Chapter 306: Talent Like You Is Just What We Lack

The Western Regions are extraterritorial lands, and horse bandits have always been rampant.

A seemingly ordinary caravan set off from Yuyang Prefecture of Zhao Guo, traveled for half a month, rushed for thousands of miles, encountered four times of official troops blocking the road for inspection on the way, three times wanting to confiscate the goods of the entire caravan. They also encountered six robberies by horse bandits, one mixed battle of several parties of horse bandits plus official troops plus a mysterious caravan, and only after such hardships did they successfully arrive at Azure Void.

There were not many people in the caravan who could know the secrets, so in the eyes of the vast majority of members, this was a journey full of legendary colors. If it weren't for seeing it with their own eyes and experiencing it personally, who would know that there were so many horse bandits in the Broken City, and they were so well-trained, so well-equipped, so tacitly coordinated, and so well-versed in military strategy?

And the horse bandits in the Western Regions had peculiar tastes and strange hobbies. When official troops appeared, horse bandits would inevitably appear, and then it would be a mixed battle of three parties. The caravan was based on the principle of self-preservation, only seeking self-protection, and as much as possible did not participate in the battle. As long as they huddled, the official troops and horse bandits were busy fighting themselves and basically had no time to pay attention to them.

The first battle they encountered, the horse bandits beat the official troops until they fled, which was fine, but the horse bandits that appeared later were more fierce than the last, better equipped than the last, and were exceptionally ruthless to the official troops. Especially the two batches of masked ones, who were extremely fierce, came up and beat the caravan guards and official troops until they were in a mess. Then they stripped the official troops naked, took their armor and weapons, and left, leaving only a ground of bare-bottomed men shivering in the wind.

When the masked horse bandits appeared for the second time, they simply captured all the bare-bottomed men.

The caravan guards at that time thought they were in a dream. How could horse bandits capture an entire battalion of official troops?

Fortunately, they later encountered two small groups of horse bandits, fought two battles, and more or less redeemed a little of the caravan's traditional impression of horse bandits.

But before they penetrated deep into the Broken Realm, they encountered another Zhao Guo caravan. This caravan obviously had problems, with only a few large carts, but there were a full several hundred guards, and everyone was equipped with two horses. This didn't look like a caravan at all, but clearly an elite cavalry army.

Where there is a caravan, there must be Western Jin official troops. The official troops appeared like ghosts, came up and shouted that they wanted to confiscate all the property of this caravan, including carts and horses. As a result, this caravan moved without hesitation and beat the official troops until they were in a mess.

It was not surprising that the Western Jin official troops were defeated; they seemed to have never won a battle.

But immediately a group of horse bandits appeared. This group of horse bandits was equal in number to the mysterious Zhao Guo caravan, but there were dozens of Dao Foundation cultivators inside! After a mixed battle, the mysterious Zhao Guo caravan was actually defeated by the horse bandits and was on the verge of collapse.

At this time, the masked horse bandits suddenly appeared and immediately launched a fierce attack on the horse bandits present. Although the masked horse bandits were slightly inferior in number, there were a hundred Dao Foundation cultivators in the team!

This mixed battle was fought until the sky was dark and the earth was dim. The mysterious Zhao Guo caravan finally managed to escape and fled toward the way they came. The Yuyang Prefecture caravan was terrified, slipped past the battlefield along the edge, and accelerated to escape, not daring to look at the battle situation at all.

This battle fully demonstrated the cruelty of the horse bandits in the Western Regions. Even if several elite units of Zhao Guo arrived here, I am afraid they could only be official troops and could not be horse bandits.

The Yuyang Prefecture caravan had a total of thirty special large carts, and the carters and guards totaled five hundred. Because they had suffered too many frights, they traveled day and night, and their marching speed was quite fast. As long as it was not a river or cliff, they would forcibly cross all undulating terrain and would not take a detour at all, finally arriving at Azure Void without danger.

The caravan brought fifty thousand pieces of cloth, a large amount of low-level spiritual plants, mainly tea trees and purple crystal grape vines that could be used to brew wine, and five thousand catties of essence of five metals. The so-called essence of five metals is actually a collective term for a variety of rare metals. By adding them to iron and copper, one can obtain a variety of high-quality gold and iron materials with different properties. This batch of essence of five metals can be used to prepare at least five hundred thousand catties of high-quality gold and iron.

When the caravan left, they took away three thousand sets of breastplates, and the price was also twenty taels of immortal silver per set. In and out, the caravan instead left more than twenty thousand taels of immortal silver.

