The Invincible Overlord of Heroes.

The three-day vacation was over very quickly.

The year begins with the month of sorrow, which casts a shadow over the entire year.

The people of the Empire, who were already not in the mood to celebrate, were even more lazy to do so. Many people simply treated the occasion as an ordinary day.

Especially those who were allocated land by their families, they were reluctant to rest for a single day and would not come back once they went to the fields.

In such an atmosphere, even Qingfeng City was greatly affected.

On the contrary, the three-day holiday was over, and except for a few people who continued to rest, most people returned to work.

Only by engaging in passionate work did everyone's pent-up mood finally ease.

Even the hardest-working and most tired miners, whether they are miners in the Crystal Cave or workers in the Miners' Town, only feel at ease when they pick up the mining drafts and go back to work.

The refugees from the Western Empire have actually fled to Qingfeng City.

You have to know that Qingfeng City is not on the border of the grassland. From the border of the Western Empire to the grassland, it is definitely at least a thousand and eight hundred miles, if not hundreds of thousands of miles.

When they completely conquered the Western Empire, news came that the entire Western Empire, which originally had tens of millions of families and hundreds of millions of people, now had less than a million people.

Everyone then realized that although the orcs in the stronghold had been repelled, peace was still a long way from coming.

A large number of buildings in the Western Empire were either razed to the ground or directly transformed into cities of hell, and hell gates connecting to hell were being built everywhere.

The originally intact farmland was transformed into a lava pool, filled with man-eating demons.

As they fled, they saw bones everywhere and the land was completely soaked with blood.

The entire scene was like purgatory returning to the human world, with ordinary people either fleeing and avoiding being hunted down, or being enslaved or slaughtered by demons.

Such news made the punished miners feel fortunate that a powerful hero like Xu Lai was born on the grassland.

At least now, they only need to finish their daily work to get a salary, which is not much but is something.

In addition, the construction site provides food, accommodation, and sometimes even alcohol, so they only have the opportunity to spend their salary during holidays.

Although the work on the construction site is hard, the rewards you can get as long as you atone for your sins are amazing.

But even without pay, they at least have a stable job, have food and drink, good conditions, and can sleep peacefully.

Unlike those poor people of the Western Empire who were enslaved by demons, they could not even have enough food to eat, and even drinking some thin soup every day was probably something they could only dream about at night.

Not to mention the delicious fish and meat, you could even taste dragon meat some time ago.

The more suffering the people of the Western Empire experienced and the more tragic the news they brought, the more actively the residents of Qingfeng City and the grasslands worked.

The most obvious thing is that the residents of Qingfeng City spontaneously acted as transport workers after completing their work every day, helping to transport the ore from underground or Conaston.

With the help of these people, the construction speed of Qingfeng City's city wall was more than doubled.

Before Xu Lai, he did not hire too many laborers because he mainly wanted to develop farmland and store more food to deal with the war.

Although there were many young and middle-aged people who fled to Qingfeng City, they were not enough to share.

With the increasingly developed trade, the demand for young and strong labor has increased exponentially.

Xu Lai also recruited a large number of soldiers, conscripted security guards, and municipal workers, expanded ranches and farms, built roads, fisheries, built post stations, and so on.

Almost every job requires a lot of young and middle-aged people.

Ordinary women and children can only do some not-too-heavy tasks such as feeding cattle, sheep and horses, processing furs, and helping to prepare meals.

This is also an important reason why men need to be treated preferentially by society, because they pay more, and it would be obviously unfair if they cannot get more in return.

With the support of the Castle Heart, the construction of the city wall should have been very fast, but the longer the distance, the more time would be wasted in the transportation process.

There is no one in charge of the construction work, and ordinary people cannot get involved.

The recruited farmers have inherent advantages in this regard. They are like program modules. As long as they are added, they can greatly increase work efficiency.

This month is a rare month of hope. The number of recruitment places has doubled and more than 300 farmers have already arrived.

With the involvement of these 300 farmers and the spontaneous assistance of countless others in transportation, the city walls on all four sides had taken shape in less than ten days.

The remaining work is nothing more than the construction of crossbow towers, arrow towers, the installation of city towers and city gates, as well as the arrangement of city defense equipment such as catapults.

