When Wu Long returned to the Silver Wing City, he was notified that the City Lord's youngest son, Ko Fuan tried to secretly purchase information about Zhao Xieren, separately from the City Lord Manor.
He smiled hearing that.
"Why do you bother with that guy anyway?", Fen Baihu who walked by his side noticed that satisfied expression on his face.
"What do you think of City Lord?"
"I don't think about him"
"...", the response montarily stunted Wu Long's speech, and after chuckling he continued, "Yeah, but what would you say he's like off the top of your head?"
"Hmm, nothing in particular cos to mind"
"Hahaha", he laughed as he should have anticipated that. Her recent curiosity in humans was limited only to Wu Long and his ladies, perhaps the Eternal Duality Valley, and the people Wu Long seed to hold interest in. The rest were as interesting as roadside pebbles in her eyes, as usual.
"He's ambitious and scheming", Wu Long decided on another approach, and seeing Fen Baihu shrug with a rather indifferent 'I guess if you say so... what about it?' look on her face, continued, "And he's in Essence Ignition Realm, which ans he is near the top of the food chain on this continent. If we were to approach him to try and negotiate, he'll try to pin us down under his control, he won't even entertain the thought of cooperation or partnership" "So... you want to use his son against him?"
"Not really against him, although you could say that since I basically plan to offer the father's position to the son. But what I'm interested in is, who of the two is going to cooperate with us. That youngest son of his is also quite ambitious. You could say he resembles his father more than his other sons, which is probably why the latter keeps him at an arm's length. But he's not in a dominant position like his father, he will profit from taking soone's hand, so he'll take ours as long as we persuade him well"
"You saw all that in a brief encounter between them and Crystal Wood Sect at the City Gate square?"
"That and the way the son behaved on the plateau. Not to ntion I stuck a spying talisman on him when he was leaving the plateau, so you could say I know the internal situation of the City Lord Manor better than most locals now"
"You've been monitoring him this whole ti?"
"No, the talisman could only last for a few days, after that I would've had to take it away so it doesn't deactivate in front of soone. But I did it earlier since my condition wasn't perfect at the ti, and so it wasn't certain the City Lord won't notice it if I kept using it for long", Wu Long shook his head, as he basically only confird the relationship between father and the four sons, and removed the talisman right after.
He witnessed as the son was repeatedly struck and berated after reporting what happened at the plateau, the actions he took were condemned as "foolish", "hasty", and "arrogant to make" on his own without instructions.
The City Lord also went out of his way to send the son to personally apologize to the Crystal Wood Sect right after, but without evoking the City Lord Manor, purely as a personal apology.
The two oldest brothers had mocking expressions as this was happening, while the third brother was silent, not gleeful but also not helpful while their youngest, the fourth son was treated this way.
This single scene had enough information for Wu Long to consolidate his ideas about future moves.
"Valley Master", a Thousand Eyes Palace mber approached them as they were already at the door to the room Madam Liang was in.
Seeing Wu Long turn a questioning look to him, the man reported, "Mister Yen and Mister Nie have arrived under guise of buying information, they have been escorted to one of the sitting rooms"
"Hmm, interesting", Wu Long chuckled, since it was a sudden visit, "lead them here, discreetly of course"
"Understood"
He entered the room, and after exchanging greetings with Madam Liang, waited for the two who arrived a bit later.
"Boss", Old Yen spoke with a slightly troubled expression, while Nie Guanting had a proud look on his face.
Seeing Wu Long's questioning gaze, Old Yen started, "We were eting with a group of..." What followed was a long-winded speech that started describing their movents in detail, but raising his eyes to et Wu Long's Old Yen stopped at "... and so..."
He then cleared his throat, "Khum, in short, we kind of took over three small-ti gangs" Wu Long's eyebrows rose, at the sa ti as understanding started to appear in his eyes. "We were trying to negotiate with a leader of one gang, but he was being difficult and trying to pull all kinds of stunts, subtly asserting dominance... when this guy challenged him to a fight", Old Yen continued, pretty much describing what Wu Long expected.
"When he killed the leader, his gang just pronounced him as a new leader, since he, I quote here, 'won fair and square after a challenge', but a few rival gangs heard about the leader changing and tried to make waves so..."
"Pfft... hahaha, good job", Wu Long lightly laughed, inwardly confirming that putting Nie Guanting next to Old Yen was a good decision.
