Elven cultivators

The City of the Beginning, the North City.

Anton stood in front of a newly built pavilion, his hands behind his back, his gaze slowly sweeping across the eaves before finally settling on the vermilion door.

The pavilion was not tall, only two stories high, with blue bricks and gray tiles, and its style was not much different from the buildings that could be seen everywhere in Taichu City.

If no one specifically points it out, most passersby would just assume it's the residence of a disciple and wouldn't pay much attention.

In reality, this attic was an alternate dimension that Anton spent a lot of time developing, specifically for storing clan supplies.

Different spaces can be independent or attached to a carrier such as a building.

The former is far more difficult to develop than the latter.

Since it was just an alternate space used as a warehouse, there was no need to ask for too much, so Anton chose the latter approach.

The space inside the attic is much larger than it appears from the outside.

Anton did not rush to enter. Instead, he spread his divine sense, perceiving the inside world as if a tide was flowing over the door and extending inwards.

The view suddenly opened up.

The space behind the door was much larger than it appeared from the outside.

The dome hangs high, estimated to be at least two or three hundred meters high.

At the very center is a spacious transfer hall with a floor paved with polished bluestone slabs.

Dozens of corridors extend outward from the edge of the hall, creating a space wide enough for several carriages to travel side by side.

On both sides of each corridor are rows of large warehouses, each with a nameplate indicating the type of goods.

The entire space contains over a thousand warehouses.

Each warehouse has different arrays engraved on its walls, used to regulate temperature and humidity, prevent energy loss, and even prevent certain special materials from corroding each other.

From metal ingots, potions, talismans, and spirit stones, to spirit beast eggs cultivated in the beast garden and rare medicinal herbs harvested from the spirit plant garden—anything the clan currently needs to store can find its corresponding storage area here.

Anton estimated that, given the clan's current size and the rate of resource growth, this alternate dimension would be sufficient to meet storage needs for a long time to come.

Unless the Silvermoon Clan suddenly grows several times larger, there is no need to build any new warehouses.

However, even if that day comes, with his current cultivation level, opening another alternate dimension wouldn't take much effort.

Anton withdrew his divine sense and nodded in satisfaction.

The opening of the alternate dimension is complete, and the two overhead clouds have been restored. Now we can set off for the Dark Region.

Once the matter there is resolved, I can go to the Great Whirlpool Sea to continue my focused cultivation and strive to condense the three aura clouds at the top of my head as soon as possible to achieve the Dharma Body.

Just as Anton was about to set off, his expression suddenly changed, and with a flick of his wrist, a communication talisman appeared in his palm.

The talisman emitted a spiritual light, and from within came Eleanor's voice, brief and clear:

"The Jade Court delegation has arrived; it is Alicia who has come."

Anton's eyes flickered.

The clan had just defeated the Bloodclaw clan when Alicia came to visit. It was obvious to anyone with a brain that her purpose was to do so.

Without lingering, he moved slightly and vanished from his spot in the next instant.

……

Yongheng Hall.

This hall, which has existed since the Silvermoon Forest era, hardly ever serves any formal council function after the expansion of the Primordial Spirit Realm. On ordinary days, it is only used for some more important foreign affairs meetings.

When Anton stepped into the hall, he saw Alicia sitting in the guest seat, with a warm cup of tea beside her, steam rising from the rim of the cup.

Eleanor sat opposite her, her posture relaxed, clearly engaged in casual conversation.

Upon seeing Anton, Alicia put down her teacup, stood up, and nodded slightly, a faint smile appearing between her cool and aloof eyes: "Chief Anton, how have you been?"

"Your Excellency Alicia," Anton smiled and nodded, taking his seat at the head of the table. "You've come a long way; you must be tired."

Alicia sat down again and chuckled, "I came here specifically to offer my congratulations. The news of the Silvermoon Clan's defeat of the Bloodclaw Clan has spread throughout the continent. A single battle that decided the fate of the world is truly astonishing and admirable."

Anton shrugged: "It's a pity we didn't achieve our goal completely and failed to wipe out the Bloodclaw Clan."

Alicia's expression turned serious, and she said, "This is not a problem with the Silvermoon Clan, but rather that Bloodhowl Fortress has acted too domineeringly. It was clearly the Bloodclaw Clan that started the war, and your clan repelled them, yet Bloodhowl Fortress turned around and stopped you from counterattacking. This is simply unacceptable."

She paused, glanced at Anton, and added, "Moreover, Bloodhowl Fortress may very well have been fueling this war."

Anton remained expressionless, merely taking a sip of his tea before looking up at Alicia with a half-smile: "Lady Alicia, we've dealt with each other more than once or twice. Please speak frankly about what's on your mind."

Seeing Anton's expression, Alicia knew that he had guessed her purpose. Upon hearing this, she stopped beating around the bush and said frankly, "I'm here again because of what happened last time. The royal court hopes that the Silvermoon Clan can join the war and work together to deal with Bloodhowl Fortress."

Neither Anton nor Eleanor were too surprised by this statement.

