Soon after coaxing Iris, Maximus didn't forget to sell the materials he had obtained from the Endless Void Nullrift.
"So many?" Iris muttered in shock.
Before her was over 700 billion worth of materials.
Even for the Immortal Palace, which could earn trillions every year, this was not a small amount.
To earn such a sum in a short period of time, all sectors of the Immortal Palace sect, spread across the Aeon Plane, had to work to their bones.
"I didn't expect you, Junior, to have this capability!"
"How about it? Does Sister Iris consider being taken care of by me?" Maximus joked.
In the virtual realm, Maximus felt his confidence soaring, as he could say whatever he liked.
If Iris got angry, she couldn't accidentally kill him.
"You wish! You can't buy me off with just a little money~" Iris said, rolling her eyes.
"Oh, by the way, Sister Iris, do you have enough funds? I'll come back later to sell more. It should be worth a few trillion origin coins," Maximus said, recalling his plan.
After receiving the money, Maximus planned to set up a shop in the Endless Void Nullrift directly.
This way, he wouldn't need to walk around buying materials, as they would come to him.
With a budget of 700 billion origin coins, he should be able to buy trillions worth of materials.
"Just a few trillion? The Immortal Palace sect is richer than you think!"
With a foundation of trillions of epochs, the sect's wealth could no longer be measured in money.
Basically, a part of the Aeon Plane was already branded by their name.
"Hehe, then I'll depend on Sister Iris from now on..."
...
A few days later, after spending some time with Iris and collecting the money, Maximus returned to the real world.
As for his wives, they were still playing with their children.
Knowing they might stay here for hundreds of years, they weren't in a hurry to be with their husband.
Furthermore, they were about to go to a place more isolated than ever before.
They might not meet their family for thousands of years.
Taking this opportunity, they wanted to make the most of their time bonding with their kids.
Going to the Nullspire Foothold alone, Maximus boarded his Void ship, 'Shadow.'
...
1438 Nullspire Foothold:
Landing at the floating stronghold, Maximus cloned himself again.
"Spread to the nearest strongholds and set up shops," Maximus ordered his clone.
Setting up just one shop would be too inefficient.
Later, when he had trillions of funds from Iris, a single shop wouldn't be able to spend it all even after a few years.
Taking billions of origin coins and materials, his clones began setting up shops around the 1438 Nullspire Foothold.
Most of the locations chosen were those with weaker base guardians.
Although Maximus was confident he could fight against a master of the River of Law, it would still be a close battle.
Thus, as much as possible, Maximus preferred to avoid crossing their paths.
The various businesses around the Nullspire Foothold united, pooling their funds to buy up treasures at an insane rate.
As usual, Maximus didn't care and matched the price hikes, just a little higher.
"There's more?! Is the Shadow Pavilion really a second-rate force?!"
"It's only trying to scare us. Don't falter, raise the prices!"
"Just hold on for a few more months. I predict this shop will close down soon!"
Soon enough after a few months, under the efforts of this spontaneous alliance, Maximus's funds were depleted.
"Hahaha, we were right! The Shadow Pavilion was just a paper tiger!"
"Tsk, what a show-off! If you didn't have enough money, why pretend?"
"Enough of that. Let's bring the prices down and recoup our losses."
"Without this madman, we can control prices however we like!"
Now that they were united, they could lower prices and earn a ton of money.
Compared to what they might earn, the past few months were nothing.
Soon, without the interference of the Shadow Pavilion, the price of polluted treasures fell to rock bottom.
The crowd, who had been happy earlier when prices skyrocketed, now fell into despair.
Because they had hoped for even higher prices, most of their loot remained unsold.
Now, with different organizations lowering prices, their losses would be immense.
As for selling their goods at stalls, after a few months of peak trading, most of the remaining treasures were low-grade and common.
They also couldn't sell their loot in the virtual world because of the void pollution.
The only chance they had was to sell it in bulk at a discounted price.
Just as the spontaneous business alliance was celebrating in revelry, Maximus, who had sold the purified treasures to the Immortal Palace sect, returned a few weeks later.
Carrying over 3 trillion origin coins, Maximus knew it was the downfall of this little business alliance.
"Time to act."
Hiking the prices back to normal, the Shadow Pavilion encountered a surge of panic selling.
They didn't even bargain; as long as the Shadow Pavilion didn't rip them off too much, they were willing to sell.
Seeing this, the spontaneous business alliance froze in disbelief.
"Are we being used?"
"H-how is this possible? How could he have so much money!"
According to their informants, the hundreds of shops around the Nullspire Foothold had just spent a few trillion origin coins in a few weeks.
"What is the background of this Shadow Pavilion?" they muttered in shock.
A month later, Maximus quickly used up all his funds.
The people seemed to have gone insane and couldn't wait to send him their money.
By now, their spontaneous alliance had fallen into despair.
Facing an unknown enemy, they stopped trying to fight and fled in a hurry.
A few stubborn ones remained, trying to match Maximus's prices.
They had already lost too much—if they backed down now, their organizations would cut them off.
Seeing this, Maximus simply smiled. Flicking his wrist, he sent out various invitations to these fallen and desperate individuals.
Opening the invitation, it read: "I have a proposal you might like. Come to the 1438 Nullspire Stronghold..."