This was not a short-term job, but undoubtedly, the most complex, time-consuming and labor-intensive work of building the city wall has been completed.

All that’s left is to repair a few gates, which will then be just a matter of the number of defensive facilities and will not affect the normal use of the city walls.

The most important thing is that as the date of January 1 approaches, more and more dignitaries, heroes, wealthy people and lords appear in Qingfeng City.

So many people, especially those with status and position, appeared in Qingfeng City.

If Qingfeng City fails to even build a city wall, it will have a huge impact on Qingfeng City's image, and the news will soon spread everywhere.

Xu Lai doesn't care much about his image, he is a pragmatist.

However, sometimes, when you reach a certain status and position, image becomes something you must pay attention to.

Apart from anything else, just letting those refugees know that Qingfeng City is a city without even city walls will inevitably reduce their willingness to come to Qingfeng City.

Because Xu Lai attached great importance to the auction, the entire Qingfeng City also attached great importance to this auction.

It just so happened that the lights and decorations hung during the Chinese New Year had not yet been taken down, so everyone planted some flowers and plants, made some decorations, and set off some fireworks to make it look more professional.

The residents of Qingfeng City also acted as enthusiastic guides today.

Those who come and go are either powerful or wealthy. Even a little bit of money that slips through their fingers is enough to feed the common people like them for several years.

The auction will not start until 10 o'clock, and those who come early naturally don't want to wait.

Moreover, Qingfeng City's reputation has now spread very widely. These people are here not only to participate in the auction, but also to inspect Qingfeng City.

After all, for many powerful people, in addition to the attraction of divine weapons, they have accumulated wealth for hundreds of years and have seen all kinds of treasures.

In peacetime, they might even be willing to spend a lot of money to buy all kinds of top-notch goods.

However, in such uncertain times, they would rather concentrate their wealth in their hands and buy hard currency such as food and soldiers.

Unfortunately, they went to the Qingfeng City market and found that an ordinary tier 2 infantryman could be sold for 500 gold coins. Such an outrageous price scared the lords who wanted to buy more soldiers back so much that their eyes almost popped out.

There is no way. The recruitment price of a level 2 infantryman is only 50 gold coins. The price has increased tenfold. Who can afford it?

But not long after, a strong man came to the market, followed by a dozen crossbowmen and archers.

"500 gold coins, you are asking for too much because there are too many people in the market, right?

I'll take all the 400 gold coins for each one. If not, you can just continue to wait in the market. I'll report to the market manager later and ask him to at least increase the rent by % or %. "

The owner of the stall took a look at the man who came. The man was wearing a military uniform of the Qingfeng Corps and was quite famous. He was in charge of logistics in the Qingfeng Corps.

This guy appeared in the market, he must be here to recruit soldiers for the Qingfeng Legion.

Given the identity of the person opposite, if he tells the manager of the market, not only is there a possibility of a rent increase, but he might even be kicked out of the market.

"Haha, you are joking. I haven't seen you for a long time. You don't know how much the market price has risen recently."

"It's a huge increase, bullshit, I just bought these archers from the front, and the other ranged troops haven't increased as much as yours."

The vendor smiled bitterly and said, "You can buy these infantrymen and put them in the swordsman training camp. With some gold coins, they can all be exchanged for level 5 swordsmen.

When the time comes, you can bring it back to the market and I don’t know how much you can earn.”

“Bullshit, if I can bring it back to the market to sell, do I still need you to teach me?

Stop the bullshit, this month is the month of hope, you gave me ten times the manpower when there are so many new soldiers, if the lord hadn't personally instructed me, I would have kicked you out long ago."

"Ahem, alright, alright, there are 20 in total, just pay gold coins."

The number of field troops in the Moon of Hope also doubled. However, although the number of troops doubled, the demand increased several times.

Not to mention other places, on the grassland alone, the nobles have raised the price countless times.

There is no way, Jimmy is just too strong and he doesn’t stop even in the New Year.

Everyone thought that they could take a break during the New Year holidays and connect with each other, perhaps there would be hope to stop Jimmy's offensive.

