Lin Qi refused without hesitation.
Xia Chu gave Lin Qi a suspicious look. In the past, he had always been the more proactive one.
Lin Qi put on a serious expression, unwilling to dwell on the matter.
He took out the remaining five Crimson Crystal Stones. His recent experiment had confirmed that the stones were harmless to Wizards.
Consuming it directly would most likely have a stronger body-strengthening effect.
Lin Qi thought he should try the method mentioned in the broadcast: dissolving it under his tongue.
He placed a Crimson Crystal Stone in his mouth, under his tongue.
He activated his Spiritual Vision and observed the Crimson Crystal Stone's changes.
Spiritual Particles seeped out at a steady rate, entering his body through the blood vessels under his tongue and circulating with his blood.
'Judging by the total amount of Spiritual Particles, the effect of a single Crimson Crystal Stone is almost comparable to an M-Class enhancement potion.'
'Twelve M-Class enhancement potions can help a Martial Artist reach Tier One. Does that mean I only need twelve Crimson Crystal Stones to gain the physique of a Tier One Martial Artist?'
A Tier One Martial Artist's strength and endurance are two and a half times that of an ordinary person without prosthetics. Their combat power is equivalent to someone with a full set of M-Class prosthetic implants.
A Tier Two Martial Artist was equivalent to an L-Class Prosthetic Body, and a Tier Three was equivalent to an A-Class Prosthetic Body.
The Martial Artist was the most common of the Extraordinary Professions in the Cyber World, and its practitioners were the primary consumers of the enhancement potions produced by major corporations.
'The absorption rate is a bit slow. It takes about six hours to absorb one crystal. If these stones could be processed into an enhancement potion, the absorption efficiency might improve.'
After a quick calculation, he figured it would take at least three days of absorbing Crimson Crystal Stones to reach Tier One combat strength.
Before the [Door] finished its cooldown, Lin Qi could absorb at most three and a half more Crimson Crystal Stones.
"Xia Chu, this is for you. Do what the broadcast said—dissolve it under your tongue."
Lin Qi now had a basic understanding of the Crimson Crystal Stones' purpose. He handed the rest of them to Xia Chu.
Xia Chu obediently took the Crimson Crystal Stones.
"Stay in the room and don't move around. Digesting the Crystal Stone will enhance your physique. Hold on to your hammer. These Zombies aren't that strong. I'm going to continue clearing out the rest of the Zombies in this building."
"The broadcast must have had a reason for advising survivors to clear out the Zombies quickly. I need to go eliminate any potential risks."
Lin Qi finished giving Xia Chu her instructions.
Xia Chu started to speak, but Lin Qi immediately cut her off. "If you're with me, I'll have to worry about your safety. It will distract me."
This was just an excuse, of course.
If Xia Chu were to follow him constantly, Lin Qi worried she would notice something was off.
'After all, I'm not the Lin Qi of this parallel world. The small differences in my habits are bound to give me away.'
"Okay."
Xia Chu's voice was soft, but it put Lin Qi's mind at ease.
He left the room and closed the door, and the moral pressure weighing on his mind lessened considerably.
'There aren't many moral people like me left in the Cyber World.'
With a self-deprecating thought, Lin Qi set off to clear out the Zombies.
The building was twenty-two stories tall. Using his Spiritual Vision, Lin Qi observed that his section of the building contained seventy-one remaining Zombies and three survivors.
There was also the corpse of a Zombie with its head blown off in the fifteenth-floor hallway.
It seemed Xia Chu had come up from the fifteenth floor.
Lin Qi didn't understand why a young couple would rent two separate apartments in the same building.
'Living together, but not *really* living together.' Lin Qi didn't get it, but he was thankful for it.
Otherwise, Xia Chu would have caught him red-handed the first time he came through the [Door].
'If that had happened, Lin Qi couldn't guarantee his 'morals' would have held up, especially after learning that the Doomsday World still had a government.'
An L-Class Exoskeleton most likely couldn't withstand heavy firepower.
He quickly cleared the Zombies from the building. The other survivors seemed to have no intention of following the broadcast's advice. Or perhaps they simply lacked the common sense to use a radio during an apocalypse.
Lin Qi fought his way from the twenty-second floor down to the first, then returned to the twenty-second, carrying seventy-two Crimson Crystal Stones wrapped in a bedsheet.
The extra one came from the Zombie Xia Chu had killed with a headshot; Lin Qi wasn't about to let it go to waste.
After all that work, he had more than enough Crimson Crystal Stones for the time being.
As for the other two sections of the building, Lin Qi decided to leave them for now.
Lin Qi wanted to know why the broadcast had urged survivors to clear out the Zombies so quickly.
'Will stronger Zombies appear? Or other kinds of monsters?'
'Will other types of Extraordinary Items appear?'
As a Wizard, Lin Qi's need for a variety of Extraordinary Items outweighed his need for sheer numbers.