Time passed very fast. Without even realizing it, another 2 and half months passed. The whole Dying isle continent was covered in a blanket of snow. The temperature has dropped significantly. The lakes, rivers, and, ponds were frozen. It was the ordinary class people that suffered the most during the winter season. The cold harsh winter made their lives very difficult.
If one has to specifically talk about the Istarin Empire, then compared to the last winter, this winter, the ordinary people are having a much better time. At least the Istarin Emperor guaranteed a stable supply of food and that is also at a cheap price. Usually, during the months of winter, food prices increase by 100%, sometimes even 200 to 300%. This happens because the entire Dying Isle continent is covered in layers of snow, and farming becomes extremely difficult. Also in the months of winter, it is extremely difficult to rely on hunting. Even fishing becomes very difficult.
The entire Dying Isle continent has to rely merchants from other continents for their food supply. However, this year, while ordinary people were expecting to see the prices of food rise, contrary to what they were expecting, food prices became even cheaper. This left many confused. Even the foreign merchants who had bought their food supplies with the intention of making a huge profit this winter were left dumbfounded.
What happened? Why did the food become cheaper instead of becoming even pricier? Very few knew the answer. In fact, it was the Istarin Empire that was taking initiative to sell food at a cheaper price to its neighboring Kingdoms. Both the Thera Kingdom and the Storm Isle Dynasty both factions solved their food crisis with the help of the Istarin empire.
This did not just stop there. The Southern Fire Dragon Empire which now had become a territory of the Istarin Empire also enjoyed these benefits. In previous years, the people of the Southern region would see a sharp rise in food prices. But this year, food prices dropped and became cheap.
The Istarin Empire not only had enough food for its southern territory, but the Empire also had enough food for its neighboring small Kingdoms. Aditya made sure to provide enough food to those small kingdoms that shared borders with their Southern territory. Aditya did this to let them know that the Istarin Empire is different from the Southern fire dragon Empire which regularly bullied them. He did make his stance clear to the whole world. By helping out these small Kingdoms, Aditya made it clear that the Istarin Empire wants peace and was ready to take the initiative for it.
The only Empire in the Southern region that did not get the Istarin Empire's supply is the Northern Frost Dragon Empire. Although no public statement was given regarding this action made by the Istarin empire, many guessed that since the Istarin Empire is not taking any initiative to create peace with the Northern Frost Dragon Empire and instead taking a neutral stance, the Northern Frost Dragon Empire might be invaded by the Istarin Empire in the future. Or maybe the Istarin Empire is not interested in getting involved in the ongoing throne succession political fight.
Aditya also has helped the Echo Dominion Empire. Although he knew that the Echo Dominion Empire would be able to afford high-cost food from foreign merchants, Aditya went out of his way to help the Echo Dominion Empire. The foods that the Echo Dominion Empire bought from the Istarin empire were much cheaper. Aditya did this to establish a close connection with the Echo Dominion Empire. By doing this he was also increasing his soft power and influence within the dying Isle.
Aditya's aim was to build a powerful image of the Istarin empire so that in the future if any faction wants to attack his empire, they would have to think twice.
"Aditya, what are you planning on doing today?" Riya walked behind Aditya.
"Riya, I am adding runic enchantment to my Adamantite Doomblade." Aditya replied without looking at Riya. He was very focused on his work. He didn't even notice when Riya approached him.
After 20 days of constant practice and learning, with the help of the 4-star rune notes that the Mutant fire ant queen, Scarlet had given him, Aditya finally managed to upgrade his Rune Monarch class to 4th-order. Without those 4-star rune notes, Aditya wouldn't have become a 4-star runemaster. It was extremely difficult to become a 4-star runemaster without any help. This is exactly why there were no 4-star runemasters in the continents of Westnia and Dying Isle. Aditya was the first and only 4-star runemaster in the Dying Isle continent. Of course, he wouldn't reveal this to the public. Only the people close to him know this.
Every Faction needs a runemaster. Without a runemaster, a faction wouldn't have defensive arrays to protect their cities or teleportation arrays which makes traveling super easy and saves a lot of time. If a Kingdom wants to become an Empire other than having a large territory, the Kingdom must also find a 3-star runemaster to build various kinds of arrays. However, the number of 3-star runemasters is very limited. If an Empire has even one 3-star runemaster, it would be considered a huge thing.
As for 4-star runemasters, no one would even think that outside of the Main Continent there would be any 4-star runemaster on the other 6 Continents. Usually, the factions that don't have any runemaster would have no choice but to hire one. And hiring a 3-star runemaster is beyond expensive.
Riya sat beside Aditya and watched him as he elegantly drew runes on his black sword. No matter how many times she watches him drawing runes, she always feels very peaceful. Her mind becomes calm. She feels when he draws runes, his serious face only adds more charm to his handsomeness. She could forever keep looking at his face.
