The enormous Thousand-Legion Ant Hill had already settled firmly at the center of the cavern.
It had begun producing black ants endlessly.
"If it ever breaks free from the seal," Akasei said calmly, "I'll come immediately and kill it."
"A Nation-Destroyer–class monster cannot be allowed to walk freely in this world."
Inside a dungeon, it was one thing.
But if creatures like that were allowed to step outside…
Then the words Nation Destroyer would no longer be just a title.
"Mm. I understand."
Kanzaki Rei waved his hand.
A sea of fire and dense thorny vines appeared around the ant hill, forming a complete ring.
The moment a black ant hatched—
it was instantly incinerated into ash.
For the foreseeable future, he would be able to come here again and again to harvest souls.
"So," Akasei said with a grin, hands behind his head, "what's the plan now?"
"Got any ideas, Rei?"
Rei smiled.
"What about you, Akasei? What are you planning?"
Akasei rolled up his sleeves.
"What else? We keep grinding dungeons, of course!"
"On the way out earlier, I took a look around the surrounding terrain. I've already memorized every Tier-4 dungeon nearby."
Rei laughed brightly.
"Sounds good."
Now that the matter of souls had been settled, a heavy burden lifted from his mind.
The two left the cave.
After exiting, Akasei tossed a Blacksteel gate slab over the entrance, then pulled out another scroll and sealed the place completely.
Iz's scrolls really were convenient.
Scrolls allowed people who couldn't cast magic to use magical effects.
As for the power of a scroll, it depended entirely on the person who created it.
Scrolls left behind by Iz Palt…
There was probably no way to buy something like that on the open market.
After sealing the location securely,
the two of them proceeded to clear dozens of dungeons together.
Now that he had the Thousand-Legion Ant Hill as a reliable source of souls, Rei became far more extravagant with his sacrifices.
Previously, he always worried about sacrificing too many souls and running out.
Even though weaker monsters would multiply,
the return still rarely covered the cost.
But now—
whenever they encountered a Tier-4 dungeon, Rei would immediately sacrifice 50,000 souls in one go.
If the efficiency decayed, so be it.
The point was simple.
He had souls to spare.
Rei had tried sacrificing 100,000 souls once.
But the diminishing returns were simply too severe.
Only twelve Nation-Destroyer–class monsters were created.
Double the sacrifice—
yet only two more monsters appeared.
That was far too inefficient.
Coming out with Akasei had unquestionably been the right choice.
If Rei had tried to kill these Tier-4 Nation-Destroyer monsters himself,
he would have been exhausted to death.
But now—
with a Level-6 warrior leading the way—
Rei simply followed behind and collected the rewards.
One person opened the path.
The other harvested the profit.
Their division of labor was crystal clear.
Before long, the two of them had cleared every Tier-4 dungeon throughout the Thousand Caves of the Distant Frontier region.
A total of 56 Tier-4 dungeons.
The materials they obtained were worth over 120 million gold coins.
Split evenly—
each person received 60 million.
"Holy…"
Akasei stared at his storage space.
Mountains of materials had piled up like towering hills.
"We really struck it rich."
Normally, even after searching for months, adventurers might not encounter a single Nation-Destroyer monster.
Now?
Each run yielded ten of them.
In remote wilderness areas rarely touched by humans, it was possible for wild Tier-4 or Tier-5 monsters to appear.
But even reaching the King-class level was already extremely rare.
Let alone Nation-Destroyer level.
While those monsters posed immense danger to humanity—
they were also incredibly difficult to find.
Even Tier-5 dungeons were hard to locate under normal circumstances.
Afterward, Rei visited several Tier-3 dungeons to experiment with new ideas using souls.
Soul Sacrifice could also directly enhance monsters.
However—
after enhancement, the monster still didn't obey his control, and its tier or rank couldn't be raised directly.
The rewards didn't increase either.
It was basically equivalent to casting something like a Berserk buff.
At the moment, it seemed fairly useless.
Aside from the Thousand-Legion Ant Hill, they also encountered several monsters that appeared exclusively during the War Moon.
But none of them possessed abilities comparable to the ant hill.
After numerous experiments,
the sun gradually sank toward the horizon.
If he had to evaluate the day—
this had been the most satisfying hunt Akasei had ever experienced.
The only unfortunate thing?
It wasn't the Harvest Moon.
If it were the Harvest Moon—
their gains would have multiplied several times over.
Rei shared the same thought.
Once you experienced the Harvest Moon even once,
you would never forget that sensation.
Sitting together on a hillside,
the two exchanged a glance.
Akasei grinned.
"Celebrate a bit?"
Rei nodded.
"Let's go."
"But before that…"
"Let me collect the souls first."
Akasei brought Rei back to the sealed location.
Rei opened the sealed gate.
Immediately—
a black swarm of ants surged toward him.
A raging wave of flames instantly surged inward.
The sea of fire clung to every inch of the cave entrance, pushing forward as it burned everything inside.
