Why is my territory in a 2D anime art style?

Chapter 117 The Zhao Family and the Rumors of Crescent City

"Old Wang! Old Wang!"

The sound of an erhu came from outside the door, accompanied by a knock.

"Little sister, go open the door!" Wang Zhen's voice rang out from inside.

Soon the door opened from the inside, and a girl of about sixteen or seventeen years old peeked out: "Brother Erhu, it's you!"

""

"Wang Ling, are you hard of hearing? You haven't heard Brother Hu's voice for a few days, and you can't even recognize it."

Erhu sighed and reached out to rub Wang Ling's head.

"No~ no~ my hair is still dry~" Wang Ling quickly pulled her head back, made way, and let Erhu in.

Wang Zhen came into the living room from the back room: "What's wrong?"

"I heard some shocking news this morning!" Erhu rushed in, and seeing the woman beside him, he quickly greeted her, "Good morning, Aunt Xu!"

"Erhu, it's been so long since I've seen you!" Xu Xingxing was sitting on a stool nearby, knitting a sweater. When she saw Erhu come in, she greeted him.

Erhu, without any hesitation, took a small stool and sat down next to him.

"Hey, I went to help out in Sui An's territory a while ago, so I haven't been back much."

"Is Xiao An alright?"

"Great! Even better off than me and Lao Wang!"

Xu Xingxing smiled and nodded: "That's good, as long as you're safe! If you need to talk to Xiao Zhen, then you two go ahead and chat, you don't need to stay here with me~"

"Okay~" Erhu pulled Wang Zhen directly towards the back room, which was Wang Zhen's room.

Wang Zhen was completely bewildered: "What's wrong? Do we really have to talk in the room?"

"You wouldn't want your aunt and sister to hear about fighting and killing, would you?"

After the two entered the room, Erhu whispered, "When I went to check on the results of last night's Ice Mist Tide battle this morning, I overheard some news. It's said that Zhao Yuan's father, Zhao Heng, had a blueprint for a level 4 purple great bow, and that's why he was kidnapped."

"A level 4 purple greatbow blueprint?"

Wang Zhen's eyes widened. He worked at Ping An Trading Company and was a mid-level combat professional himself, so he naturally knew how valuable such blueprints were.

"How rare is this? I've never even seen a mid-level purple weapon before. How did Zhao Heng get this blueprint?"

Erhu said with a touch of emotion, "They say Zhao Heng unexpectedly obtained five Fortune Jars, and from them he found a Level 4 blue longsword blueprint and this blueprint!"

"What incredible luck! I've only ever gotten one level 2 green weapon from the Lucky Jar, what a rip-off!"

Wang Zhen glared at Erhu: "You've poured all your hard-earned money into it, haven't you! But this kind of news is usually kept extremely secret, how did it leak out and become common knowledge?"

"Hey, you'd never guess how this news got out!"

When Wang Zhen asked about this, Erhu's expression became even more strange.

"It's Zhao Heng's eldest son, Zhao Hong. He's been investigating ever since his father went missing. He seems to have found some clues, but he has no evidence. Moreover, the other party is very powerful, and he can't continue to investigate."

"So he did something really weird~"

Wang Zhen asked curiously, "What is it?"

Erhu grinned, revealing his bright white teeth: "Zhao Hong wrote down how his father obtained the purple blueprints in a letter and then placed it in the safe of Ping An Trading Company. The letter also said that if he and his brother were to disappear or die one day, the murderer would definitely be someone from Crescent City!"

"Isn't it a coincidence? A few days ago, rumors circulated that Zhao Yuan's territory had been breached by a source beast, and the two brothers had perished in its belly. More than three days had passed, so Ping An Trading Company initiated the safe-clearing operation. According to regulations, the clearing of a deceased person's safe must be carried out simultaneously by the insurance business team, the care team, and the monitoring team to prevent anyone from taking the opportunity to embezzle. This investigation led to the discovery of the contents of this letter."

"With people from all three groups present, there was no way to keep the news quiet. You never know who would spread it, and I reckon Ping An Trading Company didn't intend to keep it quiet either, so everyone knew about it all at once."

Wang Zhen was both amused and exasperated. What was this? Was it a self-inflicted wound before his death?

This kind of news is quite clever. What does a level 4 purple greatbow blueprint represent?

Representing top-tier weapons for mid-level combatants, these long-range weapons are enough to allow mid-level professionals to defeat enemies of higher levels and have a higher probability of obtaining better loot.

This thing isn't just a weapon; it's a foundation.

Even those high-ranking lords might be tempted. These people aren't without descendants; if the blueprints can't be passed down, they can just throw resources at it and make ten, a hundred, a thousand!

