CHAPTER 496: CHAPTER 375: ULTIMATE EXPLORATION, MAJOR STRATEGIC RESOURCE DISCOVERY!_2

"What a shame, can’t eat it." Lin Yue appraised it and found that the meat of this mutant creature known as "Dorusda" was rated as "inedible," and the scales didn’t seem to be anything particularly hard, not useful at all.

Lin Yue finally collected their horns and took all the corpses away.

Though they’re not of any use, burying the corpses in the ground to rot could attract some bugs, and stepping on them might result in some wooden treasure chests.

These wooden chests would be perfect for the Little Ice Lizards to open later.

"Gawu." Bai growled again, seemingly reminding Lin Yue of something.

"What’s wrong?" Lin Yue didn’t hear any signs of crisis in the sound. He turned his head to look in the direction Bai’s arm was pointing and suddenly saw a "river!"

He ran quickly towards the river that emitted viscous yellow-black "water," breathing deeply as he reached closer!

"Is this... wait, could this be..."

[Crude Oil]

Crude oil!

The system’s appraisal quickly informed Lin Yue that he had discovered something extraordinary!

"It really is crude oil!"

Lin Yue looked at the black river with extremely slow flow speed and felt an unprecedented joy and excitement!

This is actually crude oil, a river of oil?

It’s also a "river of energy!"

Oil can be said to be the lifeblood of modern industry on Earth and the foundation for survival; it’s the so-called "liquid gold." Controlling oil means development, means money.

It can be said even more that controlling it constitutes one of the most important factors that could influence a region’s economy fundamentally!

Today’s technology is all built on the basis of oil, whether it’s industrial production or daily life; all rely on oil.

Basic oil, which is crude oil, further refined, will produce gasoline, kerosene, and diesel. Heavy oil can be further refined to produce asphalt, fuel oil, lubricant oil, paraffin, solvent gasoline, and so forth.

It also produces organic compounds, which can through various processes be turned into various chemical fibers, ethylene, plastic products, paint, various detergents, affecting all aspects of life.

Such an important resource, on Earth, is a valuable energy source coveted by all forces. It can be said that, before the huge development and application of various new energies, oil is the decisive strategic resource for almost everything!

"To be able to discover oil... Wow, am I about to hit the jackpot?"

Lin Yue was still excited at this moment; it seemed like the first time this happened.

With oil, future energy needs wouldn’t require trading with others...

No.

"Just having oil, without machines for extraction and refining, is useless, isn’t it?"

Lin Yue’s mind quickly calmed down.

Before refining, crude oil is just crude oil, barely usable for burning; wanting to make other things...

Seems you can only imagine so.

Then, could the High-Precision Research Workstation be of any use?

Lin Yue took one unit of crude oil and placed it on the High-Precision Research Workstation.

However...

Nothing happened.

The workstation didn’t respond at all, whether for decomposition or anything else.

Probably... it’s unable to decompose this natural mineral?

That was the same when experimenting with decomposing natural sulfur; some natural sulfur ore had gypsum attached, and the workstation couldn’t separate them.

It seems this tactic won’t work; need to find another method.

He quickly searched around on the global trading platform, but found nothing relevant.

As for the survival point platform, it was the same; survival points still couldn’t buy any good stuff, though his survival points yesterday almost reached sixty thousand, which was both surprising and useless.

Now, there seem to be only two paths left.

First is to come up with ways to get high-level treasure chests in bulk, and then rely on luck to see if they contain anything useful for oil extraction and refining,

Second is to search in the Secret Realm, hoping to find an oil field or somewhere with decomposable equipment, or to directly carry them back for research.

The disadvantage is...

Chances are really low.

The chances of high-level treasure chests containing specific good stuff, especially specific items like oil extraction machines and refining equipment, are simply disappointing.

Given there isn’t a set drop rate, no prize pool or anything, it’s all very random.

There’s a chance it could appear soon or maybe not even after opening a hundred chests.

As for searching in the Secret Realm...

Even less likely.

After fifty years without any maintenance, oil extraction machines and refining equipment might have mostly degraded, and regardless of preservation, just finding them is extremely unlikely.

It doesn’t matter whether it’s ordinary Ancient Secret Realm Gate or Special Ancient Secret Realm Gate; the locations on Earth are extremely random.

And judging by the pattern after entering and exiting the Secret Realm so many times, they’ve almost always led to cities or towns populated by humans.

The one exception was the island with an airplane runway, but besides the airport, there weren’t any signs of industrial facilities there.

Seems to be at an impasse.

Lin Yue shook his head.

Before taking further action, the most he could do was to circle and protect this oil reserve as his private property.

With this mindset, Lin Yue walked upstream against the oil river, wishing to see what was at the origin where the oil was flowing out.

Surely, discovering such resources is quite remarkable, but without extraction and refining methods, it’s all useless.

Soon, Lin Yue and Bai walked through knee-high grass and approached the vicinity of the crude oil source.

The ground here was stained with black crude oil, making some spots barren, and near the source, there was a small lake of a few thousand square meters, but the water was crystal clear. Inside, dark shadows seemed to be moving.

Lin Yue bypassed the lake’s edge and finally found the place where crude oil was emerging.

It was a huge tear-like crack, seven or eight meters long. For some reason, crude oil was spurting out, though not fast, but this "oil river" has traveled nearly two hundred meters...

"Huh? What’s that?" Lin Yue suddenly noticed something yellow and black almost submerged in the oil river, catching his attention.

"Gawu?" Bai glanced at the oil river, then at Lin Yue, thought for a moment, then suddenly grabbed him and flew off with him in its arms!

Bai quickly performed a low-altitude dive, rushing towards the yellow-black object!

Lin Yue instantly understood Bai’s plan; he took out the Outstanding Iron Spear, and soon, with a "clang" of metal collision, he found a huge object appeared in his Storage Space!

After Bai landed, Lin Yue looked over there again and saw a giant pit had sunken, and nearby crude oil was incessantly flowing in.

Then, he looked at the item in his Storage Space, and couldn’t help but be shocked.

"It’s actually a huge medium-sized machine? And it’s called... Oil Extraction Refining Platform?"

No effort wasted; it came with no effort!

Lin Yue retreated to a slightly flat and spacious area with Bai, then excitedly took out this huge thing from his Storage Space!

Soon, a massive metallic machine, quite futuristic in appearance but painted yellow-black, revealed its true colors!

"Goodness, this shape is completely different from what I imagined? Didn’t expect it to be this huge when it was in the oil river!"

Lin Yue looked at this mechanical giant, over ten meters high, with a span of over ten meters and a gigantic boom, and couldn’t help but marvel.

But marveling aside, Lin Yue had never seen anything like this, something indistinct but definitely not supposed to be an oil extraction machine or refining machine.

Yet, if it works...

[Oil Extraction Refining Platform (Damaged)]

Well, knew it would be broken.

Though, if decomposed into a blueprint, wouldn’t that work?