Time passed.
About ten years after getting the worms, Shang had given away the first True Path Stage warrior to the Temple of Blood.
That particular True Path Stage warrior had been a red-haired man named David, and Shang didn't have any use for him in the town.
David wasn't the most hardworking person, and he also didn't care about teaching people.
He was neither fit for becoming outstanding nor for raising new warriors.
Because of that, Shang told the Temple of Blood that they could take him.
That was the first time Shang had actually been paid for bringing a True Path Stage warrior to the Temple of Blood, and the payment was extremely generous.
Ten Grade Six Mana Crystals…
For a True Path Stage warrior!
The usual bonus for recruiting a High Mage was something like three Grade Five Mana Crystals, but Shang had received over 3,000 times as much!
After getting these ten Grade Six Mana Crystals, Shang could finally buy more Mind Flow Pellets, and he did just that.
As Shang sat in his castle, consuming one Mind Flow Pellet after the other, the world of the mortals had completely transformed.
The number of hunters had shot through the roof.
The worm infestation had proven to be a terrifying danger to the weaker humans.
On their own, the worms weren't directly a danger to the mortal district, but just by existing, they were threatening the mortal district.
How?
Food.
There were two kinds of worms that could be born from the two Abyss Worms.
Either they got a Darkness Affinity or an Ice Affinity.
The threat lay with the worms that had a Darkness Affinity.
They were poisonous and inedible.
The worms with the Ice Affinity could be eaten, but they were outnumbered one to ten by the worms with a Darkness Affinity.
Even more, the worms also seemed to hate and kill each other, making it even more difficult to get a worm with an Ice Affinity.
Of course, with all the worms present, the number of normal beasts had dropped to a frighteningly low level.
If the worms were allowed to multiply even further, they would eventually fill out every square meter of the surroundings.
Because of that, the pressure on the hunters had increased severalfold. They needed to kill every single worm they could find and bring back the small scraps of food they could find.
The excursions of the hunters grew longer and longer as they tried to find food.
The worms killed more and more beasts, and eventually, no beast other than the worms could be found for nearly a hundred kilometers.
The icy wasteland had been transformed into a land of worms.
The Soldier Stage worms looked more like larvae. In the Initial Soldier Stage, they were barely a meter long and 20 centimeters wide. In the Peak Soldier Stage, they were about five meters long and 40 centimeters wide.
The mortals estimated that there were over 500,000 worms in the surrounding 100 kilometers.
In comparison, there were barely 30,000 people living in the mortal district.
By now, becoming a warrior had become the default for people, and becoming anything else had actually become difficult and even a symbol of status to a certain degree.
When over 50% of the population had to actively go out and kill worms, the few that didn't need to go were quite special.
Sadly, the number of Ice Affinity worms reduced more and more, and a famine appeared in the village.
That was when a hero emerged.
Surprisingly, it wasn't a warrior but a Mage.
The Mage had been born in this mortal district, and she had been born with a rare Darkness Affinity.
She had seen her superiors fight and hunt just so that she and the others could live in peace inside the town.
She had always wanted to help them and make the lives of everyone around her easier.
Because of that, she put her everything into studying, and eventually, she created something that would eliminate the famine once and for all.
She had created a Spell that transformed the corpse of the Darkness Affinity worms into pure Darkness Mana!
With that, she managed to create a commodity that the merchants were interested in.
A merchant inside this town was viewed very differently from how normal people viewed normal merchants.
Usually, one would just think of a merchant as a shopkeeper or a trader. That's it.
But here, merchants were almost otherworldly existences.
The merchants were extremely powerful, and they were legendary existences that could traverse the outside world!
They could travel to other towns and cities, which was the dream of nearly everyone!
Of course, these supremely powerful visitors had never shown interest in anything the mortal district had produced.
But now, the Darkness Mage managed to produce something like that.
She had told everyone about her Spell, and after a long debate, the mortal district decided to trust her.
They brought back as many corpses as possible and handed them to her.
She worked day and night to produce as many Darkness Mana Crystals as possible, and when the merchants showed up the next time, she presented them with the Darkness Mana Crystals.
One of the merchants looked at it with a frown and asked her how many she had.
She told him she had around 800.
The merchant's frown deepened.
The density and purity of these Mana Crystals were horrible and barely usable.
The merchant asked the Mage how she had produced these Mana Crystals, but the Mage hesitated.
The merchant told her that they certainly had better ways to get what they wanted than her backwater methods.
Eventually, she complied and showed her Spell.
The merchant seemed quite impressed when he asked the Mage how she had come up with that Spell.
Of course, such a Spell already existed, and the Spell this merchant had access to was worlds better.
After a bit of thinking, the merchant nodded once and told the Mage about his plans.
Obviously, he can't use these Darkness Mana Crystals. The money they would bring in would be less than the space they would take up in his Space Ring.
However, he decided to invest in the Mage. He gave her a far more advanced Spell and allowed her to teach the Spell to any Mage she wanted since it wasn't really worth a lot.
Not only would the quality of the crystals increase, but she would also be able to combine several lower-ranked ones into better ones.
The next time he would return, he would trade for the crystals.
Yet, the young Mage wasn't fine with that.
Her people were starving at this moment!
She couldn't wait that long!
The merchant hummed a bit, but in the end, he decided on something.
He would trust in her, and he would pay her first.
However, he didn't carry any food with him. Food took up way too much room for its little worth.
The Mage felt horrified when she heard that, but the merchant only smirked.
Then, he handed another Spell to the Mage, and she looked at it.
It was a way to create Light Mana Crystals out of Darkness Mana Crystals!
Of course, a lot of Mana would be lost in the process, but this was amazing!
With these Mana Crystals, the mortal district could create farms!
And the famine was no more.
