Author: Xevinaly

After sending Yu Kai away, Cheng Yang started to plan his day.

He wanted to help Liu Hau find the instance dungeon near Joyous River Village, but that would have to wait. Cheng Yang would have to rely on Liu Hau’s luck to obtain the dungeon’s first clear.

He also had to secure the entrance to The Forgotten Grave. Thankfully, it wouldn’t be too difficult. He only needed one person that wasn’t an idiot to keep guard.

Thanks to the Innate Ability granted by Phoenix Village, so long as it was one of Cheng Yang’s soldiers, they would never get caught. Still, Cheng Yang wanted to assign the fastest person possible since this was an important task.

Aside from himself, the fastest person in Phoenix Village was Liu Hau. He had a Purple-Silver piece of equipment that boosted his speed in addition to the buff from Phoenix Village, his own Innate Ability, and the base stats of a High-Grade Warrior. Unfortunately, Liu Hau was too busy to be tasked with guard duty.

Even so, Phoenix Village was the most concentrated group of talented people in the world.

If it was just finding someone with a 30% bonus to Movement Speed, the problem was trivial.

Cheng Yang chose a refugee from Huimin named Fan Wukong and gifted her a pair of Green-Bronze sandals to further boost her speed.

The Snow Lepard Brigade that she was a part of was currently outside the village, so, Cheng Yang sent a messenger to retrieve her.

Less than half an hour later, Fan Wukong appeared before Cheng Yang. She had a pair of bright eyes that seemed to tear apart what she looked at and a lean body that seemed at odds with her lazy disposition.

“My Lord, you called for me?” She asked bluntly.

Cheng Yang couldn’t blame her. Since the world ended, most people found that they were the last of their family line.

“I did.” Cheng Yang replied curtly. “I need you to do something for me. The military is looking for The Forgotten Grave, so I need you to watch over its location. Just watch it passively, and once someone finds the portal, announce that it’s ours. After that, report to me.”

“I understand. Rest assured. So long as my heart still beats, no one will escape my notice.” Fan Wukong said with shrouded malice.

“Good. As compensation, I will provide you with a hundred Experience Fragments per day and an extra hundred when the task is complete. You are free to hunt any monsters you find but understand that if you fail, there will be consequences.”

Even as an officer in the Phoenix Village army, a hundred Experience Fragments per day was a generous offer. Despite that, Fan Wukong’s face was as relaxed as before.

She was one of the thousands of people who the apocalypse shattered and then reformed. Unable to cope with the cruelty of the world they were thrust into, they embraced it. The only thing left for them was a slaughter. They became living weapons.

Weapons needed someone to wield them. So, since he had pulled her out of the wreckage of Huimin, Sun Wukong happily became Cheng Yang’s hunting dog.

Once Sun Wukong left, Cheng Yang left the village with Liu Wei. Together, they were going to go to Silkworm Mountain and deal with their bird problem.

A little over halfway through their journey, Cheng Yang passed by The Forgotten Grave. Since he was nearby, Cheng Yang decided to clear it.

Cheng Yang quickly slaughtered several waves skeletons before returning to the real world with a fresh batch of equipment.

Shortly after resuming their journey, Cheng Yang and Liu Wei ran into Yu Kai’s group that had left earlier that day.

It was an awe-inspiring sight to watch several hundred soldiers trundle forwards while carrying trees as if they were toys. It wasn’t quite to the point where the procession didn’t see to have a beginning or an end, but it was close.

Since they were weighed down by civilians and supplies, Yu Kai had moved quite slowly, which allowed Cheng Yang to catch up. Once he did, Cheng Yang decided to stay with the group to ensure there weren’t any accidents.

“My Lord, should I show you where I found those monsters now, or should we eat some lunch first?” Yu Kai asked when they reached Silkworm Mountain around noon.

“Let’s eat first.” Cheng Yang replied. “After that, me, you, and Liu Wei will clean up those birds.”

“Just the three of us?” Yu Kai asked in surprise.

“Of course. No one else would have the power to resist the attacks of a flying monster. Even bringing your Liu Wei is a risk.”

Yu Kai nodded in affirmation and then ordered his subordinates to prepare for lunch. Although they had a decent supply of monster meat stored within the walls, someone needed to cook it before it was edible. It was one of the few jobs that even civilians could handle in this new world.

After a dry but filling lunch, Cheng Yang traveled five kilometers outside the city.

“There they are, my Lord.” Yu Kai said, pointing towards a rather large hill.

“Why in the hell were you so far from the station?” Cheng Yang asked with a conflicted smile. “Don’t lie and say you manage to clear all of the monsters within five kilometers.”

Yu Kai gave a wry smile. “Nope, we’ve only cleared the first three kilometers.”

“So, what were you doing out here?”

“Yesterday afternoon, while we were clearing monsters, we saw some birds. We hadn’t seen any birds since the apocalypse, so were we curious to see what they were.”

When he glanced into the distance, sure enough, Cheng Yang saw a few dozen black dots on the horizon.

“Who knows how many are over there.” Cheng Yang grimaced, “This is going to be a pain in the ass.”

Flying monsters wouldn’t care if there was a path up the mountain, but Cheng Yang and the others would have to scramble up loose gravel while fighting. They would also have trouble firing in between the thick treetop canopy the birds were nesting in. Despite that, it would be worse near the peak where the trees were sparse since Cheng Yang’s group benefitted from the cover as well.

“How much damage can you do now?” Cheng Yang asked Yu Kai.

“Enough to one-shot a Standard-Grade monster.”

“Well, you won’t be a burden, at least. Be very careful while climbing up, even though we’re fast, those birds are definitely faster. We might be able to outrun them usually, but they’ll circle around us before diving at insane speeds. If you get trapped, don’t even try to escape. Focus on defense and try to kill them all. We need to find a decent place to farm them from, or there won’t be a way to get rid of them.

Yu Kai nodded, and then the trio began their climb.

Despite putting up a strong facade, Cheng Yang was terrified. He didn’t have much experience fighting flying monsters in his past life and what little he did ended in his death.

Logically, he knew that with his current strength, even if it were just him against thousand of birds, he wouldn’t die. Still, he couldn’t shake the fear that death had ingrained in his bones.

Filled with a caution he had sorely lacked in the past, Cheng Yang led the group stealthily through the shadows of the trees. Although the monsters nested their at night, during the day, they would spend their time flying. As long as they were careful, they could reach the edge of the forest before being discovered.

Every time a bird flew over them, Cheng Yang flinched. Every step he took increasing his anxiety. Even though he wanted to deny it, his choice to sneak as close as possible was one born from the fear that he would panic and run if they flocked him all at once.

After an excruciatingly long trek, Cheng Yang reached the edge of the point where he saw the birds close up for the first time.

When he did, his face lost all of its colors. They were Spined Eagles, the same as the monster that had killed him in his past life.

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“We should use our head start to clear every single one of the higher level Instance Dungeons first.” Yu Kai said, his voice filled with longing. “That way, everyone else in the world could only cry out in despair.”

Since his hour was up, Cheng Yang walked out of the Tavern, ignoring his delusional friend.

“Ah, wait up!” Yu Kai snapped out of his daydream when his friend walked away.

“My Lord, what should we do once the military finds The Forgotten Grave?” Yu Kai asked after he caught up.

“What else can we do but make sure they know it’s ours? There might be a fight, but we can’t just give it away.”

Yu Kai smiled. “I knew you’d say that. We found it first, so we absolutely can’t let anyone take it from us. Its a great source of items, and if we give up this Instance Dungeon, we won’t be able to defend the other ones we control in the future. I think we should send some people to defend The Forgotten Grave. Even if we don’t kill the people from Cloud City, we need to give them a vicious send-off.”

Cheng Yang smiled. Unconsciously, Yu Kai had gone from your average college student to a soldier that saw death as normal. Even if it was false bravado born from an easy time in the apocalypse, Cheng Yang was happy to see his friend’s mindset change. In this world, it was better to have fake bloodlust than genuine mercy.

“How many people?” Cheng Yang asked with a chuckle. “Are you going to ask Liu Hau to defend it? Are you going to do it?”

“Cut me some slack. It was just an idea. I haven’t thought that deeply about it yet.” Yu Kai threw up his hands in defeat. “How about we bring all our elite soldiers for the first defense? If we had something like a hundred Standard-Grade soldiers, we would send the military packing!”

“That’s so unrealistic! We have nowhere near that many Standard-Grade soldiers, and by the time we did, the military would already have taken the Instance Dungeon from us.” Cheng Yang countered. “To stop Yuan Jianzhe and the military from occupying The Forgotten Grave, I’ll have to deal with him personally. We’ll station a single soldier near the portal, one of our fastest ones. Once the military discovers the entrance, our soldier will report that to me. Before that, the lookout will claim that we already own the Instance Dungeon. The military will relay that back to Yuan Jianzhe, who, since its a precious thing, will rush over immediately to secure it. Then, me and him can have a good talk.”

