sleep. I am sure a mod exists that does that… but I think it won’t help my mind. Sleep may be an important bodily function, but it also gives that shutdown period.

I don’t know about you, but after completing something difficult, you really need to shut down. Enjoying my mental musings, still smothered in soft sheets. Eventually, I feel movement at my feet. Chic, who at some point fell asleep on my feet, has awoken.

Looking over at me, they immediately walk towards me. Poking me until I respond. Swatting the annoying creature. The prodding continues until I get up. Images of food trickle through the mental link; I think Chic is hungry.

“Fine, fine, I will make breakfast,” I say in annoyance as I finally get out of bed. Slowly walking to my kitchen, spider in tow.

It doesn’t take long for me to reach the room. Preparing a fruit bowl and a porridge, which Chic made known their disappointment at the boring breakfast.

“Suck it up, you glutton,” I say to the spider. Getting an annoying hiss in response. I just smile at the complaining creature.

We ate quite slowly. I took my time to appreciate the moment. Looking out the window, enjoying the happy chittering as Chic eats their food and the occasional bang as Sling walks into doors. With a smile on my face, I finish the last vestiges of porridge.

Having had a happy meal, I ponder on the task for the day. I’ve attempted to avoid this task for as long as possible. Sadly, I have reached the end of the road; I must tackle it. I need a better power system. Sighing in frustration, “I hate power systems.”

First, I clear out a small stone room underground. Heading to my farm, I create a small crop of potatoes. These potatoes were filtered and funneled into the chest.

I craft a reservoir, a multiblock infinite water source, adding it to the room. Now, the annoying part; starting a new mod. Heading towards my main room, I start the first job – steel. I can grow steel, but I need steel to turn into seeds. Using immersive engineering, I create a crude blast furnace. It is made with blast bricks, the middle block empties in a 3x3x3 area. Hitting it with a hammer and voila, you have a blast furnace. Loading it with iron and charcoal, I boost its speed with time in a bottle.

Taking the steel, I produce some steel seeds. Using Crop sticks, time in a bottle, and a bit of patience, I get them to 5 across the board. Adding them to my farm to grow. Collecting iron, osmium, and Redstone, I create a metallurgic infuser. The most vital of machines for this mod. Realizing this, I produce 3 more.

Placing tons of osmium and Redstone into 1, I start producing basic circuits. I add hoppers with the items and export to automate the process slightly. Next, I make a steel casing with my now growing steel.

Ingredients complete, I create an enrichment chamber. Preparing a couple of these, I start pulverizing coal, diamond, and obsidian.

While that is working, I take Redstone and iron, combining them in a metallurgic infuser. Mass producing this as well, giving me a ton of enriched alloy.

Combining a portion of this alloy with diamond dust produces reinforced alloy. While also getting some iron, osmium, and gold crushing.

I create an electrolytic core using the dusts

Then using it to produce an Electrolytic Separator. While I am at it, a Pressurized Reaction Chamber is also created. The final item is a crusher, an easy craft compared to the other machines.

With the machines prepared, I produced advanced mechanical pipes. A multipurpose wrench to edit the inputs and outputs as well.

Returning to the stone room, I pump potatoes into the crusher. Having already wired power through, it starts crushing the potatoes into biofuel. Placing down the more complex machines, the pressure chamber, and separator; I pump water into both.

The Pressure chamber is between the separator and crusher. The Electrolytic Separator divides the water into hydrogen and oxygen – H2O. The oxygen is set to be dumped inside the machine, running a pipe from the left side; it pumps hydrogen into the reaction chamber. Next, the biofuel is pumped into the pressurized chamber, producing ethylene. It also makes a bi-product called the substrate. I pipe this off into a void pipe to get rid of it.

Having already semi-automated most of the resource items, I create 5 gas-burning generators. Connecting them up to the output of the pressurized chamber, they begin to create energy. With a lot of energy, quickly adding them to my power network, my power production just increased massively.

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With the task finally done, I sit back. Enjoying the pleasurable sensation of success. Yet a flicker, an idea bloomed in my mind. “Screw it, may as well.” With all the resources being produced, nothing is stopping me from scaling up the operation.

I produce 3 more of those energy generating rooms, a terrifying quantity which without a doubt would sustain even the most power-hungry bases. Of course, more power is always better. But it brings into question, how much is too much? I once had a friend find a way to produce something like 3 trillion power a minute. All I said to him was, “Why?”

His response, “we don’t need to worry about power anymore.” Flooring me in the process. The only reason you need that much power is for the infinity drill. Shaking my head at the memory. Something I should consider for this excess power… “screw it, let’s do it.”

