The various cultivation forces in Gao Province wanted to scrape together Spirit Stones, and naturally, the unlucky ones were the small factions and low-level independent cultivators.
To mobilize more Spirit Stones for those Void Refinement resources, not only had the two major Spirit Transformation forces gone all out, but the Nascent Soul forces also saw it as an opportunity to surpass the Spirit Transformation Zhou Family and Spirit Transformation Liu Family. They began pulling Spirit Stones from everywhere at any cost, levying additional taxes on all cultivators within their territories. Worse still, they not only emptied their own Spirit Stone reserves and squeezed the last scraps from the cultivators under their jurisdiction, but even borrowed a huge sum of Spirit Stones from outside.
For a time, the low-level cultivators and small factions of Gao Province groaned without end. Even their own people within the major Spirit Transformation and Nascent Soul forces found the burden difficult to bear. Yet under the suppression of the Spirit Transformation and Nascent Soul Great Cultivators, no one dared object. They did not even understand why their ancestors were mobilizing so many Spirit Stones while taking on outside loans.
In barely more than a month, not only had Gao Province's cultivation world been thrown into turmoil, but ordinary mortals had also been caught up in it. Prices in the cultivation world changed by the moment. Vast quantities of Spirit Stones had been drained away, while spirit herbs, pills, and magical artifacts had been mortgaged to forces in other provinces, creating an enormous vacuum in Gao Province's cultivation resources.
Whether it was Spirit Stones used for trade, the pills and spirit herbs necessary for cultivation, or magical artifacts and cultivation techniques, all had vanished without a trace. Gao Province's cultivation world, large enough to accommodate several Spirit