Chapter 242: Chapter 242: Stop! Keep Hitting and You Won’t Have an Heir!

"Didn’t expect the mortal realm to have this many old monsters."

In his divine realm, Ren lay in his recliner, eating pastries made from materials that the Goddess of Magic had personally gathered from various gods. He was pretty surprised. "In just this short amount of time, over forty legends have started praying to us!"

"The real number might be even higher than you think. After all, not all old fossils can accept the Magic Net right away."

The Goddess of Magic was obviously in a really good mood too. She hadn’t expected a single auction to trigger such a massive wave. Forget everything else—just these more frequent prayers alone made Her quite happy.

Since many things required multi-way communication online and offline, plus some people going to Dragon Bank to handle business and whatnot, all requiring multiple prayers to activate the Magic Net, prayer frequency had doubled under this stimulation, even though user numbers hadn’t really increased.

And this was just an unexpected bonus, not even Their most important goal.

"Wonder if these old folks will become internet-addicted seniors after this auction ends."

Although these "seniors" were mostly attracted by life-extending items, in reality, not many of them were actually close to death. Most still had some years left to live.

Previously, most of these people were in a semi-retirement state. Some were researching how to improve themselves further, some had just given up and were farming and fishing, and others were barely hanging on just so their factions could maintain their current positions for a few more years...

Whatever the situation, they really didn’t have much of a future to speak of.

After this grand event ended, once they understood the power of the Magic Net and discovered they could entertain themselves from home, well, they had nothing but time anyway. Browsing the Magic Net might just become a ray of light in their boring remaining years.

"Compared to that, what surprises me more is that Dragon Bank has already accumulated over 300 million golden dragon coins, and that’s not even counting what the dragon race deposited themselves. How come I feel like from the start, there was no need to have the dragon race prepare extra gold and silver coins? Just what these people deposited is already enough to get Dragon Bank running..."

Even as a god, He felt a bit surprised seeing this number. He knew the prices in the mortal realm.

The wealth possessed by these folks at the high and top levels of the continent was truly astonishing!

However, for Ren, 300 million gold coins could only be described as... nothing much. It wasn’t enough to support the development of magic-tech industrialization. Could only say that the appearance of these gold coins laid a pretty decent foundation for the various reforms coming up next.

And at this moment.

In the mortal realm.

In the western region of the Kingdom of Dawn.

In a luxurious church, the sounds of bamboo whips and tortured screams kept echoing, making people passing by the church shudder. If this weren’t the headquarters of the Pastoral Cult, someone probably would’ve reported it to the city guard already.

"Father, my dear father! Stop hitting me! I know I was wrong! I really know I was wrong! I’m your only son! If you beat me to death, the Pastoral Cult will have to be passed on to someone else later! The Wool Guild too!"

"This is our ancestors’ legacy! It’s been in our family for generations! The God of Shepherding loves our family the most! If you keep this up, what face will you have to see the God of Shepherding when you die!"

"Ah! Lighter, lighter! I was wrong! I really was wrong! Just go back to your previous strength!"

Wool Ryan, who not long ago was throwing money around online as "I’m Really Not the Cult Heir," was now hanging in the church’s main hall being beaten like crazy by his father—the Pope of the Pastoral Cult and president of the Wool Guild.

"Let’s see if I can beat you to death today!"

"150,000 gold coins! You just gave them away to someone?!"

"Do you know what you can do with 150,000 gold coins?! Do you know how much you can buy with 150,000 gold coins?!"

"Do you know this money was what I sent to Dragon Bank to participate in the auction?!"

"Now look what happened! So many good things, and I don’t have enough money!"

"Do you know that with that thing, our Pastoral Cult might’ve been able to get out of our current mess!"

The Pastoral Pope seemed to get angrier the more he thought about it. The bamboo whip in his hand struck Ryan’s back hard again, making Ryan grit his teeth in pain and break out in cold sweat.

Ryan actually knew he’d been way too impulsive. That was 150,000 gold coins—enough to buy several noble territories with change to spare. He’d just given it away like that, and the key was he’d also messed up this auction...

Putting that aside entirely, even if he was going to give it away, if those 150,000 gold coins had been given to the right person, it would’ve definitely brought huge benefits to their Pastoral Cult. But he’d done it just to make a beauty smile... The problem was, it hurt!

Even though he knew his father wouldn’t actually let anything happen to him, he’d been pampered for over twenty years. How could he handle such a beating!

While screaming in pain, he thought about how to make up for this loss. But just then, suddenly, a sigh came, and then he saw his old man just plop down on the ground looking defeated:

"Sigh, these years I’ve been too lenient with you. I didn’t give you a clear understanding of this world. Something like this happening, I can’t really blame you... Forget it, let’s just say the Pastoral Cult wasn’t meant to have this chance..."

Seeing his father, who just recently had been spirited and confident he could easily get through the current crisis, suddenly show this expression, Wool Ryan’s feelings got even more complicated. But a sudden flash of inspiration made his expression start to get excited.

"Father! Father! I’ve got an idea! I’ve got a way to solve our funding problem!"

The Pastoral Pope looked at his son and let out a helpless sigh. "Don’t get any ideas about the money in the warehouse. That’s for purchasing wool. Even though wool products haven’t been selling well lately, we still have to buy it to maintain our position..."

"No, no, Father, I’m not thinking about the money in the warehouse. I’m thinking about our stockpiled wool products. I’ve got a way to sell all of it. And at a price that might actually be higher than our usual selling prices."

Wool Ryan quickly shook his head and laid out his plan. "We can actually sell our stockpiled inventory through Magic Net videos! Trust me, I can clear out all our stockpiled inventory in no time. Then the funds will naturally flow again, and we might even have more than before!"

"? Magic Net videos? How’s that possible? You’re not planning to send this wool to the dragons for auction, are you? How much is wool even worth? Besides, even if it was an auction, there’s no time. We’re latecomers, so we’d definitely be put at the back..."

"No, not an auction—other sales features. The newly appeared storefront and stuff. I’ve got a great idea. As long as you cooperate, we can easily clear our inventory!" Wool Ryan got more and more excited as he talked, as if he was super confident in this plan.