Unexpectedly, they were not the only ones who had this idea. Several families that were related to Jimmy by marriage directly turned against him.

Jimmy's Knight Wind Legion not only did not lose any troops due to the capture of the city, but instead incorporated more than 5000 troops.

Instead of leaving the family property to Jimmy and his men to confiscate, it is better to use it to buy soldiers and food. Maybe it can hold out until the day when Aini said that things would turn around.

It’s just a pity that this group of people are used to being stingy and have no idea that Xu Lai’s Qingfeng City had already raised the price to three times its original price.

This means that even though the price of recruiting soldiers has skyrocketed, everyone is more willing to bring people to Qingfeng City to sell.

At least in Qingfeng City, Xu Lai is not the only buyer. The small lords and heroes who rely on Xu Lai for their livelihood will also be able to and are qualified to buy.

In addition, the reputation of Qingfeng City has spread. Apart from other things, there are countless lords and heroes who come to pay homage to the statue of the God of War every day.

Therefore, the prices in Qingfeng City are relatively exaggerated.

By the time the nobles on Aini's side reacted and raised their prices to 4 or 5 times, Qingfeng City's current offer had already reached ten times.

Of course, ten times is a bit exaggerated, but Xu Lai simply has no time to manage it now.

Otherwise, Xu Lai would definitely deal with these unscrupulous businessmen who raised prices one by one.

Due to the imbalance between supply and demand, it is inevitable that prices will increase, but the highest increase in the surrounding areas is only 5 times. Calling out ten times the price in Qingfeng City is clearly an attempt to take advantage of the big customers.

However, even with such an outrageous price, the logistics officials of Qingfeng City only bargained for it slightly and then decisively took all the goods away, without giving others a chance to react.

When Wang Chao led the recruited soldiers to the next stall, a nobleman with simple clothes and a calm and reserved temperament said to the vendor:

"Is the situation in your grassland area so tense now?"

The merchant shrugged and said in a rather helpless tone:

“It would be great if I were a grassland person. Anyone with a discerning eye knows that this heaven-sent hero named Xu from Qingfeng City will definitely be able to unify the grassland.

I heard that herdsmen in many places are no longer willing to pay rent to the local lords and are just waiting for the troops from Qingfeng City to attack.

Perhaps that hero Xu was also on guard against the demon army, after all, Qingfeng City had erected a statue of the God of War.

As long as the statue of the god of war remains standing, the strength of the entire empire's army will be improved. If the demons want to occupy this world, they will have to come to the grassland to fight sooner or later."

The nobleman's eyes lit up when he heard this, and he said to the merchant, "I never thought that a small merchant like you would have such insight."

The merchant sneered and said, "What kind of knowledge do I have? The nobles of the Western Empire wanted to unite and call themselves a country, but they were directly scattered by the demons.

Now, both the grassland and the Northern Empire are actively preparing for war, and the shadow of war is hanging over everyone's head.

Only merchants like us from the Southern Empire are still doing business without regard for our lives, sending precious soldiers thousands of miles to the grasslands. "

"Are you from the Southern Empire too? No wonder the price is so high. The shipping cost must be ridiculous."

The merchant chuckled and said, "It's actually not bad. We can take a large ocean ship and land in the Naga territory. It's only a few hundred kilometers to transport it here. Some people make money, some people make money."

"Naga?" The noble obviously didn't know that Qingfeng City had a connection with the Naga clan.

The merchant frowned and said, "Don't you know that the Naga tribe on the coast is an ally of Xu Yingxiong.

Recently, many merchant ships from the Southern Empire have docked in the Naga territory.

With the help of Qingfeng City, a super-large trade transit city is being built on the Naga tribe’s territory.

Look, the one being guarded by the eight-armed Nagas should be the little princess of the Naga clan."

With Xu Lai's current position, there are very few people who need him to greet them personally.

Bishop Durr had just gathered his men and set out a few days ago. The journey was thousands of miles and they had to walk everywhere. Even if most of them were priest apprentices, it would take at least one or two months.

Apart from those in the temple, who can be considered friends.

The only outsiders he needed to personally greet were the Northern Empire's Crown Prince, Hausen and his party, and the Naga Princess Emilia. (End of this chapter)