"Store!"
Ethan did not immediately burn Nana's body on the spot. Instead, he stored it inside his storage ring.
Anything without life would be judged by the storage ring as a dead object.
So, it could easily be taken back.
As for why Ethan insisted on bringing her back and giving her a proper funeral:
First, it was to win Nini over.
Second, it was to give Nini a sense of belonging.
After all, with her sister's grave buried inside Ethan's territory, how could someone like her, who valued feelings and loyalty so much that she would rather die to heal her sister, leave Nana behind all alone and return to Region Four by herself?
'She really is right…'
He was someone driven purely by profit. Every action he took had a purpose behind it.
Maybe in other people's eyes, that made him disloyal, cold, and ruthless. But after coming to this world, if you still wanted to talk about feelings, kindness, and loyalty, then if someone had to die, it deserved to be you, not them.
Of course, that didn't mean there were no good people left in this world. There were still many.
Ethan definitely wasn't one of them.
"Whew!"
Ethan blew a whistle.
The Bone Horse and the Birdmen immediately rushed toward him.
The reason Ethan had told them to wait outside the area from the very beginning was to prevent his identity from being exposed. Who would have thought that his identity had already been exposed from the start anyway?
But maybe, only Nana had figured it out. Still, it didn't matter anymore.
Everything was already over. He had gained the levels he needed and obtained everything he wanted.
At this point, the only valuable things left on this map were probably the dozens of scattered wooden treasure chests and the few bronze treasure chests here and there.
But Ethan couldn't be bothered with them.
Too much wasted time. Not worth it.
Besides, Ethan was in a hurry to return and combine the Fallen God Statue in his hands.
He really wanted to know what exactly that statue could predict.
Clop! Clop!
The Bone Horse arrived. Ethan directly placed the unconscious Nini onto the horse's back.
Then Ethan merged Nana's, Berserker's, and the others' three magic books, along with Nolan's magic book, the one whose body had been sliced into sashimi by the Blade Tree petals and then eaten down to half a corpse by the Ghost Face Moths, into his own magic book.
Not only that, he also found the magic books of the people originally killed by the Ground Needle Grass on Nolan's body.
Looks like Nolan also knew that other people's magic books could be merged together.
Ethan didn't know whether Nolan had planned to take them back as proof, or merge them himself.
But now… they all benefited Ethan instead.
[Ownerless Magic Book: Drip blood to claim!]
Ethan lightly pricked his finger with the tip of a knife. He already understood now that a magic book only needed a tiny bit of blood, almost like entering a password.
So naturally, he wasn't going to generously slice open a large wound and bleed all over the ground.
Instead, he used the tiny pinhole-sized cut to squeeze out one drop of blood and wiped a little onto each magic book. That was enough.
The next moment, a row of magic books burst with golden light!
[System Notification: Detected that the host already possesses a magic book. Merge? After merging, the original carrying capacity will increase, and the items and trade contents inside the magic books will also merge into the original magic book.]
'Merge!'
Did Ethan want to carry a whole stack of magic books back with him?
Besides, only after obtaining the ID password of another person's magic book could Ethan take things out from inside it.
There were quite a few people here, even if they were all rookies.
But no matter how small a mosquito was, it was still meat.
Now that he had one more person to support, naturally he wouldn't even let a mosquito leg go.
[System Notification: Base carrying capacity +45 slots. Total base carrying capacity: 55 slots]
[Storage: Bronze 31, Spirit Stones 65, Wood 287, Advanced Wood 26, Vines 108, Tree Berries 87, Short Bow 1, Arrows 35…]
There were quite a lot of things, but they were all basic materials.
Ethan's eyes quickly swept over the new items. But at that moment, his gaze stopped on one of the new items inside the magic book. It was a scroll.
"Hm?"
Ethan quickly took out the scroll and looked at it.
Finally, there was something good.
It was a scroll that increased territory defense, called the [Defense Tower Blueprint].
[Defense Tower Blueprint: Once your territory becomes larger and larger, you will realize that relying on manpower alone for defense is not only time-consuming and exhausting, but also often full of loopholes. After all, people are only human. But when you use tools for defense, you only need to consume some construction materials and the energy required for maintenance and operation. It is absolutely a worry-free creation that fully frees up labor.]
[PS: The only flaw of the Defense Tower Blueprint is that the materials are difficult to obtain. It requires Advanced Wood. Aside from some primitive forests, this kind of Advanced Wood is rarely seen elsewhere.]
"Needs Advanced Wood?"
The moment Ethan saw this requirement, he laughed.
If it had asked him for Advanced Stone or some other Advanced material right now, that really would have been difficult.
But he had just cut down a giant Blade Tree.
And obtained ten thousand portions of Advanced Wood.
'Heh!'
'Heaven really is helping me.'
"Home!"
He swung himself onto the Bone Horse and returned to his territory together with Nini and the others.
———
[Territory]
Ethan had just returned, he immediately saw Cook Four and Attendant Five already waiting at the entrance of the manor, each holding a kerosene lamp in their hands, waiting for Ethan to come back.
The Bone Horse ran to the manor entrance, and Ethan pulled the reins.
Then he looked at Cook Four and Attendant Five somewhat strangely and said, "How did you two… know I was coming back?"
"Achoo!"
Attendant Five could not help sneezing.
Only then did Ethan notice that even her nose had turned red. Clearly, it wasn't that they knew he was coming back, but that they had already been waiting here for who knew how many hours.
"Lord, please don't misunderstand. I already finished all my work."
After sneezing, Attendant Five saw Ethan staring at her and quickly explained awkwardly.
Ethan waved his hand and said, "It's fine. Just arrange your own matters yourselves."
"But next time, there's no need to wait here specifically for me. It's too cold."
"Waiting for me inside the house is the same."
"How could that be!"
Attendant Five and Cook Four spoke at the same time.
At that moment, the Scarecrow quickly jumped out from behind them with a smug look and said, ["Ethan, stop flattering yourself! My precious Attendant Five is actually here waiting for me, not for you!"]
"Oh."
Ethan simply responded with an "oh."
Attendant Five and Cook Four quickly exchanged a glance. Then Attendant Five blushed and hurriedly said, "We just wanted there to be a lamp waiting at the door when you came back, Lord. Otherwise, just thinking about you returning all alone makes me feel bad."