Chapter 440: Cultivators in Flight

These trivial matters seem boring, yet they are unavoidable. It's like within the Immortal City of the Immortal Realm, when the Immortal Emperor hosts a banquet; even though everyone is a carefree immortal of ten thousand worlds, they still vie for seating order.

However, these affairs are generally left to Fire Cloud Daoist or Ji Qiuhé and others, and only when a strong enemy appears does Wei Yuning step forward.

As the space of the Life‑Space Ring expands, Wei Yuning, merged with the ring, becomes increasingly unfathomable in combat power, yet his cultivation remains at the Out‑of‑Body Stage.

Nevertheless, he is in no hurry about cultivation, because his lifespan has grown dramatically; even if he completely abandons training, he can still reach the Tribulation‑Crossing Stage before his body declines.

Beyond the Windwave Pavilion, on the sandy beaches stretching over ten li of Water Cloud Blue Bay, Wei Yuning has also leased numerous shops; besides serving ice cream and various sweet drinks, they sell surfboards and a range of men's and women's swimwear. His designs for women's swimwear copy the original Earth styles exactly, making even beast cultivators feel embarrassed to buy them.

He does have his own official model team: the female cultivators of the Fragrant Breeze Sect.

Shui Xiu'er and two others have Wei Yuning and others as backing; with no worries behind them, after work they mingle with Qin Wu and others from the Immortal City, their cultivation skyrockets, and in less than half a year they reach the Union Stage, just one step away from the Tribulation‑Crossing Stage. During this period, they also gather fellow sect members scattered across the starry sky and various small worlds, jointly opening a dual‑cultivation market in the Immortal City.

Displaying a beautiful body is a hallmark skill for Fragrant Breeze Sect cultivators, so a group of gorgeous female cultivators dressed in bikini or back‑less outfits either stroll on the beach, surf in the lake, or sit under a large sunshade eating ice cream and sipping cold drinks, effectively retaining almost all passing tourists.

Which female cultivator doesn't love beauty? Male cultivators are the same.

Led by the Fragrant Breeze Sect's female cultivators, the attire of Water Cloud Blue Bay's female cultivators becomes the boldest along the entire Gem Lake shore, and the surf sport, full of strength and beauty, turns into the most fashionable activity in the area.

When night falls, film screenings become another unique feature of Water Cloud Blue Bay.

Xue Duoduo and Tu Jiao have not been idle in Black Dragon City these years; they have produced over a hundred films at a staggering pace. Though the quality varies, for the few who have ever seen such works, they remain hugely attractive.

The Windwave Pavilion restaurant remains the best place to watch movies, but Wei Yuning, to broaden the film industry's influence, deliberately expanded the screening area; the holographic screen now covers a thirty‑meter radius, allowing nearby people to view the full picture without obstruction.

The influence is subtle and pervasive.

The neighboring Lake Bay adjacent to Water Cloud Blue Bay began to imitate; they can't learn filmmaking, but they can roughly copy swimwear, ice cream, surfboards, and the like.

Gradually, this trend radiated along the entire Gem Lake shoreline.

But the instigator, Wei Yuning, did not rejoice for long over the current changes, because the situation in the Primeval Realm is becoming increasingly severe.

The White Realm, the Eye of Light of the entire Primeval Realm, has completely fallen under demonic cultivator control, and there it eventually established a cross‑realm Starry Sky Teleportation Array with the Demon Realm; countless great demon lords from the Demon Realm entered the once‑sacred Light Sanctum, slaughtering native life at will.

Although the Immortal Realm dispatched various Celestial Soldiers to encircle the White Realm's demons, the results were minimal; cultivating a cultivator with any combat power takes centuries, yet a great demon lord can, in a short time, spawn hundreds of relatively strong corpse demons, and if they become intelligent green corpse demons, they become extremely hard to deal with.

The demonic cultivators' practice of sustaining war through war is something cultivators cannot resist; only when they hold overwhelming advantage is it a good time to hunt demons. In evenly matched battles, cultivators are simply no match for demonic cultivators.

Besides the White Realm, the Spirit Beast World is also one of the Dark Clan's breakthrough points; through the outer Starry Sky Teleportation Array of the Spirit Beast World, several nearby small worlds have been invaded.

Although the area attacked by the Dark Clan accounts for less than one percent of the entire Primeval Realm, the resulting panic is boundless. Experts from nearby small worlds flee to the Immortal Realm or Immortal City, and along the way, even greater panic spreads.

Thus, like a rolling snowball, the scale keeps growing, forming a pervasive war‑averse sentiment throughout the Primeval Realm.

Compared to the fanatical Dark Clan, cultivators of the Living World cherish life more, but because of this, without tight organization, their combat power against the Dark Clan is clearly inferior; even the Immortal City Guard's strength falls short, and only the Immortal Realm's Celestial Soldiers possess evenly matched combat power.

The panic across the Primeval Realm has little impact on the interior of Eternal Immortal City, but the outer city Green Forest Guard City, an outpost of the Star Route Hub Station, has suffered a massive shock, with countless fleeing cultivators pouring in.

Facing this situation, even the administrators of Green Forest Guard City, despite any sympathy, cannot accommodate so many people; they have had to harden their hearts and adopt a strict admission policy.

Eternal Immortal City differs from the Immortal Realm; it was originally just a place of residence with limited output, unable to sustain such a population. Previously, most of its supplies came from the myriad small worlds of the myriad heavens, but now, amid widespread panic, several large trading houses have ceased operations, making the already scarce provisions even scarcer.

Therefore, preventing outsiders from entering the Immortal City, including its outer cities, is an unavoidable measure.

Under the new official decree, anyone entering Green Forest Guard City must pay a varying head tax; the higher one's cultivation, the less they pay, the lower one's cultivation, the more they pay. If they cannot even pay the first head tax, sorry, they lose any right to beg at the teleportation array and are simply sent for free to the nearby teleportation array, and are barred from re‑entering for ten years.

The tragedies near the Starry Sky Teleportation Array were reported to Wei Yuning by Elder Xu Lian via carrier birds; he has now become Wei Yuning's chief intelligence officer.

He spends his days stationed in the Bounty Department's mission hall, periodically gathering reports from all quarters and sending them to Wei Yuning.

Due to outstanding performance, Xu Lian's monthly salary has been raised to ten low‑grade Celestial Stones, plus an additional thirty low‑grade Celestial Stones per month for activity funds, making him a wealthy figure in the low‑level mercenary world.

He now collects information with even greater ease; countless mercenary acquaintances will sell him secret tips for a meal.

Under Wei Yuning's special directive, during this emergency, Xu Lian posted a recruitment notice in the Bounty Department's mission hall: Wood‑type Spiritual Root cultivators, meals and lodging provided, head tax covered.

Such stringent hiring conditions have, in this special period, unexpectedly become a hotly sought‑after assignment.