Chapter 318

After interrogating the surrendered demons, everyone gained a deeper understanding of the current plane's situation.

"Oh my, we were careless! We fell into the trap of fixed thinking, assuming all planes still had heaps of powerful beings like in our old days, never imagining how weak all planes have become now. Not a single monarch remains—only these rotten fish and stinking shrimps, and yet a single great demon dares launch a plane invasion." Negril said.

Different systems have different ranking structures; in the Abyssal Plane, most beings are demons, so their demon monarchs are equivalent to their gods.

At the god level, power varies wildly—some weakling gods can't even defeat a great demon, while powerful gods can create new worlds.

As for the vanished monarchs: "All were killed by a purple-gold skeleton."

"Lok?!" A name leapt into everyone's mind.

"No, not necessarily Lok—have you forgotten the other purple-gold skeleton that followed the King?" Negril asked.

Lamor hesitated: "But there was no second purple-gold skeleton beside the King. In the old Empire, only Lord Lok was the Lord of Mourning. The Emperor did have a pet, but it wasn't a skeleton."

"But the little demon insists there was a second one, because he recognizes Lok—and that purple-gold skeleton wasn't Lok. Ask him if you don't believe it."

The Terror Lord known as the Little Demon had his monument carried over and planted firmly on the ground.

The Little Demon carefully described the scene and repeatedly swore the purple-gold skeleton was not Lok. Combined with the captured demons' accounts, it was confirmed: that skeleton was definitely not Lok.

"So the King had two Lords of Mourning, and the second one went to the Abyss and killed every single demon monarch?" Anthony summarized.

"Do you think it's possible the King sent both Lords of Mourning out? Lok to kill gods and archangels, the other to kill Abyssal monarchs? Otherwise, where did the Harvest Goddess go?" Negril speculated.

"Sssss…" This theory was explosive. Why would the Undead King suddenly kill all gods and monarchs?

Of course, these were all guesses—no one knew if they were true. The reality was: the Abyss had no monarchs; lords ruled as kings, and a single great demon dared run rampant.

"Failure, failure! The Light Church's intelligence system is a complete failure—they still haven't uncovered such vital information." Anthony lamented.

"Maybe they did find out—but hid it on purpose, keeping it to themselves," Lisa guessed.

"Exactly!" Anthony groaned: "That's exactly what I wanted to do! If I'd known this, I'd have already deployed my people to the Abyssal Plane."

After a bout of regret, Anthony turned to Ange: "My lord, can we now activate the World Transit Station?"

Ange shook his head.

Anthony had expected Ange's refusal—the World Transit Station can't be used for farming; why waste mana crystals just keeping it on?

"Can I borrow it occasionally? For transporting large quantities of supplies?" Anthony asked.

Ange nodded: "Yes. Everyone can. Silver coins accepted."

"Wonderful!" Lisa jumped up first: "I'll bring Meishencheng back—no, rebuild it!"

"Oh my, now all our territories can be connected as one whole!"

Ange's current sphere of influence consists of isolated points—only Green Oasis Dark City and Meishencheng are linked; everywhere else requires interplanar travel, making communication and logistics a nightmare.

If everyone could use the World Transit Station, it would be like having access to cheap transportation—every location could exchange goods freely. Grain from the Danhai Plane and the Fallen Dragon Lake could supply all regions; the Abyss of Rest wouldn't need to spend enormous costs growing food, saving both labor and manpower.

In the Danhai Plane, under the management of the Harvest Goddess's followers, the cost of grain cultivation is extremely low. If the cost there is 'one,' then in the Abyss of Rest it's 'twenty'—a massive disparity. Even accounting for the mana crystal expenses for transport, it's still far cheaper than growing grain in the Abyss of Rest.

Each territory has different environments, terrains, mineral deposits, and climates. The best approach is to complement each other's strengths—not have every place grow grain.

Gnomes have a famous saying: To earn gold coins, first build the Golden Road. The World Transit Station is a dazzling golden road.

