Chapter 455

The House of the Departed was an invaluable platform for Bai Yin and Andong, but to Ang it meant nothing—it couldn't be used to grow anything.

Authorized, Andong and Bai Yin returned to make preparations; before leaving, they gave Ang a document: "The Necropolis Council and the Sorcerers' Alliance have both issued Expansion Edicts; any wasteland reclaimed and cultivated to produce crops will automatically belong to the reclaimers."

"Expansion Edicts? Now that's something. Beifeng City has stood for so long, and they're still issuing these? Looks like the situation really is bad," Nageleis said.

The Expansion Edict was a decree encouraging subjects to expand into new territories, also known as the Reclamation Edict. The risks were high, so the rewards were great; by enshrining these rewards in law, public confidence was boosted.

History had seen new wastelands exempt from grain taxes for three to five years, or the Western Expansion Movement—places with vast land and sparse populations often granted permanent ownership to reclaimers once crops were produced.

This attracted countless people to reclaim their own land; incentives included titles, fiefs, and more—when the reclaimed territory grew large enough, one could earn noble status and a fief.

This usually happened only when a regime first entered unclaimed land and needed to rapidly convert resources into assets, justifying such massive concessions.

Now that Beifeng City had stood so long, theoretically, the Beifeng Desert should all be claimed; yet this decree was still issued—clearly both sides were growing desperate.

Du Luo asked, puzzled: "How do we prove this wasteland was reclaimed by us? Will they send inspectors down?"

Andong shook his head: "No. They judge solely by output. They've set the desert's grain yield threshold at twenty jin—produce that much, and you claim that much unclaimed wasteland. The Beifeng Desert spans roughly one million square kilometers; only the areas near Beifeng City and the dam irrigation zones are claimed."

Nageleis counted on his fingers: "One million square kilometers equals at most 1.5 billion mu—that means if we produce thirty billion jin of grain, the entire Beifeng Desert becomes ours? And they'll pay? Ten magic crystals per ton?"

"No, no, no—if we could produce thirty billion jin, the Sorcerers' Alliance and the Empire would both come to seize us. They can't afford that much money," Andong said.

The current situation was this: the Undead Empire and the Sorcerers' Alliance were both encouraging production and offering corresponding support policies—anyone willing to farm and reclaim wasteland was welcome, offered excellent prices, and guaranteed buyers, relieving landlords and nobles of all worries.

These conditions applied across the entire plane, not just Beifeng City. Due to its geography and climate, Beifeng City wasn't a priority for either side; if not for the abandoned dam irrigation zones, the Undead Empire wouldn't have sent anyone here—they were too short on manpower.

The House of the Departed, the Necropolis Guild, the Cemetery Maintenance Bureau, the Funeral Guild, the Spirit Dragon Knights, the Living Dead Cavalry… nearly every named organization had been dispatched, competing city by city, town by town with the Sorcerers' Alliance, all to win over local landlords and nobles.

While both sides were busy, the House of the Departed flooded with sale notices—but the prices were absurdly inflated, often tens of millions of magic crystals, blinding everyone and irresistibly drawing clicks.

Yet the content had nothing to do with sales; titles were things like "Beware Financial Risks from Collecting Deposits Before Production," "Severe Consequences When the Two Powers' Struggle Spills into the Real Economy," "Ninety-Eight Ways to Make Your Competitor Fail to Deliver."

The content meticulously analyzed every possible scenario, all urging people not to accept deposits, but to auction after harvest, letting the highest bidder win.

At the headquarters of the House of the Departed, a cloaked figure roared in fury: "Why? Why can someone post notices at this price? Only I have authority for rewards over ten million magic crystals—but I don't even have permission for over one hundred million! Why? Did the Spirit Spirit glitch?!"

Not only was the posting price higher than his, the authority was higher too—the cloaked figure found he couldn't delete these notices; they remained posted.

Word spread fast—ten to a hundred, a hundred to a thousand—soon the entire plane knew, including the Sorcerers' Alliance side.

A bald goblin sorcerer was reading "Ninety-Eight Ways to Make Your Competitor Fail to Deliver," muttering in awe: "So devious, so devious—so you can do this? A merchant, the author of this article must be a master merchant."

