Shortly after Shi Feng used a Return Scroll to leave, the First District's Sanctum also became bustling with activity.
The population capacity of a Large Sanctum had increased so dramatically that many players throughout the Demon Realm were now thinking of joining the First District to enjoy better benefits and treatment.
Vetting the invitations also represented a considerable amount of work.
Furthermore, after advancing to a Large Sanctum, it didn't mean mounts could be purchased immediately; a Beast-Taming Grounds still needed to be established. Building that facility required a massive amount of soul crystals, which would take a considerable period of time to accumulate. The focus of development had to shift accordingly.
Meanwhile, once the First District's Sanctum advanced to a Large Sanctum, several guild powers within the Demon Realm began eyeing the First District's Sanctum, wanting to replace it.
Previously, while the First District occupied a good geographical location and possessed decent overall strength, it meant little to the guild factions because they were free players with no real threat. But now things were different. As the Demon Realm's first Large Sanctum, its influence was far too great. The Medium Sanctums they currently held offered no comparable advantage.
If they could replace the First District, they would not only eliminate a potential threat in an imperceptible way but also strengthen themselves, avoiding the exhausting effort of pooling all a guild's resources to create a Large Sanctum from scratch. Most critically, the First District wasn't created by any guild power; it was just a loose collection of individuals. They were certain to find an opportunity.
Kill two birds with one stone. Why wouldn't they do it?
For a time, many guild powers in the Demon Realm were scheming to secretly infiltrate their own people into the First District's Sanctum.
Nevertheless,Qingshuang and the others deliberately ignored this fact,even going so far as to charge exorbitant prices.
They weren't afraid of anyone trying to take their place.
In fact,they welcomed guild powers sending people over to hand over resources.
Only a few high-ranking members of the First District knew about its joining of the Zero Wing Guild; it hadn't been publicly announced. To outsiders,it simply looked like the First District's managers were united,skilled,and lucky.
Moreover,there were only so many guild powers in the Demon Realm. It was perfectly clear which guild force each sanctuary belonged to,so everyone assumed the First District's sanctuary hadn't joined any guild.
Under normal circumstances,the managers of a sanctuary were very welcoming of new members joining,as this strengthened the sanctuary and provided it with Soul Crystals. However,for anyone wanting to become a member of the First District's sanctuary,besides those directly recruited by its own subordinates,outsiders had to pay one Soul Crystal to join.
Perhaps the price was high,but players' levels had increased quite a bit. The difficulty of obtaining Soul Crystals had also dropped significantly,which in turn caused their value to plummet. It had fallen by two or three times compared to when Shi Feng first arrived in the Dark Cavern. Now,even an Elite small team would surely have at least one Soul Crystal on hand. With seven or eight days of effort,they could always scrape together six,let alone an Elite team from a guild power.
Charging just one Soul Crystal per person,even after Qingshuang and the others recruited some of their own people,there would likely still be 50,000 slots remaining. Converting those 50,000 slots into Soul Crystals meant 50,000 of them. Fifty thousand Soul Crystals for individuals was incomparable to the sanctuary collecting fifty thousand as a whole.
It was like promoting the Lion's Bar. An individual only needed to contribute 500,but using the sanctuary's collectively accumulated resources required 10,000—a twentyfold difference.
With 50,000 Soul Crystals,they could easily build a Beast Taming Arena,establish two more buildings that produced specialty goods and upgrade them to Two-Star,and then upgrade the Lion's Bar to Three-Star,further increasing the output of Hundred Fruit Wine.
Shi Feng himself also returned to White River City with a large quantity of attribute gems and Hundred Fruit Wine.
Attribute gems were incredibly rare, and ordinary players could hardly bear to socket them into equipment. If the equipment was destroyed, the gem would be destroyed along with it. They were generally only used on top-tier equipment for safety's sake, and could eventually be transferred to other top-tier gear when the time came.
Right now, Tier 1 gems in the Nether Domain were far cheaper — only 3 silver coins each — but in the Star Moon Kingdom, a Tier 1 gem still cost 9 silver coins. Tier 2 gems required 30 silver coins in the Nether Domain, whereas here in the Star Moon Kingdom they generally went for around 1 gold coin, a price difference of more than threefold.
Shi Feng had taken 30,000 Tier 1 gems from Qingshuang all at once. These Tier 1 gems had been secretly purchased from various sanctuaries within the Nether Domain or exchanged using Stones of Light. They came in stacks of 20, totaling 1,500 stacks worth 900 gold coins — nearly filling his inventory to capacity. As for Tier 2 gems, he hadn't bothered bringing any over, since he possessed the Philosopher's Stone, an alchemical treasure capable of upgrading Tier 1 gems into Tier 2. The success rate far exceeded what any alchemist could achieve through normal synthesis.
The moment Shi Feng returned to White River City, he headed straight for the Candlelight Trading Company.
Today, the Candlelight Trading Company was located in the busiest part of White River City and could be called the commercial center of the entire Star Moon Kingdom. It attracted the greatest number of Blacksmiths and experts across every crafting Class. High-grade player-crafted goods were displayed everywhere, and virtually anything available in the Star Moon Kingdom could be found here. Some exclusive recipes were beyond even Zero Wing's reach, so certain items couldn't be produced — but even so, the sheer variety of goods was more than players could possibly browse through, and they could only curse the gold coins in their pockets for being insufficient.
Beyond the Star Moon Kingdom itself, thanks to Feng Qianyu's support, the Candlelight Trading Company also had branch stores in major cities across neighboring kingdoms and empires, generating several thousand gold coins in revenue every day. It was almost more than Melancholic Smile could manage.
This level of earning potential far surpassed that of first-rate guilds and was comparable only to those ultra-first-rate and super guilds. However, as time went on, the ultra-first-rate and super guilds would inevitably surpass the Candlelight Trading Company in gold income, given that they covered vastly wider areas of the Divine Realm and had access to far more resources and channels.
Although the Candlelight Trading Company could continue to expand, Zero Wing Guild simply didn't have the manpower or strength to manage it all — that was the difference in foundation between guilds.
Fortunately, Shi Feng had long since prepared for this. His tenure as a second-rate guild master had not been for nothing. From the very beginning of the Divine Realm's launch, he had been constantly thinking about how to strengthen the guild's foundation, drawing up a series of plans that were now finally beginning to bear fruit.
Shi Feng retrieved the Philosopher's Stones stored in his personal warehouse at the trading company, made his way to his private advanced Forging Room, and began synthesizing Tier 2 gems.
If he had NPC alchemists synthesize high-tier gems, not only would they charge exorbitant crafting fees, but the success rate would also be abysmal — at most 30% for Tier 2 gems. Each synthesis required four Tier 1 gems to produce one Tier 2 gem, and even with favorable luck, it took roughly twelve Tier 1 gems to yield a single successful Tier 2 gem. Yet the value of a Tier 2 gem was only ten times that of a Tier 1 gem. Synthesizing gems for profit was hardly worthwhile.
However, the Philosopher's Stone in Shi Feng's possession boasted a 100% synthesis rate for Tier 2 gems. A single synthesis would multiply the profit on his stock of Tier 1 gems several times over. Shi Feng naturally wasn't about to pass that up.
But making money was not his objective.
"Right now, Tier 2 gems are already the mainstream configuration for major guilds. If I want Zero Wing's main raid team to clear the hundred-player Dungeon sooner, Tier 3 gems need to become the standard." Shi Feng took out his Tier 1 gems and began the alchemic synthesis. (To be continued.)