Yu Kai immediately understood what Cheng Yang meant by that last sentence. If they could talk it out, they would. If they couldn’t, then they would use other means.

When faced with the prospect of fighting the People’s Liberation Army, Yu Kai was surprisingly more excited than nervous. In his mind, the rise of Phoenix Village wasn’t something that could be stopped by anyone. He had always known that Phoenix Village was developing quickly, but after spending some time on the World Module, he realized that everyone else was in the stone age compared to them!

“If Yuan Jianzhe is too self-righteous, we’ll destroy him, my Lord. If he’s not willing to submit, let’s replace him with one of our guys.” Yu Kai said.

“Self reflect for a moment before talking like that. Anyways, since you had the time to worry about refugees, does that mean you finished killing the monsters near Silkworm Mountain?”

“My Lord, you think too highly of me. The ones within two or three kilometers are dead, but if we’re talking about further than that, then I’ve made zero progress. We’ve only got a few elite soldiers in the village, and kiting tactics are time-consuming. But, that does remind me, I was only helping refugees cause I needed to visit you anyways.”

“You needed to visit me? What for?”

“When I was hunting last night, I found a flock of monsters that had established a lair. I saw some treasure, so I decided to let you know.”

“Treasure? Why didn’t you get it yourself? Your strength should have been more than enough even if there was a High-Grade monster there.”

“I wanted too, but those monsters weren’t something I could beat on my own. They’re some kind of bird, so every time I tried to hit one, it would fly out of my range. That’s why I need your help. I figured you might know how to beat them.”

“That could fly? Some kind of bird?” Cheng Yang’s body tensed up.

“Yeah, I’m not sure what kind, but they were definitely birds. Big enough to make raptors seem like chicks.”

Once Yu Kai confirmed his fears, Cheng Yang’s body convulsed as images of his death flashed past his eyes.

“Yoko, are you okay?” Yu Kai looked at his friend with concern.

“It was nothing.” Cheng Yang said, forcing himself to calm down. “Aerial monsters are powerful but not undefeatable. Their advantages are obvious, but they have quite a few weaknesses as well.”

Cheng Yang paused, giving himself a few moments to fully recovered from the vivid memories that forced their way into focus.

“Aerial monsters don’t spawn very often, so you were right, they’re probably guarding something. If they are, it’s bound to be high-level loot. Plus, since they’re so close to Silkworm Mountain, we need to exterminate them as soon as possible. If we don’t do that soon, bad things will happen.”

“My Lord, did you mean to imply that they’ll attack the village?”

“Its a possibility. Once a horde of monsters reached a certain power level, they’ll start actively hunting for food. Aerial monsters are more dangerous since walls are meaningless to them.”

“I see.”

“For now, head back to Silkworm Mountain and take some building materials with you. You’re going to need it when your village levels up.”

“That’s not going to happen for a while, but I suppose taking what we need now wouldn’t hurt.” Yu Kai said, “The biggest problem is Silkworm Mountain doesn’t have a goldmine like Phoenix Village does. Paying for the upgrade will be pretty tough.”

Cheng Yang looked at Yu Kai contemptuously. “It’s just twenty-thousand Experience Fragments. Since Silkworm Mountain is a subsidiary of mine, I can directly transfer funds from Phoenix Village’s coffers.”

Yu Kai smiled. “I knew I could count on you.”

Phoenix Village really was an abnormal money-making machine. The combination of the Imperial Guard and the Blood-Soaked Cathedral was just too powerful. It could easily support the growth of all three territories under Cheng Yang’s control.

Cheng Yang clicked his tongue. “So you were hoping for that, huh? Well, take what you need, but after that, I’m going to let Phoenix Village accumulate Experience Fragments for a while. I’ll make Liu Hau wait a day or two before leveling up Joyous River Village.”

Yu Kai’s smile widened when Cheng Yang said that. Right now, Silkworm Mountain was lagging behind Joyous River Village. Liu Hau’s territory only needed to build two shops before reaching the level up conditions. But now, Silkworm Mountain would level up first since they had secured funding earlier!

Even if Yu Kai was only the Governor in name, how could he let Silkworm Mountain fall behind its competition?

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What thing in Cloud City had enough value to make the military move in full force?

“Follow me.” Cheng Yang had a sudden idea on how to find an answer to his question.

“Where are we going?” Yu Kai asked.

“The Tavern!”

---

Cheng Yang sat down at the bar with Yu Kai as he ordered a Tianshui Pure Brew for each of them. Since Cheng Yang wanted to access the World Module, he paid a full fifty Experience Fragments for each drink.

“Wow, its pretty fancy in here.” Yu Kai said, his formal act dropped since he was alone with his friend.

“It’s nice, but it costs as much as it looks like it should.” Cheng Yang laughed. “The fee we paid is only enough for us to spend an hour here.”

“Shit! That’s expensive!” Yu Kai looked around and counted the chairs around him. “It looks like there’s enough room for at least a few hundred people, and that’s just counting the first floor. At a rate of just ten Experience Fragments per person, won’t this place have a profit in the thousands every day?”

“Not a chance, who has that much extra money these days? Maybe it will when Phoenix Village is more stable, but until then… oh, here come our drinks. Open up the forum. Maybe we’ll be able to find something important.”

At that time, a waiter brought out two fine crystal glasses on a tray, which he swiftly placed in front of Cheng Yang and Yu Kai.

“Probably not? There’s no way a military commander would let their soldiers post about their operations online. Unless a donkey kicked that commander’s head or something .” Yu Kai commented before taking a sip of the beverage in front of him. When he did, Yu Kai grimaced. “You said this cost fifty Experience Fragments, right? This is just some cheap fruit wine!”

“If you can handle the cost, whiskey costs seventy-five.” Cheng Yang said, happily sipping on his drink. “Or maybe you’d like to pay even more for some good food?”

Yu Kai chuckled. “Nevermind, fruit win works for me.”

Cheng Yang turned his attention towards his terminal while cursing the gods in his heart. The reason he needed to buy two drinks was that each terminal was only visible to one person. Otherwise, he and Yu Kai could have shared.

Putting that aside, Cheng Yang opened up the World Module. The atmosphere was on a totally different level there. The Cloud City Area Module was deserted, but the World Module was filled with people.

Cheng Yang was almost thankful that the World Module only updated once a day, or it would be impossible to navigate it.

The most populated threads were one that discussed how various areas of the world weathered the apocalypse. One of the more common types of poster was a person seemed almost excited by this new world.

It may seem counterintuitive, but if you thought about it a little, it made sense. If you were a homeless beggar in the old world, after the apocalypse, you had a chance to become a new person. It was the classic story of a crow becoming a phoenix.

Other threads detailed theories for what happened to the world or tutorials on how to fight monsters effectively, or become a Professional while being an normal person.

Cheng Yang looked through page after page of threads before finally finding the message he needed to solve his mystery.

---

Dungeon

Andrew Wilson | We found a portal outside the safe zone of New Orleans that lead to a dungeon. We aren’t willing to share the exact details but we felt the need to warn people about the Boss at the end. It was a High-Grade monster and we only won because we were lucky. If you find a portal somewhere, be very cautious before entering.

---

An American posted the thread, but Cheng Yang could still read it even though he didn’t understand English. It was another one of the gods’ small mercies that, at least on the forums, there was no longer a language barrier.

The message itself wasn’t very striking, but over forty people were declaring that they found a similar portal in their city.

Anyone that saw this thread would be able to figure out that the information was accurate. Yuan Jianzhe must have seen it as well, which lead him to send out the military to search for the portal in Cloud City.

From now on, it would be impossible for Phoenix Village to monopolize The Forgotten Grave.

Even so, there was absolutely no way for Yuan Jianzhe to beat The Forgotten Grave without losing at least half of the people he brought in. Some Instance Dungeons were possible to beat with a party of Low-Grade individuals, but The Forgotten Grave wasn’t one of them.

Since he couldn’t beat the Instance Dungeon, Cheng Yang didn’t care if Yuan Jianzhe found The Forgotten Grave. However, if Yuan Jianzhe wanted to monopolize the Instance Dungeon, he would come into conflict with Phoenix Village when they tried to get the Hard Difficulty first clear. At that point, Cheng Yang would have to abandon his plan to develop without Cloud City noticing.

Cheng Yang could only hope that Yuan Jianzhe would be willing to share. Otherwise, he didn’t mind purging the safe zone.

