DKIE CH56.1: Return

The uninvited guests came in a hurry and left in a hurry.

Until the Saintess boarded the top-tier dragon ship, the gazes of the visitors on the shore couldn’t help but linger on her departing figure.

People from the Holy Court naturally possessed an aura that made the common folk want to worship them. If there was a great disparity in strength, this influence would be infinitely magnified.

The Elf King and the elders, at this moment, didn’t even spare them an extra glance.

In their hearts, the Holy Court was now a pile of filth on the roadside.

No, two piles.

The sound of dry leaves being crushed came from behind. Luka jumped down from the tree and walked over to meet them.

“Good day, Your Excellency the Elf King. Good day, esteemed elders.”

Usually, when parents are at fault, the blame is often shifted to their children. This situation did not exist at all for Luka.

Never mind being separated from his flesh and blood; he was practically undergoing plasmolysis from his parents.

“Aspiration is not determined by age,” the leading elder of the council said with a smile upon seeing him. “His Majesty has already discussed the construction of the network with us. The future is promising.”

Luka humbly agreed and took the opportunity to talk about the source of his inspiration for building the network.

“After I was exiled, I wandered everywhere and came into contact with many talented and extraordinary people. Among them were many with excellent ideas, but unfortunately, their words carried little weight due to their humble status.”

Luka tried to subtly instill in them the importance of the creativity of the masses.

The Tree of Wisdom was rooted in the elven race. If the elves forever stood on the clouds looking down on all living beings, the overall tone of the network’s development would inevitably be very slow.

The leading elder of the council thought about his words with some seriousness.

The Elf King spoke at this time. “We have an important meeting later. Why don’t you come and give them a detailed introduction?”

A meeting. What a strange yet familiar word.

So early in the morning, and the work vibes were already here.

Luka nodded. “Alright.”

This time, Luka went alone. The Quill Pen had not yet given up on the obsession of giving the magical framework a facelift and was buried in research. However, the ferret took the initiative to follow along.

At the meeting, Luka stood at the front. “I will mainly emphasize three points…”

As he spoke the words, he himself got a layer of goosebumps.

He hadn’t had a job that required meetings in two lifetimes. Everyone present could be considered a top-tier elder. The feeling of being watched was imaginable.

This directly led to Luka not looking up for the entire duration of his speech.

“When the terminals leave the factory, they need to come with some pre-installed configurations, such as the game and the communication platform, and also a space station. Users can download the latest required software through the space station…”

“Secondly, the design. The current design is too crude and must be updated…”

“And also, the time of the product’s launch…”

When Luka mentioned this, he could feel the breathing below stop even without looking up. Clearly, everyone attached great importance to this.

“I plan to set it on the day of the human city-states’ celebration, to ride the hype.”

Meetings are very boring. Luka deliberately made a little joke. “Haha, in the future when the product becomes popular, everyone will enter the annals of human history for free.”

Humans are the best at writing history books.

The atmosphere became even quieter.

Why is no one laughing? Don’t you get dry humor?

Luka looked up and found that everyone was looking at him with very complicated and sympathetic eyes. At first, he didn’t understand why, until he noticed a hazy, indistinct figure sitting in one of the seats. Luka’s smile froze instantly.

The Saint!

Can someone tell me why the Saint is here?!

It wasn’t his real body, and his full head of silver hair seemed even more ethereal. The Saint looked over with a faint smile.

Luka fell silent.

On second thought, it didn’t seem strange for the Saint to appear for a project between the two races. But for him to suddenly participate remotely, he could have at least been told!

An elder sighed. “If only he had looked up.”

Just one look.

The Saint remotely petted the ferret. It was unclear whether he was teasing or genuinely asking, “Am I on the list for the annals of history?”

Luka pursed his lips and, after a long while, squeezed out a sentence. “…You can be.”

The Saint left a meaningful smile, and his virtual image turned and disappeared from the spot.

Luka’s expression changed again and again. That departure was too formal.

It was only then that the Elf King spoke up to explain. “The communication token that the ferret carries with it has a very limited duration.”

Doesn’t that mean that, by just a little bit, the Saint could have missed my final dark joke?

Just as Luka was about to look up and sigh, a sentence from the Elf King brought him back to his senses. “The city-states’ founding day is approaching. How to position the terminal is a problem.”

When new things appear out of nowhere, the public usually adopts a wait-and-see attitude. If the terminal’s pricing is too low, it will seem cheap. Too high, and no one will buy it. A compromise… the true psychological price range of the public was really hard to estimate.

Moreover, the terminal was not yet completely perfected, and its selling points were insufficient.

