Main City
"Your Majesty, the Mountain Ape Treasury and the underground spiritual spring have been completely sealed off by this villain. Not a single blade of grass or tree has been moved. Please, Your Majesty, come and inspect them!"
"Lead the way."
After traversing winding, damp stone steps, Chen Fan followed the short, stout priest down hundreds of meters to the deepest part of the Blackstone Mountains.
The dragon-severing stone, several feet thick, rose up with a roar, and the rich spiritual energy of heaven and earth inside, so dense it was almost impossible to dissolve, rushed towards us.
In the center of the enormous underground cavern, an Earth Vein Spirit Spring with a diameter of three zhang (approximately 10 meters) bubbled with white steam, surrounded by Ten-Thousand-Year Warm Jade.
On the stone platforms on both sides of the spirit spring, there are piles of the inner cores of thousands of Seventh Rank ferocious beasts, as well as countless high-grade spirit ores and dozens of Black Profound Stone boxes filled with blood-coagulating spirit pills.
This is the entire fortune of the Mountain Ape Tribe, which has entrenched itself in the Great Wilderness for hundreds of years.
"These are good items. You guys are quite good at saving money." Chen Fan looked them over and nodded approvingly.
The short, stout priest chuckled twice, his face full of obsequiousness.
"It is all thanks to Your Majesty's awe-inspiring Great Wilderness these inanimate objects can display their true divine might only in Your Majesty's hands!"
"You've got a smooth way with the flattery. Alright, get out of here. Guard within thirty feet of the cave entrance; no one is allowed to approach."
Chen Fan waved his hand.
"Yes, sir!"
The short, stout priest bowed and withdrew, tactfully setting the heavy stone back down.
Only the sound of the bubbling spiritual spring remained inside the underground palace.
Chen Fan removed his Battle Armor, stepped directly into the center of the spiritual spring, and sat down cross-legged.
"With a foundation at the early stage of the Seventh Rank, combined with this Mortal Dust Body, it's indeed time for some movement."
He closed his eyes, and the miniature Life-and-Death Millstone Phantom within his body began to spin wildly.
Call!
In an instant, the entire spiritual spring transformed into a massive vortex, along with the mountain of ferocious beast cores piled up around it, all forcibly pulled into the air by a vast suction force.
The abundant life essence and earth vein Spiritual Power were crushed inch by inch by the Millstone, turning into the purest gray-red liquid, which frantically poured into Chen Fan's body through the pores of his entire body!
Flesh and blood were being torn apart and rapidly reassembled, and a crisp sound like the clash of metal came from deep within the bone marrow.
Half a month later.
The Dragon-Slaying Stone, sealed deep within the underground palace, emitted a muffled roar and slowly rose.
The short, stout priest, who had been standing guard outside the door for half a month without closing his eyes, shuddered and immediately knelt down.
A slender figure slowly emerged from the shadows.
Chen Fan was still dressed in a simple black robe, with no trace of violent Qi and Blood leaking from his body. The slightly sharp aura that was originally due to killing was completely restrained, and his eyes were clear and gentle, as if he were just an ordinary boy who had just taken a nap in the deep mountains.
Only when the short, stout priest secretly glanced up did he feel as if his heart had been suddenly gripped by an invisible hand.
Unfathomable!
If Chen Fan a ferocious Battle Saber that drank blood as soon as it was drawn, then the boy now is a bottomless Abyss, and he has even lost the qualification to sense his realm!
Seventh Rank Mid-Stage!
It even subtly touches the threshold of the later stages!
"Has the village been behaving well these past two weeks?"
Chen Fan stretched and asked casually.
"Reporting to Your Majesty, all the brave warriors from the Mountain Ape camp have been incorporated into the auxiliary camp, and no one dares to slack off in mining and land reclamation!"
The short, stout priest quickly composed himself, his hands trembling slightly as he took out a bone tablet carved entirely of crimson gold, radiating a faint spiritual power, and held it high above his head.
"However... three days ago, the Profound Nether Main City in the heart of the Great Wilderness sent this Trade Gold Slip via Blackwater Flying Cavalry."
"Profound Nether Main City?"
