In the void, below the Zheying Mountain.

A cloud-shaped flying artifact with a radius of twenty zhang floated slowly in mid-air, with Qing Muling sitting on top of it. The table in front of him was filled with various delicacies and spirit wine for him to enjoy at will. More than twenty beautiful women in thin, translucent dresses surrounded him, charmingly trying to please him.

Not far below on the ground, there were large tracts of spirit fields, totaling more than twenty thousand hectares. This core industry of the sect had taken more than three hundred years and a lot of manpower and resources to develop.

At this moment, in the spirit fields, tens of thousands of slaves were working, ninety-five percent of whom were ordinary young adults, and the rest were low-level wandering slaves, with their cultivation mostly in the Qi Refining Realm and the Understanding Mystery Realm, from various sources.

Spirit fields were different from medicinal gardens, as they did not require such strict underground spiritual veins and spiritual energy. However, they were still much better than ordinary farmland, so the places that could be developed as spirit fields on a piece of floating land in the void were quite limited.

Moreover, a considerable number of people were needed to take care of these spirit fields. Ordinary people were not enough, and a small number of them had to have a certain level of cultivation. For these small sects and families, this was a considerable investment.

The spirit fields produced various spirit rice, spirit wheat, and ordinary spirit fruits and flowers, mainly for the daily consumption and cultivation needs of the middle and lower-level cultivators. They could also be used to brew various spirit wines and nectars, but their quality was not comparable to those on the Supreme Dao Lineage territories.

However, for the large number of low-level wandering cultivators, such resources were already considered rare and valuable. In some remote areas, just a few dozen stones of spirit rice could hire a cultivator in the Understanding Mystery Realm to work for you.

“Being able to play as a local emperor in this place feels pretty good, doesn’t it?”

Qing Muling finished the spirit wine in his jade cup and exhaled contentedly, and the beauty beside him immediately refilled his cup.

It had been a month since he took over the Yang family. Including the four small forces, including Zheying Mountain, had been successively brought under his control by Qing Muling. All the cultivators above the Understanding Mystery Realm had powerful restraints planted deep in their divine souls, making it impossible for them to even think of rebelling.

Therefore, this piece of floating land, with a radius of over thirty thousand li, had accumulated more than four hundred large and small towns, and hundreds of thousands of villages and settlements, totaling over two hundred and fifty million ordinary people, all of whom had become Qing Muling’s subjects.

In the previous life, such a territory and population would have been enough to support a very large empire. Of course, in this vast world where cultivators and the power of heaven and earth belonged to oneself, it was not worth mentioning.

“Have you all completed the tasks I assigned to you last time?”

Qing Muling looked at the four men and one woman standing beside him, with the former Yang family head, Yang Cong, at the forefront, and the other four being the heads of the four small forces who had now followed Qing Muling as their only master.

Yang Cong quickly took out a jade slip and presented it: “Master, please take a look. All the mines, spiritual veins, and spirit fields suitable for development have been listed here.”

Qing Muling took it and carefully examined it, remaining silent.

In the past, the various small forces had acted independently, and it was common for them to attack and sabotage each other. Whether it was one family destroying another’s martial arts hall and tavern today, or another family destroying the mines and forests of the other tomorrow, there was never any peace.

There were many mines and spirit fields suitable for exploitation, but because they were located in the border areas of several forces, the ownership was unclear, and for safety reasons, all the forces could only leave them idle.

Then there were some mines and spirit fields on the edge of the desert areas, where the development costs were relatively high and the returns were limited, so they were also left untouched.

In fact, only one-third of the entire floating land could be considered good, suitable for a large number of ordinary people to live and multiply. The rest of the area was abandoned and dead, with no potential for development.

“Never mind, let’s go and take a look first.”

Qing Muling said, and Yang Cong immediately turned and ordered the cultivator responsible for controlling the flying artifact to activate the spell, driving the flying artifact quickly towards the distance.

Before long, the greenery on the ground began to decrease, and the view was gradually filled with a gray-black color.

These abandoned dead zones also had mountains, hills, lakes, and rivers, but there was no sign of life. Not to mention that humans could not survive here, even plants and insects were nowhere to be seen, and the area of thousands of li was silent.

The spiritual energy in the dead zones was chaotic and violent, and the geomagnetic feng shui was complex and changeable. Ordinary people who entered here would die within two or three hours, and low-level cultivators below the Understanding Mystery Realm could not stay here for long either.

All of this was caused by the great calamity in ancient times. During that dark and bloody era, many powerful beings fought, and all kinds of earth-shattering divine powers, forbidden treasures, and terrifying curses appeared one after another, shattering the vast world, causing the heavens to fall and the earth to crumble, and leading the entire world to the brink of destruction.

Although after an unimaginably long time, the great Dao began to repair itself, and the spiritual energy in the world gradually increased, many floating lands had reappeared with vitality, but most areas still showed no signs of recovery.

Qing Muling stood up, lightly descended with the wind, and stepped onto the ground. The cultivators on the flying artifact quickly followed.

He crouched down and touched the ground with his hand, and his divine sense penetrated into the ground, easily sensing the restless spiritual energy inside and some negative energies of different attributes. However, the destructive power and erosion were not as exaggerated as he had imagined, and were still within his tolerance.

Expanding the range of his divine sense, Qing Muling found that there were indeed spiritual veins in these dead zones, but they had all been contaminated and could not be used.Qin Muling silently operated the secret technique of the Heavenly Mechanism, and after a brief calculation, he concluded that if left undisturbed, the destructive energy within this dead zone might naturally dissipate after thousands or even tens of thousands of years, eventually giving rise to new life, as the revival of heaven and earth was an inevitable trend.

However, as things stood, there were still solutions to be found.

Qin Muling tried to channel his mana into the ground while communicating with the innate Harmony Spirit Seed within his sea of consciousness. A web-like pattern of chaotic light and shadow faintly emerged, spreading silently in all directions from his feet at the center, along the ground beneath him. Wherever it passed, the violent and disordered spiritual energy calmed down and began to be assimilated by Qin Muling’s mana.

The chaotic light and shadow spread to a radius of three thousand zhang and then stabilized, before it began to seep into the deeper layers of soil, gradually coming to a halt only after reaching a thousand zhang underground.

Under the incredulous gazes of the surrounding cultivators, the gray-black soil began to change at a visible rate, returning to the color of normal soil.

“How… how is this possible?”

Yang Song’s face was filled with disbelief, as everything unfolding before his eyes completely overturned his previous understanding.