However, Cui Shutong, as the Town-Pacifying Envoy, held the military and political power of a prefecture alone, and this batch of armor could be directly equipped for his own troops, saving countless intermediate links. It's just that although the intermediate links were saved, the account expenditure of Zhao Guo would still not be less, and the part of the expenses saved naturally all went into Cui Shutong's pocket.

After this caravan left, Wei Yuan immediately organized manpower, opened another ten thousand mu of fields and three thousand mu of slope fields. The slope fields were specially used to plant purple crystal grapes.

With cloth, the people in the realm finally didn't have to fight to mend patches. If there was no cloth again, I am afraid that even Dao Foundation cultivators would have to expose their flesh. Wei Yuan always stripped the official troops naked when robbing them recently, actually to get a few sets of clothes.

For a month in a row, two caravans were welcomed, and the result was that five thousand sets of breastplates were directly consumed, and a net profit of one hundred thousand immortal silver was made.

After sending away the Zhao Guo caravan, Wei Yuan found Yu Zhizhuo to discuss how to expand the production capacity of breastplates.

Now the realm produces one hundred sets of breastplates a day, equivalent to having one thousand five hundred skilled craftsmen. But this is still far from enough, and the two caravans ate up all the newly added breastplates this month and also took away a lot of stock.

If this continues, Azure Void itself will have no armor to use.

Yu Zhizhuo was also worrying about this matter. When Wei Yuan found him, he was drawing a new type of melting furnace. This melting furnace was shaped like a giant tripod, which could hold ten thousand catties of prepared refined materials at a time and produce four thousand catties of molten iron. It's just that the Four-Elephant Wind-Generating Array attached to this furnace required four Dao Foundation cultivators to operate, and it was best to be fire-attribute Dao Foundation cultivators, which could shorten the melting time by one-third.

But now the number of fire-attribute Dao Foundation cultivators in the realm is not large, only a few dozen.

Fire-attribute Dao Foundation? Wei Yuan was thoughtful, and the immortal sword "Pseudo-Sun" appeared in his hand.

At this time, there were nearly one thousand cultivators mining and smelting in the weapon forging workshop, seven hundred cultivators operating the iron forging machines, and then some traditional craftsmen, less than one hundred. The weapon forging workshop of nearly two thousand people, besides forging breastplates, also had to forge steel pipe guns, cast bullet heads, weapons, and farm tools, and the efficiency was already quite high. According to traditional standards, at least three thousand craftsmen were needed to build these things.

Wei Yuan and Yu Zhizhuo discussed for a whole afternoon, perfected the details of the new melting furnace, and then went to the cultivator training camp on the side of the drill ground. Cultivators who had completed Body Forging, or were close to completion and had hope for Dao Foundation, would be concentrated here for final training to sprint for Dao Foundation.

Now there were more than four hundred people in the training camp, and the quality of this batch of cultivators was quite good, basically all from the official troop captives. The latest batch was the original troops of Xu Li, and there were dozens of original personal guards of Xu Li inside. Ji Liuli personally looked at it, and the roots of these personal guards were quite good, almost all of them could be forged into Dao Foundation, otherwise they would not have become Xu Li's personal guards.

Wei Yuan estimated that among this batch of more than four hundred people, about one hundred or slightly more Dao Foundation could be produced. Seeing Wei Yuan personally come to the training camp, all the cultivators were both excited and somewhat uneasy. Most of them originally did not intend to surrender, but this side actually used the Dao path to lure them! Except for those geniuses who could enter the sect, who could refuse Dao Foundation?

In fact, they felt that they were just confused for a while at first, but Wei Yuan moved too fast, directly pulling them to rob official troops, and some even participated more than once. This "letter of surrender" was handed over, and they knew they couldn't turn back.

Wei Yuan ordered all the cultivators to be summoned together, and then hundreds of immortal swords appeared in front of everyone, with flames faintly visible on the sword blades.

Wei Yuan said, "Dao Foundation is ever-changing, but it is not without shortcuts. The immortal swords in front of you are simplified versions of the Great Sun. In a moment, each of you will come to receive one. I will pass you a mental formula, which will help you understand the mystery of the immortal sword Dao Foundation. Seven days later, when you condense the Dao Foundation, try your best to lean toward this immortal sword, and the Dao path will be much easier."

Some cultivators were excited, but some also showed disdain.