Chen Fan raised an eyebrow and reached out to take the golden slip.
The bone tablet, cast in pure gold, landed in his palm; it was heavy and had a substantial weight to it.
Chen Fan weighed the bone slip between two fingers, a playful smile curving his lips.
"The craftsmanship is quite exquisite; Pure Gold mixed with Star-Pattern Steel. If I take it back and melt it down, it would make a fine material for two pairs of solid bracelets for my mother."
Thump!
The short, stout priest, who had just straightened up, nearly collapsed to his knees again.
"Your Majesty, this is impermissible! Absolutely not!"
Cold sweat poured down the short, stout priest's forehead. His fat hands waved wildly in the air, and his face turned deathly pale.
"This is the Trade Gold Slip of Profound Nether Main City! Within the Great Wilderness, seeing this token is like seeing a giant of the main city. If someone were to melt it down and use it to make bracelets, the main city would surely unleash its fury!"
"Look at your pathetic self."
Chen Fan glanced at him sideways, casually flipped open the golden slip, and scanned it with his Divine Thought.
"Tell me, what's the background of this Profound Nether Main City? We usually see your Mountain Ape Tribe running rampant in these Blackstone Mountains, so why do you act like a dog whose tail has been stepped on just by mentioning the city's name?"
The short, stout priest wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, approached with a pained expression, and spoke with extreme caution.
"Your Excellency may not know this, but our Great Wilderness is vast and boundless, yet its rules are more expansive than the heavens. Tribes are divided into small, medium, and large. Even the former Mountain Ape Tribe, which ruled over an area of five hundred miles, was nothing more than a bottom-tier medium-sized tribe in the eyes of the truly powerful forces."
"Oh? What about the main city?"
"To establish a city and set rules in the Great Wilderness, the bottom line is extremely stringent." The short, stout priest swallowed hard, extended a hand, and spread his five fingers. "It must have at least five Eighth-Order totem giants stationed there year-round! If even one is missing, all the tribes of the Great Wilderness will rise up and attack, and we will absolutely not allow a false city to stand!"
"Five Eighth-Order?"
Chen Fan raised an eyebrow slightly.
"This is just the beginning!"
The short, stout priest lowered his voice.
"Some long-established medium-sized tribes, even if they happen to produce one or two Eighth-Order powerhouses by chance, would never dare to be so arrogant as to build a city and establish a foundation. But this Profound Nether Main City... was built by the most ferocious Profound Nether Tribe in the Great Wilderness, and there are a full six Eighth-Order old monsters who have lived for hundreds of years entrenched in the city! Within a radius of 30,000 miles, dozens of medium-sized tribes all depend on its breath for survival."
Chen Fan understood.
Six Venerables Eighth-Order.
In this mortal world, it is indeed a colossal entity that blots out the sky.
However, to the Martial God himself, who harbors the rudiments of a complete universe within his body, it is merely a slightly larger grasshopper.
"Alright, stop praising them like they're gods."
Chen Fan put away the golden slip and gently tapped the stone table with his fingertips.
"This golden slip says they want to buy our Black Profound Stones and refined Black Iron from Blackstone Mountain, and the price isn't too outrageous. Besides giving us Tempering Blood Pills of various grades, they also offer to deliver three thousand stones of Qi-and-Blood Spirit Grain every month?"
"Exactly!"
The short, stout priest nodded quickly, a shrewd glint in his eyes.
"The Blackstone Mountains may lack other things, but their black iron ore veins are inexhaustible. In the past, the Mountain Ape Tribe only managed to obtain those exquisite Battle Armors and cultivation pills by supplying the main city. Your Majesty, this trade must not be abandoned. The Fire Crow brothers have just taken over the mountains and are currently lacking in clothing and food, urgently needing pills to Foundation Establishment!"
"Granted."
Chen Fan flicked his sleeve, decisive and swift.
"You draft a plan, select honest and hardworking Mountain Ape soldiers to mine, don't skimp on their wages, and make sure they're well-fed. Of the Qi-and-Blood Spirit Grains and pills they bring back, 70% should be sent back to Fire Crow Old Stronghold, and 30% should be kept at Blackstone Mountain as wages."