Chapter 238
"The city is honestly pretty good to live in. A little bit might makes right when the enforcers aren’t around, but that’s nothing new, and it’s not nearly as bad as that one human cultivation world I visited, those guys were crazy.
The only real problem is supplies, the city is growing so fast that it’s become almost impossible to source essential supplies from building materials to food. I go to Arcana to get my hotdogs and just pay the gate fee. If I didn’t know a butcher there that makes sausages I would be in real trouble. I’ve even heard of a few places getting robbed for groceries because new arrivals couldn’t find anything and didn’t want to pay hotel prices." The vendor elaborates in response to our questioning.
"Even Arcana is getting short on supplies, demand is so high that even the Guild Hall has had to close early some days because they were out of almost everything, including monster cores to power the creation spell. You missed the entire winter traveling, but only the Arcana region really got a harvest in." Lelou explains.
If we’re going to supply a whole continent things are going to get tight, even with magic to create essentials. Earth has a lot of cultivators now, but it hasn’t been nearly long enough for most of them to even get out of the Foundation Realm. And there’s really not much we can do about it.
"Are people hunting the monsters that spawn near here to trade in Arcana?" Karl asks.
"As many as they can, every single day. But most can only hunt Rank 1 and 2 Beasts which will feed them for a while, but the construction bosses set bounties to get most of the cores. The region is pretty safe now, since the monsters are hunted constantly, and the guards take care of any giants that show up."
Sounds pretty normal for a growing city, there’s never enough resources to go around.
"They brought in a load of farmers too, from the Dragon worlds. They’ll be working the area, since most of the humans died or fled when things got bad. So next year should be better." Another voice comes from behind us as a Demon comes over to buy a hotdog.
"Yeah, the number of refugees is getting out of hand everywhere. No offense boss." Another customer says to the vendor, who doesn’t seem bothered by the comment.
"Both demons and Dragons. Once they find out things have a chance of being better this side of the portal they pack up what they have and come. I heard Arcana is building even more housing outside the main wall, despite finding many of the refugees work outside the city. That’s almost a million people in a single year that came for the promise of Hope alone."
"Word is you can buy everything but people there. Don’t try that, they’ll execute you." The first Demon agrees.
At least the city didn’t lose its basic standards while we were gone.