Under the night sky, the stars flowed like a river.
Standing on the balcony, Feng Qi looked up at the sky, his thoughts swirling.
With no light pollution, when the clouds over Elf City cleared, the sky became breathtakingly beautiful.
After living in Elf City for a while, he'd discovered many wonderful things about this place.
If not for the hidden dangers, this could easily be seen as the future that humans in the Eastern Region dreamed of.
The elf defense line at the front formed the strongest barrier, holding off domain expansions from all sides, and the residents within the city enjoyed the protection of the Elf King's power.
Peaceful and stable, wasn't this exactly the kind of future the Eastern Region humans longed for?
In the last sacrifice timeline, he had ruled Star City for over a hundred years, so he knew exactly what it took to build a prosperous and stable society.
First was the issue of resources.
Having enough to eat was the most basic demand of the residents.
In the Eastern Region, this was something that could be managed—at least people didn't have to worry about food or drink.
But society still faced a stubborn problem that hadn't yet been solved.
And that was the issue of settling scavengers.
With limited resource cycles, the five major cities could only take in some scavengers, but couldn't house them all. At its root, this problem was due to a lack of resources.
But Elf City didn't have this issue.
The elf plants rooted in the city could absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth on their own, producing water, food, and more to meet the needs of the people.
Even if the population of Elf City exploded, the food here could still meet the demand.
Beyond resources, there were also spiritual needs.
As long as someone could think, they would have spiritual needs.
Elf City had also built well in this area. The elf network was just like the virtual games he had spent several timelines trying to perfect, satisfying the people's spirits.
Then came law and order, and social stability.
Society was a complex whole, and there would inevitably be those who disrupted order. Their presence obviously threatened the safety of other citizens.
Elf City had a very well-structured system in place for this too.
Each district had well-equipped law enforcement and judicial teams to keep order stable.
As for corruption, Elf City's unique social structure made such things impossible.
At the core of the Central Region human society was the Elf King.
All spiritual resources and rune crystals produced would be sent to the Elf King, who would refine and absorb them through the furnace within its body.
With this special societal setup, resources didn't belong to any individual—they belonged solely to the Elf King.
So embezzling resources or hoarding them for personal strength just didn't happen.
The Elf King monopolized all resources, but this actually reduced many disputes over resource distribution.
With material needs fully met thanks to the Elf King, the people's pursuits became more about spiritual fulfillment.
The Elf King had already built a complete and harmonious system for society to run on.
But Feng Qi also saw a hidden problem within the city.
Compared to humans from the Eastern Region, the people of Elf City clearly lacked fighting spirit.
Because their awareness of external threats had dulled, most of the residents—except for those fighting on the front lines—had no strong sense of crisis.
And in this dangerous new world, that was definitely not a good thing.
Having seen the world One Thousand Five Hundred later, he knew just how terrifying the future was.
The strong ruled, and everyone fought for supremacy.
Under brutal racial competition, all races were like bloodthirsty wolves, needing to devour others just to grow stronger quickly.
In a world ruled by survival of the fittest, there was no right or wrong. If someone wanted to wipe out your entire race, they didn't need a reason.
Crisis awareness was a key focus in the Eastern Region's education system.
That's why, even from a young age, Feng Qi knew humanity's situation was precarious.
Even though there were always reports of victory from the front lines, those were more like glimmers of hope in despair, meant to boost morale.
The casualty rates at the front lines couldn't be faked, nor could the death rates of graduates.
Under the pressure of this crisis awareness, human society was united, with a do-or-die resolve that pushed civilization forward without relying on any outside help.
Compared to that, the Central Region now seemed underdeveloped.
But if you put aside the special existence of the Elf King, the humans of the Eastern Region had used that same fighting spirit to carve out multiple front lines and secure their rear areas.
Looking down at Elf City's night view, Feng Qi saw many strengths here.
But this kind of perfection gave him an unreal feeling.
It was like a castle in the sky, ready to collapse at any time.
A gust of wind blew past, and the spiritual energy particles sprayed by the elf plants floated with it, filling every corner of his sight.
He couldn't help but sigh.
Deep down, he hoped the Elf King hadn't broken its promise and would keep protecting the humans of the Central Region.
At least the current prosperity proved that, for now, the Elf King had brought only benefits, no harm.
If he really had to oppose the Elf King, even if he could kill it, the cost for the Central Region humans would be huge.
He didn't want to break this peace.
But if the future proved that the Elf King would ultimately become the end of Central Region human civilization, he would still act.
Turning around, he pulled aside the transparent light curtain and went back inside.
Suddenly, loud noises filled his ears.
The music came from the music flower on the ceiling.
It looked kind of like a morning glory.
It was a really special plant, with a function like a music player. It could convert audio from the elf network and play it.
Right now, the music was blasting.
On the sofa, the kid Lei Ting was stark naked, holding a cup woven from leaves, dancing wildly. His face was red from drinking, but he still kept gulping it down.
Not far away, Taihang was crouched in front of the devouring flower, staring wide-eyed as it swallowed and purified his waste, looking thrilled.
