After understanding Li Yunxian’s intentions, these people actually breathed a sigh of relief.
Anyone in business knows that there is a lot of room between what others want and what they themselves actually do.
The first thought in these people’s minds was how much profit this matter could bring them.
After a moment’s thought, the words Li Yunxian had just spoken suddenly popped into their heads.
The Path of Righteousness…
They thought about Li Yunxian’s Cultivation speed and then considered the words she had just said; it truly did match up.
In any case, the situation couldn’t get any worse, so there was no harm in giving it a try.
Given the current circumstances, the factions they belonged to had also reached a point where they needed to seek change.
The representatives of these factions found a high-sounding reason for themselves in their hearts.
However…
Someone showed a bitter expression on their face: “Teacher Li, some things cannot be achieved just by wanting to do them. We need an opportunity; we need our words to carry weight.”
At this point, the other party’s voice became tactful: “For example, if the results of our discussion with you this time allowed us to have something to show when we return to our respective places.”
“…Could you first retract that message you posted on the network?”
“No.” Li Yunxian refused without hesitation.
She was not skilled in business, but she had merchant friends she was very close to.
She knew how much these business types would try to take a mile if given an inch; conceding one step would lead to you conceding many more.
The conduct of such people had left a deep impression on Li Yunxian.
To deal with this, the trick Li Yunxian had learned was… to refuse every request the other party made and then propose an alternative solution.
This was the very clichéd carrot-and-stick model.
And the carrot Li Yunxian was offering this time was a carrot that came with absolutely no cost to her.
She looked at the people before her and asked with doubt in her voice, “With so many of you and so many factions represented here, and now that you all have the same goal, are you not natural allies?”
“You aren’t exactly weaklings. You lack neither Cultivation nor intelligence. With such vast resources and power, what do you have to worry about?”
“Are you lacking faith in yourselves, or do you not trust the other people present?”
Li Yunxian’s surprised voice fell upon the ears of The Many, once again leaving them speechless.
They had lived in their established environments for hundreds of years and had formed fixed perceptions; their view of certain matters was sometimes inferior to that of an outsider like Li Yunxian.
In the past, these factions were all hostile to one another.
After all, the Interstellar environment was only so large; if one faction ate a bit more, another faction would inevitably eat a bit less.
Even when dealing with Li Yunxian, these factions were the same; they acted in tactical agreement rather than in coordinated cooperation.
It wasn’t until Li Yunxian mentioned it now that they realized they were no longer competitors.
Seeing their dazed expressions, Li Yunxian picked up the cup in front of her, took a light sip, and said indifferently, “Since an agreement has been reached, and it’s rare for everyone to be gathered together like this—who knows if there will be another such opportunity in the future.”
“I imagine none of you have been required to return immediately, and there is plenty of time for detailed discussion. Why not just hammer out a plan and confirm how you should cooperate with each other?”
The representatives of the various factions: “…”
They had been completely and clearly arranged by Li Yunxian.
But why did it feel so stifling?
Recalling the moment they stepped into this drawing room, the pace of the conversation from start to finish had been entirely in Li Yunxian’s hands.
These faction representatives let out a long sigh.
Li Yunxian was truly the most difficult person to negotiate with that they had ever met.
But that was just how some things were. Although they were currently the ones asking favors of Li Yunxian, they couldn’t even produce anything she wanted.
These people could only accept it.
They truly began to discuss matters with one another.
The first thing they needed to consider, naturally, was how to regain their right to speak within their respective factions.
As it turned out, after these people spent a long time muttering to themselves, only the one from the Li Qiu Alliance stated that they still had blood relatives in the upper echelons and could return after polishing their seniority again.
The others struggled to calculate for a long time, concluding that the fastest they could regain any power would be ten years from now.
Listening to their words, question marks popped up one after another in Li Yunxian’s head, and she asked rather bluntly, “Why are you all calculating based on starting from scratch? Didn’t you say just now that as long as the messages I sent out were resolved, you would have another chance?”
Hearing these words from Li Yunxian, the others’ eyes suddenly lit up: “Teacher Li, are you agreeing to retract the messages?”
The more these people analyzed, the more their heads ached and the more they felt the future was bleak.
Before the discussion, although they knew their situation was very bad, it wasn’t until this moment that they had a profound understanding of exactly how bad it was.
