「Come meet me after the servers shut down. You can drive over to my place,」Nie Yan said. They could start preparations for establishing a gaming house right away.

「Alright.」Guo Huai nodded.

Nie Yan walked through several narrow alleys before arriving in front of a shabby-looking house. This area was like the slums of Orc King City. The surroundings looked poor with the buildings teetering on the verge of collapse.

Nie Yan entered the building. Three people were already waiting for him inside the dimly lit living room.

“Hello, Boss!”

“Greetings, Boss!”

“Boss!”

The three players immediately greeted Nie Yan respectfully. They appeared nervous and high strung. He was a legendary existence in their eyes. They never imagined they would get to meet him face to face one day. Their hearts raced with excitement. At the same time, they were also on edge, afraid of inciting his ire by saying something wrong.

“No need to be so nervous.” Nie Yan waved his hand, seeing through their tension. He sized the three players up.

Two were humans who looked to be in their mid-twenties. They wore Alchemist robes and didn’t really stand out in any sense. They were the types that could easily blend into a crowd. Nie Yan knew they weren’t actually Alchemists. Dressing like this made it easier for them to move around unnoticed.

As for the third person, that was the player Guo Huai told him about.

He was an elven Thief. His class was excellent for subterfuge thanks to the innate skill of elves that increased Cloaking. Elven Thieves were superior to human Thieves when it came to masking their presence.

Due to picking an elf as his race, he had pointed ears, a handsome face, and fair skin. However, among elves, his appearance wasn’t particularly remarkable. With a stalwart and resolute expression on his face, he gave off a better impression than most of the play-boy looking male elves with their slicked back hair.

“Guo Huai has already told me about your situation. Your name is Yan Hong, correct?” Nie Yan said, his gaze locked on the elven Thief. His in-game ID was Swift Maple.

“Yes.” Yan Hong nodded.

“I’ll call you Swift Maple inside the game. From now on, you’ll be in charge of gathering intel within Angel Corps. If anything happens, report to me immediately,” Nie Yan said.

Yan Hong looked fairly earnest. Add this to the fact he and his family had settled down close to Guo Huai, and he was definitely reliable. It was rumoured he was a filial son. He played the game simply to earn money to support his parents. As for the reason he could no longer continue on in Angel Corps, the situation was complicated.

“Yes! I won’t let you down, Boss!”

“As for your pay, I’ll tell Guo Huai to give you a raise based on your performance. Asskickers United won’t mistreat any of its members. Previously, Guo Huai had you gather intel on the strengths of Angel Corps, have you finished that?”

“Thank you, Boss! This is something I just completed.” Swift Maple passed over a document to Nie Yan.

Nie Yan looked over the document. It was a map of the Satreen Empire. All the areas of influence, strongholds, and so on of Angel Corps were clearly marked, with each mark containing further information.

“Not bad,” Nie Yan said. Looking at the map, he was inwardly shocked. Angel Corps’ influence in the Satreen Empire was deep. It was no surprise they could maintain their position as hegemon.

Even though Angel Corps’ territory couldn’t compare to Asskickers United’s, they possessed far more manpower. Apart from the main guild, they had six branch guilds and 56 allied subordinate guilds. The total number of players couldn’t be calculated for the time being. Of these 56 allied guilds, more than 20 belonged to the Century Financial Group. They had spread their roots deep into the Satreen Empire.

If it were the past, Asskickers United would have had a tough time shaking Angel Corps and the Century Financial Group’s position in the Satreen Empire. But after Nie Yan became the lord of the Abernathy Great Grasslands, things became much simpler.

Nie Yan rubbed his chin. Mobilizing troops from Okoron to attack Angel Corps’ territory was a great undertaking. If there was the slightest mistake, he could end up suffering heavy losses.

World Bloc didn’t lack money. He could mimic the Monet Financial Group and unite all the guilds that opposed Angel Corps in the Satreen Empire. Of course, he would have to get in touch with them first.

Even though Angel Corps and the Century Financial Group were the hegemons of the Satreen Empire, there were still plenty guilds on bad terms with them; some of them sporting real power. Elven Symphony and Heaven Rift were two such examples. Elven Symphony was a fairly famous guild in the Satreen Empire. They weren’t large with only 170,000 members and five strongholds under their control. They acquired their fame by repelling consecutive attacks from Angel Corps and were still standing strong. In fact, they were growing stronger. As for Heaven Rift, they’d settled down a great distance away from the influence of Angel Corps. Even though they only had around 200,000 players, they occupied more than 20 strongholds. They could also be considered a big player. There were of course many other guilds. Though they were small, if they were all gathered together, they would make a formidable force that couldn’t be looked down upon.

