MC's career as foreign lord

For these mercenaries who had been taken in, it was as if they had truly been reborn.

Of course, they were no longer called mercenaries, but instead… Territory Guards!

They had now left the mercenary profession and were officially employed by Zhou Ren, becoming one of the candidates for the territory's guards.

Of course, they were all still trainee guards, after all, the entire territory didn't have any enemies, and other than dealing with some occasional monsters, they spent most of their time helping with construction.

However, now most of the people weren't doing construction anymore; they had received Zhou Ren's material assistance and were working hard to improve their combat level. Not necessarily reaching Legendary, but at least becoming intermediate professionals, so they could manage the people who were arriving.

Even if they couldn't control those Legendary powerhouses and their disciples, or even make the advanced professionals obedient, these people wouldn't account for more than 1% of the total number. The truly vast numbers were low-level professionals and a large number of ordinary people.

Regardless of the race, it was likely that many people would be sent here. The two months of silence were enough for any event that happened in this borderland to spread throughout the entire world.

Whether it was the Elven race or the Beastman race, they probably wouldn't hide it. The Elven race would publicize their great victory, while the Beastman race wouldn't accept this defeat, and they needed a legitimate reason to attack.

What's more, there was the Dragon race's dissemination. The event to be held here was a continent-level auction hosted by the Silver Dragon race, with treasures provided by the lord, Zhou Ren.

To prevent many people from not believing that Zhou Ren could take out good things, they even secretly passed on the effects of some items through the Elven race, allowing them to promote it on the entire continent in advance.

It should be known that even potions that increased lifespan, weapons that granted power, and special elven fruits that even the gods could sense a bit of power from, were all on the promotion path.

The magical nature of this territory was naturally also in their promotion. In that promotion, everyone could feel that a place that was originally a wilderness would be built into a paradise, and this lord was even touted as being miraculous. Not to mention future legends, future gods, some people had already blown him up into a main god of a pantheon.

Some people even analyzed the scene of Corellon's descent into the world through his Dao, showing how such a brand-new generation of figures would re-establish his pantheon and create his race in this world.

This was what all the legends marveled at. Letting an outsider in the world not attract attention, but an otherworldly god who descended into the world and had a good relationship with the gods could shock them.

In this world where almost all the rules were completely controlled, the arrival of an otherworlder who had even had some interaction with the gods attracted the attention of almost everyone.

Don't even mention the Church of the Goddess of Wealth's unreserved publicity. If someone didn't know that this was the lord's promotion, they might be curious whether the Church of Wealth had a real new god about to ascend to the world?

As for the other churches, they could get even more news. They themselves leaked like a sieve. Except for the gods, there was no truly secret news between all the churches. They themselves were like a sieve, constantly exposing themselves.

It was precisely because of this that the other churches also knew that such a person with the essence of a god, and even the opportunity to become a god, had appeared before their eyes. How could they let them monopolize the limelight? At least the Church of Dawn wouldn't allow it.

And the brains of the Gods of Justice had begun to move, how could the other churches not follow? They went forward with all sorts of reasons, wanting to simply get a share of this gluttonous feast.

Of course, Zhou Ren didn't know this news. He was still preparing for the opening of the legendary auction!

After all, there would only be more legendary and quasi-legendary figures coming in the future, even if the destiny of that Beastman race's legend might not be very good, but who doesn't have a few unpromising disciples, who doesn't have a few unpromising nephews?

Even if the Beastman race was sharpening their knives, so what? If they dared to launch an attack on all the legends on this day, then the next day they would be directly overturned from the continent by the furious major races.

No one dared to offend the legendary powerhouses on the continent, no one could, even the gods didn't dare. Just like the magic empire that ruled the world in the beginning, the mages dared to drive their floating cities, knock down all the gods who opposed them, break their teachings, disperse their believers, and plunge this god into the abyss. Then the god far away in the heavenly realm would have to fall into a deep sleep because of the dissipation of faith.

This was also the special balance between the races and gods on the continent. Except for the truly ancient gods who could survive by relying on the elements, most of the gods actually had very strange feelings for humans.

They needed the faith of this race, but they didn't really like the strong men of these races, because the strong men had their own will, their own combat power, and also had the inescapable… terrifying numbers.

But this number also gave them the capital to reject everything in the world. Even if gods fought against humans, they needed to consider the thoughts of those human empires. The rules set by the God of Gods, Ao, restricted almost all the gods' methods, forcing them to appear in the realm and never descend to the world.

So what everyone thought about more was always just restraining them, not controlling them. It wasn't realistic. Even if he had so many props in his hand, so what? Even if he could kill all the legends present, so what?

He did have the ability. The strange items from the MC rules had pushed his combat power up more than one level. As long as the combat power didn't reach Mosa's level, the skeleton archers in his hand could kill one by one in a round of mounted archery, wiping out a bunch of people, no problem at all.

But it was precisely because of the existence of top legendary powerhouses and even divine spellcasters that he could put down some of the thoughts in his heart, truly achieve peaceful coexistence with them, and decide to thoroughly implement such a legendary event.

"Firstly, is the trading venue ready? There will be many people coming, not just legends, other people also need to have places to play and spend money!" Zhou Ren said.