They were all feeling somewhat disheartened.
Although ten years was not very long for a Cultivator, for a faction, it was enough time for others within the organization to completely swallow up their original resources.
That would truly be starting over from the very beginning.
Everything they had gained in their lives… would turn into complete nothingness just like that.
Under this mindset, Li Yunxian’s opening to concede even one step carried a weight in their hearts that was completely different from before.
What a brilliant calculation!
At this moment, as they looked at Li Yunxian, even if they were thinking that this person was too terrifying, they couldn’t help but feel that her entire being was shining in their eyes.
Like a Savior.
However, Li Yunxian felt nothing toward their gazes.
From her experiences in the Cultivation World to being surrounded by people in Qingxing, she had seen countless people looking at her with the gaze of a Savior.
For these fellows, toward whom Li Yunxian had zero favorability, whether they felt resentment or gratitude in their hearts didn’t cause even a ripple in her mind.
She hadn’t thought about manipulating human nature at all; her previous words were born of genuine confusion.
“Why should I retract the messages? Can’t you solve it yourselves?”
“Now that your factions have agreed to my ideas and are willing to put in the effort to change your respective ways of doing things, I certainly won’t make things difficult for you anymore.”
“In this situation, wouldn’t it be enough if you just convinced the local authorities that you don’t need my financial help when the Cheng Chi are being renovated?”
“I’m willing to shell out that much money to rebuild the cities; you can certainly afford to pay as well.”
“In this regard, you should have more of an advantage than I do. Your factions have been rooted on those local planets for so long.”
“If you can’t even achieve this much or settle something so small…”
“Then you really ought to be finished. Don’t even think about saving or redeeming anything.”
Li Yunxian’s words were quite direct.
Moreover, the actual situation went beyond just that.
Including Boxing Center City, the headquarters of these factions had all been hammered by the official authorities.
The local Dengxiantai certainly felt some guilt toward these people.
As long as their factions could produce a feasible plan, the local authorities would definitely choose to protect these factions to some extent.
In this regard, the advantage was truly theirs.
Li Yunxian felt that such a solution was quite easy to think of, yet after these people heard her refuse to retract the messages, they actually gave up on thinking about how to solve the matter.
Were these people really smart? Li Yunxian couldn’t help but feel doubtful.
The answer, of course, was that they were smart.
It was just that the fellows before her had all been terrified by Li Yunxian’s ruthless style of doing things.
They didn’t dare to imagine what the consequences would be if they went against what Li Yunxian wanted to implement.
Not to mention, the solution Li Yunxian had provided…
It wouldn’t work!!!
The people from the various factions looked at Li Yunxian with hesitant expressions: “Teacher Li, our Guild/Alliance… cannot produce that much money!”
Not everyone was like Li Yunxian, with nothing but pure capital in their hands!
Most of what the various factions held were fixed materials like supplies.
There was money, of course, and quite a lot of it. But none of it was something that could be accessed at any time to be used for other things.
Employee salaries, management dividends, and payments for contracts signed with other factions.
Most of the funds had fixed purposes and could not be used recklessly.
A break in the capital chain was an extremely terrifying thing for an enterprise.
And the funds needed to rebuild a city would absolutely exceed the limit of what they could produce.
Li Yunxian, who didn’t understand these common business points: “…”
These factions each called themselves the top ten of the galaxy, and their titles were so resonant, yet they were actually this useless!
Li Yunxian’s mouth twitched, but she still didn’t say anything about retracting her words.
The real focus of the message she had sent out was to urge these cities to undergo transformation.
If Li Yunxian retracted it, these opportunistic fellows would definitely drop the matter of city transformation in a heartbeat!
In truth, Li Yunxian had never intended to take the responsibility for all the city transformations onto her own shoulders.
That would be far too much attention.
It would leave the Lishi name exposed to scrutiny.
Although there was actually only Li Yunxian herself in the Lishi, there were far too many people relying on the Lishi name for their livelihoods.
Li Yunxian knew how to maintain it.
Her actual goal was to get the various factions to take over this work.
Then they would actively and diligently set goals, such as finishing the transformations before the Lishi intervened.
As for what these people were thinking—conspiracy theories about Li Yunxian using them to control the internal affairs of these factions and become the ruler of the entire galaxy—Li Yunxian wasn’t interested at all.