Regardless of whether Crescent City is the murderer or not, you'd better actually have Zhao Heng right now, and he has to be alive!

If Zhao Heng isn't stupid, he definitely won't keep the blueprints; he'll use them himself.

"Is it really Crescent City?" Erhu leaned against the wall, arms crossed, clearly eager to gossip.

Wang Zhen shook his head: "Whether it is or not, what difference does it make? This is half an open conspiracy. Even if Crescent City is not Zhao Heng's kidnapper, it is very likely that it has offended Zhao Heng."

"The ruthlessness of this move lies in the fact that Zhao Heng truly possesses the blueprint for a level 4 blue longsword, the Zhao brothers' territory has indeed been destroyed as Zhao Hong predicted, and their fate remains unknown. Most importantly, Crescent City truly possesses the strength to achieve this!"

After Captain Zheng mentioned Crescent City last time, Wang Zhen privately investigated and found that the city lord's eldest and second eldest brothers were both level 7 experts.

Especially his second brother, Li Linyuan, who possesses dark energy.

As we all know, among the source beasts, dark source beasts are the best at concealing their forms, and the same applies to professionals. Therefore, it is the most likely scenario that he kidnapped someone in Jiangcheng.

"The most terrifying lie in the world is nine parts truth and one part falsehood. There will always be people willing to try it, like the three city lords. They don't need to do anything to Crescent City; they just need to send someone to investigate. But who among those who can become builders of a level 6 territory doesn't have some kind of backing?"

Wang Zhen was not optimistic about Crescent City's situation. After investigating, he discovered some good things that might even tempt the city lord himself.

"No wonder they all say Zhao Hong is very smart. In this light, his methods are quite interesting."

Erhu naturally understood Wang Zhen's analysis: "The most interesting thing is that the city is still under the Ice Mist Tide. Even if there are people from Crescent City in Jiang City, the news cannot get out. The remaining time is enough for the three city lords to make a decision. This is too much of a coincidence."

"The city lord claims to want to bring peace and development to Jiangcheng. He can't be bothered by the little tricks people play outside of Jiangcheng. But now that someone has kidnapped key talents from his territory and the news has been made public, isn't that a slap in his face? He will definitely take action on this matter."

"This is going to be funny!"

"This thing is just for fun~" Wang Zhen shook his head, then suddenly changed the subject and said softly.

"I wonder how Sui An's territory is doing. Yesterday, during the Blood Moon Night, he was attacked by an Ice Demon. His Sword Star Totem is fire-attribute, so we have to use it with restraint. I'm a little worried."

"What's there to worry about with his territory? The Ice Demon's characteristics are completely countered. It's not afraid of the ice mist, and it has elemental statues that attack automatically, plus that illusion—"

As Erhu was playing, he suddenly realized something was wrong. He quickly turned to look at Wang Zhen and hurriedly asked, "What did you just say?"

"Worried about Sui An's territory?"

"That's not it!"

"Blood Moon Night plus Ice Fairy?"

"That's not it either!"

"The Sword Star Totem is fire-attribute; it must be used strategically?"

Erhu was bewildered. He stammered, "Can't we use fire-attribute attacks to fight the Ice Demon?"

Wang Zhen frowned, quite puzzled: "It can be used, but it's best not to. The fire-attribute energy fluctuations can easily anger nearby ice demons, leading to a swarm attack. Didn't you know that?"

Erhu quickly shook his head: "I don't know. I only participated once, and that was when I was guarding the city near Jiangcheng."

He slapped his thigh suddenly and exclaimed, "Surely Sui An doesn't know this?"

"You have no idea, and no one told him that he used to be an ordinary person, and he couldn't directly participate in the defense of the city during the Ice Mist Tide, so how would you know!"

Wang Zhen stood up in surprise, feeling somewhat guilty: "I thought you knew, so I didn't remind you. It's my fault!"

Erhu suddenly exclaimed, "No, Fang Si should know that he's a year older than us, and might have experienced even more!"

"Let's hope so!"

Time quietly passed to the fifth night of the ice fog tide.

After two days and one night of proactive clearing, Sui An's merit points returned to 1,000. The hunting range of his territory was too small, and with these merit points, he could only buy one Meteorite Bronze. As for building the statue, he could forget about it.

As for the consumption of Originium, the Originium he harvested was barely enough to cover his consumption.

As for the additional basic source materials needed for the turret, he still had a lot of them, most of which he acquired along the way when he completed all the blueprints.

"You'll probably have to use this tonight."

Fang Si pointed to the sword star totem below: "Under the full moon, all the source beasts are in the most frenzied state, and the range that the territory can attract source beasts is also at its maximum. Normally, it doesn't matter, and there are basically no intermediate source beasts roaming around this area."