Time marched on, and the situation in the Lower Realm had long since matured. The skeletons could even send the crafted gold coins to the surface world wave after wave through the Hell Gate, forcing him to excavate a special room composed entirely of Lower Realm metal, Adamantium alloy, and obsidian.

Within that special room were placed even more special boxes: boxes made of Adamantium alloy, and metal drawers constructed with Adamantium alloy upgrade methods.

There was even an Ender Chest. The characteristic of these items was that, without a way to break through their inherent defenses, the contents inside would never be taken out. The Ender Chest was even more special; only the owner could retrieve items from it, while anyone else opening it would only find an empty chest.

He and Messagem each prepared an Ender Chest, placing within them a sufficient quantity of Adamantium alloy coins and plenty of Mithril coins.

As for the remaining boxes, they were all filled with gold coins. If the coins in this room were taken out and genuinely exchanged, the resulting economic impact would be enough to turn the entire world upside down.

And this was just one aspect. In the future, gold coins would be directly outputted through this room. As for copper and silver coins, the people below would manufacture and use them themselves.

These two types of currency were more of an exchange method than a true circulation effect. Although their exchange value was higher than standard gold coins, it was still within a range that a nation could control.

What he was scattering now were actually just a portion of the coins. These coins all contained a large amount of experience points, and today was the day he would officially allow the people of his territory to begin using experience points.

To prevent the coins from completely turning into various particles – those particles looked small, but each one was actually about the size of a fist, making them troublesome to use – he specifically added a simple experience lock to the coins.

The general effect was that each coin could only have 90% of its experience points used, with the remaining 10% being unusable, used to lock the coin's shape and solidify it.

This way, even after most of the experience points had been used, it could still maintain its original size, which was about a circle larger than a thumb.

Moreover, the mass inside would not decrease as a result, and it wouldn't be too burdensome to hold, making it particularly useful for transportation and other purposes.

Furthermore, this time he also planned to introduce Mithril coins for use. These were coins worth a full 1000 experience points, and even a single one could be considered a large sum of money in most places.

The most ⊥ new ⊥ small ⊥ say ⊥ is ⊥ at ⊥ six ⊥ 9 ⊥ ⊥ book ⊥ ⊥ bar ⊥ ⊥ first ⊥ hair!

After the complete opening of the Underground World, even Ancient Metal, which held 2500 experience points, might be directly usable. This place, projecting into the endless worlds and the vast universe of worlds, should be able to accommodate the value of these currencies, without even needing them to convert it themselves.

As long as the metallic properties of the coins existed, even if they were purely priced based on their internal experience points, Zhou Ren wouldn't mind. Standing before him were some of humanity's strong individuals, ranging from beginner to advanced professionals.

Each person held a gold coin. This time, he wanted to thoroughly quantify the improvement that the experience points in these coins could create.

"Now that everyone is ready, let's begin!" The beginner professional was none other than the current acting town mayor, Henry. Through his efforts, he had not only solidified his position at the beginner professional level but also genuinely gathered a group of people to assist him in administrative duties while also overseeing various defenses in the territory.

In this situation, his inherent knowledge suddenly found a use, managing the humans in the entire woodland in an orderly manner, ensuring that they had different tasks to do each day instead of wandering around like unemployed vagrants.

This was a healthy society, where everyone had their own things to do, preventing them from venting their energy elsewhere.

The test subject for the intermediate professional was the guard captain, Werner. In just two short months, he had jumped two levels, transforming from an ordinary mercenary into a mid-level warrior. Even with assistance, his past combat experience contributed to his gains. He had stagnated for ten years, only to leap forward in two months.

He now managed the basic combat matters of the entire territory, as well as more external defense events. The people under him began to grow in number, yet everything was still well-organized. As a fallen noble, he possessed more management experience.

As for the high-level test subject, it was the former blacksmith, Odinson. He was still working with the dwarves and had opened his own blacksmith shop, using the special metals available in the territory to forge weapons unique to his territory.

He had, of course, also learned the special forging techniques. But whether it was because of Zhou Ren's influence or not, after Zhou Ren described a hammer that shone with lightning, he seemed to have an epiphany and had been crafting that thing ever since, finally achieving some preliminary success.

With the help of the lightning elements in the Lightning Pool, Odinson had already obtained a lightning hammer at the advanced professional level, thereby forcibly elevating his combat power to the advanced professional level.

Those who came to participate in the experiment were the three people Zhou Ren likely encountered earliest in this world. Coincidentally, all three were professionals, at the beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels. Standing in a row, each held a gold coin, slowly absorbing it.

The experience points sparkled on their bodies like specks of light, naturally leaving some traces. Henry, the beginner professional, seemed to have his aura suddenly rise a notch.

"I feel the aura within my body rapidly increasing!" Henry said, as if he had already touched the boundary between beginner and ultimate, but was unable to fully perceive it due to the short time since his promotion.

"I can also feel the improvement in my strength, about half of what it was," Werner said. Since the increase in his strength was acceptable, presumably the last person's would be even more so?

"I feel a little bit of strength increase, roughly about 20% of the strength in my body!" Odinson's final statement basically confirmed that this amount of strength increase, although insignificant for a legendary powerhouse, was still sufficient for those below the legendary level.