He Fang covered his mouth. What kind of great people were these? They were even greater than the spirit of Angel City back in the day.
Once this knowledge reached his city, it would definitely bring earth-shaking changes to his NPCs. For his city, that would be a groundbreaking leap forward.
“You mean… you’re saying you’re willing to share all your knowledge?” He Fang couldn’t help but confirm once more.
“Yes.” Shi Canghai answered with certainty.
“You don’t want anything in return? You’re so selfless?” He Fang felt that this NPC’s intelligence was simply too perfect.
“All we ask is to better preserve all the documents so that they won’t be lost again.”
He Fang covered his mouth to hide his excitement. He was simply in awe of this city’s spirit. He was already dreaming of the ‘Scholar’ profession appearing in the future.
“Come, come, come. Where do you want to settle down? I’ll mark out a place for you. Do you have enough food? Enough supplies? Do you need us to support you? Is the city’s operational power sufficient? Do you need our help?” He Fang even showed absolute excitement.
Zhu Yan looked at He Fang’s bright, sparkling eyes and found it amusing. On his originally cold and hard expression, there was now a bit more helplessness, like he wanted to soothe his creator’s excitement. He even coughed once, not wanting others to see his expression trying to hide a laugh.
The twins let out a sigh of relief. They knew how important their city was, and people from Hope City would never refuse them.
But there was also a bit of helplessness on the twins’ faces. The moment He Fang saw this expression, his heart sank with a thud.
“What’s wrong? Is there some difficulty?” He Fang asked.
“The knowledge in the library is extensive, and inside the library, basically everyone is educated and possesses knowledge. So the library is not only about preservation. There are also many mobile cities that send many upper-class people to the library to study, and there are materials stored there, too. The library and all the mobile cities are intertwined in countless ways.”
He Fang’s excitement slightly eased. He also knew that this situation was very normal.
An orange-level mission. It couldn’t possibly be that simple.
Shi Sangtian also spoke seriously to He Fang: “In the apocalypse, knowledge is not allowed to be shared with everyone. We chose Mirage precisely because Mirage shares knowledge and also has absolute military power to protect itself. We watched all the promotional videos of your city’s launch. They’re indeed very interesting, but… they do lack a certain weight.”
He Fang nodded. He understood. Although Angel City had pretty good service capabilities, in the end, they were not real scholars.
“The situation with Angel City is enough to prove that knowledge cannot be freely shared. If we take the initiative to join Mirage and get discovered by other mobile cities, to ensure their status isn’t threatened, they will do everything they can to stop us from allying with Mirage.” Shi Canghai’s brows furrowed tightly. “They might even attack us to make sure knowledge is not shared. The Library is a historical city; any abnormal war would be disastrous for the Library. We cannot take part in any conflict.”
He Fang nodded to show he understood. Protecting the Library would be very simple. Just place a Divine Lord statue and two Light Pillars there, and it would be enough. But…
“The situation of the Library will directly affect quite a lot of cities. We want to share, but none of the cities allow us to share. If we join Mirage, then for Mirage and us, it would mean having to make enemies.” Shi Sangtian’s expression was also full of helplessness. “The Library hopes to be a bearer of history, not a fuse for war.”
He Fang was stunned.
Only now did he realize just how thorny this matter was.
Once the initial excitement passed, he now had to think about what kind of consequences the nature of the Library would bring about.
With Hope City’s current conditions, joining the Library would be groundbreaking. But this would also completely shake the entire fixed pattern of mobile cities in the apocalypse.
Only now did He Fang understand why there were so many cities surrounding the Library. They were probably on guard precisely against the possibility that the Library might turn to Hope City for support.
“The population inside the Library is mixed and complicated. The reason we don’t let City Lord He Fang directly let the god descend over the entire Library is also because of this. I only conveyed to my trusted people that I wanted to contact Hope City, but I never found a proper way. I just didn’t expect that you, City Lord, would come looking for us on your own. At first, I even thought it was because you needed the Library… hahaha, forget it, I won’t say more.” Shi Canghai gave an awkward smile.
The more He Fang thought about it, the more he felt the Library was thorny. This was almost enough to shake the very foundation of the entire apocalypse.
And besides, even a rabbit will bite if pushed too hard. If his actions were too drastic and made all the mobile cities launch a crazy counterattack, what would he do then? Was he supposed to kill everyone? Wouldn’t that be openly becoming the enemy of the entire world?
In this situation, it was almost impossible to find a perfect solution.
The conversation between the three City Lords suddenly fell into silence.
“Do you have any ideas?” He Fang asked.
“We’re very sorry. If we were familiar enough with Mirage, maybe we could think of something, but obviously, we aren’t.” The twins looked at each other and spoke helplessly.
“Then do you want to come take a look?” He Fang had never really sealed off his main city. If someone wanted to enter, there were all sorts of ways to get in.
“Although we’d like to, I’m afraid we can’t. To understand a city, you’d have to live in that city for at least a few months, and with a city like Mirage, even more so. But we have to host and maintain the operations of the Library. There’s no way we can spend that much time away. And if we’re gone from the Library for too long, it will definitely cause suspicion.” Shi Sangtian shook her head.
