Earth, Shanghai City.
Li De, lying on his bed, opened his eyes.
The familiar environment of his home reappeared before him.
Every time he came back, he always felt a sense of unreality, as if life in Glory was nothing more than a long dream.
But when he looked at that incredibly handsome face in the mirror, it reminded him that this was more real than gold.
After standing up and letting his body adjust for a moment, he felt a vague sense of emptiness.
In Glory, he was too powerful.
Although compared to his top-tier subordinates he was still fairly ordinary, as a Level 14 Advanced Mage, a single spell could easily demolish a building. Even faced with an entire mechanized regiment on Earth, he would not back down, he could be called a walking tank.
To possess the strength to tear apart mechs bare-handed, and then return to Earth where he was nothing more than a ridiculously handsome man, the contrast felt jarring.
Still, even though he was weaker on Earth, there was a sense of safety here that Glory could never offer.
At the very least, he didn't have to worry about some top-tier Magical Beast suddenly appearing to kill him. On this planet, the most dangerous creatures were of a single kind, women.
Luckily, as a single dog, Li De didn't need to confront these lifeforms even more terrifying than Transcendents.
He turned on his computer, logged into the official website of Glory, and began browsing the latest game updates.
Stanley's wild idea of opening a Dark Pact branch on Earth had given Li De a great deal of inspiration.
He had previously always overlooked Earth's value because there was no mana here, so the things most crucial to him, magic, or the higher-level faith energy, simply couldn't be studied or leveraged through Earth's power.
He couldn't possibly rely on a bunch of silly players to offer him advice on researching magic, could he?
Damn it, their absurd ideas were definitely endless, but if he actually tried to implement those whimsical schemes, no matter how high his Mana Affinity was, he would suffer grievous losses.
Modifying magic was an extremely rigorous process, requiring exploration of every magic node's function, exploration of mana's flow speed and intensity.
Only after all the properties of the magic nodes were fully understood could he attempt to improve the spells.
Moreover, each spell's magic nodes were entirely different, which raised the difficulty of any improvements.
He had failed countless times just to successfully improve two spells.
This kind of subtle feeling, which could only be grasped through firsthand experience, was impossible to resolve through mere player speculation or suggestions.
Faith energy was the same. This power, even more advanced than mana, was shrouded in mystery.
Although on Earth there were plenty of novels and films that mentioned the effects of faith energy.
But, could he trust them?
He'd read a hundred novels, and every single one described faith energy differently. Which of them was he supposed to believe?
He'd watched a hundred movies, and every single one explained and applied this energy in completely different ways. How was he supposed to operate?
Try them one by one?
His brain would have to be kicked by a donkey. Even as a Vampire Progenitor with formidable vitality, he wouldn't dare toss himself into such chaos.
That was why he had never devoted too much attention to Earth, because the things he desired, Earth could not provide.
Asking him to study nuclear weapons in a world without even a trace of uranium, was that a joke?
But after Stanley's reminder, he suddenly understood. He had an epiphany.
Even though Earth's power couldn't directly help him research mana or faith energy.
He didn't have to fixate solely on that. There was enormous room for maneuver. The official website of Glory was hosted on Earth. All player information was gathered on Earth.
He could completely establish a Dawn City branch on Earth and use Earth's resources to collect information from Glory.
If it was only him, even if he spent 24 hours a day buried in the Glory official forum, he wouldn't be able to gather half the players' information.
Or his brain would be filled to bursting with mountains of useless garbage.
After the beta test began, the 100,000 beta players had already started exploring Glory. Although their progress was slow, and the starting difficulty could be called hellish.
Nevertheless, they were 100,000 people. Among them, players would inevitably discover all kinds of useful information.
For example, hidden characters that appeared, newly discovered ancient ruins, mysterious NPCs, powerful Magical Beast lairs, buried dragon hoards, and so on and so forth.
The players right now certainly had no way to complete those quests, and given their flamboyant personalities, they wouldn't be able to resist sharing.
At that moment, he could pick the fruit.
What the players couldn't accomplish, he could.
Right now, even if all 100,000 beta testers combined forces, they weren't stronger than any of the factions under his command.
If something truly worth intervening in were discovered, the power he could mobilize was on a completely different level from the players.
And most crucial of all.
He wielded vast native forces in Glory and could recruit people on Earth to cultivate his own players inside the game.
Then he'd really be crushing both sides.
So he planned to return to Earth to establish a force to support his development in Glory.
A Dawn City Earth Branch, just thinking about it sounded thrilling.
At this thought, the corners of Li De's lips curled into a wide arc.
A moment later, he fell into contemplation again.
How to establish a force, this still required careful consideration.
At this point, Li De was no longer the fledgling who had just resigned a year ago.
After nearly a year of campaigning in Glory and experiencing countless battles, in his final fight against the beastmen, he had personally slain dozens of beastmen.
He commanded three vast powers, Dawn City, the Crimson Mage Tower, and the Dark Pact, controlling the fate of over ten thousand people.
He had decisively crushed the Lionmane Tribe, that beastman tribe with over ten thousand warriors. Even the Level 18 Beastman King, a terrifying existence that could clash head-on with a Bone Dragon, was captured alive by him.
If he wished, he could launch a large-scale war in Glory at any time.
Experience was the best nourishment for growth.
The man he was now had undergone a complete transformation.
Not only had he become more and more striking in appearance, his spirit had truly evolved into a supreme boss holding countless lives in his hands.
A refined noble, an absolute ruler.
"To establish a force, in Glory the foundation was: power. Without formidable power, you were nothing but a lamb waiting to be slaughtered.
But on Earth, it wasn't so dangerous. Here, all you needed was enough money."
At that thought, Li De frowned slightly.