Currently, its most powerful function was its ability to replace the consumable communication stones, successfully breaking the barriers of time and space.

An elder hesitated. “Why don’t we wait a little longer?”

Wait until more interesting things are developed and the whole thing is more mature before selling it to the public.

But Luka shook his head.

The communication function was already very powerful. In the past, if one was trapped in a place a little farther away, even a communication stone couldn’t be used to call for help.

The terminal relied on the Tree of Wisdom, so the signal would not be lost.

“I actually have a plan. It doesn’t require a grand marketing campaign. Even if it doesn’t make a splash, it won’t affect a second wave of publicity in the future.”

Compared to just now, many of his words this time seemed much more cryptic.

Luka gave a rough outline. The Council of Elders wavered between thinking it made some sense and that it was exaggerated. However, they gave Luka their full trust and respect.

“We’ll proceed according to your plan for now,” the Elf King made the final decision. With a flick of his cold, pale fingers, a storage ring appeared opposite him.

“Funding for the initial preparations.”

Luka’s divine sense swept over it. Inside were a large number of rare magical plants and precious medicinal materials.

Although there wasn’t a single gold coin, any one of these items could fetch a high price at an auction house.

Just as Luka was about to say it was too much, the Elf King continued, “From the sounds of it, you plan to return to the human race before the city-states’ celebration day. The Saint’s side should also make some gesture.”

“…The resources are mostly in duplicate. Your friend seems to have contributed a lot as well.”

The construction of a complex magical system was not a project that could be completed by one person in a short time. He was obviously referring to the Quill Pen.

Luka took a light breath.

This world that doesn’t make empty promises is simply wonderful.

…

In the following two days, the elven race quickly mastered the use of the community. Not only did they spontaneously register for accounts, they even began to try posting.

Luka had to meet with Cullen first to settle on a distributor, so he had to depart early.

On the day of departure, the scale of the farewell was unprecedentedly grand.

On the shore where the sea and sky met, all outside visitors, regardless of race or status, were asked to move a thousand meters away. The Elf King, unusually, wore ceremonial robes. His feathered cloak was stunning as he personally played the zither.

Countless elves accompanied him with music and drums, a scene worthy of a celestial palace.

During this time, the visitors looked at Luka with doubt and uncertainty several times. Many of them had been waiting here for a long time and knew that Luka had been here for less than half a month, yet he was receiving such high honors.

The piece the Elf King played was the one he had composed with Luka that day.

Some little elves were also in the farewell procession. Influenced by the Elf King, they thought Luka was very good. Now that he was leaving, they were very reluctant to see him go.

Experiencing a farewell for the first time, some of them with a crybaby constitution had tears welling up in their eyes.

Luka held the ferret and stood at the edge of the dragon ship with the Quill Pen. As his eyes met the Elf King’s, he subconsciously joined in the song.

Halfway through singing, he frowned. “I keep feeling that this scene is strange.”

There was a strange sense of déjà vu.

It wasn’t until the song ended that Luka slapped the ferret’s thigh.

He remembered! It was from a textbook.

“Upon the Yi River… Gao Jianli played the zither, and Jing Ke sang along in the mournful key of ‘bianzhi.’ All the gentlemen shed tears.”

Isn’t this the farewell at the Yi River?

The dragon ship was about to cross the sea. The music and drumming continued, but had switched to a farewell tune.

The little elves waved their arms. “Safe travels!”

Luka: “…”

He was not convinced. He turned back and shouted, “I will be back—”

A muscle twitched at the Quill Pen’s temple.

The weather at sea was unpredictable. After encountering storms for two consecutive days, by the time they reached the city-state closest to the Boulder City, they were a full day later than planned.

The Boulder City had no port. The ferret used the teleportation array in the city to call for people.

Luka and the Quill Pen guarded the dragon ship. In early winter, he had added a new padded jacket. “If we had terminals, it wouldn’t be this much trouble.”

Towards the end of the year, spies from various races were competing for performance, and communication stones were sold out.

The Quill Pen did not refute, absorbing the essence blood of a demon beast that had been purchased along with the winter clothes.

By the time Cullen and Lilian arrived, there was still a faint, sweet, and bloody scent in the sealed cabin.

Seeing that Luka showed no signs of injury, they both tactfully refrained from asking questions.

Lilian was also dressed lightly in winter, her eyes only on the industrial chain. “Luka, I was just telling my staff yesterday that, counting the days, it’s about time for you to make the newspaper headlines.”

The Quill Pen gave a light snort.

Luka pretended not to hear. Once the dragon ship set off again and a soundproofing spell was deployed, he took out two terminals and gave a live demonstration of the network.

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