Rei's soul count skyrocketed.
Earlier, sacrificing the 56 Tier-4 dungeons had consumed 2.8 million souls.
Now—
in just a few moments, the loss was completely recovered.
「Souls — 10,000,000」「Souls — 20,000,000」「Souls — 30,000,000」「Souls — 35,220,000」
In such a short time,
more than thirty million black ants had already been born.
The Thousand-Legion Ant Hill truly lived up to its reputation as a Nation-Destroyer monster.
If allowed to grow freely in the outside world for a while,
it would eventually produce hundreds of millions of ants—
a limitless army that would blanket the skies and earth,
impossible to exterminate,
capable of erasing entire nations.
Unfortunately—
while the quantity of these black ants was enormous,
their quality was extremely low.
The strongest ants produced were only Tier-3.
Of course—
if the ant hill could produce higher-tier ants, it would be utterly terrifying.
The strength difference between Tier-4 and Tier-3 monsters was simply too vast.
"But… hasn't the monster tide around here grown thinner again?" Rei asked while scanning the surroundings.
Akasei also looked up toward the sky.
"Yeah."
"This Thousand-Legion Ant Hill actually has that kind of effect, huh?"
Rei nodded thoughtfully.
"Maybe that's actually a good thing."
If the monster tide in a region grew too dense, they could place the Thousand-Legion Ant Hill there.
It would convert the dense monster tide into low-tier black ants.
At the same time, it would prevent powerful monsters from forming within the tide.
What was this?
Biological pest control?
However—
after the monster tide became thinner,
the ant hill's production speed slowed somewhat.
Still, this was the wilderness.
Monster tides replenished themselves as quickly as air.
There was no need to worry too much.
As long as it continued producing black ants,
its output would never be too slow.
At this rate,
over the next few days,
harvesting hundreds of millions of souls should be effortless.
The souls of these black ants were classified as:
Tier: Nearly Puppet-Like Empty Spirituality
That was probably the lowest possible category.
Rei experimented by not activating Exalted Soul, using only the ants' original soul energy to ignite Soul Explosion.
Nothing exploded in midair.
It was comparable to a silent fart.
Not even a sound.
But when using Exalted Soul, a 1-soul Soul Explosion could instantly snap the trunk of a giant tree.
In terms of raw power,
it surpassed ordinary Tier-2 spells.
However—
10 souls only produced five times the power of 1 soul.
100 souls produced roughly twenty-five times the power.
1,000 souls produced around seventy-five times the power.
5,000 souls produced only about 150 times the power.
Although increasing the number of souls did increase the damage,
the diminishing returns were obvious.
There were clearly many subtleties regarding how souls could be used.
If an ordinary Death Priest wanted to explore those secrets…
how many people would they need to kill just for experimentation?
…
Collect the souls.
Seal the chamber again.
Tomorrow—
he would return to harvest new souls.
After returning to the City Within the Circle, Rei stretched his body.
What a bountiful harvest today.
"Akasei, shouldn't we go sell the goods at the Adventurers' Guild?" Rei asked.
Akasei replied casually.
"What are you talking about? There's no way the Adventurers' Guild could swallow a shipment that large."
"We're going to a specialized merchant consortium."
Within their Legendary Adventuring Party, Akasei had always been responsible for handling loot sales.
After all—
he was the gatherer of the team.
This kind of thing was his specialty.
[Myriad Goods Consortium]
Rei remembered seeing their sign earlier on the street—
Myriad Goods Emporium.
Apparently they sold literally everything.
The guard at the entrance opened the door for Akasei.
Akasei strode inside confidently.
"Boss!"
"I've come to sell goods."
The merchant hall glittered with gold and crystal, exuding an atmosphere of dignified luxury.
The moment the owner heard the familiar voice,
he hurried out from somewhere inside,
greeting them with great respect.
"Brother Akasei!"
"It's been a long time since you honored us with your presence! What treasures have you brought this time?"
Akasei patted the man's shoulder.
"This is Rei. The boss here's from the same hometown as me—we're both from the Vanyuan Continent."
Rei had heard him mention it before.
In short—
it was another continent entirely.
The place they were currently in was called the Rylen Continent.
Rei smiled and greeted him.
"Nice to meet you, Boss."
Before the owner could ask about Rei's background,
Akasei continued patting his shoulder.
"The goods I'm selling this time…"
"You might not be able to afford them."
The owner laughed.
"Brother Akasei, you must be joking. Our Myriad Goods Consortium is one of the most famous merchant houses on the entire Rylen Continent."
"What goods could possibly be beyond our capacity?"
Akasei seemed very satisfied with that response.
The two chatted as they walked toward the transaction hall.
Clearly, Akasei was extremely familiar with the place.
According to him,
this VVVIP reception trading hall was only opened for important figures of his caliber.
The prestige sounded impressive—
but coming from his mouth,
it somehow felt a bit less dignified.