She had always been a hands-off boss.
These messy matters would only hinder her Cultivation!
It was just a pity that these people were useless beyond her imagination.
But it was also impossible for Li Yunxian to take back her words or simply continue paying out of her own pocket.
Li Yunxian looked at these people speechlessly for a long time before finally choosing another plan.
She took out a Dan Prescription.
Namely, a Medicinal Bath Recipe.
“Then I’ll authorize you to handle this thing,” Li Yunxian said.
In the Interstellar world, Li Yunxian had authorized many things, but she had never authorized this most basic Medicinal Bath Recipe.
Li Yunxian now explained the functions of this formula to these people.
The faction representatives: “…”
The faction representatives: “!!!”
Everyone gasped.
“This thing can let ordinary people cultivate?!” they exclaimed in shock.
Previously, Li Yunxian had brought out items that improved a Cultivator’s Innate Talent.
But that wasn’t strange.
Because their Interstellar world also had similar medicinal functions, it was just that they needed to be paired with Magic Tools and weren’t as convenient as directly taking a Dan Yao.
Either way, they were things that required extremely expensive Spirit Materials to create.
But the Medicinal Bath Recipe before them was different.
Even with just a rough glance, they could see that all the materials on it were extremely common; they weren’t even Spirit Materials.
They were ordinary Herbs that could be grown in mass quantities.
The only thing that could be called expensive was the Bloodbone.
Although the price of Bloodbone had risen quite a bit over the last two years, it was still far too common.
Many Beasts produced it, and after the fluctuations, it was only around two thousand Star Coins.
Most ordinary people in the Interstellar world could afford that amount.
This truly meant mass-producing Cultivators!
Hearing their words, Li Yunxian shook her head: “Not exactly. It just timely absorbs the blockages in the flesh, blood, and Channels of ordinary people, allowing the sealed Linggen to be revealed. Only that portion of people will be able to cultivate normally.”
“For ordinary people with absolutely no Innate Talent for Cultivation, it will merely strengthen the body and improve their appearance.”
None of the people from these factions cared about what Li Yunxian said next.
Whatever this function meant in their ears, it would mean the same in the ears of the rest of the populace.
This thing could change the world!
They didn’t hesitate for a second and immediately signed the standard Lishi authorization contract.
Only after signing did they realize something in a daze.
It seemed that accidentally… along with the signing of this document, they had become part of the Lishi.
—That was how the Interstellar world identified the Lishi’s power.
If you had an authorization, you were part of the Lishi.
They were now a community of shared interests.
So this was ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’…
Recalling how they had been handled by Li Yunxian from the moment they entered the drawing room until now…
The faction representatives were completely won over.
At this point, everyone settled their minds and began to collaborate with each other again, discussing the reclamation of power.
With more chips in their hands, these things were actually very easy to talk about.
They exchanged information and methods of cooperation, while Li Yunxian occasionally reminded them about how to handle the content discussed on the network regarding the public’s need for them to change, admit their mistakes, and provide compensation.
Point by point, they confirmed everything in an orderly fashion, and before they knew it, several days had passed.
Once all the discussions were finished, the people from these factions looked at the scenery outside the drawing room and felt as if they were in another world.
And indeed, it was as if a lifetime had passed.
It felt as though the people who had stepped into the Du Jie District a few days ago were entirely different from who they were now.
They had never imagined that, as a faction, they could do so many things that were good for everyone.
The Path of Righteousness had suddenly appeared beneath their feet.
Stepping onto it, they actually felt so relaxed and at ease.
It felt as if their bodies and minds had been cleansed.
So this was what it felt like to practice the Path of Righteousness.
Some even felt the Cultivation bottleneck that had trapped them for many, many years beginning to loosen.
Everyone turned their gaze toward the fellow whose surrounding Cultivation was fluctuating.
So, everything Li Yunxian said was true.
Even though they had already judged it to be so, they still couldn’t help but think it in their hearts.
Taking a deep breath, they gave Li Yunxian a deep bow and then spoke: “Thank you for your help. If you have any needs or arrangements in the future, please feel free to contact us.”
Li Yunxian blinked and didn’t refuse: “Alright, I’ll arrange for someone to coordinate with you later.”
They had no objections and said sincerely, “We will not fail your trust.”
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