Checking my NEi, showed a surprisingly simple recipe. 3 diamond blocks and 2 iron, which I crafted immediately. It didn’t take long for me to realize why it is so simple. It requires 2 things in ungodly amounts: Power and biofuel. 2 things I have in massive amounts.

I fill it up on biofuel before sticking it on my draconic charging station. Works like a charm sucked my power dry in seconds, and it will continue to do so. I produce so much power, it didn’t even shut down my power grid. Enough being siphoned off to run all my machines and then some. Although, I might have to unplug it if I need a lot of power.

While I have the chance, I produce a massive amount of vibrant capacity banks, boosting my power storage massively. Just glancing at the infinity drill, it is already at 16 million RF. That gives it a radius of 5x5 and if I improve it to the next tier, it mines 7x7. The final tier, which is 13x13, requires 9,223,372,036,854,775,807 RF. That is stupid; it is bragging rights, that is all. I can see why even 3 trillion power a minute wasn’t enough. Still, common sense requires me to say, other mods do it better for easier. The Terra shatterer, the awakened ichorium pickaxe, and a variety of other mods; do the same job.

Admittedly I am not touching awakened ichorium because of all the insanity required, but the terra shatterer works. The tiers before the final one are fine and great. You get a great mining tool at the cost of power. In fact, it is a great way to store ungodly amounts of power.

Even better is the fact, it stops you from wasting power, it all goes into a bottomless pit.

I might still make a terra shatterer, anyway. It is a very cool item and a great way to dump excess mana. Have all your main pools and a single pool the mana goes when the others are full. The pickaxe rests on top, as it does not despawn. And now you have a way to recycle excess mana.

I really should continue botania at some point. Alas, I am lazy. With my power system done and excess power is stored, let’s get to the next task. Deflating at the prospect, but it must be done. I need to kill the ender dragon somewhere around 100 times.

With heavy limbs, I search through my ME. Here we are, ender dragon eggs. The spawn eggs collected from the Red ant dimension. I only have 3, I need to gather some more soon. I should make a digital miner for that job.

I take the ender dragon spawn eggs, and head to a quiet area. Using my builder’s wand, I build a massive obsidian cage.

With a deep breath, I spawn the first one. Feeling a blast of air as it materialized out of thin air. It looks stunned for a moment but quickly collects itself. Focusing its gaze on me, it goes for the strike.

My superior armor allows me to dodge with far more ease than before; I am truly able to fight now. Dodging its claw strikes, I lash out like a whip. Drawing a line across its cheeks with my sword. It recoils back in pain as I advance. Rushing towards it, I dodge its claw frenzied claw strikes. I see its eyes filled with crimson rage.

I manage to land one slash along its flank before it takes flight. It quickly realizes it is trapped, smashing into the wall; stunning itself. Using this moment, I strike a piercing blow through its ribs. Leaving a massive wound, bleeding heavily.

It retaliates by flying straight towards me, maw wide. It snaps with an audible crack, missing me by a hairsbreadth. Okay Jaws, let’s go. I fly to the side, slashing one of its eyes. An ear-piercing squeal is released from its mouth; a high-pitched squeal that makes my ears ache.

Head aching in pain from the loud noise, dizziness overtakes my mind. Just guessing, I use my feet to launch up as fast as I can. Angled to the right, I feel a blast of air to my side, just where I was.

Head coming back into clarity, I fly towards it. Dodging a bite, leaving a long slash along its neck. It managed to strike me with a claw while I drew the deep red line along its neck. I was smashed away, knocked into an obsidian wall. Bones rattled slightly; I shake my body to ease the pain. Stepping forward, I rush towards the dragon again. Slipping my helmet up and eating a golden apple while I can.

I feel my bones crack as any misalignments move back into their rightful place. A rush of adrenaline making my hands shake, I start dodging the beast. It flies after me with hate, snapping at me every chance it gets. It opts to create a wide blast of flame, blanketing the area in the purple conflagration. Something tough to avoid, and even doing so has left me far warmer than I deem comfortable. The obsidian box a sealed area suffocating me; time to finish this battle.

Mind coming into crystal clear focus, I rush towards the dragon. Moving to the side, I have a dog fight, leaving small cuts all over. Focusing myself on its blind side, taking advantage of it the best I can.

I don’t escape unscathed, catching nicks and scratches occasionally., The force of which I struggled to resist. With the blood loss, its body has started to slow. Limbs heavy from the oxygen deprivation, which I take advantage of. Flying over its blind side, I strike its good eye.

It buck’s its body in the hopes of removing me; I hang on with difficulty. Plunging my sword into its neck, I begin the arduous process of sawing it from the body. Its agile movements slow to a stop as it collapses to the floor. Blood pooling on the floor, it dies.

“Only 2 more to go today.”