Despite having resolved the matter he was worried about, Cheng Yang didn’t leave immediately. Since he’d already paid the Experience Fragments needed to access the World Module, he was going to make the most of his time.

“Yoko.” Yu Kai looked over at his friend. “There’s a Tavern like this one in every safe zone, right?”

“Yep, every single one.”

“In that case, if I posted on the forum, wouldn’t my parents be able to see it?”

“It would work in theory.” Cheng Yang said honestly. It was a common tactic in his past life. “But, even if we use the Continent Module, there will be thousands of new threads created every day. Yours would be buried by then, so your parents probably won’t see it.”

“Still, they might!” Yu Kai protested. “I also saw a feature that allows me to pin my thread to the top of the module. If I paid for that, it would work, right?”

“It probably would, but do you think your parents would be able to handle the exposure? Pinning a thread is expensive, so anyone willing to do so would be someone rich. If someone finds out who your parents are, they would be able to threaten you and receive a ransom through the Auction House.”

“Then, I’ll just make a normal thread.” Yu Kai said after hesitating. “Even if the chances of my parents seeing it are low, its better than nothing.”

“Don’t worry. I’m sure your parents are doing well.” Cheng Yang tried to comfort his friend since he was in distress. “You were able to warn them, so they definitely survived the earthquake. Even if they didn’t manage to reach the safe zone before monsters started spawning, they would be close enough to be rescued first.”

Yu Kai nodded and, despite his melancholy mood, started to type out a thread.
“Yoko, did you manage to find what you were looking for?” Yu Kai asked when he was done.

“I did. It’s highly likely that the military is searching for The Forgotten Grave.” Cheng Yang said. “They’ve probably already found it.”

Yu Kai chuckled. “who cares, we’ve already gotten the first clear, and the military couldn’t beat the Hard Difficulty even if they sacrificed all fifty people that went in. Although, with so many groups trying to clear Instance Dungeons, there’s no way we’ll be able to get the first clear for all of them.”

Cheng Yang rolled his eyes. “Of course they will. There are so many different Instance Dungeons in this world that wanting to get the first clear of each one is childish. Moreover, our new goal will be getting as many first clears on Instance, Dungeons for people in the second stage of evolution as we can.”

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Suddenly, Old Lee realized what Cheng Yang was implying. “My Lord, you don’t mean to say there’s a Boss on the other side of the Western bridge, do you?!”

“I’m not sure, but my intuition says there is.” Cheng Yang replied.

“This is…” Old Lee groaned. Cheng Yang hadn’t been wrong yet, so if he said there was a Boss, there probably was. “Does this mean it’s impossible to clear the western bridge?

“No, it would just be risky. Of course, if all we wanted to do was kill most of the monsters there, we could do it.”

Old Lee sighed. Even if they killed the monsters on the bridge, they’d at most get a piece of decent loot, something with a value that was incomparable to a Territory Altar.

“What are we going to do next then, my Lord? The development of Phoenix Village is on track, and with their current trajectory, Silkworm Mountain and Joyous River Village will level up in less than a month.”

“Let’s wait until we have a surplus of Standard-Grade soldiers before making any big moves. Our development is on track, but we can’t allow any mistakes right now.” Cheng Yang replied. “We could try and secure another Territory Altar, but we’d have to travel to another city.”

“What about checking the area around Yanghe City, my Lord. It’s only eighty kilometers away, so it shouldn’t be hard to reach?”

“Even if its only eighty miles away, it will be hard to find. The terrain has changed since the earthquake, so we’ll probably get lost. Although difficulties are inevitable, getting separated from the village is a death sentence in the wilderness. If it were just me, it might be fine, but…” Cheng Yang paused. “Nevermind that, how are the civilians doing?”

“Not bad, our soldiers bring a lot of food to the village every day, so no one is going hungry. We’ve been storing any grains or rice we find and serving roasted monsters as food. It’s a little bland after a while, and we try to use any seasoning we find, but…”

“But what?”

“We just have too many people.” Old Lee sighed. “Our total population is close to fifty thousand, so the amount of resources we consume in a day is staggering. Most of what we scavenge is non-renewable, so before long, we’re going to run out of old-world products.”

“Just that?” Cheng Yang laughed. “Don’t worry about it. As long as we’re surviving, it doesn’t matter if we’re comfortable. Eventually, we’ll be able to produce some of those things on our own, but until then, we’ll have to tough it out.”

Cheng Yang didn’t know the specifics, but he knew that eventually, there would be several Professions available to normal people. One example was the Farmer.

Thus civilians would become the primary source of food in this world and would likely gain access to other Professions that produced necessities.

Old Lee’s worries were put to rest when Cheng Yang assured him that they would be solved in the future.

After some more chit chat, the two parted ways. Before they did, Cheng Yang transferred the Experience Fragments needed to train new soldiers to Old Lee.

Cheng Yang then returned to his Meditation Hall and, after retrieving his Experience Fragments from Liu Wei, began training.

When Cheng Yang finished, he visited the Territory Altar. By this time, the Priest class change statue had leveled up.

Cheng Yang nervously opened the Preist statue system pane with his eyes shut. He cracked one eye open and then sighed in relief. The statue lifting stone’s bonus was multiplicative!

Although it was just a drop in the bucket compared to the healing needs of Phoenix Village, having proven that the bonus wasn’t additive was incredible. From now on, Phoenix Village would have an enormous number of healers!

When fighting a group without Priests, Phoenix Village would be nearly undefeatable, and even if the enemy did have Priests, Phoenix Village would still have the advantage. Also, the Priests from Phoenix Village would know Angelic Inspiration, further sharpening the village’s edge.

Even without being inspired, Cheng Yang could handle most monsters with ease, but what if he added Liu Wei into the equation? With her acting as his support, he would be able to face Boss type monsters with ease. She would take care of the high-level mobs, and he would wipe out the low-level ones. Then, together, they would annihilate the Boss. It was a beautiful scene that combined two extraordinary people into one.

Cheng Yang couldn’t wait!

Shaking his head to clear those thoughts, Cheng Yang started the process of upgrading the Priest statue again. Since Phoenix Village’s statue had an extra research option, it would take a total of 12,000 Experience Fragments and 18 days to level up.

As for the other statues, their current research was still ongoing. They wouldn’t finish until some time tomorrow.

Then, Cheng Yang summoned his Imperial Guard and cleared the Blood-Soaked Cathedral. In the process, Cheng Yang obtained a Purple-Silver robe. It was an incredibly useful item which increased his Mana by 60 points but didn’t have a defense bonus.

Although this piece of equipment had a smaller defense bonus than his old one, Cheng Yang didn’t care. Mana was more important to him, and there was only a two-point difference.

After all, increasing his Mana meant Cheng Yang’s hunting efficiency would increase.

Before Cheng Yang could savor his gains, he saw Yu Kai walked towards him.

“Yu Kai? What are you doing here?” Cheng Yang asked. “Actually, it doesn’t matter. I’ve been wanting to hold a conference with the generals, so this is a lucky coincidence.”

Yu Kai grimaced. “You might have to delay that conference. I have bad news. I ran into a group from the Cloud City safe zone. It wasn’t some small band of mercenaries either. There were nearly a thousand people, so it had to have been the military.”

Cheng Yang frowned. “And then what happened? Did they find you?”

“I was searching for refugees and didn’t notice them until it was too late. They chased after us, and since the soldiers from my village don’t have any Movement Speed buffs, so it was challenging to lose them.

“Where did you first encounter them, and where did you last see them?”

“We were about a kilometer from the Northern bridge, and we were chased all across the city. We only threw them off a kilometer or so from the Southern bridge.”

“That close!” Cheng Yang sighed. “It’s way too early for the military to try and leave the city, so whats going on?”

“I thought it was strange as well. They weren’t a routine patrol or hunting party since they would avoid conflict with monsters. I think they were searching for something. Moreover, even after they stopped chasing us, we ran into two other teams of the same size. Luckily, we were on guard by then, so we weren’t discovered.”

“They were looking for something?” Cheng Yang murmured. It probably wasn’t a person they were looking for since they would want to remove threats during a search and rescue. Since it wasn’t a person, what was their goal?

Last Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

Cheng Yang exited out of the Council of Lords and shut down the terminal after glancing at the Transcendent’s List enviously.

Cheng Yang then chugged his beer and left the Tavern. He felt like he was on top of the world. There was no one even close to matching him among humanity, and with the Adventurer’s Guild built, he could finally register as an Adventurer.

The buildings were only thirty meters apart, so after a short walk, he entered the Adventurer’s Guild and walked directly to the secretary.

“Excuse me, ma’am. I want to register as an Adventurer.” Cheng Yang was an Adventurer before he died, so he was familiar with dealing with the guild.