Unlike last time, Anton did not refuse outright this time.

He put down his teacup, pondered for a moment, and slowly said, "I can agree."

A glint flashed in Alicia's eyes, but she didn't rush to reply. Instead, she waited patiently for him to continue.

Sure enough, Anton followed up by saying, "But the Silvermoon Clan will only send fleets to participate in the war, and they will only be responsible for long-range strikes and strategic projection; they will not send troops to actually participate in the war."

The war between the Emerald Court and Bloodhowl Fortress, while not as engulfing as the Dragon Slaying War that nearly drew in the entire continent, was no less intense.

Battles involving tens or even hundreds of thousands of soldiers were commonplace, and the casualties were so heavy that they could be described as meat grinder battlefields.

The Silvermoon Clan itself doesn't have a large population, and Anton doesn't want to waste the clan's population on such a place.

For the Silvermoon Clan today, every member is precious.

The larger the population, the faster the development.

Therefore, in the Battle of Tal Plains, the clan preferred to let the Taoist army take the lead and fight to the point of near annihilation in order to minimize the casualties of the clan members.

Alicia paused slightly upon hearing this, then lowered her eyes thoughtfully.

She could roughly guess Anton's concerns.

After a moment's thought, Alicia nodded: "It's alright, as long as the Silvermoon Clan is willing to participate in the war."

The Jade Court is not lacking in the Silver Moon Clan's forces of less than 100,000.

What they truly valued were the fleets capable of traversing half the continent and directly deploying entire armies to the flanks of the battlefield, and...

"There's one more thing," Alicia said seriously. "We hope the Silvermoon Clan can provide a batch of Yellow Turban Warriors and Five Battalions of Divine Soldiers. We can pay for them."

Anton shook his head upon hearing this: "It's not that we're stingy to buy them, but the Yellow Turban Warriors and the Five Camps of Divine Soldiers are special. Only our disciples from Taichu City can control them. Even if outsiders get their hands on them, they'll just be a bunch of iron lumps that they can look at but can't move."

Alicia frowned slightly.

There is also this restriction.

She didn't doubt that Anton was lying.

If he doesn't want to sell, he can just refuse directly; there's no need to make up this excuse to fob her off.

However, this answer disappointed her expectations by half.

After a moment's thought, she asked, "Can the disciples of Taichu City bring alchemical puppets into battle? They don't need to fight themselves; they just need to control them."

Anton smiled slightly: "The Five Battalions of Divine Soldiers won't do, but the Yellow Turban Warriors would be fine. However, we just finished a battle, and the Yellow Turban Warrior Legion suffered considerable losses and is still rebuilding. The royal court will probably have to wait a while."

Although Alicia was somewhat disappointed that she hadn't managed to capture the Five Camps of Divine Soldiers, she thought to herself that getting the Yellow Turban Warriors was not bad at all.

The Yellow Turban Warriors' performance in the Battle of Tal Plains was remarkable.

With average silver-tier combat power, fearless, undaunted by pain, and tireless, its combat power on the front lines far surpasses that of golems of the same tier.

Even if the royal court itself has a well-organized golem army, who would complain about having an elite puppet army at their disposal?

"Time is not a problem," she readily agreed.

Subsequently, the two sides discussed the scale and frequency of fleet deployments, the number of Yellow Turban warriors participating in the battle, and the standards for compensation for battle losses one by one.

It was finally decided that the Emerald Court would reward and compensate the Silvermoon Clan with rare materials based on the actual combat strength they contributed.

The entire discussion went very smoothly, without much unnecessary back-and-forth or probing, and both the host and guests enjoyed themselves.

By the time Alicia rose to take her leave, dusk had already seeped in through the windowpanes, casting a soft and lingering shadow in the hall.

Eleanor escorted her to the palace gate, then turned back and saw Anton still sitting in the same spot, so she sat down opposite him.

"Chieftain, is this alright?" Eleanor hesitated. "We still have to deal with Shadow City. Even if the Yellow Turban Warriors are rebuilt, they will have to be deployed to the Underdark first. I'm afraid we won't be able to spare any resources to support the Royal Court in the short term."

Anton smiled calmly and said, "To deal with Shadow City, we don't necessarily have to use Dao soldiers, or even... we don't necessarily have to go to war."

Eleanor paused, then asked, "Then why did you have the clan prepare for war before?"

"We're preparing for war just in case," Anton smiled. "I want to try another method first. If that doesn't work, then we can go to war."

Seeing that Anton was confident, Eleanor nodded slowly and did not ask any further questions.

"Oh, right," Anton remembered something, "the alternate dimension has been opened up, you can arrange for people to move the supplies in."

Eleanor's expression brightened slightly, and she immediately nodded in agreement.

Now the warehousing problem has been solved smoothly.

The clan can now accelerate the stockpiling of strategic materials.

After settling his affairs, Anton rose and left the Hall of Eternity, transforming into a sword beam and hurtling toward the entrance to the rift in the Dark Region.