LIGHTNOVELWORLD Chapter 209: "You've taken the trouble.
"And beneath, I've laid a great swath of reeds and cotton to ensure that falling in won't cause any injuries."
"This is the labyrinth entrance I've designed."
"..."
After a long silence, Hungry Monkey finally gave a thumbs up, "You've put a lot of effort into this."
He didn't know what to say, so he chose not to say anything at all.
...
Later, when Yuan Buping and Miao along with others followed this entrance successfully into the underground palace, he also started to showcase the fruits of his labor over these days. It was evident that he had indeed put in a lot of effort—there were ventilation ducts, emergency passages, and everything that was necessary was in place.
The entire underground area had nearly been hollowed out.
While all the living amenities were not yet fully provided, spaces for these amenities had already been allotted.
One could imagine that over countless days and nights, Yuan Buping and his men had started excavating this underground palace, putting in the hard work. Although it was still in its infancy, one could already see quite a lot.
The excavated space was around the size of fifty square rooms, with a height of over three meters.
Though it sounds small, considering the need for secrecy, this space was dug out by Yuan Buping and his crew bit by bit, which makes it quite significant.
After all of this was done, Chen Miao left the underground palace and returned to his own tomb chamber, continuing to sleep and adjust the market. Ever since he had woken from the dream, for some reason, he always felt extremely exhausted.
He just wanted to sleep.
It was a good thing the recent time difference was off—it allowed him to catch up on sleep and readjust.
...
The next day, daylight broke.
Eight in the morning.
Chen Miao at last woke up. After freshening up, he stood at the entrance of his tomb chamber, smoking a cigarette as part of his morning routine, while watching the news from Zhenba City. Everything was still under the control of the Federation. The progress in the second phase of the Sea of Human Suffering had increased significantly, but it was still manageable.
However, it was worth mentioning that—
Many native residents of Zhenba City had taken flight. Even though Zhenba City, which was not the Federal Capital City, had a population of 2 million, even after hundreds of thousands had died, there still remained over a million people.
Out of this million-plus population, several hundreds of thousands fled Zhenba City overnight.
Some thought that Zhenba City had become too chaotic recently and sought to find a safer place to preserve their lives.
Others had their livelihoods in Zhenba City ripped apart, leaving nothing to hold onto, so they simply left for other cities in search of better opportunities.
But—
The majority left because they had seized quite a bit of Blessing in the second phase and, for safety, opted to flee straight away.
For them, three to five blessings were enough. Coveting too many could make them too conspicuous, and if they were caught or executed on the spot, it would be a devastating loss.
"Blessing..."
Chen Miao's eyes narrowed slightly. By now, he had completely awakened from that dream and began to sort through the recent events he had experienced. Blessing wasn't equivalent to Luck Value.
Having an abundance of Blessing didn't necessarily mean your luck would improve.
How should I put it? It's like a person's whole life is mostly made up of three scenarios:
Exceptionally good luck, completely ordinary, or exceptionally bad luck.
For most people, their lives are predominantly ordinary, with only a few individuals experiencing either exceptionally good or bad luck with unusual frequency.
And this 'Blessing' is like something that can help increase the frequency of 'exceptionally good luck' scenarios.
It seems to sound no different from Luck Value, but actually, there is an essential difference.
It can't increase your personal Luck Value, but only helps you increase the frequency of having "particularly good luck".
"Born at an inopportune time."
At this point, Hungry Monkey and others also came to their senses and glanced at the translucent panel in front of Miao, made some emotional remarks after seeing the news on it: "We are just in Fengtian City, if we had arrived in Zhenba City before the advent of the Sea of Human Suffering."
"I can't even imagine how blissful that would be."
"With Miao's ability, harvesting tens of thousands of Blessing wouldn't that be a breeze? I can't even imagine, when a person's Blessing reaches into the tens of thousands, what kind of existence would that be? Isn't that just purely a terrestrial immortal?"
"The kind who picks up money just by walking."
"Isn't that vision a bit narrow?"
Yuan Buping fantasized with longing on his face, "Wouldn't it mean picking up a wife, discovering that she's the richest woman in the world, then she madly falls in love with you, allowing you to reach the summit of the world in one fell swoop?"
Chen Miao paid no attention to the others and continued to sort through the recent events, as well as inventory his latest gains.
Two things needed to be dealt with promptly.
Perfectly passing through a Level E secret realm would allow his Nothingness Space to level up again.
It was important to get his character level up to 20 as soon as possible so as to unlock the panel for the Level S Taboo Item "Life of Degradation".
These two tasks were his current main quests. Of course, before that, he needed to find a place that was quiet and hidden enough, as he was about to begin hoarding supplies on a large scale.
"Did you find the location I asked you to look for yesterday?"
"Found it."
Seeing that Miao began talking business, Hungry Monkey spoke seriously, "The northernmost point of the Land of Extreme Cold has a place that's extremely suitable for our existence. That area is absolutely hidden, so hidden in fact that there isn't even a map of it."
"Even satellites can't observe that section."
"That place has become much colder after the world underwent Transcendentalization; it used to be somewhat normal, but now the whole world has changed a lot. The clouds over there have been frozen solid, with countless thunderclouds hovering in the sky all year round."
"Some clouds are frozen solid, while others can be passed through normally."
"Flying into the clouds is entirely up to luck, you never know whether the clump of clouds in front of you is like a lump of iron. Countless raindrops are frozen mid-air and then land on these frozen thunderclouds, causing that part of the sky to be consistently overcast all year long, completely isolated from the world."
"And absolutely concealed."
"..."
Before Miao could respond, Yuan Buping spoke up tentatively, "Although Miao told you not to consider living conditions, we should at least find a place where people can survive, right? Can people live in that kind of place?"
Chen Miao didn't seem to mind that, and instead turned to look at Hungry Monkey: "How did you find out about this place?"
"Here."
With evident pride, Hungry Monkey slowly opened his browser page.
A line of text appeared prominently on the browser.
"Exposed! Blue Star's top ten uninhabited no-go zones! The first place is so inhospitable not even gods can live there, and nine out of ten people don't know it!"
"Number ten: Secluded Island."
"Number nine: ..."
"Number one: The deepest part of the Land of Extreme Cold!"
That's right, this was an article, the kind of ubiquitous clickbait content you often see, which typically earns money by luring readers in with sensationalist headlines for platform traffic monetization.
And Hungry Monkey seemed somewhat pleased with his own cleverness, still discussing his thought process: "Yesterday, Miao asked me to find a new place, absolutely secluded, and with no need to consider living conditions."