The secretary had been watching Cheng Yang since he entered the building and had apparent disdain written on her face. She wasn’t the only one, the other NPCs in the building were at best apathetic to Cheng Yang’s tipsy appearance. Their attitude was in stark contrast to the usually subservient approaches NPCs had towards the Lord of a territory.

“As you wish, sir. Please make a payment of twenty-five Experience Fragments.” The secretary said courteously.

After Cheng Yang paid, the secretary handed him a form. It was only meant to verify a person’s identity and that they weren’t forced to become an Adventurer.

“All right, you’re an Adventurer now.” The secretary’s voice was cold when she accepted the form from Cheng Yang. “Once you earn five hundred achievement points, come back, and I’ll increase your Adventurer Rank. That will allow you to accept higher-level missions.”

Cheng Yang nodded and then left the building. Once he did, Cheng Yang found Liu Wei, and they left the territory together.

After experiencing the small war in Cloud City, Liu Wei was much closer to Cheng Yang, and the barrier between them had disappeared.

Although she couldn’t be called talkative, she was far friendlier with Cheng Yang, and their trips weren’t as silent as before.

They most of the night chatting and hunting monsters in the area between Cloud City and Phoenix Village.

Once they returned, Cheng Yang lent Liu Wei the Experience Fragments she needed to train. Although Cheng Yang’s training was essential, for the time being, he believed Liu Wei’s was more critical.

Now that he had some free time, Cheng Yang walked around Phoenix Village, basking in his accomplishments. The village was beginning to take shape. There were several dozen buildings and a few sophisticated facilities. They filled the Inner Village in a spiraling manner, forming streets that the gods were kind enough to pave with packed dirt and loose cobblestone.

Cheng Yang only regretted that electricity no longer existed, which meant that the only light came from torches lining the wall. Well, lightning still existed, but there was nothing humans could utilize.

Thankfully, the gods had been merciful during these past few days. It only rained during the day, and the moon was visible every night.

Now that the Barracks had been constructed, there were more than enough beds for everyone in the Inner Village. So, after housing the professional soldiers, the remaining people were spread out with five in each Meditation Hall.

Even though they didn’t own the Meditation Halls and could be kicked out at any moment, having a roof over their heads provided spiritual sustenance. Compared to when everyone was sleeping outside, the atmosphere was much livelier.

Of course, this was far from enough to support everyone in Phoenix Village. It wasn’t even enough to house all of the soldier’s family members. But, everyone could tell that it wouldn’t be long before everyone in Phoenix Village could live comfortably.

All of the soldiers knew that Phoenix Village was in a unique golden window of time for expansion. As long as they established a foothold in this new world, they could secure a life for the people they loved. Thus, even though there were almost three thousand soldiers, it was hard to find any inside the village.

Aside from the apparent time sinks of training and hunting, hundreds of soldiers were working hard to collect raw materials. It made the Inner Village seem a little lonely.

While Cheng Yang was wandering around, Old Lee’s brigade returned to the village. Once Old Lee saw Cheng Yang, he motioned for his second-in-command to lead the group.

“My Lord, welcome back. Did you find the Instance Dungeon near Joyous River Village already?” Old Lee jogged over to meet Cheng Yang.

“Not yet, I’ve had horrible luck. We spent the entire day searching yesterday and weren’t able to find it.” Cheng Yang sighed. “I’m going to try again today, and if we still can’t find it, we’ll just have to wait for a lucky hunting party to stumble upon it.”

“Should I have my brigade join your search?” Old Lee asked after a moment of contemplation.

“That won’t be necessary. We still have a few days before anyone will be capable of stealing the first clear from us, so your subordinates have more useful things to do.” Cheng Yang said. “Unfortunately, another mass evolution will occur among the monsters in a few days, so we need to fortify our foundation before then.”

“Again?” Old Lee was shocked. After the first mass evolution, every large horde had a few dozen Standard-Grade monsters, which significantly increased the pressure on the Phoenix Village soldiers. Although Liu Hau and Yu Kai were at the High-Grade Apprentice level, they had their own villages to defend. If another mass evolution happened and High-Grade monster’s appeared, the village would be helpless without Cheng Yang.

“Don’t be too worried. There won’t be any High-Grade monsters for a while longer. This mass evolution will just increase the number of Standard-Grade monsters.” Cheng Yang explained once he saw Old Lee’s face. “Still, we don’t have much time.”

“We’re doing well in that regard, my Lord. By tomorrow, we’ll have another twenty-seven Standard-Grade soldier, all of which were be able to use eight times training speed. The soldiers using two times training speed will take another dozen days or so to level up.”

“That is to say, we’ll only have five or six Standard-Grade soldiers per brigade?”

“Something like that, yes.”

“That’s too few.” Cheng Yang said. “I’ve accumulated quite a few Experience Fragments, around thirty thousand, which I’ll lend so that we can enable another one hundred and seventy-five soldiers to use eight times training speed. I need you to make sure those soldiers earn enough to sustain their new training speed.”

“Of course, my Lord. I’ll find a way to procure the daily Experience Fragments each of them needs. I’ll also make sure to distribute our resources in such a way that those with better Innate Abilities will level up the fastest.”

“Good. I’ll be able to build the Bank tomorrow, so if you need too, you can make those soldiers take out a loan. Since we’re more or less forcing them to do so, I’ll make sure they get minimized interest rates. The most important thing right now is to level up those soldiers.”

Old Lee agreed with Cheng Yang’s statement. It would only build resentment if they tried to make a profit in a situation like that.

The situation was nearly the exact opposite of Cloud City. The number of Professionals was growing explosively, which limited the growth of any individual. There were only so many Experience Fragments to go around, which meant most people found it hard even to use two times training speed.

This problem was exacerbated by Cheng Yang culling any horde large enough to catch his attention.

Ironically, although this weakened Cloud City, their losses from the second mass evolution would probably be lower this time around.

Over time, the situation in Cloud City would change. Individuals like Yuan Jianzhe would start to extract a fee from their subordinates to support the growth of talented individuals. Before long, they would produce some Standard-Grade fighters.

“My Lord, you’ve cleared three of the bridges into Cloud City, but when are you going to get the fourth one?” Old Lee asked after a while. He had been talking to Cheng Yang about the development of the territory and the delineation limits on contribution scores before remembering this important task.

“Old Lee, what do you think those three bridges had in common?” Cheng Yang suddenly asked.

Old Lee blinked in surprise. “Umm, was it that there was a Territory Altar on the other side?”

“There was, but that’s not the answer I was looking for. You should have asked yourself, ‘what wasn’t there?’ Why weren’t there any surprises? Where were the strong monsters? Where was the randomly spawned loot? Even now, we haven’t found any of the more powerful loot drops. Don’t you think it’s suspicious?”

“Are the things you’ve found up till now normal? What about the blueprints of the Imperial Gaurd Pavilion? Was that not a good drop? It was guarded by monsters that could annihilate any army from another area, so how can it be considered normal?”

“Those monsters? Strong? Old Lee, do you know what kind of monster appears at the end of the Nightmare Difficulty of an Instance Dungeon?”

Old Lee shook his head.

“Normally, the last monster is just a level above the strongest mob in the instance. However, in the Nightmare Difficulty, that last monster is a Boss, a real one that has stats that far surpass any other monster at their level. Do you understand now?”

“I see.” Old Lee said pensively. “So, the monsters we used to call bosses were just normal monsters? But what does that have to do with the last bridge?”

Last Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

Cheng Yang walked over to confront the Trial Hall manager, who greeted him respectfully.

“What can I do for you, my Lord?”

“Hello Mr. Manager, I had a question about the functions of your charge. If I want to enter a trial, does your terminal teleport you in?” Cheng Yang asked.

“That’s correct, my Lord.” The manager replied.

“In that case, what’s that portal over there for?”

“My Lord, I can only say that your Phoenix Village is too special.” The manager said with a glowing smile. “Once a village encompasses an Instance Dungeon, it is one of my responsibilities to create an easily accessible portal to it. Your village already having one when its only at the High-Grade level is simply extraordinary!”

If the manager was impressed by that, what kind of reaction would he have if he learned that the village had an Instance Dungeon even when it was at the Low-Grade level?

“Do you mean to say, that if I enter that portal, it will take me to the Blood-Soaked Cathedral?” It was Cheng Yang’s first time hearing about the Trial Hall’s extra feature, so he wanted to gather more information.

“Yes and no, my Lord.” The manager said. “While it is true that entering that portal will take you to the Instance Dungeon you mentioned, it is not reserved for it. Even if your domain encompasses multiple Instance Dungeons, they will all be accessible from this portal.”

“So, if a new Instance Dungeon enters my territory, it will automatically be connected?”

