Seeing the Cardinals of the Church of the Good Gods reach an agreement with Muria, the faces of the twelve Northern Grand Dukes present turned extremely ugly.
"What about us?" a burly Grand Duke, who looked like a bear, asked, suppressing his anger.
"Surrender or leave this continent. Those are your only two choices," Claudia, the Frost Queen sitting next to Muria, raised her head and glanced at the twelve Northern legends. "Oh, right, there's actually a third option: fight me and get killed."
"You..." One of the Northern Grand Dukes looked hopefully at the group of Cardinals sitting together, but to their disappointment, the Cardinals were all resting with their eyes closed, not even glancing at them.
The Church had already completed its exchange of interests with Muria, so these Grand Dukes were now insignificant. In the eyes of the Church, this group of Northern rulers was never worth much. With their demands met, they had no reason to support them anymore.
"Fine, we're leaving." The Northern Grand Dukes stood up, ready to leave.
"Leave? Without making a choice? What nonsense are you talking about?" Bone-chilling frost began to spread, and faint dragon shadows appeared outside the palace. A sense of imminent death gripped the hearts of the Northern Grand Dukes, with their senses wildly warning them.
"I choose to leave this continent," a few of the legendary Grand Dukes said grimly under the pressure of the dragon shadows outside.
"If I surrender, what kind of treatment will I receive?" another Grand Duke asked Claudia tentatively, unwilling to lose his current power.
"According to your human rules, whatever treatment a legend deserves, you will receive," Claudia replied with a smile.
According to the main continent's human empire rules, a legendary figure like a Northern Grand Duke would only receive a nominal title of a duke, without any real power or fiefdom, and merely receive some crystal offerings every month—quite pitiful.
"Then I choose to join you, great Queen Claudia." Under the contemptuous gazes of the other Grand Dukes, this Northern Duke immediately knelt and swore allegiance to Claudia, assuming she meant the status of a legendary figure in a subcontinent kingdom.
"With the Northern matters settled, the next task is the high-yield frost seed issue." Muria nodded in satisfaction at the Northern Grand Dukes, who either surrendered or chose to leave.
Soon, through the channels of the Church of the Good Gods, Muria invited six legendary archdruids, all of whom were nature-friendly and skilled in plant modification.
When these archdruids heard Muria's request to grow high-yield crops that could absorb frost power in the frozen land of the North, they were so impressed by his idea that they halved their fees. Admiration aside, they couldn't work for free, could they?
Even with the fee halved, it was still an enormous sum. However, Muria no longer cared about money. The Stargate connecting to the Soros locust world had been completed, and resources from the other world were being continuously extracted and transported to Synapse. After processing, they were sold directly to the Deep Blue Chamber of Commerce—partly to repay debts and partly to obtain various necessary resources.
Under Muria's support and leadership, dragon hunters in the North were quickly eradicated. The profession, related techniques, and weapon manufacturing methods of dragon hunters were nearly extinct, becoming forbidden knowledge in the North. Simultaneously, Claudia swiftly completed her unification of the North.
Without legendary support at the top, the people at the bottom had no chance of resistance. They could only passively accept being ruled by dragons. All resisters were killed to intimidate the remaining populace. At the beginning of the rule, no mercy was allowed.
The first task of the newly established Northern Kingdom under Claudia was to send powerful monsters to collect various frost plants that could grow freely on the continent, with high yield, large quantity, easy propagation, and short cycles as the criteria. These seeds were all transported to the plant research institute in Synapse.
The six legendary archdruids invited by Muria jointly researched and cultivated frost crop seeds that ordinary humans could plant on a large scale. Under the research of these legends, Muria's desired seeds quickly yielded results and were initially planted.
With the initial success of the frost hybrid crop seeds, Muria assisted the newly established Northern Kingdom in their second task. The White Dragon Legion led by Claudia, along with the surrendered Northern human legends and many soul-intent level powerhouses, began moving mountains and filling seas.
For the first time in the history of the Deprosian Subcontinent, legendary power was used on a large scale to transform the living environment. Impassable mountains were destroyed by legends and transported to deep ravines...
Former natural barriers became open roads, and countless deadly places for mortals were turned into habitable areas. Using legendary power to transform nature, in Muria's eyes, this was the true application of legendary power.
