Chapter 2833 – Promotion to Main City
Seeing the system prompt, Shi Feng chose to upgrade Zero Wing City without hesitation.
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System: Main City upgrade will cost 500,000 Gold Coins and 200,000 Magic Crystals. Do you wish to proceed?
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“Proceed!”
Shi Feng was not at all surprised by the upgrade cost; he had long since prepared the necessary funds.
The next moment, 500,000 Gold Coins and 200,000 Magic Crystals disappeared from his bag. He then received another system notification.
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System: Payment completed. All players within Zero Wing City will be teleported out of the city in three minutes. Upgrade is estimated to take two hours.
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Zero Wing City Region System Announcement: Zero Wing City will commence upgrading into a Basic Main City. All players within Zero Wing City will be teleported out of the city in three minutes. Players within the city are advised to make the necessary preparations.
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After the regional announcement’s appearance, the several hundred thousand players that populated Zero Wing City promptly broke out in doubt and exclamations.
“What’s going on? Zero Wing City’s getting upgraded into a Main City?”
“Zero Wing City isn’t even an Advanced City yet. How can it get promoted into a Main City?”
“What did Zero Wing do?”
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The independent players and Guild players operating in Zero Wing City were thunderstruck by this unexpected piece of news.
This was especially true for the various Guild players. They felt as if the system was playing a bad joke on them.
Ordinary players might not understand the significance of a Main City, but Guild players like themselves knew just how difficult it was to raise a Guild City’s status to Main City. In fact, even upgrading a Guild City into an Intermediate City was already incredibly difficult for Guilds at this stage of the game. After all, Guilds needed to ensure the constant development of their Guild Cities’ popularity and security standards, and fulfilling these requirements required a lot of manpower and resources.
However, after Zero Wing had prohibited NPCs from entering its Guild Cities and increased the entrance fees the cities charged, Zero Wing City’s prosperity and popularity had plummeted. At this point, let alone getting promoted into a Main City, even getting promoted to an Intermediate City should be impossible.
Yet, the system was now telling them that Zero Wing City was already getting upgraded into a Main City. This defied credence!
However, no matter how much the players inside Zero Wing City refused to believe the system announcement, the system’s timer continued counting down the seconds. Eventually, after three whole minutes elapsed, every player in the city was teleported out of the city. Only after finding themselves standing outside the city walls did everyone understand that Zero Wing City’s promotion was real.
This astonishing piece of news quickly reached the ears of Star-Moon Kingdom’s various powers, and all of these powers were inevitably shocked.
In an era where most superpowers did not even possess a single Intermediate Guild City, Zero Wing had already secured itself a Main Guild City. This situation was simply unbelievable.
When Liang Jing, who was working in Silverwing City, heard about Zero Wing City’s promotion, she hurriedly contacted Shi Feng and asked, “Guild Leader, what did you do? How did Zero Wing City get promoted into a Main City?”
Currently, even the popular Silverwing City was still a long ways from becoming an Advanced City. She found it simply incredible that Zero Wing City, which was drastically inferior in terms of popularity, could become a Main City ahead of Silverwing City.
However, while Liang Jing was confused by this unexpected development, she couldn’t help growing excited over it as well.
After all, Zero Wing’s present situation wasn’t as rosy as everyone thought. Although the various superpowers had given up on cornering Zero Wing after the battle at the Secret Covenant Tower, they continued to suppress Zero Wing economically. Although Zero Wing indeed possessed combat power surpassing even that of the Five Great Super Guilds, it was still limited to passive self-defense; the Guild couldn’t actively wage war against the various superpowers. Not to mention, due to the war of attrition with the various superpowers, Zero Wing was now severely lacking in weapons and equipment.
To make matters worse, the income Zero Wing generated from its Guild Cities continued to decline. After the major system update, maintenance costs for NPCs had increased. Moreover, Guilds were now required to pay upkeep for buildings and magic arrays. And although there was the Teleportation Hall in Silverwing City, most adventurer teams dared not enter Silverwing City at all, due to the pressure from the various superpowers.
At this point, if not for the huge sum of funds from Crimson Emperor and Unyielding Soul, Zero Wing would’ve long since gone bankrupt and crumbled.