“Correct. You can also manage the various Instance Dungeons connected to the portal using the nearby terminal. By default, Instance Dungeons are open to anyone who has performed a class change ceremony in the village, but you can adjust who has access.”

Cheng Yang thanked the manager before going to inspect the portal.

Using the instructions the manager gave him, Cheng Yang opened the terminal and then checked the page for the Blood-Soaked Cathedral.

---

Blood-Soaked Cathedral
Standard Grade Party Size Apprentice Instance Dungeon
443 Clears Until High-Grade

Normal Difficulty	10/10	Hard Difficulty	10/10
Nightmare Difficulty	8/10	Hell Difficulty	0/10

Restrictions

• Non-residents barred from entering

---

After reviewing the data, Cheng Yang was able to infer that Instance Dungeons were hierarchical. Since it was an Apprentice Instance Dungeon, there must also be instance dungeons for the other stages of evolution. Since the Blood-Soaked Church had an average monster level in the Immature range, other dungeons probably had a monster in the Mature range or higher.

He also learned the disappointing reality of leveling up an Instance Dungeon to High-Grade. Cheng Yang didn’t know the exact number of clears needed, but he estimated that the Blood-Soaked Cathedral was at most 10% of the way to the goal.

For now, Cheng Yang left the restrictions as they were. All of the low-level soldiers knew that entering on their own would be suicide. The higher-level ones had, on the other hand, were all registered with the Barracks and would be quickly punished if they stole a run.

When Cheng Yang tried to leave, the manager wanted to entice him into attempting a trial. Cheng Yang declined since the low-level trials offered wouldn’t benefit him.

Finally, Cheng Yang visited the Tavern. It was the part of his inspection that Cheng Yang was looking forward to the most. However, since it was the middle of the day, Cheng Yang was there to gather information, not to drink.

When Cheng Yang entered the Tavern, he was shocked by how quiet it was. In his past life, loud drunks filled the building at all hours.

“My Lord! Welcome!” An energetic young waiter greeted Cheng Yang.

“I’d like a pint of beer, please.” Cheng Yang requested before sitting down at the bar.

Even if he didn’t want to drink at the moment, the employees would throw you out if you tried to loiter inside without buying anything.

Once the beer was served, and the five Experience Fragment tab was paid, a terminal appeared in front of Cheng Yang.

As long as one spent five Experience Fragments per hour, the Tavern offered a complimentary connection to a site similar to a forum from before the apocalypse.

There were four forums in total: Open Forum, Action House, Council of Rulers, and Transcendent’s List.

In his past life, Cheng Yang had visited the Open Forum and Auction House. The Council of Rulers was restricted to Lords, their officials, and high ranking soldiers or adventurers. As for the Transcendent’s List, Cheng Yang hadn’t even heard about someone being able to open it.

Although the Auction House was a place to auction off equipment and other treasures, most people used it as a glorified shipping company.

If you listed an item, a Tavern employee would take it from you, and once it was purchased, you could pick up the payment.

It was a convenient way to make money if you ignored one glaring flaw. The Tavern charged a dealer fee of ten percent with a one thousand Experience Fragments minimum. So, unless you earned ten thousand Experience Fragments with an auction, the Tavern would take an absurd cut.

This meant it was only worth auctioning an item if it was worth thousands of Experience Fragments, but which idiot would give away something that valuable for money?

As such, very few items were every auctioned, with the exception being raw resources. Since delivery was convenient, areas with a large number of natural resources would sell off massive quantities to the highest bidder.

The Open Forum, on the other hand, was just as useful as it sounded! It provided a way to communicate with humans from around the world. There were four different discussion forums inside the Open Forum page: the Area Module, Province Module, Continent Module, and Global Module. As the names suggested, each one would let you communicate with a progressively more significant portion of humanity.

Currently, Cheng Yang could only access the Area module, which connected him to people in the Cloud City Area. As such, the forum was nearly silent since it was still poorly developed. To get access to the other modules, Cheng Yang would have to spend more Experience Fragments.

Once he did, he would be able to join a thread or start a new one. There was also a direct message feature as long as you were both in the same forum module. However, it wasn’t a perfect experience. Each module would only update new posts and messages after a certain amount of time.

The Area Module updated every twenty minutes, every three hours for the Province Module, every twelve hours for the Continent Module, and every twenty-four hours for the Global Module.

Cheng Yang didn’t have any expectations for the Auction House or Open Forum, so he didn’t care that no one was posting anything there. What he wanted to see was the Council of Rulers.

For most people in Cheng Yang’s past life, the Council of Lords was a forbidden sacred area, and Cheng Yang was no exception.

Cheng Yang’s opened the forum with barely contained excitement that was doused when he found out it was more or less identical to the Open Forum and just as empty.

The Council of Rulers was no longer a mystifying location. It was just a forum where he was the first-ever visitor.

Last Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

When Cheng Yang suddenly appeared behind him, Liu Hau was filled with curiosity. That curiosity quickly turned into brattiness after Cheng Yang told Liu Hau about the instance dungeon near Joyous River Village.

“My Lord, how can you play favorites like that? You should have told me there was a treasure trove like that near me! Just think of the advantage of being able to enter an instance dungeon one day earlier grants! Now Yu Kai’s going to be ahead of me despite me getting a village first!”

Cheng Yang rolled his eyes. “Even if I told you, are you capable of clearing it? Then again, since no one’s run the copy before, do you think I’d let you take the first clear from me?”

Liu Hau smiled. “That’s fair. So, shall we clear it today?”

“We’ll need to find it first.” Cheng Yang sighed, “We’ll split up and notify the other person if we find it.”

Cheng Yang left Liu Hau to finish the battle he was in and returned to Joyous River Village.

Once he arrived, he picked up Liu Wei, and they left the village in the opposite direction of Liu Hau’s hunting party.

Cheng Yang didn’t know if Liu Hau was just unlucky, or if the feng shui of Joyous River Village was off, but even after searching everywhere within six kilometers of the village, no one had found the instance dungeon.

This situation was similar to when Cheng Yang was searching for the village’s Territory Altar. The difference was that there was an undeniable sign indicating the location of the Territory Altar but none for the instance dungeon.

When it got dark, Cheng Yang returned to Joyous River Village. The day was wasted.

When Cheng Yang returned to Phoenix Village, he found 1,300 cubic meters of wood waiting for him. It seems that the Loggers had worked hard today.

Lau Hui also had the chance to officially enlist all of the current Phoenix Village officers into the army. Now, all of them had the Army Rank of private first class.

Now that the Quest Hall was built, it would start to generate Territory Quests automatically, but there weren’t many quests a private could accept.

There were several types of quests one could receive from the Quest Hall, but the two most common were Territory Quests and Private Requests.

Territory Quests were generated based on the current needs of a territory or safe zone. Lords also had the privilege of submitting Territory Quests if they wanted to.

Private Requests were a bit different since the Quest Hall wouldn’t generate any. They were all submitted by individuals.

Since Phoenix Village was desperately in need of more raw materials, most of the current quests were fetch quests. In return for completing one of these quests, soldiers could earn credit towards promotion in addition to a few Experience Fragments. Since the territory was generating these quests, the rewards came from its supply of Experience Fragments.

Although these quests paid a little less than the standard price for the resources, soldiers would prefer them since it was the easiest way to get promoted. This was especially desirable to them since their rank indicated their salary as well as the quests they were allowed to accept.

The reason why there was a surplus of wood today was those quests. As soon as the Quest Hall was built, it started to issue fetch quests which the newly enlisted soldiers worked hard to complete.

Now, only the Tavern and Adventurer’s Guild were left unbuilt. Since there were enough resources, Cheng Yang chose to consume half of the wood and stone in Phoenix Village to build them.

Then, Cheng Yang used everything else to build Meditation Halls.

After using up all of the material resources, Cheng Yang checked the territory’s Experience Fragment balance. The last couple of days had been an economic boom. Thanks to the Imperial Guard, there were more than 12,000 Experience Fragments even after all of the class change ceremonies and aptitude checks performed.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite enough for Cheng Yang to justify building a Bank.

Ah! I forgot about Zhou Jie!

When Cheng Yang started to think about the bank, he finally remembered the third person he brought back from Cloud City.

Scolding himself for forgetting someone so talented, Cheng Yang opened the territory’s System Pane and searched for Zhou Jie’s name. As expected, Zhou Jie had been among the people that performed class change ceremonies over the last few days.

Cheng Yang immediately checked Zhou Jie’s System Pane.

