“Yes. Good observation. Harvestable crystals go through three safe stages: the first ring has a loud, medium-toned hum that makes it active. The second ring has a softer, medium-toned hum, which makes it less active. Then it goes back to neutral with the third tap, which sounds like hitting a normal rock. Nothing special.”

That sounded easy enough to get. “What about the unharvestable ones?”

“They go through two safe stages, but they’re never neutral. Their pitch can also vary. They either start out a soft, very high-pitched hum, then get louder and higher-pitched with each tap until they explode. Or they start out at a soft, very low-pitched hum, then get louder and lower-pitched until they explode. The important thing to remember is that with an unharvestable crystal, it starts out as neutral before it’s ever touched, but one tap activates it. The second tap makes it even more active—which is the opposite of a harvestable crystal. So, if you hit a crystal and it gets louder the second time, then the third tap will make it explode.”

“How can I be sure if a crystal is harvestable or not?”

He tapped the box. “Going to show you here once you’re done with the questions.”

I ran my hands down my face as I tried to think. I definitely had more questions. I needed to find out everything I could before mining. “Do you have to make it neutral to harvest it? Can you just hit it the one time and then take it?”

“No. If you don’t hit it three times, then it won’t come free from the surrounding bedrock.”

I suddenly got why he added all those music questions to the test. If a miner wasn’t paying close attention to the pitch or tone of the crystal, then they might easily mistake it as harvestable and blow themselves up. Add in a bit of desperation and nerves, and it was easy to see why so many miners didn’t make it.

“Anything else?” Carl asked.

I wasn’t sure what questions I had. It all seemed confusing to me, but maybe I’d understand once I started doing it. “What should I know that you haven’t told me yet?”

“Ah. No one’s ever asked me that.” He scratched his cheek as he thought. “Okay. Here’s something. Be careful how many unharvestable crystals you tap twice.”

“Why?”

“You can hit a bad crystal two times, but I advise against it. You really need to know with that first hit. But, if you hit it a second time and it gets louder, walk away. That’s fine. You made a mistake. But you don’t want to do that too many times in the same area.”

“Why not?” I wished I had something to take notes on, but instead, I rubbed my temples, hoping that all the information would somehow stick.