Chapter 229 – Variant
Translator: Mr Voltaire
Editor: Modlawls123
After returning to the Great Qin Town, the first thing Zhao Fu did was have the Hidden Evil Grass replanted before taking some and using them to refine Hidden Evil. As for what he did with them, he obviously added them to medicinal pills.
In actuality, Zhao Fu could even have his own soldiers take the medicinal pills with Hidden Evil because it raised the efficacy of medicinal pills. It was simply a matter of whether they received an antidote or not. With an antidote, Hidden Evil was actually incredibly beneficial.
Now, with Hidden Evil, Zhao Fu had something else to use in trades to secretly backstab others. Afterward, Zhao Fu went to an area 50 kilometers south of the Great Qin Town and re-established Highstone Town. He also brought most of its residents to the Great Qin Town.
Now, Zhao Fu had two Towns, and if he could obtain one more Town, he would be able to level up the Great Qin Town into a City once he had enough EXP. There was also the requirement of having three people at the status of Baron and making them Mayors, and Zhao Fu had long since diverted most of the Achievement Points to Bai Qi. He had obtained 500 Achievement Points after conquering Highstone Town, and with the King’s Ring’s bonuses, Bai Qi was already a Second-Ranked Baron.
Even though upgrading to a City only required a Third-Ranked Baron Status, it wasn’t a waste for Bai Qi to reach Second-Ranked Baron because status was still important for upgrading further.
Now, Zhao Fu decided to divert most of his Achievement Points to Liu Subai to promote her to Third-Ranked Baron. At the same time, he appointed Bai Qi as the Mayor of Highstone Town. With the King’s Ring, obtaining Achievement Points was incredibly easy to Zhao Fu.
Zhao Fu’s next task was to collect the people from the various trading offices in the different regions. Zhao Fu was quite disappointed to find that for each region, they had only obtained around 200 or so people in a day.
However, this was to be expected. After all, everyone valued population because it wasn’t something that could be easily increased. As such, he had to find a way to make it so that they had no choice but to sell their people.
Zhao Fu decided to try adding in medicinal pills in exchange for population, and he hoped that business would be better in the future.
However, gaining roughly 200 people from each region in a day was already quite good. Zhao Fu had opened 22 regions, and apart from Green Apricot, which had just been opened, there were 21 regions. This amounted to 4,200 people in a day.
Gaining 4,200 people in a day was already tens of times faster than gaining population through conquering Villages and Towns. This made Zhao Fu want to slightly shift the focus from conquering to trading, as this was much faster and more efficient.
Of course, exploring and conquering was still necessary – after all, by doing this, they would gain not only population but City Creation Stones, Achievement Points, and battle experience for the soldiers.
Soon, the first batch of Hidden Evil was refined and added into some Hundred Origin Pills. Zhao Fu then brought some equipment and those Hundred Origin Pills to the Orc City.
After the Ghost Festival had ended, Zhao Fu and Gunador had set a time for Zhao Fu to come again to trade items for people – that time had now come.
After arriving at the Orc City, Zhao Fu met up with Gunador, who took him to a plaza.
The plaza was quite big and crude, and there were Orc soldiers training at the side, making it quite noisy. The atmosphere there was quite fierce and violent, and there were people in cages at the other side.
Most of them were dressed in tattered clothes and had ashen complexions. They sat in the cages with looks of terror on their faces as their bodies trembled, not knowing what would happen to them. There were humans, Elves, and Kobolds.
There were roughly 1,200 people, and many of the women looked like they had been violated and had dull gazes. The women also had most of their skin showing.
Zhao Fu’s expression didn’t change, nor did he feel much, as this was what he had expected. He wasn’t so naïve as to think that the Orcs would show mercy and kindness to their prisoners. Zhao Fu had long since realized the true nature of the Heaven Awaken World. Only by immersing his heart in darkness would he not be disturbed by the evils of this world.
Moreover, these people didn’t have very high grades or great potential. People with low grades weren’t very useful to large factions, as they didn’t have much opportunity for growth. They could only be used for labor and might not even be able to become soldiers.
This was because nurturing people with low grades required much greater resources than for those with high grades. The Orcs were most likely worried that Zhao Fu would one day act against them, which was why they had given him these people. If he became too powerful one day, it would definitely be detrimental to the Orc City.
Because Zhao Fu had the Heaven and Earth Refining Formation, he didn’t care too much about the grades, but he was displeased that the Orcs had tried to do this to him. To most large factions, these people would just be cannon fodder.
“Esteemed guest, are you satisfied with this?” Gunador wasn’t quite sure what to expect. He knew that there were hidden dangers in giving these people to Zhao Fu because it was equivalent to strengthening a potential enemy. Normally, Orcs didn’t like taking prisoners, but because he wanted equipment from Zhao Fu, he couldn’t help but make an exception.
When he heard this, even though Zhao Fu was somewhat displeased, he still lightly laughed and replied in a pleasantly surprised tone, “Respected Vice-Lord, I had never thought that you’d gather so many people. I’m very please; apart from the equipment, I will also gift you 300 bottles of medicinal pills.”
As Zhao Fu spoke, he took out a bottle of Hundred Origin Pills. The Orc City was a city-level existence, so they most likely had Stage 1 medicinal pills like the Little Spirit Pills. If Zhao Fu took out Little Spirit Pills, they wouldn’t be as attractive, so Zhao Fu brought Hundred Origin Pills.
Gunador received the bottle, and upon inspecting it, a look of joy appeared on his face.
These medicinal pills’ effects were incredibly good, and now that Zhao Fu was giving them both equipment and medicinal pills, Gunador felt a bit apologetic and replied, “How could we just accept these medicinal pills? Esteemed guest, how about I gift you 50 Giant Wolves?”
The Orcs’ Giant Wolves were a variant type of normal wolves. They were incredibly big, powerful, and fast. In fact, they were much faster than even normal warhorses.
Zhao Fu’s Black Forest Horses could rival the Giant Wolves in terms of speed, but they all had their own advantages and disadvantages. It was incredibly difficult to find these Giant Wolves in the wild, and it seemed that only the Orcs could breed them. That was why the Orc Wolf Cavalry was so famous.
Since the other side had gifted these Giant Wolves to him, Zhao Fu decided he might as well accept. After all, he was quite interested in these Giant Wolves. After completing the transaction, Zhao Fu first went back to the Great Qin Town by himself to bring some soldiers to help him escort these captives back.
After arriving at the Great Qin Town, the captives felt terrified. Zhao Fu gave the order for them to be taken out of their cages, and he reassured them that they were safe. He promised that he wouldn’t harm them and that he would give them stable lives.
Zhao Fu’s words caused the broken people to cry tears of joy. They all knelt on the ground and kowtowed to Zhao Fu, and after reassuring them, Zhao Fu asked Li Si to take them in before turning to look at the Giant Wolves.