---

Zhou Jie
Phoenix Village Private First Class
Class: Ranger
Level: Low Grade Apprentice (21%)

Age	19	Life Span	110
HP	51.84	MP	34.38
Physical Attack	8.64	Magic Attack	13
Physical Defense	1.73	Magic Defense	1.73
Attack Speed	1	Movement Speed	3

Innate Abilities

• Increase attack range by 20% per level
• Sky God’s Blessing (Special Ability): Favorable winds increase the attack range of you and your allies by 30% per level
• Movement speed is increased by 200%

Skills

• Meditation (Low Grade): Meditate to absorb experience fragments and level up
• Reinforced Arrow (Low Grade): Imbue your arrow with magic power increasing damage | Damage: 7.5 | Cost: 4 MP | Cast Time: 3 sec | Proficiency: 7%

Equipment

• Birch-wood Bow (Green Bronze): A well crafted bow made by an accomplished woodworker in the village of Raol | Increases Physical Attack by 1 | Durability: 50/50
• Quiver: A magic bag that can hold 60 arrows | Spawns one arrow every minute

---

It was there! Zhou Jie’s Innate Abilities were just as good as Cheng Yang remembered!

Unlike Liu Wei, both of Zhou Jie’s Innate Abilities were quite good on their own. When they were combined, they created the best sniper build Cheng Yang had ever seen.

Combine that with an elite squadron of other Rangers and the Movement Speed bonus Phoenix Village granted, and you create the perfect shock troopers.

They’d be able to attack from farther away and retreat before the enemy’s attacks could hit them.

Once they got to a certain level, they might be able to shoot a target from far enough away that the enemy wouldn’t even be able to see them. Cheng Yang looked forward to that day.

Special Abilities like Zhou Jie’s were called strategic abilities in Cheng Yang’s past life. Right now, the only other person in Phoenix Village was Zhao Chuan. They were very rare, and every Lord coveted the people that had them.

As far as Cheng Yang knew, Zhou Jie wasn’t in any battalion at the moment, even though he already appeared to have unlocked four times training speed.

Cheng Yang guessed that Old Lee was taking care of Zhou Jie for the moment after realizing just how valuable his Innate Abilities were.

Returning to his previous train of thought, Cheng Yang visited the various new buildings. Now that everything was built, the only thing left to do was upgrade the old buildings.

The first place Cheng Yang visited was the Quest Hall. It was a simple building with the main room at the front covering two hundred square feet in addition to a few small places at the back for the NPC managers to work.

Dozens of individual terminals that looked like blackboards covered the walls of the main room with a couple more intermittently spaced between the walls.

When you approached a terminal, they allowed you to scroll through the various Territory Quests and Private Requests.

At the moment, there were only a few quests available.

---

Gather Wood
Donate ten cubic meters of wood to the Phoenix Village .

Time Limit: None
Reward: 30 Experience Fragments and 1 Advancement Token
Conditions: Private First Class or F-Rank Adventurer

---

Cheng Yang wasn’t an adventurer yet, so he couldn’t accept any quests. As such, he wandered around for a few minutes before leaving.

Then, Cheng Yang visited the Trial Hall. The building was arranged identically to the Quest Hall except that the terminals would teleport you into an instance dungeon. Or at least it should have been.

When Cheng Yang arrived, there was a large portal on the back wall.

Even though the Trial Hall was an area that allowed you to enter an instance dungeon, there shouldn’t actually be any entrances to an instance dungeon inside.

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The battle ended as quickly as it started. Once he was done, Cheng Yang walked out of the car park.

“The rest is up to you. Don’t tell anyone about my involvement in this matter.” Cheng Yang called over his shoulder.

Xiao Zhen opened her mouth to stop Cheng Yang from leaving, but the words never left her lips. In the end, all she could do was sigh.

A few minutes later, the rest of Xiao Zhen’s mercenary group entered the car park.

When they did, they were filled with the same shock and rage as the group before them.

At that time, Xiao Zhen kicked out all of the men. Once she set up the women in the group to take care of the victims, she went up to the surface.

“Beans, did you see where Mr. Cheng went?”

A young man shook his head. “No, he was gone by the time we arrived.”

“Warn everyone in the team about it. Be very respectful if you ever meet that man and don’t mention him to anyone outside our team.”

“Elder sister, don’t worry.” Beans said, “We saw that guys strength, how could any of us even think about offending him.”

“Just so you know, Mr. Cheng is even more dangerous than you think. If we ever pissed him off, not even the army would be able to save us.”

Bean was skeptical. “How is that possible? Even if every soldier only attacked once, he’d still die.”

“Maybe if we were still in the old world, but not anymore. Numbers don’t hold the advantage they used to. Mr. Cheng crushed those bandits without them being able to fight back. How much more powerful do you think the soldiers are?”

“This…” Beans felt a chill go up his spine.

“Like I said.” Xiao Zhen continued. “Mr. Cheng is far more dangerous than you think.”

---

“My Lord, they seemed like good people. Why didn’t you offer them the opportunity to come to Phoenix Village.” Liu Wei asked.

“I don’t want information about Phoenix Village to be made public yet. We also can’t guarantee their loyalty. I have a way to control people who performed a class change ceremony in Phoenix Village, but I can’t guarantee that for outsiders. Maybe if they had more to offer me, I would have let them come with us, but they were just a couple of Low-Grade Apprentices.” Cheng Yang replied.

Liu Wei vaguely understood, so she nodded.

When they finally returned to Phoenix Village, it was one in the morning. Since it was so late, they didn’t have time to hunt monsters.

Cheng Yang gave Liu Wei the Experience Fragments needed for thirty-two times training speed and then left to visit Liu Hau in Joyous River Village. He had promised to help his friend find iron ore earlier.

After collecting Liu Hau, Cheng Yang brought Liu Hau into the forest.

“Yoko, is there really iron ore under that mound?” Liu Hau asked cautiously.

“Of course, why would I lie to you?” Cheng Yang said.

“Well, it’s a tiny mound, so I don’t think there could possibly be much ore in there.”

“Not much, I suppose.” Cheng Yang said, “But, it’s close to your village. It’s almost impossible to find a considerable vein of iron ore waiting to be excavated, so finding anything is already pretty good. Besides, a small mine just means it has hundreds of tons of iron instead of tens of thousands. There’s plenty of ore in there to build ten thousand pieces of equipment even if you consider the failure rate.”

Liu Hau shook his head. Ten thousand pieces of equipment sounded like a lot, but most classes needed at least three parts that used iron. Especially Warriors that had all but two slots filled with metal equipment.

“Forget it. Start digging. At the very least, you’ll be able to practice your Mining skill.

Liu Hau took out his pickaxe and used the flat head on the back to remove the dirt from the mound.

When the vein Liu Hau finally unearthed, he knew it was slag quality metal that could only be used to make the lowest quality equipment. Even so, he diligently started excavating it.

Cheng Yang left his best friend there to complete his work and returned to Phoenix Village to train.

Before that, Cheng Yang had one last chore to complete: building new buildings.

Thanks to an increase in the number of people harvesting resources, the wood and stone output of the village increased by 20% today. It would probably see some incremental improvements for the next few days until evening out. It would then stay there until enough people leveled up their Profession.

With the resources the village currently had, Cheng Yang would be able to build two of the new buildings. As for upgrading existing buildings like the Alchemy Tower, Cheng Yang decided to postpone that decision.

After a moment of contemplation, Cheng Yang built the Quest Hall and the Trial Hall.

These buildings were much smaller than the Baracks. Each one was a two-story building about the size of Cheng Yang’s Meditation Hall that were run by NPC managers sent by the gods.

Cheng Yang also wanted to build the Adventurer’s Guild since he planned to become an adventurer again.

If anyone else had that goal, Cheng Yang was determined to make them become a soldier. But, since the Lord wasn’t allowed to be a soldier, he may as well become an adventurer.

This was because, adventurers weren’t tied to anything, unlike soldiers who could only enjoy their benefits in the territory they became a soldier.

Naturally, as the Lord, there was no need to tie himself to the territory as a soldier. After all, the territory was Cheng Yang, and Cheng Yang represented the territory.

So, there were only benefits to gain by becoming an Adventurer since he could then receive quests. He could also accept adventurer team quests and bring the Pheonix Village army to complete them since he was the Lord.

The sooner Cheng Yang built the Adventurer’s Guild, the faster he would be able to raise his Adventurer Rank. However, since building it would only benefit him, Cheng Yang chose not to.

Once he was done, Cheng Yang began training straight away. Since he was neither an adventurer or a soldier, he had no reason to visit the Quest Hall, and the instance dungeons in the Trial Hall were useless to Cheng Yang since he didn’t need to train against low-level monsters.

When he finished training, Cheng Yang’s experience bar was a half-point away from reaching twenty percent. He still had a long way to go before leveling up, but he was getting closer.

