Chapter 151 - 128: Great Harvest
Chapter 151: Chapter 128: Great Harvest
A look of pleasant surprise replaced the fury on the Seventh Prince’s face.
He truly hadn’t expected the Celestial King Stronghold to give him such a pleasant surprise. The strength of its Village Chief was secondary. The main point was that by seizing Prince Lie’s territory, the Celestial King Stronghold now absolutely ranked among the first-rate powers in the buffer zone.
He glanced at Zhao Yu beside him and said, "Immediately notify our people stationed at the Northern Border. We must bring the Celestial King Stronghold under our banner, no matter what price they demand."
The Seventh Prince now stared at the members of the Celestial King Stronghold in the Profound Light Mirror as if he were looking at a treasure trove.
As for the forces on the Withered Leaf Plain, aside from the ten thousand or so who fled, the rest surrendered directly. They were just bandits, after all, and would follow whoever was strongest.
This was the law of this chaotic land.
By the time all the captives were gathered, the sky was already beginning to brighten.
A Gang Qi Realm expert responsible for garrisoning the stronghold that Zhang Ke had built also surrendered without hesitation, bringing his subordinates with him after being completely surrounded by the army.
Lu Yuan rode his warhorse, surveying the chaotic battlefield.
In last night’s battle, aside from a few top-tier experts from both sides, not many people had actually died.
This was mainly because after Zhang Ke’s death, the others had surrendered too quickly.
After glancing at the camp ahead, Lu Yuan said to Yang Xiao, "Take inventory of the supplies. Didn’t Prince Lie provide a great deal of support here? Tally it all up."
"As you command!" Yang Xiao said excitedly.
This battle had been gratifying. With these supplies, their strength could once again increase rapidly.
After Yang Xiao left,
Lu Yuan gave Zhou He a meaningful look and pulled him over to a secluded spot.
He took out a Token and said, "Go back at once. Take this Token to the Northern Patrol Army Camp and mobilize the troops for me. Have them garrison the area inside the pass, within the Withered Leaf Plain’s territory."
"You want to wipe out all of Prince Lie’s men who escaped?"
"They fled toward the pass, so they will certainly try to go through it. Because of their connection to Prince Lie’s Mansion, no one will dare stop them. They think that’s how they can escape an attack from the Celestial King Stronghold.
However, we must annihilate them.
Leaving any of them alive would be a disaster.
If we don’t kill them all, Prince Lie’s Mansion will make a comeback, and we’ll be their first target," Lu Yuan said gravely.
Zhou He couldn’t help but be startled. "But if we do this, we’ll have thoroughly offended Prince Lie."
"Do you think we won’t offend him if we don’t kill those people? If he ever found us, he wouldn’t spare us regardless. This is the buffer zone of the Northern Border right now, and the higher-ups from both Dayong and the Northern Barbarians are forbidden from entering.
We need to take advantage of the fact that neither side has any intention of continuing the war to develop our own power.
Otherwise, if we miss this window, we might not get another chance," Lu Yuan said calmly.
’He’s calculated that the Dayong high command wouldn’t dare get personally involved. If they did, not only would the Northern Barbarians object, but so would factions within Dayong itself.’
Dayong had just reached a truce with the Northern Barbarians and the Xirong.
The Xirong in particular still had a large army stationed at the border that had not yet withdrawn.
Therefore, Dayong absolutely did not want to start a conflict with any other power.
The various powers kept each other in check.
The situation was extremely sensitive. It was only because the Northern Barbarians’ national power had waned so severely; otherwise, Dayong would have to be even more cautious.
After all, in the past, the Northern Barbarians had always been Dayong’s greatest enemy.
"Alright, I’ll go mobilize the troops now," Zhou He replied.
Lu Yuan nodded.
Then, Zhou He spurred his warhorse and rode off into the distance.
Lu Yuan, meanwhile, slowly entered the Withered Leaf Plain camp.
