Volume 31, Chapter 411.2: Black Dragon Reverse Scale

Huo Yuhao silently left the Slaughtering Grounds after cultivating until the morning of the second day. The Three-Headed Scarlet Devilmastiff was already waiting for him. The Scarlet King escorted him as he left the Great Star Dou Forest and rushed towards Shrek Academy.

As his cultivation increased, he was now able to fly using his soul power. However, using soul tools helped him to better conserve his soul power.

After fifteen minutes, he reached Shrek City.

From the sky, it was clear that the city was under busy re-construction. The original Shrek City had become a fortification, and the new city now expanded out from it. Far from the city, the Spirit Pagoda was already nearly complete. It was a huge tower! As the headquarters of the Spirit Pagoda, Shrek Academy had spent a lot of effort to construct the tower. The tower was in a hexagonal shape, and covered more than a thousand square meters. According to the plan, the tower would be thirteen stories and two hundred meters high. It would be big enough to hold more than ten thousand people.

This was all for the future development of the Spirit Pagoda. Currently, there weren’t even a hundred staff members at the Spirit Pagoda, and this number was unlikely to change in the short-term.

Not far from the Spirit Pagoda was the new designated region of Shrek City. Right now, the outlines of the new city walls were already being constructed along the perimeter. As the scale was too large, the construction of the city walls wouldn’t be complete anytime soon, only an area was being sketched out right now. However, even so, it was possible to tell how grand the city would be.

Hopefully Shrek City will become stronger and stronger in the future! Huo Yuhao revealed a smile on his face. At least my efforts have not been wasted over the past three months! If not for the fact that he had come to an agreement with the Great Star Dou Forest, how would Shrek City dare to carry out such a large expansion?

During the last beast tide, the Tang Sect’s soul tools drew the most attention, especially those two thousand stationary soul cannon shells. Their value couldn’t be measured with money.

After the beast tide ended, the Tang Sect was immediately promoted to a strategic partner of Shrek Academy after a decision was made during a conference of the Sea God’s Pavilion. In addition, both the Sect and the Academy worked closely with each other. It was no longer like it was in the past, where the Sect was sort of a subsidiary of the Academy. The Tang Sect’s position was recognized by the entire Academy for the first time.

To thank the Tang Sect for their contribution during the beast tide, the Sea God’s Pavilion made an unprecedented decision: they offered the Sect a position in the Sea God’s Pavilion! This position naturally wasn’t offered to Huo Yuhao, since he was already a member of the Sea God’s Pavilion. Rather, it was given to the leader of the sect, Bei Bei.

As of now, the Tang Sect had two members in the Sea God’s Pavilion!

This wasn’t just beneficial in terms of reputation. Shrek Academy had already informed the Tang Sect that the Sect could pick a base of their own after Shrek City was rebuilt. This would allow the Tang Sect to expand their influence in Shrek City.

By the time the Spirit Pagoda was fully constructed, the scale of Shrek City and the effect of the pagoda on its prosperity was going to be very great. In such a prosperous city, Shrek Academy was very generous in allowing the Tang Sect to choose a base of their own in the city. Furthermore, the Academy had already fully paid off the debt that they owed the Tang Sect. While they hadn’t paid for the two thousand stationary soul cannon shells, they gave the Tang Sect a form. After Xuan Ziwen received this form, he smiled very widely.

There was an inventory list on this form, which included all sorts of rare metals. It comprised roughly fifty percent of all the rare metals that the three empires were willing to supply to the Academy.

The benefits of Spirits for soul masters had been fully revealed after many experiments. Although Shrek Academy was very generous, they weren’t overly generous! Shrek City’s development required a large amount of money and resources.

As a result, the Sea God’s Pavilion had already raised a few terms and conditions when they negotiated with the envoys of the three empires.

Huo Yuhao had yet to impart the contract of equals. These terms and conditions were naturally regarded as stepping stones for spiritual-type soul masters from the various empires to join the Spirit Pagoda.

Shrek Academy had indeed incurred huge losses resisting the beast tide. Furthermore, the three empires were also not affected at all, because Shrek Academy had resisted the beast tide for them. From the tragic state of the battlefield, it was obvious that Shrek Academy had utilized a lot of resources to fight. It was only right for the three empires to offer them some aid.

In this way, both parties were happy. As the Tang Sect had made very special contributions, they were offered half of the rare metals. Teacher Xuan was finally pleased, given that he was extremely heartbroken after losing more than two thousand stationary cannon shells.

Of course, the Academy did make a new request of the Sect, which was that they had to prioritize the supply of soul tools to equip Shrek City and the Shrek City Defense Army.