Cheng Yang then brought the Imperial Guard with him to clear the Nightmare Difficulty Blood-Soaked Cathedral.

When he got out, he visited the Territory Altar. It was time for him to use the Statue Lifting Stone he earned yesterday.

Deciding what attribute to double was an easy choice. Cheng Yang chose to double the number of slots available.

Low-level Warriors without a sub-class were nearly useless as damage dealers. They couldn’t act very aggressively, couldn’t attack from a distance, and were always under high pressure. However, they were an essential part of every team as a tank. So long as the Warriors in a team could block melee-type monsters, everyone else could focus on fighting to their best ability.

Unfortunately for them, Warriors were destined to be cannon-fodder. As such, Cheng Yang wanted to maximize the amount of cannon fodder in the army.

Thus, doubling the number of Warriors in Phoenix Village was a natural choice.

When he was done, Cheng Yang called Old Lee over to facilitate the class change ceremonies of the new Warriors.

Finally, Cheng Yang started the last research topic for the High-Grade Priest statue.

Once the research completed twenty hours from now, the number of Priests in the village would increase once more. Cheng Yang would also be able to see if the bonus from the Statue Lifting Stone carried over between level-ups.

Throwing the question to the back of his mind, Cheng Yang took Liu Wei with him to Joyous River Village.

Since the road built by the gods was usually clear of monsters, it took them less than half an hour to arrive.

At the time, Liu Hau was out farming monsters. So, Cheng Yang left Liu Wei in the village and followed the direction of the wall guards to find Liu Hau’s hunting party.

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Cheng Yang looked into Liu Wei’s eyes and sighed. Finally, he turned back to the middle-aged woman. “Fine, I’ll go. Find someone decently fast to show me the way.”

“I’ve got boots that increase my Movement Speed by three, so I’ll do it.” The woman responded.

Cheng Yang nodded. “Liu Wei, come with us.”

“But I’ll slow you down.” Liu Wei said. She wanted to go too, but she was worried that her inclusion would endanger the trapped women.

“Don’t worry about that.” Cheng Yang said, “I’ll carry you. Besides, it’s not safe for you to be left alone here.”

Liu Wei wanted to refuse Cheng Yang’s offer, but his last comment worried here. After watching the massacre, she was a little uneasy about staying with a bunch of people she didn’t know.

Cheng Yang squatted down, allowing Liu Wei to crawl onto his back for a piggy-back ride. Luckily for her, it was the middle of the night. Otherwise, the deep crimson blush on her face would have been on display for everyone to see.

She wasn’t the only person thankful for the low visibility. Cheng Yang wasn’t interested in a relationship, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t interested in women. This was the first time he was physically close to a woman in both of his lives. Not to mention, the person in question was the stunningly beautiful Liu Wei.

Even though he was a man with an incredible force of will, he couldn’t suppress the low throb in his pants.

Without waiting for his navigator to start, Cheng Yang jogged ahead of her so that no one would be able to see him before he calmed down.

Cheng Yang thought it was terrible when Liu Wie first crawled onto his back, but it was even worse once he started running. His jagged steps caused Liu Wei to bounce up and down behind him, allowing her chest to rub against him.

Liu Wei hadn’t worn a bra today since they were a luxury few could afford. As such, Cheng Yang couldn’t stop the fire in his pants from spreading to his face.

“Snap out of it!” He mentally scolded himself. “You can’t date anyone!”

Even though he thought that, his subconscious was grateful for the treat. In reality, he really did want to find a woman to share his life with, but he knew that this cruel world would only take that person away.

He’d seen it happen too often in his past life. People lost their cherished ones in the apocalypse, and then if they found someone else, one of the two would get eaten by monsters.

Anyone in that world could tell you that the greatest tragedy isn’t to live a life, never having found love. Instead, it was to have found the person you were destined to be with, only to have them ripped away from you.

Despair was a more deadly threat than monsters. Cheng Yang considered himself to be an emotionally stable person, but if he were to lose someone he loved that dearly, he didn’t know how long he would be able to continue fighting without his second half.

Right now, Cheng Yang was confident he would be able to help everyone he knew survive until the point he lived in his previous life. But what about after that? Cheng Yang didn’t know what would happen. Only one thing was certain: it would be exponentially harder to survive.

Maybe someday, if he lived long enough, Cheng Yang would find someone to start a family with. However, he would only do that if he could ensure a safe and happy life for his family.

……..

But maybe, if he might die anyway, it wouldn’t be so bad to cherish the half-year safe period he had carved out.

“Ma’am, what’s your name?” Cheng Yang started a conversation with his guide in an attempt to drive such thoughts from his mind.

Hearing that Cheng yang was talking to her, the middle-aged woman was happy to start a conversation.

“My name is Xiao Zhen. I lead a mercenary team from Cloud City.” She said, introducing herself, “The people from earlier were part of my group. We used to have more than fifty people, but a dozen of them died in the fight.”

Xiao Zhen was a talkative person. Cheng Yang only asked for her name, but she offered up a lot of information. If it weren’t for her getting sad after bringing up the deaths of her comrades.

“Are there a lot of mercenaries like you in Cloud City?” Cheng Yang asked, rekindling the conversation.

“Not a whole lot. Maybe around three thousand or so split up between a few dozen teams. Our team isn’t a big one, but we’re also not the smallest.” Xiao Zhen paused when she realized there was something weird about Cheng Yang’s question. “….sir, aren’t you affiliated with Commander Yuan?”

“You could put it that way.” Cheng Yang replied, vaguely.

Despite how obvious it was that Cheng Yang was gathering information, Xiao Zhen realized he didn’t want to divulge anything else about himself. Despite that, she decided to tell him more. After all, it wouldn’t hurt to befriend someone so powerful.

“Although there’s a lot of mercenaries in the city, the real power is held by the army. They have over ten thousand soldiers organized into battalions of two thousand. Compared to them, our mercenary teams are like ants.”

“Why haven’t you decided to join the army then?” Cheng Yang asked.

“The army is too strict. Unless you were originally a soldier, you aren’t allowed to have any individual freedoms. Some people don’t care, but now that being a mercenary is an option, most choose to be one. Of course, there are black sheep like that scarred man you killed. They started as a mercenary team but relocated to outside the safe zone to become bandits.”

As they talked, the rescue party drew close enough to the safe zone to see the shimmering barrier. The conversation itself wasn’t particularly useful to Cheng Yang. He was only able to confirm things he already knew in between learning various bits of gossip.

A few minutes later, they arrived at their destination.

“Mr. Cheng, the car park is over there.” Xiao Zhen said, pointing towards a cave in the ruins.

At the same time, a man ran towards them from out of the darkness. When he saw Cheng Yang standing near the mouth of the cave, his expression changed to one of terror.

It was one of the bandits that had fled the battle. How could he have expected to run into Cheng Yang after barely surviving earlier?

When Cheng Yang noticed the bandit, he cleanly sent an Icicle Blast into the man’s chest. Cheng Yang wouldn’t hesitate when it came to executing someone with such a wicked heart.

When she saw Cheng Yang kill a man without batting an eye, Liu Wei’s eyes flashed with anxiety. She knew the man deserved to die for what he had done, but it was hard to watch someone that couldn’t fight back get squashed like a bug. She nestled her face into Cheng Yang’s hair, finding comfort in the warmth of his body.

“Let’s go in.” Cheng Yang said softly, putting Liu Wei down.

“Of course, follow me.” Xiao Zhen had also been stunned by Cheng Yang’s ruthlessness, but she had been able to snap out of it when she remembered the women in the cave.

Xiao Zhen went into the cave, followed by Cheng Yang and Liu Wei.

“How dare they!” Xiao Zhen, who was a room ahead of the others, cried out angrily. “Mr. Cheng, don’t… don’t let your companion in. She doesn’t need to see this.”

Xiao Zhen hadn’t elaborated as to what she had seen, but it wasn’t hard to imagine. Cheng Yang turned towards Liu Wei, intending to stop her.

“I’m going in.” Liu Wei said stubbornly.

Cheng Yang gave up trying to stop her and turned around to walk inside.

“Ah…” When Liu Wei rounded the corner, she couldn’t suppress her surprise and disgust with what she saw. Initially, when she saw Cheng Yang kill the bandits, she felt a bit squeamish, but now, she thought killing them was too light of a punishment.

There were dozens of women scattered around the car park with glazed eyes and bruised bodies.

In addition, there were a few bandits still in their base, committing atrocities.

Suddenly, one of the bandits fell to the ground.

The bandit beside him laughed. “What’s wrong Old Huang, too tired to keep going?”

When the bandit looked over his shoulder to check on his companion, he realized something was wrong. He crouched down and checked the fallen bandit’s pulse.

