Stopping and starting, they headed east all the way!
The dragon boat was faster than expected, and more and more people boarded.
At first, there had only been several tens of thousands. After several dozen stops, the lowest level alone held over a million people.
The vast space was no longer as empty as before. People were everywhere, gathered in little groups of three or five. Yet the atmosphere was not noisy; there were only faint murmurs of conversation, too indistinct to make out, as though they had been shielded by magic power.
Even though fighting was forbidden aboard the dragon boat, no one let down their guard against others.
Even while resting, one person would remain alert, watching everyone around them.
The only comparatively lively place was probably Li Su's.
There was an endless stream of people trading medicinal herbs for elixirs. After several days, Li Su's gains were immense. He had collected over ten million jin of first-rank medicinal herbs, and even second-rank herbs amounted to roughly sixty or seventy tons.
That was an astonishing quantity. After all, Li Su's elixirs were not expensive. The main issue was that he had too few varieties—only the Qi Recovery Elixir and the Qi-Gathering Elixir for cultivation. Since people needed to trade for other resources as well, they had not exchanged everything with him.
Even so, Li Su had taken in nearly seventy percent of all the first- and second-rank medicinal herbs.
That was an enormous figure, representing staggering wealth. It would be a lie to say it did not tempt people.
The quantity was simply too great. Profit stirred the heart. If they could get their hands on it, they could trade for cultivation methods they had never dared dream of, special-purpose elixirs, talismans, even magical treasures and divine weapons.