When everyone learned this news, especially the Silver Coins of the Sunken Lands, they immediately contacted Anthony through Ange:

"Lord Anthony, what do we do now? Has your grain shortage been resolved?"

"No. The demons had little grain to begin with—all the goods traded earlier were scams."

"So that's how it is! Lord Anthony, I heard you were desperate for grain—I couldn't sleep a wink all night, racked my brain, and even got blisters from worrying." When speaking to Anthony, Silver Coins was never as concise as when speaking to Ange—he droned on endlessly without getting to the point.

Anthony's eyes narrowed: I believe you as much as I believe a giant-headed ghost.

"So last night I tallied this year's grain yield and calculated next season's consumption—and found a surplus of 150, 00 tons…"

Before Silver Coins finished speaking, Anthony instinctively lunged forward: "Sell it to me."

"That's exactly what I thought! Lord Anthony's problems are my Silver Coins' problems—I was so anxious…" Silver Coins began rambling again.

"I owe you a favor," Anthony cut him off immediately—he knew exactly what this merchant was doing.

"My lord is too kind! I immediately consulted the Grand Sage—he refused. He said he doesn't need money, doesn't want books, won't eat fruit, doesn't play with handsome men or beautiful women, doesn't need slaves, doesn't…"

Anthony's temples throbbed. No desires at all?

Undead beings were notoriously hard to deal with. Anthony himself was human-turned—first reborn as a undead. Though he lost interest in food and drink, his appetite for amusement skyrocketed from sheer boredom.

But for native undead, it was different—like Bone King Lok, who could sleep for centuries. If the King didn't wake him to fight, he wouldn't stir. He had no needs whatsoever.

Of course, undead still had needs—like soul crystals. But where could Anthony get so many soul crystals? If he had that many, he'd be better off giving them to Ange to activate the Instant Death Aura and grow 150, 00 tons of grain in minutes.

His head ached from thinking. He gave up. Silver Coins, having spent too long with the Grand Sage, knew better what the man wanted. All that rambling was just to show how hard he'd worked, how much trouble he'd gone through—to squeeze out more profit. Anthony refused to indulge him.

"If you don't speak now, I'll send men to block your estate and trading posts' sewers with mud, glue the keyholes shut, fill the water and food pools with feces, and release a few nests of termites inside."

"…You're ruthless." Silver Coins gritted his teeth: "I said I could get clients to gather information about the Abyss of Rest—and the Grand Sage agreed. Now the problem is: what information about the Abyss of Rest can we even reveal?"

"Damn it! Cheater!"

"Cheater!"

The first was Negril cursing; the second, Anthony.

The Abyss of Rest is theirs now. They're the ones buying grain. They decide what information to reveal. Isn't that like trading the layout of your own furniture for a trading right?

"It seems the Grand Sage really wants to come back. So what information should we give him?"

"Tell him the World Transit Station has shut down, the Wind of Rest is raging, everyone has retreated into underground cities, the City of Wraiths is starving, and the farmlands of the Ice City were burned by demons. Reveal the conditions before Lord Ange arrived."

"That works. Let's just send him a sack of soil blown by the Wind of Rest—to soothe his longing."

"Why not just bring him back? Now we have the World Transit Station—we can teleport him straight back without passing through the main plane."

"Are you mad? Can we control Harvey? He's a Lord of Mourning!"

"Uh… right. Harvey wouldn't pledge loyalty to Ange anyway. Forget it."

After the discussion, things proceeded smoothly. They sent a sack of Abyss of Rest soil through the portal—soil long exposed to the Wind of Rest couldn't be faked. The Grand Sage touched it and knew instantly.

"Is the Abyss of Rest really suffering famine? How many people are there now?" the Grand Sage asked.

"Five thousand in the City of Wraiths, fifty thousand in the Ice City, four thousand in Demon Valley. Yes, famine is real. Philin is even preparing to unleash the Plague of the Undead. Uh—Philin is the mayor of the City of Wraiths, a lich," Silver Coins said.

