chapter 990: celestial city

the border surveillance room was near the city entrance, so it was easy for vaan to overhear and sense the situation inside.
nevertheless, he was not concerned about the city's reinforcement.
after all, vaan was currently inside their city. even if they sent experts, they would have to exercise caution and restraint lest they bring about the destruction of their own city.
moreover, vaan had already discovered the celestials' weakness in cultivation.
the divine inheritors were already weak due to the nature of the divine inheritances. however, their biggest weakness was their lack of understanding and utilization of the laws.
the heaven-defying path of energy cultivation required shattering the energy core at the void realm to produce a violent yet controlled energy explosion, which could form a miniature universe to accommodate the superior divine energy.
as such, all divine origin realm cultivators have their own heaven, known as the divine world or inner world. they opposed heaven by creating their own personalized heaven. however, the biggest difference of the heaven-defying path of energy cultivation was its ability to bypass the requirements for law comprehension to reach the divine origin realm. after all, the heavenly path of energy cultivation required entering the truth manifestation realm instead of the void realm; it was the process of germinating the energy core like a plantal seed instead of shattering it and inducing a world-creation explosion.
unfortunately, the heavenly path of energy cultivation had a huge demand for spirit energy in order to reach the saturation limit required to germinate the energy core into a divine tree.
furthermore, after entering the truth manifestation realm, the cultivators needed to comprehend the laws well to grow their divine trees before they could eventually enter the divine origin realm.
as such, most cultivators would choose the heaven-defying path since it had a much lower requirement and was easier. even so, it was also far more dangerous.
after all, shattering the energy core to enter the void realm required being able to survive or withstand the energy explosion. otherwise, death would be the only outcome.
after the garrison captain logged into the celestial database with his access level, vaan immediately perused the available information with incredible speed.
fortunately, the garrison captain had enough permission to access information on every city's location.
in total, the celestial kingdom had thirteen cities in pangea: eight in the inner seas, four in the outer seas, and one in the rumored central sea found in the heart of the dragon vein. these thirteen cities were also categorized into eight farming cities, four mining cities, and one privilege city.
the eight farming cities of the inner seas made up the majority of the celestial kingdom's population and its low to middle-class societies. they were self-sufficient cities that did not require any imports to maintain their basic functions.
on the other hand, the four mining cities of the outer seas were made up of lower-class celestials. mostly, criminals, slaves, and plebians without backgrounds were sent there for menial and hard labor.
furthermore, the four mining cities were all founded in the northern outer sea, the only outer sea that the celestial kingdom managed to conquer for development. roughly seventy percent of all rare metal imports in the celestial kingdom came from here.
lastly, the privilege city of the central sea, celestial city, was where the privileged upper- class celestials congregated. they held the greatest power and enjoyed the best divine inheritances after the ocean master and twelve city lords.
the world's spirit energy was also gathered here before distributing to other celestial cities via spirit transmission pipelines and cables.
because of celestial city's control of spirit energy distribution, it was able to haggle and enjoy regular resource tributes from the twelve cities. cities with more generous tributes received more spirit energy than others.
although celestial city did not always possess such a dominant position, it grew into it due to its strategic and important location.
in fact, celestial city had assumed such a dominant position that it considered itself different from the rest of the celestial kingdom; its people called themselves celestial dragons, and even the city lord assumed the title of celestial dragon king.
it could also be said that the decline of the celestial kingdom's military faction truly began when it lost its grip on celestial city.