Seven days passed in a flash, and it was time for the monthly foundation forging again. After the routine three warm-ups of "Momentary Sentient Beings," the power of "Wood-Generating Xuan" enveloped the whole field. Ji Liuli, Wei Yuan, True Person Chuhe, Sun Yu, Yu Zhizhuo, etc., all arrived at the scene, guiding them one by one.

In just a moment, the heaven and earth origin energy in the sky above the drill ground kept pouring down, and one after another, flaming immortal swords rose into the sky, which was spectacular for a time.

Seeing such a magnificent scene of immortal cultivation, Wei Yuan felt emotional. These people were originally hopeless for the immortal path, but now one in four could forge a Dao Foundation. The supernatural powers and means of the senior who refined the Azure Void Immortal Stone were truly terrifying!

It's just a pity that Xiaoyu couldn't see such a beautiful scene of numerous immortal swords rising into the sky.

At nightfall, eight cultivators who had initially stabilized their Dao Foundation came to the weapon forging workshop. They sat cross-legged around two newly built melting furnaces, each occupying an array eye, and four freshly baked immortal swords "Pseudo-Sun" materialized and were inserted into the melting furnace, urging the furnace fire to spray out from the furnace mouth, reaching several zhang.

This batch of four hundred cultivators finally cultivated eighty-three immortal swords "Pseudo-Sun," and another thirty or so failed to forge "Pseudo-Sun" and turned into fire swords. With Wei Yuan's thick skin, he couldn't call that an immortal sword.

!.

But fire swords could also be considered Dao Foundation, but they were half a point inferior to "Silk Rain."

There were also more than forty arrogant ones who wanted to forge a Dao Foundation that belonged exclusively to themselves, but only six succeeded, and the success rate was far less than focusing on understanding the immortal sword "Pseudo-Sun."

This batch of people could not forge a Dao Foundation and were not qualified to manage the furnace, so they could only go to shovel furnace slag.

Just after coming out of the weapon forging workshop, Wei Yuan saw a cultivator running over, saying, "Just now, an envoy from Western Jin came, saying that there is a reward for the Realm Master, and the imperial envoy will arrive tomorrow!"

Wei Yuan was stunned and said, "Where is the envoy? Take me there."

A moment later, Wei Yuan met the Western Jin envoy in the guest town. The envoy only brought two attendants and ten guards, and rushed over quickly, precisely to greet Wei Yuan in advance, so as not to be in a hurry and lose etiquette.

After asking the envoy, Wei Yuan was also surprised. The imperial envoy who came this time was actually the eunuch Zhao Tong, who was in charge of the pen in the palace!

This person was an absolute confidant of the Prince of Jin, and he himself was a high-level cultivator in the late stage of Dharma Form. It is said that his Dao techniques were unpredictable and he was a quite powerful figure.

This reward came suddenly, and Wei Yuan suddenly thought of Consort Yuan, with some guesses hidden in his heart.

After getting the news, Wei Yuan seized the time to reorganize the realm, closed off the places that were not suitable for outsiders to see, and then focused on waiting for the arrival of the imperial envoy.

At noon the next day, two thousand red-sleeved black-armored Western Jin Imperial Guards marched into the realm. Their armor was bright, their weapons were shining, their steps were neat, their military aura was bright, and their appearance was excellent. At this time, there were already realm cultivators leading the way in front, leading them all the way to the guest town.

Wei Yuan had already led everyone to wait here.

Two thousand Imperial Guards spread out to the wings, and eight bronze-bodied strongmen carried a large sedan chair, walking until they were in front of Wei Yuan before landing the sedan. Two red-browed and white-toothed eunuchs ran over and lifted the sedan curtain. They had Dao Foundation cultivation, their movements were soft and delicate, and their movements were synchronized, the sedan curtain rising neither fast nor slow, like clouds rolling and relaxing.

There were two more eunuchs who placed an incense burner in front of the sedan, and the curling clear smoke instantly dispelled the filthy aura around.

Only then did a soap boot decorated with pearls stretch out from the sedan, landing lightly, and then a light red lapel was thrown out, with a green silk official belt tied on the lapel, with a piece of beautiful jade inlaid on it, full of spiritual energy.

A person appeared in the sedan, with white powder and red lips on his face, eyebrows like beans. Seeing Wei Yuan, he smiled, stretched out his finger and pointed lightly at Wei Yuan, saying, "In our Great Jin, talent like you is just what we lack!"

(End of this chapter) ===== CHAPTER 307 =====