Bone-chilling wind blew across the flat ice field, where blue and white ice rice, absorbing frost power, swayed like a rolling sea. Each stalk of ice rice was heavy with shimmering, crystalline ice grains.
"It's time to leave." Muria smiled with satisfaction at the sight of the bountiful harvest. Ice crystal rice, the result of three years of joint research by several legendary archdruids.
This rice might not look special, but it could survive and grow in extreme climates, with a very fast growth cycle, yielding two crops a year.
The ice crystal rice could basically meet the normal food needs of all ordinary humans in the North. With the ice fields specially cultivated by the legends, supporting a population of one billion was not yet possible, but it was not out of reach. This was just the first type of grain crop; the archdruids' research had not stopped.
"It's time to head to the next continent!" The Synapse, which had been stationary above the Frost White Dragon City for several years, began to move again. This time, with more than ten percent of its completion, the Synapse's movement speed was several times faster than before arriving on this frosty continent. Now, the Synapse no longer worried about construction resources.
Due to Muria's thick-skinned and ruthless nature, three legendary wizards were now overseeing the transformation of the cloud island, making the progress incomparable to before.
...
"Work, work every day. When will it ever end?" Hank, exhausted from a day's work of rune proofreading, dragged his tired body out of the rune factory and looked up at the sky.
It wasn't the blue sky, but a huge city suspended in the air—the original cloud island. They blocked the sky, preventing Hank from seeing the sun.
He couldn't remember how long it had been since he had seen the sun. He was in the lower cloud island, also known as the Island of Sin. There was no concept of night here, only eternal daylight. The people here had only six hours of rest and meal time each day. The rest of the time was all work; they had no concept of entertainment.
"Those bigwigs up there don't care about our lives. Three people in my rune factory died of overwork this month. They don't even get the stipulated rest time. These damned exploiters, vampires," Hank silently cursed. Every night before he went to sleep, he regretted choosing to become a pirate and then being unlucky enough to be caught by the Synapse's Punishment Legion and thrown into the Island of Sin for repetitive work, supposedly to atone for his crimes.
The Synapse's policies were flawless. With his current bronze-level fighting spirit, six hours of rest a day was more than enough.
But where there is a policy, there is a countermeasure. The fat manager of their rune factory, for the sake of rewards and performance, disregarded their lives, making them work overtime in every possible way, treating them as consumables.
Even so, not a single one of these villains dared to resist. Hank, full of depression and frustration, looked up and quickly knelt, for a red dragon exuding a scorching aura was flying overhead.
Here, so-called resistance offered no hope. Resistance was just a way to choose to end oneself. However, after a demon openly appeared before these villains recently, no one dared to end their lives easily anymore.
Having their souls fall into the hands of a demon after death was the most hopeless thing. Whether in life or death, they were exploited by the Synapse.
Soon, after a short walk, Hank returned to his home—a cramped thirty-square-meter space. According to the Synapse's regulations, as long as he did not commit any crimes, no one was allowed to enter without his permission. Of course, Hank treated this regulation as a joke; as a prisoner, he had no personal rights.
However, Hank suddenly felt something was wrong. After unlocking the door, he felt a chill and the usual noise vanished. It became eerily quiet.
"What's going on?" Hank suddenly felt it was difficult to breathe, the air seemed thicker, and he could hear a pin drop.
This was abnormal. Hank knew that in this nearly hundred-meter-high dormitory building, at least five hundred labor prisoners lived. This silence was very unusual.
He hesitated, then slowly opened the door and walked in. The ordinary wooden furniture, a single bed with a white sheet—everything seemed normal.
Except for the man sitting at his tea table, sipping tea. Hearing the noise, the man slowly raised his head and smiled strangely at Hank.
"Hubble, how can you be here?" Seeing the man, Hank took a step back, his face showing undisguised horror.
This seemed normal. Hubble was a former pirate on the same ship as Hank, and after being caught and sent to the Synapse, they were both assigned to the same rune factory. They would chat in each
other's homes during their breaks.
But this was the greatest aberration. This guy had died of overwork three days ago. Because of the fat manager's ruthless exploitation and processing demands, his only companion had died.
Taking a deep breath, Hank looked up again, and the burly man had vanished. It was as if everything he had just seen was an illusion.
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