Chapter 1 Northern Fortress

Earth-core Mountains, Northern Fortress.

The moment Shi Feng logged in, the once sparsely populated streets had become bustling with activity. He could even see large numbers of guild members from Dragonheart City, who had booked out the fortress's hotels as temporary residences, making the entire Northern Fortress no less lively than an ordinary city.

It was almost certain that the Northern Fortress would become the center of the entire Earth-core Mountains.

The Zero Wing Residence was overflowing with people. Many free players from Dragonheart City wanted to join Zero Wing to gain the benefit of free rest in the Northern Fortress, keeping Hei Zi and the others busy.

"Guild Leader, you're back." Aqua Rose, who was processing documents in the office, saw Shi Feng enter and asked with some concern, "How did things go with the Fang family?"

Although she wasn't in Windridge City, she knew the Fang family's status there. Now that the Fang family had come knocking, they definitely didn't have good intentions. Zero Wing had only just started in Windridge City, and if it were targeted by the Fang family, Zero Wing's great prospects in God's Domain would be greatly affected.

Especially now that almost all the major powers understood the value of training centers and martial arts schools. Many guilds not only cooperated with well-known training centers and martial arts schools, but some even started their own, cultivating their own talents for the guild and enhancing the guild's members' levels and reputation.

This led to training centers and martial arts schools in various places being closely linked to the major guilds, making it difficult for Zero Wing to gain a foothold in other cities. They could only rely on the Tiandou Training Center to cultivate talent and provide fresh blood for Zero Wing.

"It's nothing, they just wanted to acquire Zero Wing and we didn't come to an agreement." Shi Feng waved his hand.

"That's terrible!" Aqua Rose looked speechlessly at Shi Feng, who seemed unaffected. "The Fang family controls the Qilin Consortium, and Windridge City is their base of operations. If they want to take action against us, it's as easy as pie. They only need to contact the major training centers and martial arts schools in Windridge City and directly suppress our prices, and I'm afraid no one will go to the Tiandou Training Center anymore."

The Tiandou Training Center was now Zero Wing's main source of talent. If no one went there, they wouldn't be able to absorb new talent. Moreover, with the Fang family's financial resources, poaching new talent from the Tiandou Training Center with high prices wouldn't be difficult.

At that time, the Tiandou Training Center wouldn't be able to provide talent for Zero Wing, but would instead become a huge burden. After all, the funds needed to operate the Tiandou Training Center every day weren't a small amount.

"Don't worry, Zero Wing isn't what it used to be." Shi Feng's lips curled into a smile. "If they want to eat us, they'll have to see if they have teeth good enough! How is the construction of the shops in the fortress going?"

"It's done, but renting out shops in the Northern Fortress probably won't earn much money. After all, the Northern Fortress is just a medium-sized fortress, and it can't accommodate many people," Aqua Rose said. "So far, few forces that have come to the Northern Fortress have mentioned shops. Most of them want to rent our hotels long-term."

Shops were indeed attractive to the major forces, but there was a prerequisite: they needed a large population. With the population of the Northern Fortress, it would be difficult to rent them out at a high price, not to mention that the number of shops was far less than that of guild cities.

In God's Domain's fortress settings, the number of shops was limited. A small fortress could build a hundred shops, while a medium-sized fortress could only build two hundred and forty. This was nothing like guild cities, where it was easy to have thousands of shops.

"It's fine as long as it's done. Prepare now and issue a notice to the outside world," Shi Feng said with a smile. "Say that the Northern Fortress is starting to rent out shops, with a starting price of five million credits per shop per month! A total of two hundred shops will be rented out on a first-come, first-served basis!"

"Guild Leader, you..." Aqua Rose looked at Shi Feng with an expression that said, "Are you crazy?"

Even in Zero Wing City, which currently had the largest population in Zero Wing, it would be difficult to rent out a shop for even one million credits a month, let alone five million credits, especially in the Northern Fortress, which didn't even have a population of fifty thousand, and five million credits was just the starting price...

"Just do it, and you'll naturally know when the time comes." Shi Feng didn't explain, but simply told Aqua Rose to spread the news.

In God's Domain, the most profitable places weren't guild cities, but the fortresses in neutral maps. Because the environment of many neutral maps made it impossible to build guild towns, these fortresses became the main gathering places and resting places for players on neutral maps.

And in the entire God's Domain, free players were the vast majority. If they didn't need the items they obtained in the wild, they would almost always sell them in their resting places, and shops were a good platform for acquisition and storage, especially for storing items that couldn't be put away.

Therefore, fortress shops became one of the main sources of resources on neutral maps.

In addition to having the function of acquiring rare materials and providing storage, neutral map fortress shops also had a hidden benefit.

That was the right to trade special items with neutral map NPC wandering merchants. This was a transaction that could only be carried out if there were shops in the neutral fortress. Without shops, it was impossible to trade.

Of course, it wasn't easy to trade with these wandering merchants. First of all, the fortress itself needed to reach a sufficient level of security to make these wandering merchants willing to come to the fortress.

And the items sold by these wandering merchants were completely different from those sold in shops and by individual players. They were all very precious items for the major forces.

For example, the Advanced Wanderer's Camp, which could be temporarily set up as a resting place on a neutral map. Although it could only be used three times, with a maximum rest of one natural day each time, it could allow a team to fully recover their physical and mental strength, which was a treasure for exploring teams.

In addition to the Advanced Wanderer's Camp, there were also many other special magic scrolls and magic props, each of which was a prop that could allow teams to survive better on neutral maps.

Sometimes, they would even sell super-rare small mobile camps, which were permanent props. Although they could only accommodate a team of one hundred people, they could be used indefinitely, only requiring the consumption of some magic crystals.

These props could be said to be the guarantee for better development on neutral maps.

And a medium-sized fortress was the bottom line for attracting these neutral NPC wandering merchants. This was why the major forces in the previous life were crazy about medium-sized and larger fortresses.

Because a medium-sized fortress on a neutral map was a real gold mine, and they wouldn't hesitate to engage in guild wars for it.

And in order to develop better on neutral maps, the major forces would rent these fortress shops at all costs.

It could be said that as long as there was a fortress on a neutral map, there was no need to worry about not making money, especially the current Northern Fortress, which was the only place in the entire Earth-core Mountains that had return scrolls and long-term residences, and there were still a large number of ancient civilization relics that hadn't been explored.

There was no need to worry about not being able to rent out the shops.

Afterwards, Aqua Rose checked the information and directly released the news about the Northern Fortress shop rentals.