For the next few minutes, no one spoke. Riya watched Aditya's face as he drew runes. Compared to before, he has gotten twice faster. Each time he drew a runic word on the black sword, the runic word would glow in crimson red before the glow slowly faded away.
"Where is Julia?" Aditya asked without pausing. His hands moved like water. Each of his strokes were elegant and very smooth.
"Sister Julia is in her lab. She is currently making a new kind of potion from the herbs that she has grown in the garden." Aditya slightly nodded his head. After about 10 minutes of silence, Aditya finally put the pen that was made out of gold and crystal down on the floor.
He then looked at Riya who was looking at him with a smile. "Thank you for helping me all this time. The only reason that the Istarin Empire was able to bring down the food prices is because of your help."
"As I said before there is no need to thank me. I happy to help you." Riya's cheeks slightly flushed while looking at Aditya. In these 2 and half months time, Riya and Aditya have grown closer. Aditya has learned many new things about the elf princess.
As the goddess of Nature, Riya has the power to manipulate plants and also accelerate plants' growth rate. After returning from the Ethereal empire, Aditya and Watson were thinking about how could bring down the food prices. It was then Riya offered her help. Aditya gave Riya 25 acres of farming land. The farming lands were covered in a layer of thick snow. Aditya had to use his magma manipulation to rise the heat of the 25 acres of land which melted down all the snow and thus cleared the land.
After that Riya used her powers to do everything. Within a single day, a large quantity of rice was grown and even harvested. After calculating, Aditya was shocked to find that each acre yielded 10,000 pounds of rice which is 4535.924 Kg of rice. Riya kept using her powers to shorten the time needed for the crops to grow by only one day. She kept repeating the process with various crops for 2 months. In the end, the granary was full of harvested crops.
Riya helped them harvest so much food that Aditya was able to sell it to other Kingdoms and Empires. Aditya sold food to the Ethereal Empire and the Edrinia Dynasty. For the Ethereal empire, Aditya didn't want to take any money but Ronny insisted. Aditya thought of giving the money that was earned from selling food to Riya since without the nature goddess this wouldn't have been possible but Riya refused saying that she had more than enough money.
"Since you have helped me and the Istarin Empire a lot, I will grant you a wish. You can ask for anything but don't ask for something that is too much or something I can't do." Aditya made sure to add the last part knowing that the elf princess can be very mischievous. This is one of the things that he learned about her.
Hearing Aditya's words, the elf princess giggled. "Hehe! Let me think. I don't want to waste my chance after all." Aditya watched her think.
Because of Riya, Julia was able to grow lots of herbs in a very short period of time. Now Julia had more than enough herbs to start working on making various kinds of pills and potions which she was never able to make before. Also, the herbs that were grown inside the dragon palace with the nature goddess's powers had the highest quality.
After an entire minute of thinking, a small smile appeared on her face. Seeing Aditya suddenly started to feel worried. She closed the distance between them and took his right palm.
She directly looked into his eyes and asked. "I want you to take me on a date. I want you to give me this full day. Can you keep my request?" Riya would have asked Aditya on a date a long time ago but given how busy he was, she decided to wait.
'I guess I was worried for nothing.' Aditya inwardly thought. Given her slight yandere personality, he thought she was going to make him do something extreme such as make him sleep with her something which Aditya wasn't ready for as their relationship was still growing and hadn't reached that point yet.
Aditya put the black sword that was on his lap on the floor and then looked outside. "Sure. These days, my workload has significantly decreased because of my new prime minister Spencer. I can take a day or two off if I want."
"That's great. Then what are we waiting for, let's go now." Aditya put the black sword in his storage ring and then stood with his right hand being held by Riya.
From the wide balcony, Aditya can see just how fast and how far the capital of the Istarin Empire has developed. In these 2 months and half months, just like Aditya expected, many Dragons from all over the continent came to Azure city and decided to settle there. Around 50% of them even joined the Istarin Empire so that they can get inside the Dragon Palace which is heaven for the Dragons. Aditya gladly took any Dragon that wanted to join his faction. Every Dragon that entered his faction received a drop of his bloodline which turned them into Aditya's Dragon Warriors. This not only further purified their dragon bloodline but also turned them much stronger than before.
Of course, some Empires sneakily tried to gather information about the Dragon Palace. But no information about the Dragon Palace was revealed. Even if one or two factions managed to gather information about the Dragon palace, Aditya wasn't worried. Even if a Peak 5th-order cultivator wants to force his way inside the Dragon Palace, he would have to go through Aditya and all the powerful 5th-order guards first.
"Let's go." Aditya wanted to use this opportunity to see how much the capital has grown.
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Really Thank you very much to all those who sends support with valuable golden tickets. I hope we can keep it up!!!
[Everyone, it looks like I made a mistake thinking that yesterday was the last day of 2022. This chapter is the last chapter of this year.
Happy new year in advance.]
This content is taken from (f)reewe(b)novel.𝗰𝗼𝐦