As for acquiring all these guilds, Nie Yan would have to have a discussion with his father first. He wasn’t sure World Bloc would be willing to fork out this kind of money.

Seeing Nie Yan thinking deeply about something, Swift Maple and the other two didn’t dare to disturb him.

“You guys can go back to work. If I need anything, I’ll get in touch, especially you Swift Maple,” Nie Yan said. A plan was rapidly taking form in his mind.

“Understood!” The three nodded.

The three bid farewell and took their leave. Nie Yan looked over the map in his hands. Even though most of the Satreen Empire was under Angel Corps’ control, he could go wherever he wanted. No one could stop him.

Nie Yan walked out on the streets. As he read a report on the overall situation of the Satreen Empire and the Starry Night Potion Shop’s profits, his lips curved into a satisfied smile.

After acquiring a monopoly on the potion market, the Starry Night Potion Shop was starting to have an impact on Angel Corps.

For large guilds like Angel Corps, providing their players cheap and affordable potions was a must. If this benefit disappeared, it would sooner or later invoke dissatisfaction. However, the amount of potions their in-house Alchemists could produce was far from enough to meet the demands of the guild. So, they had to buy potions from the Starry Night Potion Shop.

In order to avoid attracting Nie Yan’s attention, Angel Corps had to buy small batches from the various branches of the Starry Night Potion Shop scattered across the Viridian Empire and Satreen Empire. This was a costly and time-consuming method, but they had no other choice. The era of guilds having countless potion shops at their beck and call was long over.

Save for the guilds that were enemies with Asskickers United like Angel Corps, ordinary guilds could purchase in bulk from the Starry Night Potion Shop. If they signed a supply deal where they provided raw materials to the Starry Night Potion Shop, they could receive up to a 50% discount when buying potions. However, Angel Corps would be dreaming if they thought they could get in on this.

All bulk orders were strictly controlled. Only guild leaders were allowed to place such orders and if a guild was found to be transferring over the potions to an enemy like Angel Corps, they would be blacklisted and cut off.

Angel Corps had no way of purchasing potions at a discount. They could only purchase from the Starry Night Potion Shop at full price. Their daily potion costs were staggering at over 1,000,000 gold, sometimes even several million. This was an enormous burden. Their financial situation had taken a dramatic turn south.

According to the data reported by Swift Maple, Angel Corps made about 8,500,000 gold a day from their strongholds, of which 6,000,000 would be used to pay their players. In other words, their daily profit was about 2,500,000 gold. Of course, apart from the strongholds, they also had other businesses such as auction houses, shops, gold farming teams, and so on. The profit generated from those was about 1,000,000 gold a day. Added together, that was 3,500,000 gold. Where before only a fraction of this amount, give or take 300,000 gold, would go to potions on a daily base, now that number had gone up to 1,000,000+. With their expenditures increasing for no good reason at all, Soaring Angel was extremely depressed. Thanks to their previously accumulated wealth, even though the potion costs made them grimace, it wasn’t enough to truly hurt them yet.

Nie Yan felt a sense of superiority. After unifying the Viridian Empire, Asskickers United made 18,000,000 gold a day from their strongholds, of which 13,000,000 gold was used to pay their players. Like this their profit was about 5,000,000 gold. Meanwhile, the Starry Night Potion Shop raked in a daily profit of 6,000,000 gold. Combined with the 2,000,000 gold generated from his auction houses and other businesses, that was more than 13,000,000 gold a day, more than four times that of Angel Corps.

Nie Yan would provide the War God Tribe with 6,000,000 gold every day to help it develop. The remaining 7,000,000 gold would be saved and used for various other ventures, such as Okoron.

Since the requirements for entering Asskickers United and its branch guilds were strict, there were fewer members than in Angel Corps. But that also meant the members who did get in were of a higher quality, and requested a higher salary. In fact, Asskickers United paid their members far more in comparison, double as much even. Asskickers United wasn’t only richer than Angel Corps as a guild. Even their players were wealthier than their counterparts in Angel Corps. All the truly strong elites flocked to Asskickers United and not Angel Corps. Ever since Asskickers United unified the Viridian Empire, more and more players from the Satreen Empire were gradually joining the guild.

Seeing Angel Corps’ enormous territory, Nie Yan coldly chuckled. Since he had come to the Satreen Empire, he naturally wouldn’t leave empty handed. He would definitely give Soaring Angel and Cao Xu a headache.

Nie Yan put away the reports in his bag. Shortly after he walked out of the slums, he received word from Swift Maple that Angel Corps’ elite team was setting out for Branston Town in the Nightmare Barrens. They were planning to run the Baleful Beast Basin dungeon.