As soon as the news broke that shops in the Northern Fortress were available for rent, the major factions that had gathered their players at the fortress received the information almost immediately.
When it came to something like fortress shops, saying the major factions weren't interested would be a downright joke.
The current Northern Fortress had already been confirmed as the central hub of the entire Heart of the Earth mountain range. Other superpowers might still seize quite a few fortresses — even medium-sized ones — but reaching the Northern Fortress's level was likely impossible from here on out. After all, the one who gets ahead stays ahead.
However, before the various powers on Dragon Heart Island could even begin turning their attention to the Northern Fortress's shops, the system notification that suddenly echoed through everyone's minds left them all stunned.
System Announcement: A player has triggered an Epic Main Quest, unlocking the new expansion "Planar Invasion." Portals to the various plane worlds will gradually open in three hours.
After the system announcement blared three times in succession, forget about the players on Dragon Heart Island — even the players across the entire Divine Realm were left dazed for a good while.
But after the initial shock wore off, everyone's faces broke into expressions of wild joy.
The plane worlds were something well known to all. They were treasure troves of resources, and entering them had always been an extremely difficult affair. Now these plane worlds were opening up on their own — for the vast majority of players, this was undoubtedly fantastic news.
"Guild Leader, this is truly wonderful! If the plane worlds open, then our Level 100 weapon and equipment resources will no longer be something to worry about," Waterfall Rose said, her face brightening as she read the system announcement.
When it came to plane world resources,
If the portals to the various plane worlds were now opening, it would be a tremendous boon for Zero Wing.
"Why is this happening so fast?"
The opening of the plane worlds could indeed bring an abundance of rare resources, but it would also bring a great deal of trouble.
The trouble of increased players!
Because all the plane worlds had vast numbers of players within them. If the portals fully opened and connected the two worlds, allowing free passage back and forth, then players from the plane worlds would flood into the Divine Realm in massive numbers. And it wouldn't just be players — most likely, a great many factions would follow them in as well.
The competition within the Divine Realm was already fierce enough as it stood. If a swarm of players poured in, the consequences would be predictable.
Moreover, Shi Feng clearly remembered that in his previous life, the opening of the plane worlds had caused a massive shift in the power dynamics across the entire Divine Realm. Countless factions had perished during this planar invasion — and superpowers among them were no exception.
Although the plane worlds might seem like nothing more than small worlds, roughly the size of a kingdom at best, different plane worlds varied greatly depending on their environments. Player levels could be high or low. The Ice Crystal World was considered a rather ordinary plane world, but in some of the more powerful ones, strong inheritances were much easier to obtain, and even transforming into a powerful race was far simpler. The combat proficiency and levels of players in such worlds far exceeded those of the Divine Realm's players.
Zero Wing had only just barely managed to approach the level of a superpower. Facing this kind of shock was decidedly not good news.
He remembered that in his previous life, when the planar invasion began, many of the major factions already had numerous experts who had advanced to Tier 3
"We have to pick up the pace," Shi Feng said through gritted teeth as he reviewed Zero Wing's current figures. He turned to Waterfall Rose. "Waterfall, head over to
The planar invasion would cover the entire Divine Realm. If they wanted to fare well in the coming chaos, they needed to bolster their strength as quickly as possible — especially the guild's overall power.
Originally, Shi Feng hadn't wanted to do this. Increasing guild membership would drive up the guild's consumption. If resources couldn't keep up, the guild would stagnate or even regress. That was why he had taken things slow, step by step, and hadn't pursued rapid membership expansion the way other faction guilds did. When resources fell short, expert resources would plummet, progress would crawl, and it simply wasn't worth the trade-off.
But now that the planar invasion had begun, he could no longer afford to be cautious.
The gears of a new era had started turning. If the guild didn't have enough manpower, it would be easy for rivals to exploit the gap. After all, Zero Wing had already grown into quite a large operation. Their existing personnel were already stretched thin. If they didn't start recruiting now, players from the various plane worlds would pour in, and they wouldn't be able to hold their ground in many places.
This was especially true with the Fang Family still gunning for Zero Wing's Tiandou Training Hall. They needed to accelerate even further.
Waterfall Rose went to notify Zero Wing City without delay once she heard Shi Feng's orders, and the shops began transitioning to Credit Point transactions.
Beyond the shops, Shi Feng also instructed Waterfall Rose to expedite the search for
He had previously accumulated a fair number of Soul Essences — excellent items for boosting NPC retainers' potential. While they could be used directly on the guild's Gold-grade retainers, Soul Essences were difficult to accumulate. Even after completing the siege battle for the Northern Fortress, he had only gathered 90 drops.
Good steel had to be used on the blade's edge. Rather than expending those extremely rare drops on the few Gold-grade retainers they had, it was far better to use them on Silver Mythril Rank retainers with high potential, allowing those retainersto advance to the Gold grade.
Silver Mythril Rank retainers and Gold-grade retainers might seem to differ by only a single step, but the gap between them was comparable to the difference between a peak expert and a supreme expert. If he could assemble a squad of over a hundred Gold-grade retainers, at this stage of the game, it would truly be a case of striking down any god and slaying any demon that stood in their way.
On top of all that, Shi Feng took out the remaining two teleportation tokens for the Tower of the Four Gods and sent Huo Wu, Bai Qingxue, Ziyan Liuyun, and Waterfall Rose to train there.
Zero Wing currently had no shortage of Insight experts — the number had long since surpassed a hundred. But their true peak-level experts were still woefully few. For Zero Wing, this was a critical weakness. Especially once Tier 3 Classes came into play, when various restrictions were lifted, the gap between experts would widen even further, and compensating through attributes alone would become much harder.
Cultivating more peak-level experts as early as possible was crucial.
Just as Shi Feng finished handling everything, another system notification echoed through his mind.
System Announcement: Planar world portals have opened. Players may travel to the various planar gateways to move between the two worlds.