"So this is called vicious competition? Blindly inflating returns, causing disproportionate input-to-output ratios, leading to losses and industry collapse?"

"Makes sense—if everyone grows grain, next year's harvest will flood the market, prices will crash, farmers will go bankrupt, and the year after, no one will plant anything."

"Central grain reserves to stabilize prices? Farmers can't store grain on a large scale, but we can. This is clearly written for us—oh, the undead can store too. Better build more large grain silos. But storing grain means hauling it up—transportation costs are too high."

The bald goblin sorcerer muttered, quickly jotting down a string of key points. The Sorcerers' Alliance had always been airborne, with few people and little economic activity; many commercial concepts had never developed. This notice had opened his eyes.

The consequences described in the notice were not what he wanted. For both the Undead Empire and the Sorcerers' Alliance, surface life was their foundation.

If it all died, both the Sorcerers' Alliance and the Undead Empire would become stagnant water without a source—once their existing reserves were consumed, they would vanish.

The Sorcerers' Alliance would vanish faster, since their lifespans were short; the Undead Empire would too—though they lived thousands or tens of thousands of years longer, as new undead diminished, they would slowly decay.

Only if surface life thrived endlessly could the Sorcerers' Alliance continually replenish its talent pool, keeping the flame of technology eternal.

When the bald goblin sorcerer exited the House of the Departed, two goblin maidens immediately stepped forward to serve—one wrung out a warm towel to wipe his face and head, the other held a beautiful transparent crystal bottle filled with clear liquid.

"Huh? Bought it? This is the latest popular skin-nourishing essence?" The goblin sorcerer quickly wiped his face and picked up the crystal bottle.

Bai Yin's product, Du Luo's design—even the crystal bottle brimmed with luxury, nobility, and elegance, making you instantly feel it was expensive and willingly pay ten times the price.

The goblin sorcerer uncapped the bottle, sniffed carefully, and frowned: "Holy light? No—no sharpness, too soft."

He dripped a drop onto his wrist, raised his other hand, and snapped his fingers—Identification Spell.

The essence, originally a droplet with a lotus-effect surface, instantly spread into a puddle and flowed away.

"Can't identify? The manufacturing method and power exceed my understanding?" the goblin sorcerer frowned.

Just like the Golden Touch Rod—if you lack the corresponding knowledge, you can't use it. You must know carpentry to turn it into a table, know how to knead dough and wrap dumplings to turn it into dumplings.

Identification Spell works the same—if you don't recognize the method or materials, you can't identify anything. It only assists; it doesn't give direct answers.

If it can't be identified, the manufacturing method or power used exceeds his level—this forced him to be cautious: "New technology?"

He dripped another drop, snapped his fingers again—Disassemble Spell.

The droplet glowed faintly, turned slightly cloudy, rolled once, then changed no further.

The goblin sorcerer nodded: "Extraction—added some power. The cloudiness is spore powder—this must be mushroom spores."

If Du Luo saw this, he'd give the goblin sorcerer a thumbs-up—he was a walking analysis machine. With bare hands, he'd deduced so much. Any proprietary potion falling into his hands would be reverse-engineered on the spot.

Too bad he couldn't recognize holy light without added damage, or the holy mushrooms grown by holy water. Without these two key elements, even if he analyzed the entire process, he couldn't reproduce the essence.

Confirming the essence contained no harmful components, the goblin sorcerer poured a little into his palm, rubbed it on his face, and gently patted it for better absorption.

The two maidens' eyes instantly lit up, staring in shock at the essence on his hand.

From their reactions, the goblin sorcerer knew the effect must be excellent—but when he picked up the mirror, he was still stunned.

His face bore two shallow cat-scratch marks, barely painful or itchy, which he'd ignored. Now the scratches were gone, wrinkles reduced, skin smooth, softer, whiter—as if he'd aged backward by over a decade.

"No wonder it reached me—this effect is too good! Who brought this back?" the goblin sorcerer asked.

"My lord, it was brought back by Mo Nika, the Sixth Sky Ladder's Grand Hierophant. In just one month, it's swept the entire Alliance," the maidens replied, eyes gleaming at the bottle in his hand.

