Chapter 1910: Chapter 1903: Is This Place Heaven?
The city’s defensive power was already more or less in place. Zhang Menglong believed that once Kaido and the others spread the news, a large number of Dao Realm powerhouses would soon swarm over, maybe even no fewer than those in the Fortress Cities!
But now came the second problem: how were they going to attract more people to actually move into this city? If the city only had those Dao Realm Martial Artists, Zhang Menglong would have to feed that huge bunch all by himself, and then he’d have no leeks left to harvest.
At this stage, it wasn’t suitable for Zhang Menglong to compete with those Fortress Cities for people. If they noticed their population dropping sharply, they’d soon realize Illusion City existed. Once they came knocking, he wouldn’t even have time to react!
So at this stage, the most suitable approach was still to increase Illusion City’s population by drawing in those who drifted outside the Fortress Cities.
"Go post some threads for me!" Zhang Menglong knew that the Endless Land also had a lot of forums. These forums were mainly used for sharing information, like where large numbers of Phantom Profound Beasts appeared, where a vein of ore was discovered, who found a region with stable spatial structure, and so on.
Throughout the night, Zhang Menglong and his eight thousand underlings were clacking away madly at keyboards. Zhang Menglong even borrowed all kinds of Earth-style marketing copywriting.
But he still underestimated how cautious people were when it came to a place to live. After all, they needed to stay long-term in one spot; no matter what, safety had to come first, everything else came after.
You say your city has meat, and you expect people to just believe you?
You say your city can resist Phantom Profound Beast invasions—how am I supposed to know you’re not just bragging?
Their publicity not only failed to have any positive effect, they even got cursed out everywhere as scammers. In this information-overloaded internet, their posts didn’t even cause a big ripple.
"This is really speechless..." Zhang Menglong originally thought that by the next day, no matter what, a few batches of Survivors would come to settle in Illusion City. But by nightfall, not a single group showed up, which made him feel very dejected.
Zhang Menglong actually understood quite well. First, Illusion City’s builder didn’t have much credibility. If a well-known powerhouse of the Endless Land announced the news, the effect would be completely different.
Second, the places where everyone was currently living were hard-won. Many people couldn’t even find a relatively stable place to survive. Now that they finally had one, how could they possibly abandon this hard-earned spot for some mirage-like promise?
If they went to that Illusion City and got attacked by Phantom Profound Beasts after just a few days, they’d be the ones regretting it!
Besides, everyone had more or less reached a consensus: the Bimora Plain simply wasn’t a suitable place to build a city. Most people just let out a cold snort, prayed that this city wouldn’t vanish too quickly, and then stopped paying any attention to it!
Zhang Menglong didn’t know that the City Lords of several Fortress Cities had also taken notice of the information about Illusion City.
Especially the City Lord of Luosai Fortress City. Not long ago, he finally got to eat a meal with meat again. But after he shared the meat with some of the city’s higher-ups, it was gone in no time. When he wanted to look for Zhang Menglong again, that guy had already disappeared from the trading market.
After asking around, he found out that this guy had actually gone to the Bimora Plain to build a city!
He found this quite hilarious. Someone even suggested going to drag Zhang Menglong back, but the City Lord refused. He believed that after suffering a bit outside, Zhang Menglong would naturally return to Luosai Fortress City. With a few Dao Realm powerhouses protecting him, he wasn’t that easy to kill.
He merely told people to keep an eye on Illusion City, and to inform him immediately if anything happened.
"Boss, people are here!" On the morning of the third day, a few members of the Sunset Sect came rushing excitedly to Zhang Menglong.
"How many came?"
"Around two or three hundred thousand!"
"Take me to see!"
Zhang Menglong was overjoyed. With this first batch of people, there would naturally be a second batch later.
When Zhang Menglong arrived at the city entrance, he immediately frowned. In an instant, he understood why this group had shown up here.
Almost all of them were injured, utterly haggard, looking like refugees fleeing a disaster. Among these people, the highest Life Levels were only Ninth Grade Divine Cultivator. By rights, a survival squad of several hundred thousand people should have at least a few Dao Realm powerhouses.
"Our City Lord is here!" When they saw Zhang Menglong approaching, someone immediately greeted a middle-aged man within the group. He also looked like the strongest one in the squad.
The middle-aged man tried to stand up, but his balance was off and he quickly fell back to the ground.
"You’d better not stand up," Zhang Menglong sighed. "What happened to you all?"
"City Lord, my name is Lumos. Our survival squad was attacked by a group of Phantom Profound Beasts last night. There were a lot of them, and there were even Dao Realm ones among them. Our leader abandoned us. We originally had more than eight hundred thousand people; now, less than one-third are still alive."
Banak, beside him, also let out a sigh. In the Endless Land, this kind of situation was all too common. Many people would choose to abandon others when faced with such crises.
"He even took all our survival squad’s Crystal Cores when he left," Lumos said through gritted teeth.
True, they had all enjoyed his protection, but nobody owed him anything. They had also been out hunting hard. Most of the settlement’s assets had been earned through their desperate battles.
And now that bastard had just run off with everything. The rest of them were badly injured and had no Crystal Cores to pay for treatment in the cities. Going out now to hunt Phantom Profound Beasts was basically the same as courting death.
They’d stumbled across information about Illusion City by chance, and only then decided to gamble it all. What if this place really was as advertised?
They took a huge risk. Fortunately, they didn’t encounter any more danger along the way, or it wouldn’t have been impossible for all two hundred thousand plus of them to be wiped out.
"You’ve had it rough," Zhang Menglong shook his head. "You’re the first batch of people to come to my Illusion City. From now on, I grant you official resident status in Illusion City. Each of you will be assigned a place to live, and you can enjoy all the resources here at a discount price. You don’t have to pay any extra fees just to stay!"
"We’re not asking for all that," Lumos said with a bitter smile. "Our only request is to have a safe place where we can recover from our injuries."
Zhang Menglong patted Lumos on the shoulder. "Brother, you need a bigger vision and higher goals. Just safety isn’t enough. We’ve got to live better lives too!"
"You’re all hungry, right? Today’s meal is on me. Eat as much as you want!"
Zhang Menglong waved to his underlings. "Get some food ready, and refine some elixirs to heal their injuries!"
After following Zhang Menglong for so long, those from the Sunset Sect had already become masters of both Alchemy and cooking.
When elixirs and plates of delicious food were brought before them one after another, everyone was dumbfounded.
"These are healing elixirs? In a Fortress City, each one costs at least dozens of Level Seven Crystals!"
"This can’t be the legendary meat, right? I’m not having a last burst of strength before dying, am I? I think I’m seeing my great-great-grandma..."
"Vegetables! There are actually vegetables!"
"Is this place Heaven?"
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