Above, the negative consciousness body was flying around wildly, clearly enjoying the chaotic rhythm of the music.
On the floor on the east side of the room, Po Jia was sitting cross-legged, trying to cultivate, but his face showed helplessness. Obviously, he couldn't focus anymore, but he still didn't join the madness.
Only Xiao You, no matter how loud the music was, could still sleep curled up on the corner of the sofa, completely undisturbed.
This was something Feng Qi really admired about Xiao You.
They had traveled through some seriously rough places, but as long as Xiao You wanted to sleep, there was nowhere she couldn't do it.
Slacker You, really lived up to the name.
In all these years of traveling, ever since getting her flight mask, he had never seen Slacker You use her legs to walk.
Sometimes Feng Qi even thought, those legs of hers were just a waste.
They didn't seem to have any other use besides swinging around with her mood.
"Qi brat, come drink with your king!"
Already drunk, Lei Ting jumped off the sofa and landed in front of him, one hand on his hip, pointing at him with the other, holding his cup, looking all smug.
"Don't make me beat you."
Maybe it was the trauma of being beaten up too many times, but even drunk, Lei Ting shrank back, then hopped back onto the sofa. His eyes darted around, and he went to the corner, lifting the sleeping Xiao You:
"Xiao You, drink with me!"
Faced with Lei Ting's invite, Xiao You didn't even open her eyes. Her body was soft like a rug, just dangling from Lei Ting's hand.
"Awooo!"
Taihang, who was especially fond of Xiao You, suddenly leapt up and bit Lei Ting right in the crotch.
"You dumb dog, are you crazy…"
The chaotic fight broke out again.
Seeing this, Feng Qi couldn't help but sigh.
He'd wanted to build a cold, ruthless war team, but things had turned out totally different from what he expected.
What a bunch of weirdos.
He walked over to the green plant mat in the corner and sat down, picking up the encyclopedia.
He had finished reading the children's encyclopedia.
Now, the one in his hands was a domain encyclopedia written by the scholars of Elf City.
Just like in the Eastern Region.
Facing all sorts of domain creatures and domain forces, the scholars here were also compiling detailed data on domain lifeforms.
They even had domain studies here, just like in Old Day City.
The curriculum covered knowledge of domain fields, domain life, domain resource divisions, domain scripts, and so on.
The encyclopedia was filled with fresh and novel information.
Reading through it gave Feng Qi the feeling of flipping through a collection of bizarre stories.
The strange domain creatures described in the book even opened his eyes, despite all he had seen.
But what interested him most was the section about the situation around Elf City.
It talked about the powerful domain forces nearby.
The encyclopedia described these forces in a timeline model.
Elf City called this line the "Rise Line."
Along this line, many forces that had once been enemies of Elf City were listed, but most of them had been wiped out, either destroyed or turned into wandering factions.
As of today, in this latest edition of the encyclopedia, the local power structure around Elf City focused mainly on five strong clans, with other minor clans mentioned briefly.
They were:
1. The Absolute Clan to the north.
This was a powerful race born in extreme cold, naturally able to control temperature.
They appeared 18 years ago, defeating a troublesome group of the Central Region humans, becoming the northern force directly facing Elf City.
2. The Strange Wood Clan in the southwest.
3. The Flying Feather Clan in the east.
4. The Iron Bone Clan in the south.
And the most troubling for the Central Region humans was the Holy Light Domain Field in the northeast.
The forces within this domain field weren't actually that strong, but erasing this field was extremely difficult.
It involved a real problem.
Domain creatures might not be able to adapt to human world rules when they leave their domain, and humans also might not adapt to the rules inside a domain.
The Holy Light Domain Field was one such place that humans couldn't adapt to.
Its rules, from a human perspective, were twisted and warped. Anyone entering would soon die from various rule suppressions.
For example, in the Holy Light Domain Field, countless beams of light existed. When humans entered, their blood would reverse flow under the domain's rules, and their life would shift toward death.
Humans simply couldn't survive that change.
Because of this, humans of the Central Region had never been able to shatter the space crystal inside the Holy Light Domain Field.
Even if they had the strength to defeat the races in that domain, breaking the field itself was nearly impossible.
The structure of domain fields made them very hard to destroy from the outside.
You could categorize the strength structure of domain fields into three types.
First, directly destroying the space crystal, the simplest and most effective way to disperse a domain field.
As complex and solid as a domain field looked, once the crystal at its spatial node was broken, the whole thing would collapse instantly.
Like Rupert's Tear, domain fields were built with the spatial crystal as their biggest weakness.
Second, breaking the domain barrier from inside out.
Third, the hardest—breaking it from the outside in. Trying to destroy a domain field this way was almost impossible.
The Eastern Region had spent years trying countless ways to break domain fields from the outside.
Like the various lethal technological weapons used during the early days of the Cataclysm.
But for domain fields, those weapons were useless.
The races inside the Holy Light Domain Field weren't strong, but humans couldn't do anything about them. Protected by the domain's rules, the Holy Light Clan stood undefeated.
Feng Qi had faced a situation like this in a previous timeline.