The trading hall was absurdly large.
Even after the three of them sat down,
a vast open area still remained.
"Brother Akasei," the owner said with a grin, "won't you show your goods so this humble man can widen his horizons?"
Despite looking significantly older than Akasei,
he still addressed him as "big brother."
"Haha! Of course."
Akasei raised his hand and waved it casually.
BOOM!
The entire floor trembled violently.
Mountains of materials instantly appeared,
filling the entire open space of the trading hall.
"This… is only a small portion."
The owner's eyelids twitched.
The trading hall had been built this large specifically so merchants could display massive shipments.
Yet—
even this enormous hall seemed barely enough.
"Th-This… this…"
"Eyes of the Shadow-Veil Bird, Stellar-Pattern Blood, the Third Eye of the Daylight Titan…"
"These are all materials harvested from Nation-Destroyer monsters?!"
"Yep!"
Akasei tossed him several storage bags.
"Check for yourself. This place is too small to hold everything."
The owner's eyelids twitched again.
Too small?
This hall could easily hold the entire corpses of ten Nation-Destroyer monsters.
And that was considered small?
Still muttering internally,
he opened the storage bags and inspected the contents.
The moment he looked inside—
he inhaled sharply.
Materials from Nation-Destroyer monsters were piled up like mountains.
And they weren't useless carcasses either—
every item was valuable material:
bones, blood, eyes…
As the Vice President of the merchant consortium, he had seen countless treasures.
He recognized most of these materials.
However—
many of them he had only read about in books, never seen in person.
Fortunately, thanks to his Scholar class, he could match each physical item to the knowledge stored in his mind.
Yet even as a Scholar—
there were still several materials he couldn't identify.
"How many monsters… are represented here?"
"All of them Tier-4 Nation-Destroyer monsters?"
Akasei spread his hands.
"There are also some Lord-class and King-class corpses mixed in there."
"I didn't bother processing those. Just price them however you want."
The owner's mouth twitched.
For a moment, he didn't even know how to respond.
After a quick estimate—
there were roughly 580 Nation-Destroyer monsters worth of materials.
Some materials were harder to determine; it wasn't clear whether they came from one corpse or two.
But the number 580 was roughly correct.
Wait.
Where did so many Nation-Destroyer monsters come from?
Throughout the entire history of the Rylen Continent,
only five Tier-4 Nation-Destroyers had ever appeared.
You could count them on one hand.
And now you sit down here—
casually throw out a pile—
580 monsters' worth?
What are you running?
A breeding farm?
"AAA Wholesale Nation-Destroyer Monsters?"
The owner steadied his emotions before speaking.
"With such a massive shipment, Brother Akasei, you understand we must follow certain procedures."
"Inspection, appraisal, valuation…"
Akasei waved his hand.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. Just go ahead and do it."
"I'm well aware of how much these goods are worth."
Akasei showed no concern about them attempting tricks or manipulation.
If they knew a few methods—
then his Level-6 warrior also knew a few battle techniques.
By this time, a maid had already served premium tea.
"Brother Akasei," the owner asked carefully, "may I ask where these Nation-Destroyer monsters… came from?"
Akasei answered without hesitation.
"That has nothing to do with you."
"It's a secret of the high-rank professional world."
Oh.
High-rank professionals.
Did that include him, a Level-2 Mage / Level-1 Death Priest?
The owner sighed.
"…Very well."
"But Brother Akasei, there are a few things I must say beforehand."
"If such a large volume of Nation-Destroyer materials enters the market, it will inevitably impact prices."
"If everything is released at once, the value will drop significantly."
Rei could understand that.
After all—
if something rare suddenly appeared in hundreds of times the normal quantity, its price couldn't possibly remain unchanged.
"To maximize profit," the owner continued, "these goods will likely need to be sold gradually over time."
"The capital will take a long period to circulate back."
"For this batch of goods, my rough estimate is 100 million gold coins. How does that sound?"
"Of course, this is the minimum price I can promise you."
That was a 25% reduction.
Akasei spoke calmly.
"120 million."
"If you accept that price, I'll continue supplying your consortium with more Nation-Destroyer materials."
"If you refuse…"
"I'll just go sell them next door."
Oh?
Not bad.
Looks like Akasei knew how to negotiate after all.
Maybe he wasn't as simple-minded as he appeared.
The owner clenched his teeth.
He and Akasei weren't really close acquaintances.
This was purely a seller-buyer relationship.
If one merchant house offered a poor price,
the goods would simply be sold to another consortium.
Different merchant houses offered better prices for different materials.
For example—
the Radiant Gem Consortium paid premium prices for gem-type materials, since they could extract greater profits from them.
Meanwhile, the Full Armament Consortium offered generous prices for materials suitable for heavy weapons and armor.
As for the Myriad Goods Consortium—
they bought everything.
But their prices…
were often somewhat average compared to specialized guilds.
..
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