Chapter 1269: The Home Star's Population Will Increase to One Trillion

"Alright, one moment."

Jiang Ding spent some time handling various government affairs.

It all looked very practiced—every matter was dealt with at extreme speed, comparable to a Void Refinement divine soul, and with the cooperation of the central array spirit computer and the efficient immortal sect bureaucracy, there was no real difficulty in the governmental work.

"Teacher, after the inauguration speech, how has the immortal sect's public sentiment changed?"

Jiang Ding asked.

Since he wasn't in the military, the forms of address in every area were casual, nowhere near as strict.

"It's alright, I suppose."

"Most citizens approve of it—this is the excellent result of the immortal sect's education." Teacher Gu Lin laughed. "Of course, the fact that this policy doesn't affect the vast majority of citizens' interests much in the short term is also an important reason."

"That's good."

Jiang Ding nodded slightly. "In another ten years, after the citizens' assembly votes on it, the immortal sect will roll out policies encouraging childbirth. By then the sect's population will grow rapidly. We expect that after a thousand years, the population will stabilize at around one trillion."

"The education department's task ahead is very heavy—you must pay special attention to it."

"Citizens' education is a matter of life and death for the immortal sect. It concerns everyone's Dao, everyone's shared fate. No amount of attention to it would be excessive."

"Understood!"

Teacher Gu Lin's breath hitched slightly.

One trillion people!

That was nearly thirty-four times the immortal sect's current population!

It looked extremely exaggerated, but if you placed it on a thousand-year time scale, it seemed rather slow—less than a doubling of the population every hundred years on average.

The immortal sect's top cultivators had already reached a consensus.

The foundation of the immortal sect—the number of citizens—had to grow to one trillion. Otherwise, let alone coveting the Ancient God Domain, they wouldn't even have enough to hold down their existing territory.

One trillion people would just barely meet the minimum.

"This might affect your Great Sun Soul Transformation Strategy."

Teacher Gu Lin said with some concern: "Once the citizen population is sufficient, there may no longer be a need to supplement it with outside prodigies. The resistance to this policy will grow much greater."

"It doesn't matter."

"Outside prodigies were always meant only as supplements. Citizens are the true core, and we must strictly limit the number of prodigies."

Jiang Ding didn't care, saying: "Their wisdom, the inheritances they possess—that's what we want. But no matter what, we must first get the foundation right."

"That is the primary issue."

"Looks like I'm the one being petty here…"

Teacher Gu Lin was left speechless.

After finishing the report, Teacher Gu Lin left with a great stack of documents, and the place returned to quiet.

In fact, as a Dao Merging-level faction

If no unexpected incidents occurred, Jiang Ding basically only handled government affairs once every hundred years. Normally, he dispatched avatars to oversee the execution of duties in each department—quite relaxed, all things considered.

Behind him, a Sun Divine Tree broke through the soil, its surroundings blazing with radiant light.

Terrain such as the Sun Abyss, Moon Xihe River, and Sun Flame River began to overlap with the immortal sect's Vice Executive Office Secret Realm, enveloping the four directions, once again becoming the cultivation environment Jiang Ding was familiar with.

In the sky, a blue-gold flying sword blazed with brilliant light, having successfully smelted a sixth-grade top-quality No. 1 Synthetic Synthetic Gengjin. Within it, rule-prohibition runes continuously extended outward, forming a constantly rotating orb of rule runes, which gradually solidified into a Rule Divine Prohibition.

The Void Refinement spatial treasure, the Taiqing Flying Sword, had successfully refined its second Rule Divine Prohibition!

"One thousand three hundred and seventy-four years."

"It took a thousand three hundred years!"

Jiang Ding gently stroked the Taiqing Flying Sword, sensing some of the changes that had taken place within her.

Inside the flying sword, after the Great Sun Destruction Order had transformed into the Great Sun Destruction Rule, the Primordial Magnet Order also began transforming into the Primordial Magnet Rule. It was expected to complete the transformation at the instant the third Rule Divine Prohibition took shape, at which point the sword's power would undergo a stage-by-stage increase—especially when executing sword arts related to the Primordial Magnet.

"The refinement speed is so slow.""I'm so rich right now!"