Back then, in the supply zone west of Star City, he had encountered a domain field that humans couldn't adapt to. Because it occupied a key geographical spot, it had to be cleared.
In the end, it was Zhang Daowen who developed a special potion that let humans adapt to the rules of that domain field for a short time, allowing them to disperse it.
From the descriptions in the encyclopedia, Feng Qi learned that the Elf King was now helping humans tackle this problem.
The Elf King wanted to create a type of elf lifeform that could adapt to the rules of the Holy Light Domain Field, and then use these special elf beings to disperse it.
Reading this, Feng Qi couldn't help but feel curious.
Did the Elf King really have the power to create lifeforms at will? Could it really just make whatever kind of life it wanted?
Was this something a spiritual plant, even a powerful one, could truly do?
He couldn't help but suspect that the Elf King possessed a Miracle item.
In this world, it seemed only Miracle items could defy all rules and give birth to limitless possibilities.
Or more precisely, Miracle items were rules unto themselves.
Like the first Miracle item he encountered, the "Bloodstone," which completely broke the law of conservation of energy. Even without injecting any energy into it, the Bloodstone could endlessly produce pure mini bloodstones.
He had every reason to believe the Elf King had a Miracle item too.
That would explain why the Elf King could give birth to so many different types of elf lifeforms.
As he flipped through the book, time passed, and morning sunlight streamed in through the window.
Lei Ting, Taihang, and Po Jia, who had been going wild all night, were now fast asleep. Of course, Slacker You was no exception—she had slept through the night and was still sound asleep.
At that moment, there was a knock on the door.
Feng Qi got up from the cushion and went to open it.
Outside stood a man in work clothes, pushing a food cart, smiling.
"Good morning, Mr. Feng."
"Morning."
After the brief greeting, Feng Qi took the cart and closed the door.
Back inside, looking at Lei Ting and the others still deep in sleep, he couldn't help but call out:
"Breakfast time."
That sentence was like flipping a switch. Xiao You, who was sleeping on her stomach, suddenly lifted her head, eyes bright as she shouted at him:
"Boss!"
"Come eat."
"Okay!"
Xiao You instantly flew off the sofa and started circling the food cart.
Lei Ting and the others slowly woke up and joined for breakfast.
Today's breakfast was quite special.
Besides the usual plant drinks and domain beast meat, there were many green vegetables they hadn't tried before.
What Xiao You loved most was a type of purple leaf. It was super tasty, and after eating it, even the air she breathed out had a light purple mist.
Even more amazing, after eating it, the sweat or any other fluids from your body would carry a pleasant fragrance.
The whole person would be wrapped in this scent, inside and out, for about three hours.
Way better than perfume or any external stuff.
After breakfast, Feng Qi got a call from Xie Yuanli, the head of the Southern District Law Enforcement.
On the phone, Xie Yuanli said they had already started arranging for him to attend the Elf Festival.
But because of his special status—being an outsider, not a resident of Elf City—if he wanted to join the festival and see the Elf King directly, he needed multiple levels of approval.
Feng Qi understood why.
The Elf King meant everything to the humans of the Central Region.
Even though the Elf King was super powerful, the protection around it had never stopped.
The Elf King had become the very core of Central Region human civilization. Any harm to it would cause unimaginable damage to Elf City, and even to the whole human civilization in the Central Region.
No matter how strong the Elf King was, protecting it was always a top priority for the humans here.
So, strict vetting was obviously necessary.
Xie Yuanli said the review process needed his full cooperation, and even after approval, when he went to the central area of Elf City, he'd have to wear restricted gear.
Feng Qi didn't mind at all and agreed over the phone to fully cooperate.
He had worn Elf City's restricted gear when he first arrived—it blocked the body's sensing of external spiritual energy.
But to him, that kind of restriction didn't matter.
He wasn't just a normal cultivator. His power came from the Demon Blade.
Even if his spiritual energy sense was sealed, as long as he had the Demon Blade, his strength wouldn't drop, and he could handle any emergencies.
As for whether the Elf King would have bad intentions toward him?
He didn't even consider that a problem.
From all the data and info he had, the Elf King had always been kind toward humans. Even if it had other plans, it wouldn't act on a big festival day, under the watch of thousands of humans.
More importantly, he hadn't done anything to threaten the Elf King.
From the Elf King's point of view, he was just a visitor from the Eastern Region. No threat at all.
Unless the Elf King could read his mind and know he wanted to give Central Region humans the power to resist it.
But that was clearly impossible.
At least in all the timelines where he had died, and in the futures he had seen, he had never run into a domain creature that could read minds.
Over the next few days, Feng Qi worked with Xie Yuanli to prepare all the documents for the review.
It mostly involved filling out detailed info about his background and current situation.
Time passed.
One day, Xie Yuanli called again.
As soon as Feng Qi picked up, Xie Yuanli's laughter came through the line:
"Brother Feng, the Elf Festival will be held in three days. Your review is all done. You can head to the central area of Elf City anytime now."
"Thanks."
After hanging up, Feng Qi turned to look at Xiao You and the others.
He decided to set out right away.