“Dead?” The man had a great deal of fear in his voice. There wasn’t a single wound on the bandit’s body, so how had he die? He looked around wildly, seeing not only Cheng Yang and his companions but another dead bandit as well.

“Enemies! There are enemies in the base!” the man shouted, warning the dozen or so other bandits in the car park. They stumbled around like clowns, desparately wielding weapons while entirely naked.

“Calm down Liu Wei, let me handle this.” Cheng Yang whispered. Next to him, Liu Wei was bristling with anger. It was actually her that had killed two of the bandits just now. Her intense anger had allowed her to use the Smite skill on humans. It was her first murder.

Even though she was far from calm, Liu Wei remembered that she wasn’t supposed to show her skill to others when Cheng Yang reminded her. Sending one last bloodlust filled glare towards the bandits, Liu Wei turned around and left the basement. If she stayed a moment longer, there was no way she could stop herself from killing again.

Cheng Yang sighed. It seemed that Liu Wei was a far more vicious person than everyone believed her to be. Still, it was a trait that would serve her well in this new world.

Then, Cheng Yang waited for the bandits to close in on him before using Petal Blizzard. At that point, only the four ranged bandits were left alive.

The first time Cheng Yang used that spell, Xiao Zhen hadn’t gotten a good look at it, but now, she was able to see what had happened. Cheng Yang had an ability that allowed him to slaughter humans like dogs, even when they were Professionals.

She’d also seen the prowess of Cheng Yang’s defense. Six or seven people had attacked him, but he didn’t seem to have been injured at all.

Xiao Zhen could tell that if news of Cheng Yang got out, it would cause him to become a public enemy. Even if every soldier and mercenary in Cloud City banded together, what could they possibly do to stop a person like Cheng Yang?

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“What an amusing display of bravado.” Cheng Yang smirked. “If you’re in a hurry to die, save me the trouble of killing you, and just commit suicide. It’s not urgent though, wait until I’ve finished my conversation.”

Cheng Yang then ignored the scarred man’s retort and turned back to the older woman. “Elder sister, you don’t have to worry. I may be a single person, but I’m more than enough to exterminate these bugs. Tell me more about the situation. Where are the people they captured? How many are there?”

“Not too far from here. There’s an underground car park that was preserved even though the building on top of it collapsed. Those bastards are using it as their base. Earlier today, we met a woman that escaped. If not for her, we wouldn’t have ever known.” The woman replied.

Seeing that Cheng Yang was indifferent to his crimes, the scarred man tried to backpedal. “What nonsense! We felt sorry for them, so we rescued them from the ruins and gave them food. If they were feeling grateful and wanted to repay us, why are we criminals?”

“Fuck you!” The woman shouted, “If it was voluntary, why was Xiao Ling covered in bruises? Don’t think you’re getting out of this! I’m ending this today, I’ll kill you with my own hands!”

“Kill me? Let’s see if you fucking can!” The scarred man roared. Without warning, he raised his bow and shot the woman in the chest.

The speed of the arrow was simply too fast to dodge. Luckily, the woman’s Health was still high enough that she wasn’t killed in a single hit.

A wave of anger washed over Cheng Yang’s heart. He was in the middle of a conversation, and someone decided to make a sudden attack?

“I see you’re really fed up with life!” Cheng Yang raised his stave and started to cast Icicle Blast.

Magic was a slow process. It needed to be cast, and aside from increasing your Attack Speed attribute, there wasn’t a way to make it complete faster.

Watching the air chill and frost collect at the end of Cheng Yang’s stave gave the people present a shock. They’d seen Mages attack before but they’d never seen anything like that.

“You… What skill is that?” The scarred man started to panic. It was the fear of the unknown. He didn’t think it could kill him in one hit, but he could feel the situation spiral out of his control.

“Never see a skill like this before?” Cheng Yang mocked. “Let me tell you, even though its beautiful, you’re going to die.”

With that, the spell was cast. With a flick of his wrist, the icicle flew forwards and pierced the man’s forehead.

The scarred man died with a look of terror on his face. As soon as he saw the attack fly towards him, he realized he was going to die. People like him that murdered others like it was nothing, were more scared of death than anyone else. There was no way he could accept his face.

The force of the attack sent the man flying. His body struck the ground a few meters away like a rag doll. He didn’t even get the chance to make a final struggle.

Everyone was stunned. Seeing a man suddenly die like that frightened them.

The scarred man had taken the opportunity to drink a Health Recovery Potion when the fighting stopped, so his Health was probably full. As such, killing him in one hit was incredible.

People started to speculate on the damage Cheng Yang’s attack dealt. Since Rangers had twenty-five Health, the spell must have dealt at least that.

Once they realized this, everyone panicked. Especially those that had the same or lower Health as the scarred man.

If Cheng Yang wanted to kill someone, all it would take was a few seconds and a single attack. They wouldn’t even have a chance to escape.

“You… You…” The people on the woman’s side recovered first. Since Cheng Yang was on friendly terms, they weren’t as afraid that he would suddenly kill them. Still, the shock was too strong for them to find a way to talk to Cheng Yang.

“Don’t be afraid.” Cheng Yang smiled. “Someday, you too will have strength like me.”

Cheng Yang hadn’t lied. In his past life, some people reached his level after six months. Of course, that was only the very best humans in the world. It was hard to say if any of the people present would even survive to that point, much less reach the Pinnacle-Grade.

With that, Cheng Yang turned towards the scarred man’s subordinates. Although he hadn’t confirmed that the scarred man was abusing women, the moment he attacked, his decision was made.

“Now that you’ve lost your humanity don’t expect me to treat you like humans!” Cheng Yang raised his left hand, and a flurry of razor-sharp ice shards spun appeared. No matter what class a person had, once that flurry enveloped them, they were killed in seconds.

The scarred man’s subordinates were terrified. Cheng Yang had killed ten people with a single attack!

“He’s trying to kill us all! Get him!” Every one of the scarred man’s subordinates lifted up their weapons and attacked Cheng Yang.

They knew it was their only chance to survive. If they let Cheng Yang live now, who knew how powerful he’d be later?

There was no regard for formations. The Warriors held up their shield and charged while everyone else attacked Cheng Yang from a distance.

No matter what kind of attack hit him, Cheng Yang stood there: unmoving and unscathed.

Then, he retaliated.

The Warriors quickly realized that their shields were useless. Even if they were able to block an Icicle Blast, Cheng Yang didn’t waste any attacks trying to hit them with it. Instead, he used Petal Blizzard, which was impossible to block.

Everyone else got the same treatment their leader did. A single icicle through their forehead. Instant death.

Watching their companions die one by one broke their spirit. Watching their attacks harmlessly bounce off Cheng Yang broke their minds. This was the despair of death. The despair of meeting a reaper.

Everyone that was left lost their will to fight. Without a synchronized movement, they fled into the darkness.

At this point, the woman’s group decided to take advantage of Cheng Yang’s fierce offensive. They drew their weapons and routed the enemy.

When they did, Cheng Yang stopped attacking. It wasn’t because he suddenly decided to show mercy to the bandits, but rather that he couldn’t tell the two groups apart.

Even without Cheng Yang, there was no way the bandits would win. Their only thoughts were about escaping this hopeless battlefield.

A few minutes later, every bandit either escaped or was dead. All that was left was to clean up the battlefield.

“Sir, this is the equipment those men died with.” The middle-aged man from earlier nervously offered all of the loot to Cheng Yang. “Its all quality equipment with good bonuses.”

Cheng Yang didn’t even glance at the equipment. He knew that any equipment they had was subpar mass-produced goods from the stores. Even if he sold it, he wouldn’t get five hundred Experience Fragments.

“Keep it. Things like that are useless to me.” Cheng Yang said quietly. “Also, my work here is done. You can save the trapped women on your own. I won’t go.”

Cheng Yang turned around, intending to return to Liu Wei, but after only two steps, the woman from before called out to him. “Sir, please help us one more time. There are lots of women trapped and if those men who escaped decide to take out their anger on them… We aren’t fast enough to save them, so please help us.”

Cheng Yang paused. As someone who had already experience every hell the apocalypse had to offer, he didn’t value life very highly. The only reason he helped out this time was to nip a growing threat in the bud. He had suffered greatly at the hands of people like the scarred man.

Besides, he didn’t want to associate himself with people from Cloud City. The refugees were fine since they were easy to control and could bolster Phoenix Village’s forces in the future, but what did foreign soldiers have to offer?

His best and the safest choice was to kill the threat and then disappear. Only then could he ensure Phoenix Village would stay hidden.

“My Lord?” A quiet and cute voice tickled Cheng Yang’s ears as Liu Wei stepped out from behind the rubble. “I want to help them.”

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