Tapping into this opportunity, the Shrek City Defense Army started to expand for the first time in its history. It originally consisted of ten thousand people, but it was about to be expanded to fifty thousand. Among these fifty thousand people, thirty-five thousand ordinary soldiers would be recruited, and the remaining slots were to be filled up by recruiting soul masters and soul engineers.

The City Defense Army had suffered huge losses during this battle and many were wounded. More than twenty-five hundred people lost their lives. Fortunately, the ratio of soul masters and soul engineers who had lost their lives was relatively low.

This time, the City Defense Army recruited people from all over the continent. The news was being disseminated, and interested applicants would be screened in batches and recruited within the next six months.

After the Shrek City Defense Army managed to fight off the beast tide, its reputation was greatly boosted. The minimum requirements needed to join the army were naturally raised. In addition, Shrek City treated its army very well. Many people started to arrive from different places to apply for a position in the City Defense Army.

Spirits had also become very popular among the three empires in the Douluo Continent. Shrek City and Shrek Academy’s reputation improved greatly from all this talk about Spirits. The greatest pull factor for people wanting to join the City Defense Army was that they would be given priority to use the Spirit Pagoda.

Just this benefit alone was able to draw many soul masters to apply to join the City Defense Army!

Shrek Academy managed to greatly maximize their benefits because of this Spirits issue. The three empires didn’t know what to say about this.

Not long ago, the Spirit Pagoda had announced that it could only cater to two hundred soul masters every month, as it had just been established. This number would increase in the future, but this was the best they could do now.

On the one hand, it was because of the lack of soul beasts being supplied by the Great Star Dou Forest. On the other, the Spirit Transmission Masters had only just learned about contracts, and they weren’t very fluid with the process yet. They needed time to accumulate experience.

Furthermore, the pagoda was still under construction. As a result, the Spirit Pagoda decided that there could only be this number of Spirit Transmissions every month at Huo Yuhao’s request. At the very least, this number wouldn’t increase until after the pagoda was fully constructed.

At the same time, the Spirit Pagoda also disseminated another piece of information to reassure the Great Star Dou Forest. Huo Yuhao was the one who directly disseminated this information. It was very simple: it publicly announced Huo Yuhao’s earlier guess, and informed all soul masters that Spirits could give them more than one soul ring. As a result, one could obtain more soul rings if they suppressed their soul power.

The point of this information was to make soul masters less anxious about obtaining soul rings, and to accumulate their abilities instead. In this way, they would be less inclined to hurt soul beasts.

After these two pieces of information were disseminated, the existence of the Spirit Pagoda was quickly made known to the three empires of the Douluo Continent. There was a sudden rush of soul masters into Shrek City as a result of this news.

Shrek Academy had yet to begin its recruitment of new students, but many sects had already sent their disciples over to participate in Shrek Academy’s tests. Those who were over the age limit applied to the Shrek City Defense Army.

Their arrival caused Shrek City to become even more prosperous. Although it would take a long time to rebuild and develop the city, its bright future was evident from the people who had rushed over.

Huo Yuhao made some calculations, and came to a conclusion: it would take at most three years for Shrek City to rebuild. Even though only a portion of the soul masters that applied to join the City Defense Army would be retained, the entire city was bound to experience great changes if the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy’s Soul Engineering Department were given three years. When the time came, Di Tian wouldn’t be able to threaten Shrek Academy anymore, even if he unleashed another beast tide.

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As he was about to enter Shrek City’s airspace, Huo Yuhao descended from the sky. Although Shrek City didn’t have clear aerial restrictions like the three empires, no soul master or soul engineer would fly above Shrek City unless there was some kind of special situation, out of respect for Shrek.

Huo Yuhao entered Shrek Academy from the east gate.

Recently, he had become very reputable. When he entered the Academy, he was already recognized by the students. Before his juniors could come up to him, Huo Yuhao quickened his footsteps and hurried off. As he waved his hands to acknowledge them, he quickly rushed towards Sea God’s Lake. He moved forward above the water’s surface and reached the inner courtyard.

As a member of the Sea God’s Pavilion, he could enter the pavilion freely, and this was what he did.

He stopped in his tracks when he arrived in front of the Sea God’s Pavilion. When he saw the Golden Tree, which was glowing dimly, he kneeled down once again and kowtowed three times before walking into the Sea God’s Pavilion.

“Yuhao? Di Tian was willing to let you out?” Elder Xuan was surprised. Very soon, a few elders in the Sea God’s Pavilion rushed down to the main hall.

“Greetings, elders!” Huo Yuhao hailed them respectfully.

Elder Xuan chortled and said, “You don’t have to stand on ceremony with us! Moreover, you are also a member of the Sea God’s Pavilion. How’s it going on Di Tian’s side? Why was he willing to let you out? Didn’t you say that you control the destiny of the entire Great Star Dou Forest? We were still discussing how we should go about saving you!”