In the battles that followed, Ye Liuyun and his first clone helped the Ferocious Bandit Gang round up another two hundred-odd capable bandits, swelling their ranks.

The demonic beasts and the women had fought to their hearts’ content; once the fighting ended they went straight back to cultivation and recovery.

With Ye Liuyun’s assistance, Li Xinran collected the entire planet. Her cultivation was still low, so she worked together with Tang Xinyao and the others; having a planet inside her spatial world meant she could borrow its power at a critical moment to save her life.

Tang Xinyao gazed at the now-empty starry sky, filled with emotion.

“When we first arrived, we had to use a combined formation just to face a Unity Six warrior. Now we can actually challenge Unity Six experts across levels!”

She knew that without following Ye Liuyun, they could never have improved so quickly.

“We’ll only get stronger,” Ye Liuyun said casually, then asked, “Have you all adapted to the outside world?”

Tang Xinyao nodded. “The strong devour the weak; everyone scrambles for resources. Every cultivator is a bandit.”

“True. As long as we keep our own principles.” Ye Liuyun sighed. After everything he’d been through, his understanding of the martial world ran deep. Still, he had his own bottom line and did not strike indiscriminately.

Tang Xinyao studied him. The more time she spent with Ye Liuyun, the more she realized how formidable he was—clever, resourceful, versatile, and advancing at terrifying speed. Anyone who offended him was bound to regret it.

“What is it?” Ye Liuyun noticed her stare and asked. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

“Nothing... just thinking you’re really too strong.” She didn’t voice the rest: compared to him, no other man could catch her eye. She wondered what she should do.

Tang Hao understood her thoughts but dared not expose them, lamenting inwardly, Usually so bold and mischievous—why turn timid in front of the boss?

Ye Liuyun didn’t dwell on it, saying they would all grow stronger, then swept everyone into his spatial world. Next he collected the demon legion, and finally brought in Xiao Heng’s squad.

Xiao Heng had arrived with just over two hundred men; after the past few days of fighting only a hundred remained. They had taken the same number of cities as the women.

Though Ye Liuyun used slave seals to keep them fighting, they still advanced at only one city per day. He considered this normal and did not push them. At least the resources they’d seized could support themselves and even yield a surplus for him.

After gathering them into his spatial world, Ye Liuyun used the black teleportation tower to return to his main base so everyone could cultivate and recover, then set out to claim the targets Jiang Yunmo had provided.

Jiang Yunmo had supplied more than twenty coordinates: several great clans, mostly military camps, and—surprisingly—an entire star system.

That system was called Tianmen, serving as an outpost for the Fireseal Dynasty, much like Crossingbridge. According to Jiang Yunmo, it belonged to the Fourth Prince, Jiang Yunmu, so Ye Liuyun could act without worry.

Moreover, it was the farthest from the capital; reinforcements would need at least half a month to arrive.

“You’re planning to strike all the other princes at once?” Ye Liuyun had asked.

“If I don’t weaken them, how can I compete?” Jiang Yunmo replied with a sigh.

“Don’t tell me you want to be queen of the Fireseal Dynasty?” Ye Liuyun guessed.

“Why not? Can’t a woman rule?” Jiang Yunmo countered without confirming. “Queen is still beyond me—and your strength isn’t enough yet. I’ll be satisfied if I can secure a better position for myself.”

She had indeed dreamed of the throne, but felt the goal was still distant; she could only advance step by step.

Ye Liuyun hadn’t expected a woman to harbor such ambition for power.

He knew his current strength was insufficient, but if things continued this way, toppling the Fireseal Dynasty might not be far off.

Yet he paid little heed to the squabbles of royalty; his focus was seizing every chance to grow stronger and gather resources. When he acted, he simply had to avoid falling into an imperial ambush.

While Ye Liuyun rested his forces at the main base, Jiang Yunmo returned the twenty-odd cultivators he had lent her, worried he might lack manpower for so many targets. She kept only Wei Yushan as her body double.

She now controlled the merchant guild and had cultivated her own loyal subordinates. Those borrowed experts, after all, were Ye Liuyun’s people; using her own was far more reassuring.

She even took the trouble to explain it to Ye Liuyun, afraid he might overthink things. But Ye Liuyun didn’t care in the slightest. Whatever the Fire-Seal Dynasty became in the future, whatever his relationship with Jiang Yunmo turned into, in the end everything would still come down to raw strength.

So he immediately led everyone into cultivation. He’d fought plenty lately, yet the Unity Sixth-Layer demanded far more energy; advancing another realm would take even longer.

Inside his clone’s spatial world he trained for half a month before finally pushing his cultivation to the mid-stage of Unity Sixth-Layer. Though the increase was small, he could feel his overall power had grown significantly. His control over heaven-and-earth energy had improved, and even his spatial force had risen along with it.

Among the demonic beasts and Tang Xinyao’s group, some were already on the verge of breaking through—only a final spark was missing.

The women with lower cultivation had just stepped into Unity Third-Layer; crossing into mid-Unity would clearly take them a long while.

Yu Xiaofeng and the others had been training and fighting non-stop; several had broken into the Unity realm. Ye Liuyun was eager to see what they could do and had them spar first with the Unity-realm slaves; if that wasn’t enough, Jiang Yunmo would send more over.

In the second clone’s spatial world, Cui Daoran had taken a few bandits and left to lead the rest of the bandit corps. At present there were forty-eight ninth-layer experts: six of them late ninth-layer, most of the others at mid ninth-layer, and a handful of early ninth-layer assassins.

That force was already enough to prop up a mid-tier faction; their strength had clearly risen.

Cui Daoran’s bandits numbered just under three hundred, all now outfitted with soldiers’ armor and gear. Xiao Heng still had only a hundred-plus soldiers left, but resources were abundant.

Ye Liuyun handed all the surplus resources Xiao Heng had turned over to Cui Daoran, telling him to have the bandits train first. From now on they would support themselves and also hand over a portion of whatever they seized.