Gaining a Main City now would undoubtedly solve Zero Wing’s financial problems. This was because a Main Guild City was much more amazing than an ordinary Guild City.
First and foremost, a Main City was much larger than an ordinary Guild City. Even a Basic Main City could easily accommodate more than ten million inhabitants.
Secondly, there were some high-end buildings that could be constructed only in Main Cities.
Thirdly, a Main City could recruit up to 30,000 NPC soldiers. With so many NPC soldiers, the Main City’s security system would be much less vulnerable than ordinary Guild Cities’.
Lastly, a Main City had the authority to govern a region. With this authority, a city could dispatch up to 20,000 of its soldiers to fight outside the city. In other words, the entire map the city was located in would be under the city’s control. If Zero Wing City really did become a Main City, the Guild could afford to open the city to NPCs, and none of the various NPC forces would dare make trouble in the city.
“It’s a secret,” Shi Feng replied, chuckling. “However, you should get ready on your side. Once Zero Wing City’s upgrade is complete, I plan to open the city to the public and construct a Teleportation Hall in the city that will connect it with Sky Spring City. At that time, I’ll need you to manage Zero Wing City. As for Silverwing City’s management, leave that to Melancholic.”
“You’re having me manage Zero Wing City?” Liang Jing was confused. “But isn’t Melancholic working in White River City? Wouldn’t it be more convenient to have her manage Zero Wing City?”
Shaking his head, Shi Feng said, “No. After Zero Wing City’s upgrade, I plan to transfer it to a neutral map far away from Star-Moon Kingdom. Melancholic already has her hands full with Candlelight’s matters in Star-Moon Kingdom. The most she can do is manage Silverwing City. It would be impossible for her to manage Zero Wing City.”
Not only did Melancholic Smile have to manage the Candlelight Trading Firm, but as an Advanced Master Forger, she also had to work on getting promoted to Grandmaster Forger. If she had to manage a Main City on top of that, she wouldn’t even have time to sleep. After all, a Main City had many more things that required management than an ordinary Guild City.
Just the recruitment and management of the Main City’s 30,000 NPC soldiers would be more than enough to keep a person occupied. Zero Wing City’s manager would have to assign daily tasks to these soldiers as well as constantly revise the weapons and equipment configuration of these soldiers, allocating better gear and positions to soldiers who performed well, and so on.
From his experience as a Guild Leader in his previous life, Shi Feng understood just how tedious it was to manage a Main Guild City.
In the past, it was precisely because he had to devote a significant portion of his time to handling Guild affairs that he failed to reach Tier 4. Hence, in this life, he had pushed all these tasks to other people while he focused on improving himself. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have achieved his current combat power.
“You’re also going to move the city?” Liang Jing’s breathing quickened when she heard Shi Feng’s words.
Just the fact that Zero Wing City was getting promoted into a Main City was already plenty shocking. If Shi Feng could also move the city to a neutral map, Zero Wing would be rich.
“Mhm, so I need you to begin the necessary preparations now. You’ll probably be very busy afterward,” Shi Feng said, nodding. Simultaneously, a hint of anticipation appeared in his eyes.
Currently, of Zero Wing’s three Guild Cities, Stone Forest City in the Dark Night Empire and Silverwing City in the Orc Empire held strategic locations. In the case of Stone Forest City, it was necessary to stop the Dark World’s invasion. As for Silverwing City, it served as a barrier to the Faux Saint army’s expansion. Hence, both cities should not be moved unless absolutely necessary.
This left Zero Wing City as the only option to use as a foothold in high-level neutral maps. After all, unlike Stone Forest City and Silverwing City, Zero Wing City didn’t counter any player forces. Moreover, Zero Wing City’s position in Star-Moon Kingdom no longer brought much value to the Guild.
Two hours went by quickly, and an entirely new Zero Wing City came into view.
Immediately afterward, Shi Feng arrived in the City Lord’s Mansion’s core control room and injected 5,000 Mana Stones into the World Mirror. He then transferred Zero Wing City to a Level 140 neutral map, leaving the excited crowd outside the city dumbfounded.