The Grand Sage nodded: "Now I believe your information is genuine. You even know Philin's name—he used to be an employee at the World Transit Station. I saw him several times during my mental projections. They called our projection state 'Watchers'—a fitting term."

Powerful undead like the Grand Sage occasionally projected their consciousness into lowly skeletons or zombies, using their bodies to wander and observe plane developments—mostly out of boredom.

Only a few could do this: the King, Lok, Du Luo, the Grand Sage, the Witch, and a handful of others. Once, Lok projected into a skeleton and was inexplicably killed by a squad of demons—he was furious and wanted revenge.

But when he crawled out of his grave, Luo Ge and the other Death Knights returned with demon heads: "My lord, we avenged you."

"Did I ask you to avenge me? I was finally having fun—you stole my kill!!!!" Lok's roar nearly shattered their souls.

…

One hundred fifty thousand tons of grain were loaded into the teleportation array in batches, with Silver Coins personally operating the array to send them over one by one.

No need to carry anything—directly redirected to the main plane, delivered to Anthony's territory. The World Transit Station served only as a transit hub.

But because of this transit, mana crystal consumption dropped by eighty percent. Previously, one teleport cost ten mana crystals; now, two teleports cost only two.

Anthony immediately distributed the grain, easing the food crises in several starving regions.

Ange, who was tending the World Tree, suddenly stopped, pulled out his God of Cultivation Core, and said to Negril: "It's grown."

"Grown again? What did you do?" Negril flew over, frowning at the noticeably more vigorous Cultivation God Core.

"Grain. Silver Coins. Grain." Ange said firmly.

Negril said: "So Silver Coins' grain caused your Cultivation God Core to grow stronger?"

Ange nodded. This wasn't the first time the God of Cultivation Core had grown stronger—the very moment it ignited was also due to grain. Since then, Ange and Negril had kept watch.

But why could grain grown by Silver Coins also strengthen the Cultivation God Core?

"Does that mean any grain grown by your followers can strengthen the God of Cultivation's core? Is that even possible? The grain Anthony bought is clearly meant for Light Church followers—they don't worship the God of Cultivation. Why does it still strengthen your core?"

Negril muttered in confusion, then suddenly froze: "Damn it! That's equivalent to the God of Cultivation stealing the power of the Light Gods!"

Ange suddenly raised his hand—his palm sprouted scales—Dragon God Transformation. But Ange didn't fully transform; he stopped after changing only his palm. As the scales retracted, Ange said: "I can transform for twenty-six seconds."

"Three seconds longer? How can the God of Cultivation's power extend your Dragon God Transformation time?" Negril's brow scales nearly twisted off:

"Does that mean as the Cultivation God Core grows stronger, you can keep extending Dragon God Transformation—and even Lok's transformation time?"

"And to strengthen the Cultivation God Core, you just need to grow grain for others to eat? That makes sense—the God of Cultivation is defined by producing food others consume. If you grow things no one eats, you're just the God of Nature."

"Forget it. You don't have any grain to test with right now. Get back to farming. Grow more grain—we'll test again later." Rarely, Negril urged Ange to farm—he usually only told him, "Stop farming so much."

Ange nodded. Just as he was about to return to his fields, Anna rushed over: "My lord! My lord! Bad news—the World Transit Station has received a connection request from an unknown source!"

"A request is a request. Why panic?" Negril snapped.

Since they decided to open the World Transit Station to everyone, it would inevitably activate occasionally. The more often it opened, the more likely someone would notice.

Negril now understood the situation across all planes. He wasn't worried—the gods and monarchs were gone. The remaining great demons and such? If they dared cross planes, Teshi could crush them instantly.

They'd prepared mentally and had contingency plans. If someone requested connection, they'd just ask questions and decide how to respond. What's there to panic about?

"But—he says his name is Gulliani. He wants to buy grain from us." Anna cried out.

"Pfft… What? The Pope wants to buy grain from us?"