He Fang felt very helpless.
In the end, no matter how much they discussed, there was still no good solution. But He Fang agreed with the Library that he would eventually bring the Library into the Hope City Alliance. By doing this, he had directly accepted this orange-level mission.
When the video call ended, He Fang directly leaned back and fell onto his chair, face up.
“This matter… seems really complicated.” The more He Fang thought about it, the more he felt just how difficult this was. It felt like he had run into the final boss of the game.
As long as he accepted the Library, it would mean he had already changed the entire structure of the apocalypse. How was he supposed to do it stably, with the smallest sacrifice and cost, and let the Library safely become one of his allied cities?
“Mm.” Zhu Yan lowered his head and looked at He Fang’s troubled expression, but helplessly, he also felt that this matter was really thorny.
“But if we have the Library, it really would be a very important development for us.” All the more so since it was an orange-level mission. Who would give up an orange-level mission?
“A one-time offensive would be very difficult.” Zhu Yan thought for a moment. “I’m afraid it will take a long time to bring the Library in.”
“What does it matter if it takes a bit longer? The important thing is that it will belong to us. And Zhu Yan, you must want it too, right? This way, you’ll have more and more knowledge to study.” He Fang suddenly looked at Zhu Yan. This NPC, who was abnormally fond of learning and research, if he got the Library, would definitely go mad with joy. He Fang had never seen Zhu Yan look crazed before.
Zhu Yan froze for a moment, then in his eyes appeared a gentleness that belonged only to their creator: “Yes, City Lord, I do want it.”
“I’ll make the Library ours.” He Fang said with a smile. “But if you’d like, Zhu Yan, I can also send you to the Library to study. Just like the other mobile cities do.”
Zhu Yan shook his head: “If I have to choose, I’d rather stay by your side, City Lord.”
He Fang looked at Zhu Yan’s loyalty value, which had unknowingly already reached fourteen thousand. He Fang felt deeply moved.
For the sake of his NPCs, he needed to work hard, too.
“Do you have any ideas? Can you think of anything?” He Fang tried to squeeze out even a little bit of inspiration from his NPC.
“To suddenly think about what advice I can give you, City Lord, might be a bit limited, so maybe you can just listen first.” Zhu Yan would never hand their creator a blank answer sheet. Even if it was just a little, he would always point out a path for their creator.
Zhu Yan’s meaning was to first analyze the current difficulties of bringing the Library into Hope City’s scope, as well as the external threats, and then find a balance point from that. Afterward, work backward and, after gathering enough information from the middle ground, list out one by one the small achievable target conditions, and in the end, reach the bigger goal.
He Fang understood what Zhu Yan meant. Break a big matter into smaller parts and tackle them one by one. This was also the best method He Fang could manage.
As expected, this orange-level mission had a huge influence. It directly changed the entire structure of the apocalypse. He Fang felt this mission felt like the final boss of a typical open-world game.
He Fang logged off and opened “Ruins Without Restart” on his computer, then directly entered the control panel to look at the entire post-apocalyptic map of “Ruins Without Restart”.
Because of the contract with Ao City, he basically already controlled most of the western region. The development of his Hope City and Angel City wasn’t that big yet, but looking at the whole map, it wasn’t that small either.
The open-world nature meant the world did have borders, and all these borders were entirely made up of dark Nightmare Beast forests. In the future, all these areas could be expanded.
The population would still develop rapidly, at least for this period of time, as there were quite a few pregnancies within his city.
To change these people’s mindsets, he first needed to start with Angel City’s cultural influence. For example, slip in a bit of his agenda, shoot more films and shows about people who stand on their own feet, and gradually rely on their strength to reach the peak. Then he would add subtitles below, so as many people as possible could gradually start learning to read.
While He Fang was thinking, he directly gave Angel City an order through the control panel to start filming.
Selling terminals in other mobile cities has always been a challenge. If he tried to force sales, it would probably cause rejection and resentment. But what if he offered to split the profits?
The money that residents of mobile cities had was mostly spent on daily food and drink anyway. Even if the upper levels of the entire mobile city gathered a lot of money, due to the lack of supplies, they actually couldn’t buy that much with it.
He Fang thought about it. It looks like he needed to open up trade.
Because he cooperated with Ao City, opening up commerce within Ao City’s sphere of control, there was no big shortage of supplies. He Fang planned to turn all the land outside the Nightmare Beast forest that surrounded the main city into a fully open tradable zone. He wanted to make Hope City’s resources into a globally traded resource.
The most specific reason why mobile cities didn’t control many resources was that they didn’t have enough time to mine and cultivate. They were always on the move, fleeing and managing the direction of the Nightmare Beast forests. But what if he opened up a resource trade?
As long as he controlled the resources, he could directly secure Hope City’s extremely important position in the entire world. Besides, the main city’s location was uniquely advantageous, right in the middle of the Nightmare Beast forest, making it very easy to become a transportation hub.