The goblin sorcerer smiled, handed the bottle to her, and asked: "Have you used it? How much per bottle?"

The two maidens each dripped a bit onto their palms, rubbed it on their faces, patted gently, and replied: "Eight thousand magic crystals per bottle…"

The words had barely left their lips when the bottle vanished from their hands—the goblin sorcerer took it back without expression: "Keep the rest for my analysis. Go fetch Grand Hierophant Mo Nika."

After the maidens left, the goblin sorcerer's face twitched in pain, gritting his teeth: "Merchant."

Bai Yin dared raise the price—on the main plane, the essence cost one thousand five hundred magic crystals per bottle; he raised it to eight thousand, realizing the Sorcerers' Alliance's magic crystals were worthless.

On the main plane, one magic crystal bought a ton of grain; here, the Sorcerers' Alliance offered ten magic crystals per ton. Though part of this was due to bidding against the Undead Empire, the lower purchasing power of magic crystals was undeniable.

So Bai Yin investigated the Sorcerers' Alliance's purchasing power and set the price at eight thousand per bottle—limited to five hundred bottles, sold out in half a month.

"Luxury pricing isn't about making more people able to buy—it's about making more people unable to buy," Bai Yin said.

Soon after, Mo Nika arrived to visit. When she saw the goblin sorcerer's sparse bald head, her newly formed professional instinct made her eyes gleam.

…

All the other commotion had nothing to do with Ang—he went back to reclaiming wasteland.

Jia Delige sighed as he pulled the plow ahead, the little zombie held the plow behind, the little angel and Nageleis followed to sow seeds, and Ang watered from behind.

He hung the Death Speed Aura Stone on his body; wherever he walked, seeds rapidly took root and sprouted.

Once rooted, seed survival rates soared—the roots plunged deep into the sandy soil, making them hard to kill even without water.

Thus, they reclaimed and sowed as they went, soon reaching the southernmost edge of the desert, where the towering Beifeng Mountain Range loomed before them.

"This Beifeng Mountain Range is the main reason the desert exists—it's a wall blocking southern moist air, causing the desert to receive little rain. Only cold, dry winds from the north blow into the desert, hence the name Beifeng Mountain Range," Nageleis said while sowing.

In the past, no one responded to his stories—they weren't interested—but now, with Jia Delige, the dragon lich, bent over pulling the plow, bored stiff, he quickly asked: "Why call it Beifeng Mountain Range? If it blocks southern winds, shouldn't it be called Nanfeng Mountain Range?"

"Exactly! Why call it Beifeng? Terrible naming. Let's rename it Nanfeng Mountain Range." Nageleis suggested.

Jia Delige shook his head: "If you're renaming it, why not make it better? Like Endure Mountain, Invincible Mountain, or Jia Delige Mountain."

"... You really want the last one, don't you? Dream on," Nageleis sneered.

They bantered back and forth, but Ang suddenly stopped and climbed the mountain.

Climbing to over a thousand meters up the slope, they entered a hidden valley.

The mountain ranges extended slightly, cradling the valley. At its bottom lay a vast deep pool, fed by a massive waterfall that crashed onto the water's surface, echoing thunderous roars through the semi-enclosed valley.

Nageleis examined the terrain and sighed regretfully: "This deep pool has hidden tunnels—water drains through them. If it flowed out from the valley mouth, the desert would gain another river."

Hearing this, Ang tilted his head, focused intently, and pulled out a World Tree sapling.

From Ang's shoulder, a small sapling and a tiny Treekeeper emerged.

The Treekeeper looked at the World Tree sapling in his hand and asked: "What are you doing? Planting trees for me?"

Ang nodded and planted the World Tree sapling before the deep pool.

The Treekeeper spoke slowly: "Thank you. Though this place is barren, I fear my children won't grow."

Ang pulled out sheets of floating gel, inserted soilless rice, and tossed them onto the pool's surface; he pulled out the Death Speed Aura Stone, and soon the pool's surface bloomed with vast fields of rice seedlings.

Barren? In Ang's hands, it didn't exist.

"Well, you have many ways to grow things. By the way, I've scattered my seeds into the Starburst Array—I found many plants there. They told me the Starburst Array might be breaking."