Chapter 1456

After the price war ends in Fang Yuan’s victory, Zhao Lian Yun privately studies how a newcomer swept aside three veteran sellers using absolute strength. She wants to learn how a newcomer breaks into a market, but takes nothing from a victory built on strength alone. She judges that dropping his price gradually, rather than at once, let him earn more, test the three sellers’ limits, and assert his dominance over them. She concludes he means to drive the three out of the market entirely, not merely beat them once. She has just begun her own immortal aperture, very far below his level. ^{ch. 1456}

Rong Xin, Wang Ming Yue, and Xie Bao Shu meet to discuss the wreckage: Wang Ming Yue says his strength lets him supply the whole treasure yellow heaven market alone, leaving their year Gu unsellable. Xie Bao Shu, pale, says the newcomer means to get rid of them entirely, and Rong Xin agrees the year Gu market will shrink immensely for years to come. Their stock sits unsold, since buyers already holding cheap year Gu will not buy more unless prices fall further, and the three cannot sell at Fang Yuan’s price. The three fall quiet, the mood very heavy, since even a market recovery in a few years would only invite Fang Yuan to repeat the same tactic. Wang Ming Yue hopes his strength was only a bluff. The other two find it very unlikely. ^{ch. 1456}

Rong Xin proposes they try to cooperate with Fang Yuan, as they once banded together themselves, but Wang Ming Yue doubts they can cooperate across such a gap in strength. Xie Bao Shu says it will depend on what else they can offer him if year Gu is not enough, and Rong Xin adds that refusal would leave them no choice but to abandon the year Gu business. Xie Bao Shu, a lone cultivator who relies on year Gu to fund his cultivation and connections, refuses to give it up and takes the heaviest blow of the three. Wang Ming Yue’s situation is only slightly better, since she can lean on her husband’s clan, and Rong Xin, backed by a Central Continent super force, faces the least pressure and could simply stop refining year Gu. Fang Yuan receives their proposal and rejects it at once. He sees no reason to share profits he can claim alone. ^{ch. 1456}

Fang Yuan tallies twelve million immortal essence stones gained from the price war. He plans to raise prices slightly once he drives the three sellers out, though he expects them to hold on a while yet. Some buyers, including Wang Ming Yue’s own super force, will still buy a huge portion of their year Gu at higher prices to preserve relationships. Even those relationships will strain in five to six years if he keeps dominating treasure yellow heaven, since prices that low pull buyers toward him anyway. He reasons that dominating treasure yellow heaven, a huge share of the whole Gu Immortal world’s year Gu market, will make him its biggest seller in time. After repaying his debts he still holds ten million immortal essence stones, though this method of profit cannot be used again for two or three years. He then hears from Sixth Hair that the food path Immortal Gu he commissioned has finally been created. ^{ch. 1456}