# Universal Duct & Native Storage

Stage 8 introduces the **Universal Duct** — one duct that carries **items and fluids** on a single
network — and **native storage** that the network indexes.

## Universal Duct

The universal duct is the new default conduit. A single line carries **both items and fluids**
(energy stays on [Energy Cables](Conduits.md)); each resource is routed to the matching neighbour —
items to inventories, fluids to fluid storages. It is **cheap** to craft (8 per recipe).

- **One line, two media.** Internally the duct joins both the item and fluid networks at the same
  positions, so you no longer run parallel item and fluid lines.
- **Faces.** Set per-face input / output / disabled with the **Configurator**; the mode applies to
  both items and fluids on that face.
- **Item filter.** Bare-hand right-click opens a whitelist: drop sample items into the slots and only
  those pass; an empty filter passes everything. (Per-face *fluid* filters are a later refinement.)
- **Interop.** A universal duct placed against a legacy **Item Duct** merges with its item network, and
  against a **Fluid Duct** merges with its fluid network — so old and new lines mix freely.

## Item Storage

The **Item Storage** block is a native network warehouse: a 54-slot store that the network reads and
writes.

- **Right-click** to open its double-chest GUI.
- **On the network.** Universal ducts route items into and out of it, and the
  [Storage Request Terminal](Terminals.md) aggregates its contents into the searchable network index —
  no extra setup, because NeroLogistics discovers inventories through the vanilla container contract.
- **Interop.** Hoppers, and the standard item capability (on all three loaders — Fabric, NeoForge and
  Forge), expose it to other mods; when
  **AE2** is present its interface is just another inventory on the network, read the same way — no hard
  AE2 dependency, no duplication.

## Roadmap (Stage 8 follow-ups)

These are designed and scheduled but not in this build:

- **Gas** as a third universal-duct medium (pending a confirmed gas capability / Mekanism interop).
- **Native fluid tanks and gas containers** as first-class storage endpoints.
- **Typed storage cells** (item / fluid / gas) with **capacity tiers** and **partition / priority**,
  held in storage drive/host blocks.
- A **controller-unified network index** (the controller aggregating all storage into one index) and
  deeper **AE2** crafting delegation.

## See also

- [Network Controller](Controller.md) — manages the network and scales its throughput.
- [Conduits](Conduits.md) — legacy item/fluid ducts and energy cables.
- [Terminals](Terminals.md) — the storage request terminal that indexes native storage.