"But the ice mist tide is different. If there are level 5 or 6 ice demons wandering nearby, under the blood moon, the attraction of your territory is negligible to them. They will only point their attention further away. But under the full moon, it's hard to say."

Sui An grinned and said, "Isn't that a good thing? We were holding back yesterday, afraid of attracting even more outrageous attention."

"Now I don't have to worry too much about attracting any strange things. The ice demons that are meant to come will come, and those that aren't meant to come, even if I attract them, they probably won't come."

"It's still hard to say."

Fang Si shook her head: "The later you use it, the better. Try to wait until those terrifying beings are attracted away by the mid-to-high-level territories in the distance and far away from your territory. The lower the probability of something happening to you, the lower the chance of you getting into trouble."

"I understand, I will restrain myself~" Sui An looked up at the sky. At this moment, the territory was extremely dark, with only the energy lamp that Sui An hung on the watchtower illuminating the territory.

But the next moment, the scarlet moonlight flowed in along with the thick icy fog. Every time Sui An experienced a full moon, he was always shocked by this blood-red moonlight.

At this moment, the moonlight did not seem like light, but truly resembled blood.

In the distance, countless mournful howls rose and fell, the sounds so piercing that they seemed like a procession of a hundred ghosts.

The detection platform showed that the area within a hundred meters of the territory, which had been cleared by Sui An, was filled with ice demons surging in from all sides in just a few breaths.

Sui An sighed, "This number must be the peak of the Ice Demons during the Ice Mist Tide, right?"

Fang Si explained, "The fifth day is about the peak time. After tonight's cleanup, the ice mist will become thinner and thinner over the remaining time, and the birth of new ice demons will become slower and slower until the ice mist completely dissipates."

Sui An continued to operate using the same old method: using the illusions to gather ice demons, elemental statues, and the gold-shattering cannons to clear them away. He had practiced this method for five days and was already extremely proficient at it.

But just two days later, Sui An clearly felt that the density of ice demons outside his territory had increased to another level. He had only manipulated the illusion to create a circle, and there were already hundreds of light spots around him.

Not only that, but now, in the area where his illusion had just passed, scattered ice demons were crossing the 40-meter-wide blank area and arriving in front of Sui An's territory.

Sui An frowned, looking at the projection on the detection station, feeling a bit of a headache.

If he continues to lead the illusion in circles, he can clear it away, but the ice demons he has attracted will never be eliminated.

"Forget it, a little shouldn't be a big problem. I already have two to clear out the remaining ice demons on both sides of the south side, so I'm not going to worry about it!"

Sui An gave up trying to find the perfect answer. After pulling the illusion to the designated location, he began to control the elemental statues. Together with the three people behind him controlling the Gold-Shattering Cannons, they quickly cleared out the accumulated ice demons.

A very slight ripple traveled through the icy mist.

"Hey, the territory that opened the rift is in luck today~" Sui An raised his head and glanced at it subconsciously, but then remembered that the surrounding area was full of ice mist and he couldn't see a trace at all.

"There's no way around it, a full moon is the easiest way to cause cracks."

Fang Si's voice came from above. He seemed to have thought of something and said, "I heard that starting from intermediate-level territories, if a rift hasn't been triggered for a long time, it might be forcibly triggered during a full moon in a certain month."

"Huh?" Sui An was a little confused. His understanding of architects mostly came from the people around him, since there were no textbooks to tell you how to do it.

He asked curiously, "Is there such a saying?"

"Yes, there are, but those who know about it are probably at the intermediate professional level. I only heard about it by chance."

Fang Si nodded and said with a smile, "Except for the rift assessment when advancing from level three to level four, there are indeed cases where low-level territories have advanced to the intermediate level without ever experiencing the Blood Moon Rift. However, there shouldn't be any level four territory that can advance to level five without ever experiencing a Blood Moon Rift."

"What is this? Is this a monthly exam held by the will of the Source Realm for us architects?"

Sui An was somewhat amused and exasperated: "Is there a specific time limit for this monthly exam? For example, how long must it be before this crescent-shaped rift is triggered?"

Fang thought for a moment and said, "It seems there's no definitive answer. Some people get a month, some get two months, but it's rare for it to drag on for three or four months."

"I originally thought that the large territories of Jiangcheng opened the rifts on their own initiative. It seems that they knew they couldn't avoid it, so they deliberately triggered it in advance to prevent the full moons from clustering together."

Sui Anman suddenly remembered what Wang Zhen had told him a few days ago, but he quickly shook his head: "Okay, I probably won't encounter something like that."

He already has a cheat code, but he regrets that the number of times he can overtake others on a curve is limited.