It had been slightly over half a year, yet there had surprisingly been no changes in the stats interface. This was also the first time that his stats interface had remained the same for such a long time since Meng Lei had first gotten it.
It wasn’t so much as he couldn’t change anything, but because Meng Lei had deliberately been self-indulgent and had ignored the system all this while.
Meng Lei thought to himself, It’s about time to go back.
Then, he left behind a divinity projection of himself and left.
“Big Brother Galen, we’re back!”
...
“Master, you’re back!”
Bubbles, Klaus, Nadja, and Seisia bowed in greeting to Meng Lei.
The aura around them was majestic, and their divine power strong and vast—this was because they had assimilated the divine cores.
“All of you are more or less done with the assimilation?”
Meng Lei remarked with a calm smile, “So, that means all of you have become lesser deities. Not bad!”
“Thank you for kindly bestowing the divine cores upon us, Master!”
The four of them hastily bowed and expressed their gratitude.
Their strength had gone through a tremendous change after they had assimilated the divine cores.
Even though they could be said to be among the weakest lesser deities out there because they had only just assimilated the divine cores, a lesser deity was ultimately still a lesser deity and an actual true god. This was far beyond what a half-deity could compare to.
Therefore, the gratitude that the four held toward Meng Lei was sincere and true.
“We’ve lingered long enough in the Golden Archipelago. It’s about time we return.”
Meng Lei sighed as he said, “But someone has to be stationed here in the Golden Archipelago. Who among you is willing to stay behind?”
“This...”
The four of them looked at one another, all somewhat troubled. To be honest, all of them wished to follow Meng Lei.
Meng Lei was a generous person, bestowing upon them both divine weapons and divine cores. Where were they supposed to find a Master like that?
But staying behind had its own benefits, too. One would oversee an entire region from then on and would become a true-blue local emperor of a region.
“You wily old foxes!”
Meng Lei was rendered speechless. Without a second thought, he whipped out the Abyss Blade Demon’s companion machete and said, “Whoever is willing to stay behind and be stationed at the Golden Archipelago shall receive this blood-red machete!”
The four of them perked up, their gazes all falling onto the blood-red machete as looks of desire flashed across their eyes.
However, Bubbles, Nadja, and Seisia’s gazes shifted away after only a quick glance. Compared to the machete, they were still more willing to be by Meng Lei’s side.
“In that case, this machete will be Klaus’ now.”
Meng Lei handed the blood-red machete over to Klaus and said, “Remember to guard the Golden Archipelago property well. Don’t mess it up, get it?”
“Don’t worry, Master! I will definitely do my best!” replied Klaus as he gave his promise.
“One more thing, by the way!”
Something occurred to Meng Lei, and he said, “Not only are you to watch after the Golden Archipelago, but you are also to put in great effort to improve the islanders’ standards of living and their own combat abilities.
“If the conditions allow for it, try your best to build Battle Aura and magic academies and let those children attend school.”
“As Master commands!”
Klaus nodded heavily.
“Do your best!”
Meng Lei gave Klaus a meaningful look. Then, he left with the other three.
“Take care, Master!”
...
“Are you returning to the Dragon God Empire, Master?”
“Yeap!”
“It’s been more than a year since we’ve left. I wonder how the Dragon God Empire is and whether that fellow Puhaman has been slacking off? See if I don’t give him a good beating if he has!”
Meng Lei wasn’t too sure about the Dragon God Empire’s development progress, either. However, from the changes in worshiper numbers during the past year or so, he could nonetheless still sense a thing or two.
During the last two years or so, his worshiper numbers had increased exponentially and reached a terrifying total that numbered dozens of billions!
He gained close to ten million worshipers practically every day. Some came from the Dragon God Empire, some from the Titan Empire, and some from the underground world.
Out of all the worshipers, 70% of them were from the Dragon God Empire!
That equated to a few dozen billions of worshipers!
This showed that Puhaman hadn’t been slacking off. Rather, he was doing a pretty good job at taking care of the Dragon God Empire. Or at least, he was doing great when it came to spreading faith.
The four of them passed through the eastern Endless Oceans waters and arrived at the Dragon God Empire. Then, they saw the changes in the Dragon God Empire.
“Master, from what we’ve seen so far, it seems like all the Dragon God statues in the Dragon God Empire are gone?”
“Take a closer look. They aren’t gone; rather, they’ve been changed to statues of Master!”
“That is certainly so!”
Meng Lei felt very gratified.
Originally, apart from small, remote mountainous regions like the Magical Beast Village, every city and town that was on a slightly larger scale would contain a Dragon God Cathedral and Dragon God statues for people to pray to the Dragon God and to collect power of faith.
However, both the Dragon God Cathedrals and the Dragon God statues were gone during his return this time. In their place were instead his temples and statues.
There was an endless stream of worshipers, and various praying activities were constantly taking place. Many joss sticks burned within the temples and formed a flourishing sight. As they traveled on, they realized that this was the case in almost the whole of the Dragon God
