Su Hao had just finished pondering over Gu Fei when he looked in the direction of the Summoning Altar.
A wisp of white smoke floated out, and at that moment, more than 100,000 Sacred Night Bugs were emerging from the Summoning Altar.
Their overall number had doubled from when they previously left the castle.
Most of them were uninjured, and it seemed that even a level 10 goblin was easily crushable in their eyes.
Su Hao immediately sent the summoned Sacred Night Bugs to rest in the Skyscraper Tower.
He knew that the Sacred Night Bugs would not be able to rest long before they would begin to 'satiate themselves' again.
Another point to note was that those lords would not have come all the way there to surrender to him if they had upgraded their castle to level five.
Based on the current development of the other lords, none of them had upgraded their castle to level five.
After all, they would know the existence and use of elements once they reached that level.
Considering the fact that Su Hao was reborn, he also remembered that almost all the lords had been upgraded to a city-state after the first invasion of darkness.
By that time, level one city-states popped like mushrooms after the rain.
It was only after reaching the level of a city-state would an underground tunnel be opened between city-states.
That underground passage was used for the convenience of those within the two city-states, whether it was the militia, the soldiers, or the lord.
At the ends of these passages were buttons for each city-state. There were three colors to the buttons, namely red, green, and blue.
Red represented conquest, green represented submission, and blue represented peace.
As the designation suggested, it was the relationship that had been decided between both sides after a discussion. Those who wish to attack would press the red button, and the troops or militia in that city-state would use that passage to attack another.
Choosing the blue button meant peace, where both sides would not interfere with each other!
If the green button was pressed, the castle lord and everything in the city-state would become the soldiers and people of the other party.
Their city-state would then disappear, and every time they successfully resisted the invasion of darkness, the lucky draw would naturally be given to the lord of the castle that they had submitted to.
In other words, if 10 lords chose to submit to the same lord and everyone had successfully resisted the invasion of darkness, the main lord would get 11 lottery chances.
At that moment, the lords who came there could not be designated as friend or foe from the outset.
Su Hao knew that only those who were willing to come to him were, in all likelihood, unable to make good progress in the early stages. Lords like them whom he took in would be obedient and grateful to him for his gesture, resulting in a very high loyalty toward him.
However, Su Hao had already expected that some lords might have other ideas.
If they wanted to rebel, he would definitely send the Sacred Night Bugs to toy with them.
Then, he would give them a good beating until they begged for mercy and were willing to submit.
If he took these people in before the invasion of darkness, he would naturally be able to win the mystery award—the Radiant Holy Sword!
He would also get a lot of lottery chances.
If on the off chance that someone as capable as Gu Fei was among them, he was confident that he could still take them down.
With that line of reasoning, he had no reason not to accept someone who came to seek shelter with him.
As he thought of that, the militia leader immediately ran over and panted.
"My Lord! They're here at the city gate! Should we open the city gate to welcome them?"
"Go ahead!"
Gu Fei sat on his lion and listened—without offering his opinion—as the crowd discussed Su Hao.
"You heard it, didn't you? The Big Shot who exchanged food for gold coins is Su Hao."
"No way! Are you for real?"
"And he killed the goblin tribe not too long ago!"
"Goblins? I've only heard of them in legends. Goblins are at least level five and above, and they can reach as high as level ten! How did he even kill them?! What kind of terrifying troop does he have?"
"Level five? My wild rabbit troop can't even kill a grade three wild beast, let alone level five or even a level ten! It's terrifying. Simply terrifying!"
"I thought it was all fake, but I guess I have no choice but to believe it! If Big Shot Su Hao has a citystate like that, a class ten goblin is a piece of cake for him!"
…
As the crowd engaged in a heated discussion, their admiration and respect for Su Hao continued to grow!
Even Gu Fei was getting more and more curious about Su Hao after hearing their conversation.
He could not imagine that there was someone other than himself who could fight against wild beasts that were on level five to level 10.
Although his Golden Battle Lions were level eight at most, they had already begun to kill level ten beasts.
At that moment, he began growing more and more curious about what kind of troop Su Hao had that could directly kill an entire goblin tribe. Although he did not know if this was true or false, it was highly likely that a castle lord who had leveled up to such a scale would have every capacity to kill an entire tribe.
The truth of the matter, however, would only be known after he met Su Hao.
Excitement began brewing in his heart when he thought of that.
If he could seize Su Hao's castle, then those seized resources and his own would practically make him a god in the entire Endless Continent.
…
Everyone arrived at the gate of the city-state, but strangely, the gates had already been opened!
It was as if Su Hao had been waiting for everyone!
However, the city-state was surprisingly empty. Not even a single troop or militia was in sight.
Everyone was dumbfounded and started discussing among themselves.
"What's going on? Why isn't there anyone in such a large city-state? Where's Big Shot Su Hao!"
"Yeah, I don't even see a single troop! Isn't it a waste of effort to come all the way here just to submit to him?"
"Could he have brought his troops out? Why don't we wait for a while? Let's not enter just yet. It'll be rude."
"Have you ever thought that maybe he already left? Now that we're here, we can take over the place!"
"Hey! How can you think like that? We're here to pledge allegiance to Lord Su Hao. How can we do such a thing?"
"Why not? Isn't it obvious that there's no such rule in this barren world to say that 'first come, first served'? Being polite won't get you anywhere!"
…
The crowd was in a heated discussion, but the discussion was basically divided into two opinions.
One was to wait for Su Hao to return before making a decision.
The other was to take over the place, shut the gates, and reign there like a king.
At that moment, Gu Fei narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms as he sat on his mount. He glanced ahead at the empty city-state.
As he listened to the discussions of those foolish lords, he felt that everyone was stupid.
When it comes to submitting to people, only others could submit to him!
When it came to seizing the place, he was the only one with the right to do so!
Whether or not Su Hao just happened to go out or had abandoned the city-state, it was a good time to clinch the opportunity and seize his territory!
Since he had already made his decision, he turned to the Golden Battle Lions around him and commanded, "Attack!"