Hye didn't act polite, emptied the content of their inventories and stores of any crystal.
He did the same for other families, ending up without meeting anyone who mattered. He was sure by the end of his long visits that the leaders of this world already agreed to distance themselves off him.
He tried to collect any news about the upcoming war, about anything related to the Hescos expected time of arrival, numbers, the size of their forces, and such things that mattered. But he failed.
"They ordered everyone to not tell us anything!" the lady nymph complained from behind while they were exiting the elevator they took to visit the last family.
"You can't blame them," Hye shrugged, "the more they kept it secretive, the worse it was."
He guessed it right. The Hescos intended to deal with two annoying thorns at the same time. And after the last humiliation they suffered in that auction, more voices rose up in the higher council of their leaders to take rid of Hye and this world once and for all.
So they were amassing tons of their forces, moving any army that belonged to them in the entire region towards that world's location.
This world was safe by the protective shield, but its location was known far and wide. So it was expected to imagine how many forces were gathering towards there.
At the same time, Toranks kept a silent radar, and didn't even send a single message out to Hye. it wasn't because they were ditching him, but they knew such war would yield them great gains if they joined.
And so they planned to stay quiet and bide their time, waiting till when the world leaders would find it impossible to defend their world, ending up asking for their help. By that time, they'd ask for astronomical prices to interfere.
As they planned such a thing, they started to amass their forces as well. Yet they kept these away from the expected range of battle, not far enough to interfere when they'd get the deal they wanted.
They never expected that the world's leaders depended on the fact that Hye was in the middle of all this mess. These leaders thought Hye would be the one asking the Toranks for help, never crossed their minds that Hye and the Toranks were already planning something different.
The Toranks knew Hye very well and knew how he thought about things. They were sure he was there to mud waters, then find the fastest lifeboat and abandon the sinking ship!
He didn't have any interest in this world to work to save it. Or else he'd be the first to speak with them the moment he learnt about the ongoing war preparations from both sides.
They were right, but Hye decided to take part in the upcoming war. He didn't want to save this world, but wanted to get a glimpse of how big wars in the open new universe were like.
He wanted to see such high end war by himself, to know what he was lacking. And as he rented a hotel room, one that looked like a small world on its own, he started to take out his warriors and fortify them using his crystals.
He raised their level to level twenty. As for him, he raised it to level thirty. He knew he got a long road ahead of him if he wanted to have a strong force in the universe.
In his eyes, arriving at stage three was a must to be able to raise one's head against other forces. That was, of course, without counting the three top races in the universe.
To do so, he needed a scary number of crystals, a figure he didn't have or was even close to. He kept checking over the Crystal Heart from time to time, ending up getting disappointed.
ραΠdαsΝοvel.cοm "This heart… It takes forever to produce the crystals…" he noticed the small puddings grew during the past two weeks of his stay in that hotel. But in the end, there was still a similar distance to cross, if not more, to harvest the first crystals from it.
According to what he understood, this heart would take a fixed amount of time to yield results. He estimated it to take roughly one month to produce crystals, and for high end ones, it might take half a month more.
This meant he had to plant tons of trees, and that needed him to spare lots of crystals.
"Hmm… They are keeping sealed lips even about when that war would start…" Hye wanted to know how long he had. If he got months, then he could plant all of his crystals into the heart. But if he got a few weeks, then it wasn't going to be productive this way.
He knew in any war; loot was going to be immense and massive. Even if he ran low on crystals, the ones he'd fight, and kill wouldn't lack such a thing. But he had to obtain enough power first to kill them before dreaming about any loot.
"If they kept even such news secretive, then I would have no other choice…"
[My man! Don't tell me you are speaking on behalf of those greedy merchants!]
The other way he had was to speak with Silverlining, trying to get the news he wanted from him.
[I'm here to speak for myself, and I'm not asking for help]
[I thought so, hahahaha! I bet they are waiting for you to ask for our aid. This way they'll save their world without the need to pay anything in return. Those merchants… I hate them!]
[Don't curse them, after all you are a merchant, hahahaha!] Hye laughed, before adding, [I want intel about the upcoming invasion. What news do you have for me?]
[It's going to be epic!] Silverlining seemed to be excited about this, [According to what I learnt, the Hescos are amassing all the forces they own in the entire region! Not to mention they already bringing the help of tons of mercenaries, the same as the ones leading that world are trying to do]
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