In other words, he could become the biggest resource-supplying city. Once he had a resource supply, money would become especially important. Then, when negotiating with these cities to make money, he could sell terminals to all the major cities, and might even directly lift the terminal restrictions to realize partial network connectivity.
After that, to ensure resources could be delivered accurately, logistics would become extremely important. The airport that he had always worried couldn’t be built might also be easily resolved through negotiation.
Although many cities were wary of and resentful toward Hope City, probably no one would refuse to get better. Besides, his city’s resources were extremely cheap. Anyone who didn’t buy would be a fool.
He Fang suddenly felt that his thoughts were clear. Before, he’d felt that e-commerce simply couldn’t develop, and it still couldn’t. But after partially lifting the terminal restrictions, letting people place orders online became possible. Where there’s one, there will be two. Once the mobile city elites got a taste of the profit and shared the cut from the orders, maybe then he really could open up e-commerce.
At that time, Hope City would become the world’s largest trade city.
Once e-commerce was launched, people would have to be able to read the product pages, so at the very least, basic learning of knowledge could be allowed. As long as the spread of culture and knowledge had even a small breakthrough, the situation on the Library’s side could ease up a lot.
Then, step by step, bit by bit, after changing the situation, he would make everyone realize the importance of Hope City. Then, using the reason of “possessing knowledge lowers costs and thus offers lower prices”, he could start plotting for the Library.
With accumulated time and gradual buildup, the Library could naturally become part of his city.
He Fang thought about it. At least judging by this, the idea was fine.
But the problem was whether the main city and other cities’ resources could successfully supply all the mobile cities in the wasteland.
He Fang bit his finger, feeling that finding enough resources might be rather difficult.
Even if he spent more money to open up the Nightmare Beast forest, he still couldn’t guarantee that what came out would be resources. This thing was like gambling; the cost was too high, and at least for now, he couldn’t afford it.
He Fang stared at the whole map of “Ruins Without Restart”, falling into deep thought.
Otherwise, should he go and check out the resource points scattered outside?
And then build factories based on the resource points?
No. It would still be best to transport everything to Hope City. After all, not every resource point was suitable for building a factory. Transportation would be needed, and that meant logistics…
He Fang’s face darkened.
Good grief.
He’d fallen into a dead loop.
He Fang let out a howl and flopped onto the bed. This… what should he do about this? As expected of an orange-level mission, it was complicated. Was there no simpler way?
Feeling a bit helpless, he picked up his phone and saw a message from the deliveryman asking to play a game together. The moment he thought of that soothing face of the deliveryman, He Fang couldn’t help but smile.
He Fang: I’ve been playing a game lately and I’m stuck at a level I can’t get past.
Deliveryman: What game is it?
He Fang: Ruins Without Restart
The other side paused for a bit. It was hard to tell if he was busy or looking up what kind of game it was.
Deliveryman: Oh, it’s a building game. I’m not interested in games like that.
He Fang: Mm, everyone has different hobbies.
Deliveryman: But I’ve played plenty of other games. Tell me what level you’re stuck at. Maybe I’ll have an idea?
He Fang thought for a bit, then used the simplest words to roughly sum up the current situation. But even though it was already as simple as possible, he still ended up rambling a whole bunch.
Looking at the screen full of words, He Fang felt a bit guilty. He’d typed so much, would the other side even understand it all?
Deliveryman: Got it.
Deliveryman: It’s a bit complicated.
He Fang: Yeah, I think it’s kinda complicated, too. This game is really well-designed. Solving these complicated problems feels really rewarding.
Deliveryman: You like it that much?
He Fang: Yeah, it’s a really fun game.
Deliveryman: Then I definitely have to help you come up with an idea.
Deliveryman: Do you have any special or unique skills?
Skills? He Fang thought for a moment. The deliveryman probably meant some sort of ability.
He Fang: I’m probably the strongest one in the game.
Deliveryman: Then how about using that strength to make them afraid?
He Fang: Wouldn’t that cause them to resist?
Deliveryman: No, what I mean is, you create something that scares them a bit. Put some pressure on them, you know?
He Fang suddenly flipped up and sat straight.
Huh?
Create pressure?
In that moment, He Fang suddenly thought of how he had been so afraid of the coming calamity that he’d lost his appetite. If he deliberately created some pressure, like when he’d used Chong Xiao to disguise himself as a Nightmare Beast to provoke the people in other cities!
By doing something like that, he could directly supply them with the things they desperately needed and severely lacked. For example, the new energy “Energy Blocks” that Zhu Yan developed, instead of supplying them with plenty of raw resources. That, his city could pull off!
He Fang: You are a little genius!
Deliveryman: Then, as a reward, I’m off work tomorrow. Can I come over tonight and hang out at your place all night? (cute sticker)
He Fang’s expression froze.
![The Way of the Empress [Interstellar]](https://www.freenovels.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-04-at-8.01.00-PM.png "The Way of the Empress [Interstellar]")