"Eh?", Old Yen's face as he was mumbling froze in a mix of incredulousness and disbelief.
"Ehem, thank you, Boss", while Nie Guanting boasted a wide grin with a satisfied and proud huff, puffing out his chest.
While the forr's carefulness and craftiness was certainly comndable, it could be a liability at tis when decisive action was more desirable. A little recklessness of the latter, to balance things out was just right. Of course, it may take ti before the two learn to properly balance each other, but when that eventually happened, their cooperation would not just add, but multiply each other's potential.
'Now all that's left to see is if the Obsidian Moon will react or not', Wu Long narrowed his eyes, as the silence from that side was worrying.
Since the two were there, Wu Long had Fen Baihu bring out key people of the Eternal Duality Valley and his Dao Family for another general eting.
"If it isn't too presumptuous to ask... why do we seek out the passage to Great Wilderness? Isn't it overrun by a swarm of Demonic Beasts? Are we going to sohow exterminate them?", Song Minfu carefully asked, as almost every bit of Wu Long's plans made sense to everyone, except this one.
"Good question. It's true that what lies on the other side of the World Stone is a wasteland by now. Giant Reaper Ants that took over that World and very likely several others around it would have eaten anything that contained Spiritual Qi, all vegetation, minerals and any living beings, and when that run out, sucked the Spiritual Qi out of the very ground beneath them, and the air, turning the area into a lifeless desert", Wu Long nodded, "It would be indeed a good thing to have a passage to the Great Wilderness beyond that wasteland area, but we can obtain that without exterminating them, why would we ruin a perfect inco source?"
"Inco source?", Sui Luxiao's eyes lit up.
"Their Demonic Cores are pretty much useless, but even they in such large amounts could co in handy. But more than that, one particular exoskeleton shell on their backs is a very valuable material for armor-making, their chewing mandibles are precious weapon material, and most importantly, there is a gem that naturally forms in their bodies as they age, that gem is a main ingredient for a very special, and very profitable pill", Wu Long chuckled.
"So we are going to harvest the endless swarm of ants...", Sui Luxiao nodded, recognizing that it was basically an infinite resource.
"Yes, and we can also use that as training grounds, both training combat personnel and harvesting at the sa ti", Wu Long nodded.
"Hahaha! Splendid!", General Feng imdiately sprang to his feet, delighted to hear about such excellent live training grounds, ones extrely to his liking.
"But wouldn't that be too risky? It was a threat large enough to warrant sealing off an entire route into the Great Wilderness...", Song Minfu expressed his concerns.
"Mm, it's indeed almost impossible to keep a constant defense without risks, more so if we
are going to send people to train there", Wu Long nodded, since the numbers were just too overwhelming, and there were also higher-tier Profound Grade specins among the swarm that could threaten even Wu Long at his current strength.
"That's where this cos in", he then raised his hand, with a little glass vial that was sealed with a cork. Inside the vial was a small ball, resembling a pill.
"""A... a stink pill?!""", several people exclaid in unison, while Yu Huan's eyes lit with understanding and eagerness.
"Yeah, this one's just sothing I received as a Disciple of the Yin Yang Unity Palace, when I went out for a small mission, but what I an is a modified version", Wu Long smiled as he placed the small vial on the table, "Giant Reaper Ants, like many of the Ant species of Demonic Beasts, actually have very poor eyesight, they can only make out very vague shapes. Their main sensory systems are sll and Spiritual Qi. And there is a variant of a Stink Pill, which could be produced cheaply, that would confuse both of those senses completely" "H-how co no one used it then instead of sealing off that world?", Zhao Xieren mumbled under his nose, since the solution seed too simple.
"I don't know exactly why, but it could be that no one bothered. This may sound wasteful, but there are many Frontier Worlds just like this one, and more routes into the Great Wilderness than you could count spending years on it, so real Major Powers wouldn't bat an eye if one of them was closed, it happens all the ti for one reason or another" Wu Long shrugged his shoulders, since he couldn't be certain of what happened.
But Zhao Xieren could see how this explanation made sense, "Hmm, so only those in this region were interested in the prosperity of this continent as a Frontier World, and it could be that none of them possessed the knowledge, while those who could co up with this solution never bothered with this remote place..."
"That's just how it is, the rest of the world tends to move on even when for soone it seems still because their concerns overwhelm them", Wu Long nodded.
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