He had just sat down by a bonfire when Wu Han ran over and said, "We’ve also taken over the checkpoints on the trade route! Our income should nearly double now. On top of that, with the tens of thousands of men we’ve absorbed, the Celestial King Stronghold’s forces are approaching two hundred thousand."
"That’s why you need to focus on increasing your strength. Although I’m here to keep things stable for now, and nothing major will happen, I won’t be here forever. With your talent, once you reach the Innate Realm, you should at least be able to put up a fight against a Void Manipulation expert.
With this army under your command then, where in the world could you not go?
From now on, besides expanding our territory into the surrounding areas, the most important thing is for you to increase your strength."
"Yes. I’m already at the Great Success level of True Essence. After a bit more polishing, I’ll try to break through to the Perfection stage. If I make good progress, reaching the Gang Qi Realm before year’s end won’t be a problem," Wu Han said with a nod.
This time, the rebellion of several Innate experts had given him a sense of crisis.
Although he had a large army under his command, his personal strength was lacking. This would ultimately constrain him at critical moments. After all, this was a stronghold, not the imperial court, which already had a complete system in place.
In the empire, one’s rank determined their authority, but here, strength was what got things done.
It was only because Lu Yuan was here—especially after he had just revealed such overwhelming power and awed everyone—that things were stable.
Otherwise, even if the tens of thousands of men from the Withered Leaf Plain surrendered, he might not have dared to accept them directly.
With Wu Han’s current strength, he could at best command the obedience of those in the Gang Qi Realm; controlling Innate experts was still a bit of a stretch.
"That’s good. But above all else, the most important thing is to protect yourself. Staying alive is what matters most."
"Yes."
Wu Han replied.
At this moment, even though he was the leader of a great stronghold managing over a hundred thousand people, in front of Lu Yuan, he was still the same as he had been all those years ago.
Whenever something came up, he always liked to hear his opinion.
’When Lu Yuan is around, I find myself subconsciously getting lazy and not using my brain.’
「Come noon.」
Yang Xiao had several men carry over a few chests.
Their contents seemed very heavy.
After Lu Yuan glanced over, Yang Xiao quickly said, "Village Chief, there was too much of the other gold, silver, and elixirs for those below the Innate Realm, so I didn’t bring them over. They’re all piled up over there.
These are the elixirs and Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures for those at the Innate Realm and above. And there’s one other great item."
After Yang Xiao finished speaking, the chests were opened.
As expected, they were filled with many things.
Rubbing his hands together, Yang Xiao said, "We have a full thirty chests of Innate Pills, and more than ten Innate Fruits—a type of Heavenly and Earthly Treasure. We also have Void Manipulation Pills for cultivators in the Void Manipulation Realm. We found over thirty chests of those, along with twenty-eight stalks of other Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures.
Besides all that, we also found this. It seems to be a Storage Ring, looted from Zhang Ke’s corpse."
Lu Yuan’s gaze was instantly drawn to the simple, ancient-looking ring.
He took it and infused it with his True Essence, discovering it was packed with several hundred Spirit Stones.
Lu Yuan had heard that the upper echelons of the imperial court used Spirit Stones as currency. He hadn’t expected it to be true.
Moreover, holding a Spirit Stone while cultivating could increase one’s training speed severalfold.
’This time, I really won’t be short on cultivation resources.’
With a wave of his hand, he placed a chest of Innate Pills and several Innate Fruits into the ring. He took about the same amount of Void Manipulation Pills as well.
Then, he looked at Yang Xiao and said, "Send the rest of these items to the stronghold’s treasury to increase our overall strength. What are the quantities of the other confiscated goods?"
"Tens of millions of taels of silver, three thousand suits of armor, roughly one hundred thousand Entry Pills, and about one hundred thousand pills each for Bone Forging, Tendon Refining, and Organ Refining.
And ten thousand each of True Essence Pills and Gang Qi Pills."