Jiang Ding swept his divine sense over his savings and let out a sigh.

He wouldn't even mention the various spirit stones and heavenly materials and earthly treasures—they were just numbers to him. What truly mattered was his Void Refinement battle merit and the related heavenly materials and earthly treasures.

Many years ago, he had fifty-four points of Void Refinement battle merit and seventeen portions of Void Refinement-grade heavenly materials and earthly treasures.

Now, he had sixty-four points of Void Refinement battle merit and thirty-four portions of Void Refinement-grade heavenly materials and earthly treasures.

After more than a thousand years of refining his flying sword, he hadn't grown poorer—he had grown richer!

Was this a good thing?

No, it wasn't a good thing—especially for a sword cultivator.

Poverty is the sword cultivator's most precious quality.

It represents that the sword cultivator possesses a powerful capacity to digest resources—however much comes in, they digest it all. And it's not wasteful digestion; it's like a glutton, not wasting a single bit, utilizing everything with maximum efficiency.

That is the sword cultivator with limitless prospects!

"Back in the day, Zou Zou Xiyuan was poor. I can't fall short of him."

Jiang Ding Zi murmured to himself.

The current him could safely say he was richer than Zou Zou Xiyuan.

Zou Zou Xiyuan was merely the master of a Void Refinement sect in the Nine Spirit Domain, while Jiang Ding was among the wealthiest few in an entire Dao Merging sect—fully an entire tier above.

And Jiang Ding's realm was still only Soul Transformation, not yet Void Refinement.

That was precisely why Jiang Ding, despite being far stronger than Zou Zou Xiyuan had been at the Soul Transformation stage, was so rich.

"The main issue is still that the efficiency of refining the flying sword is too slow."

"

And this is already the result of cultivating the *Great Sun Sword Refinement Art*. I've pushed this sword-refinement art's potential to its absolute limit, and yet I've only improved the efficiency by just over five hundred years."

"Even setting aside the fact that refining the flying sword gets slower the further along you go, I still need twelve thousand years to refine the Taiqing Flying Sword to perfection."

Jiang Ding silently calculated.

The flying sword's growth was intimately tied to his potential, combat strength, and cultivation speed — extremely important.

"Should I try… the Sun Sacrifice Sword Art?"

Jiang Ding's gaze fell on this scripture.

This was the original sacrifice-refining method of an immortal-grade faction in the Upper Realm, far surpassing the Great Sun Sacrifice Sword Art—which was inevitable. Though the successive Great Sun Sword Masters were dazzlingly brilliant, their realms were only at the Refining Void stage; even if the Great Sun Sword Dao was more orthodox, it could not compare.

However, this Upper Realm sword-sacrifice method had two difficulties.

First, it lacked the Great Yin Sword Seed, so the Great Sun Sacrifice Sword Art would be extremely perilous — but this wasn't really a problem. Yin-yang imbalance and qi deviation were, in the eyes of the Great Sun Sword Pavilion, problems only the weak faced. As long as the Great Sun was strong enough, one slash would cut through it; if you couldn't cut through it, you died. No big problem.

Jiang Ding himself wasn't unafraid of death — he simply considered yin-yang imbalance too weak to bother with.

The most critical point was the second.

The Great Sun Sacrifice Sword Art was born in the Upper Realm; its cultivation required many cultivation materials unique to the Upper Realm — not necessarily precious, but exclusive to the Upper Realm.

Because the senior sword cultivator of the Great Yin-Yang Sword Realm who created this Gong Fa would certainly have made full use of the materials at hand, and wouldn't have come to the Nine Spirit Domain to tailor it.

Jiang Ding had already been searching for substitute materials.

Relying on the immortal gate's powerful immortal-path synthesis industry, he had already achieved partial results, but complete substitution was still a distant prospect. Several particularly special materials offered no hope of artificial synthesis within ten thousand years.

"Should I ascend to the Upper Realm for a trip?"

A thought arose in Jiang Ding's heart.

"Bro isn't going there to cause trouble — just to purchase some special materials. These special materials aren't expensive; they might be complete street-corner junk in the Upper Realm."

"If there's any danger, I'll just slip away."

(End of chapter)