Fully extending my spatial and spiritual senses and confirming no one watched me except ordinary mages unable to grasp what I was doing, I slipped my consciousness into the pendant's inner space.
Opening my eyes, I saw a light-gray world around me, with fireflies floating everywhere—souls and their shards. By glow intensity and pressure, one could gauge their level. After admiring the mesmerizing sight briefly, I began tallying my haul.
Generally, to get a full Servant-level soul, you need to kill 50 to 150 monsters on average, depending on type. For example, Sand Demons in Donghai are famed for high soul drop rates, about one in twenty.
Infernal Ants in an African valley, raiding nearby cities yearly, have an extremely low chance—one in 250. One soul per quarter million monsters! I don't envy African Hunters...
White Eagles, not particularly strong monsters without high drop fame, don't sink to Infernal Ant level. On average, one soul per 65 eagles—pretty good. Simple math: from ~30k killed Servants, about 460 souls should drop. Even if all went to me ideally, not enough to boost both my girls' stars by one step.
After such a massive battle! Now it's clear why, besides the high cost, no one uses this method. It's simply not profitable for people to trade huge human losses in war for doubling one High-level mage's strength. Not worth it, even I admit. Without my parallel-world travel ability and knowledge of sure soul droppers, I wouldn't bother. I'd hunt magic-boosting items instead.
Of course, I didn't have 460 souls. Despite the White Tiger pendant's huge collection radius—boosted by Commander souls—Bul didn't fly over the entire battlefield, though it tried while facing two Commanders.
Now, per my count: 337 Servant-level souls—not enough for one girl's stars, let alone two. Need to buy six more before gifting to one. Sigh, still need fitting compensation for the second to avoid offense.
Suddenly, I wanted to hunt surviving White Eagles. Just to skip inventing another gift. But I held back. Though I'd recover reserves fast, and my Soul Seed's ice armor is hard to pierce even for peak Commanders, the birds would scatter on sight.
Need to finish soul-transfer-between-worlds research soon. I think of it too often; embarrassing it's not done. Joint work with Luo Mian yielded breakthroughs. Boosting my girls with soul piles is close.
Might wait till International University Battle ends to avoid excess attention. I stand out already, but blame ancient clan legacy dumped on lucky me. Two more anomalies? Not exception—statistics.
Dismissing thoughts, I checked other souls from the slaughter. 54 Flock Leader souls, plus one stray Commander soul. Nice; selling today's harvest would net at least three billion yuan.
From that angle, artifact-crafting from these souls would boost the city or raise a couple High-level mages from bottom. Naturally, only if talent allows. War drives progress in any world. Sadly for Hangzhou folk, I took all souls, buying off with three Galactic Veins... Profit.
Forty minutes after sending him to clean traces, Luo Mian returned with a corpse still radiating High-level poison-element cultivation aura, third step. Man, didn't even try cheating; killed the right guy outright. Thought I could expose him for extra goodies. No fate. But political sharks beside me won't leave money even for Parthenon treatment. No salt in wounds.
Then routine. Speeches to citizens about our glorious victory, mages' great contribution defending homeland, etc. Main message: Luo Family, as goodwill and charity gesture, pays fallen mages' families three years' salary each, upfront. Poor Luo Mian; almost pity him. He'll walk armless longer now.
Naturally, every Warlord-fighter donated for city good, for PR and prestige. My three Galactic Veins topped by Zhu Men: half billion yuan from Zhu Family for restoration. Could compete, but didn't. Let him take main patron glory; my wealth less conspicuous.
At end, behind closed doors sans outsiders, discussed restoring Hangzhou Winged Legion. On Silver Firmament Sovereign approach, all tamed birds before submitted to higher bloodline, rebelled; mages preemptively killed them. Victory won, restore handy defense/transport tool. But ignore rebellion risk on future attacks? No.
I proposed long-term alternative: Silver Firmament Sovereign compensates attack with 5k White Eagle chicks. Hangzhou sells half to other cities, buys equal compatible birds, breeds hybrids, takes chicks, sells parents as obsolete.
Hybrids far less bloodline-pressure prone, solving revolt issue. Won't restore Legion instantly, but in three years. Minus old weaknesses. Tang Zhong and Wu Ping Jin agreed. Others non-citizens, uninvolved... Except Luo Mian, wisely silent in his spot.
Last: convey to bird Warlord he owes solid future chicks from nest. Some treasures nice too. Luckily, Totem Serpent conveyed demands, guaranteeing "deal" sans issues. Losing bird swallowed pride, agreed to stronger monster's terms. Jungle law: strongest rules.
Exiting meeting hall post-discussions, declining Warlord-nest expedition for treasures but securing 10% finds anyway, I headed to Magic Court's roof for the phone ringing three hours straight.
"Hello." Knowing what followed, I resignedly picked up.
"Mu Bai, are you okay?! Why didn't you take us to such a dangerous place?! What if something happened to you?!" Machine-gun worried questions from TuTu and Jiao Jiao poured, yelling over each other to convey worry. Seemed I heard similar from Ling Ling. Damn, feels so good when they worry sincerely.
"I'm fine, no need to worry..." I calmed my girls, convinced no prior attack knowledge (or like Shanghai, would've brought them), sweetened with future gifts. Basically, dodged slippery topic.
Fully aware how dear they are, I physically can't take them where I might die, low chance or not. Their safety > this planet. Worlds like this abound; they're unique to me. Choice obvious. For me. Thus, future solo risks. All for them, then this world and folk.