The more Yang Xiao spoke, the more excited he became. With all these resources, the Celestial King Stronghold’s power would surely take a great leap forward.
Lu Yuan, however, raised an eyebrow, feeling fortunate for his decision. ’Now that these nobles have territory and have recruited manpower, their next step will be to cultivate their subordinates.
They won’t be lacking in resources.
So they’ll quickly pull away from a grassroots stronghold like the Celestial King Stronghold.
And in the end, completely crush us.
It’s a good thing we acted so quickly. If we had waited another half-year, all these elixirs would have been used up. The Celestial King Stronghold would have had no chance against them then, not even with me here.
I can’t possibly slaughter my way through an army of a hundred thousand all by myself.
Forget me, even an expert at the Gathering Pill or Divine Palace Realm couldn’t do it.
Excessive slaughter invites Heavenly Punishment.
Once, on this continent, an invincible general single-handedly annihilated an army of several hundred thousand, and Heavenly Punishment descended that same day to obliterate him.
Not unless your physical body is strong enough to withstand Heavenly Punishment and you’re confident you can resist it directly.
Or unless you carry some kind of treasure to evade it. Otherwise, killing too many people alone will immediately trigger the power of heaven and earth.
This is also why many experts who clearly have the power to destroy a city still rely on an army to launch an attack.
It isn’t just because the enemy has powerful experts of their own; it’s also because they don’t dare to face Heavenly Punishment.’
Besides, with Lu Yuan’s true strength, he really couldn’t defeat a hundred thousand men on his own.
Even a Gathering Pill expert would be doing well to match thirty thousand Armored Warriors.
Against a hundred thousand, perhaps only someone at the Divine Origin Realm could come and go as they please.
As for a gathered army of a million, no one in the world could stand against it. Any expert would be dragged into the sea of people and eventually exhausted to death.
But now that these elixirs had fallen into the hands of the Celestial King Stronghold, they could be used to raise a batch of elite troops.
In Lu Yuan’s eyes, the resources sent by Prince Lie’s Mansion were enough to produce two or three thousand cultivators at the Tendon Refining or even Organ Refining stage.
’Another thing is, there are quite a few territories belonging to nobles nearby.
They’ve all been shipping massive amounts of resources over lately.
The Celestial King Stronghold would live to regret it if we don’t use this opportunity to grow stronger.’
Therefore, Lu Yuan planned to use the upcoming opportunity of inspecting the Northern Border fortresses to lead the Celestial King Stronghold in conquering enough territory.
And seize enough supplies.
He would inspect the fortresses with the Northern Patrol Army during the day, and after making camp at night, he would go raiding Beyond the Passes.
’After one full tour, the Celestial King Stronghold’s strength should increase tremendously.’
Thinking of this, he looked at Wu Han and said, "You and Yang Xiao can handle things here. I’ll be leaving this afternoon."
Then, he tossed an Innate Pill into his mouth.
He was now just one step away from reaching Innate Perfection. After taking the elixir to reach the Perfection stage, he could use a Heavenly and Earthly Treasure to break through directly to the Void Manipulation Realm.
’Once my cultivation reaches that stage, I’ll have no real rivals among the common experts in this buffer zone, to say the least.’
Even if a Gathering Pill expert showed up, Lu Yuan was confident he could kill them here.
In the next moment, a dense energy began to emanate from his entire body.
His Innate Qi grew increasingly dense.
A Spirit Stone appeared in his hand, shrinking at a speed visible to the naked eye.
As Lu Yuan had manifested Divine Essence in every realm, his own talent was also constantly growing, allowing him to absorb the Spirit Stone at a considerable speed.
About two hours later.
Lu Yuan let out a long, turbid breath.
He felt much more relaxed. Then, a system prompt appeared in his mind.
[Fourth-Grade Cultivation Skill: Mixed Element Qi Skill (Innate) | 10,272/10,000 (Great Success) | Breakthrough?]