After concluding their negotiations with the Rulson Kingdom, Xu Yi and Kennard left the kingdom together.
Kennard headed to Amplistown in the Milando Duchy to inspect the construction progress of the Xinfei Merchant Guild's factory there, while Xu Yi followed his planned itinerary into the Lampari Kingdom.
Nearly half a year had passed since he last left Bunta City. Returning now, Xu Yi could not help feeling wistful.
From the outside, Bunta City looked no different from when he had left, but that very lack of change was what stirred such strong feelings in him.
Back when he and the Xinfei Merchant Guild were both in Bunta City, something new appeared almost every day. After half a year away, he might have found the city almost unrecognizable.
Now, however, Xu Yi had been gone for half a year, yet Bunta City had not changed at all. Clearly, it had stagnated during those six months, with no development whatsoever.
This city, which had always seemed so vibrant in previous years, now appeared to have sunk into lifeless silence.
Looking at the Falling Rain Highway outside the city, cracked all over from a complete lack of maintenance, Xu Yi could not help shaking his head.
In previous years, this highway had been Bunta City's most important road. Many residents had even called it "the road to wealth." Countless horse-drawn carriages and Magic Locomotives had traveled back and forth along it at practically every hour of the day, while just as many pedestrians had passed along it.
Now, however, Xu Yi stood beside the highway for a full ten minutes and saw only three horse-drawn carriages pass. Two were clearly nothing more than ordinary, old-fashioned passenger carriages. Only one carried goods.
He glanced toward the far end of the Falling Rain Highway, which