Last night, the entire Mai Lang Valley was imrsed in the joyous celebration of a true harvest.
Villages and communities lit bonfires in their drying fields or village squares, set up long tables, slaughtered chickens and sheep, and hot soup bubbled in pots, with countless large cuts of at and bowls of wine circulating.
The liveliest spot was the main celebration ground in the center of the valley, where over a dozen of the most outstanding villages and communities held a combined feast, with dozens of pots of dishes simultaneously served, their aroma drifting far on the night wind.
Under the cover of night, firelight illuminated people's smiling faces, and the “Spring Ploughing Performance List” was read aloud, with awards announced one by one.
“This year’s ‘Plough King’ is Hall Thorn from the Thirteenth Village Community!”
Cheers erupted, shaking the heavens, as Hall Thorn, his face flushed, stepped onto the stage. His hands trembled as he accepted the land deed, stamped with the Red Tide Territory’s seal.
It was a permanent plot of high-quality private land, complete with the right to use a new iron plow and two oxen.
For this, he had risen early and worked until dark, making him the most diligent person in the entire Wheat Wave Territory. Of course, all his efforts beca worthwhile tonight, as his destiny was changed. “The top ten households are as follows: Roy, Keira, Behi—”
Behind every na was a year of desperate struggle by a village community.
Villagers excitedly pushed their relatives and friends onto the stage to receive awards, with children tugging at their parents’ clothes, shouting, “That’s my father!”
So elderly people, with trembling hands, accepted their certificates and were lifted high by young people before they even returned to their seats.
The prizes included grain, cloth, ironware, as well as land deeds and livestock.
For these farrs, whose feet were rooted in the soil, this was not just a reward, but also a form of recognition.
And just after the “Top Ten Households” list was announced, a group of young people were called out by na by representatives from various village communities.
Most of them were around twenty years old; their shoulders hadn't fully straightened, but their eyes were already resolute.
When Green called their nas, his tone was particularly solemn: “The fifteen individuals above, due to their outstanding work, have been recomnded and will travel to the Red Tide main territory later this month to participate in junior managent team training. After completing their studies, they will return to their hotowns and be prioritized for deputy positions in community teams, assisting in coordinating agricultural affairs, transportation, logistics, and disaster preparedness.”
The villagers burst into an uproar, followed by a resounding round of applause.
This was not just praise, but also a gateway to a higher social class.
These young people would no longer just be good laborers; they were now expected to beco key figures responsible for a village, a community, or even an entire territory.
In this northern valley, which once only had slaves and vagrants, countless eyes looked at them at this mont, with envy and hope.
anwhile, in that bustling corner, the main seating area seed a bit quieter.
Lord Louis held his wine glass, leaning back into his chair, his cloak glowing warm red in the firelight.
He listened to the villagers' cheerful conversations while half-closing his eyes, gazing at the pile of grain.
The firelight occasionally flickered across his face, making him look less like a lord and more like an old soldier who had just won a battle, put down his weapon, and was catching his breath by a fire.
He said nothing, but his gaze spoke volus.
It wasn't complacency, nor relaxation, but a sense of solid contentnt after a long journey finally reaching its destination.
He truly didn't drink much.
Emily glanced at him, shook her head with a smile, reached out to take his wine cup, poured herself a little less than half a cup of warm Cang Wen Honey, and handed it back.
“You're always like this,” she whispered, “always thinking about tomorrow when you should be enjoying the mont.”
“I can’t help it. The two counties and thirteen territories of the North are on my shoulders; I dare not slack off,” Lord Louis said with a smile as he accepted the cup.
There was a hint of mischief and self-deprecation in his eyes.
Emily said nothing, rely leaning gently on his shoulder.
On the second day of the celebration, with the afternoon sun warm and gentle, Lord Louis boarded the carriage back to the Red Tide main territory.
As he boarded, with a single command, the entire convoy set off. Unlike their arrival, they departed with dozens of carts of grain.
On both sides of the carriage, fully ard Red Tide Knights were lined up, escorting them.
They were not unfamiliar; this was already the third grain transport team.
The success of the first two batches had made everyone more steady and skilled; the routes, defenses, and rhythm were all well-practiced.
Hooves pounded the ground, wheels rolled over the road, dust flew up on the main road, and the formation was orderly.
This large transport team strictly followed the “Trunk Line Transport Plan” previously formulated by Lord Louis:
The main road extends directly from the Wheat Wave Territory to the Red Tide main city granary, with the entire journey taking approximately five to seven days. Along the route, a compacted stone road has been laid, suitable for large carts.
Along the way, three transfer points and fixed grain guard posts have been established to prevent accidents such as bandit raids or Soul-Devouring Lizard Beast attacks.
The convoy is organized to move in a “ten carts per group, with each group accompanied by an Elite Knight escort squad” model.
Transport vehicles include ox carts, mule carts, and newly manufactured finely cast iron-wheeled horse-drawn carts, with a carrying capacity between five hundred and eight hundred kilograms, advancing continuously day and night in shifts.
To prevent loss, each bag of grain is lined with oil paper and marked with its processing status: red for /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ “sun-dried,” blue for “oven-dried,” and yellow for “awaiting sifting.”
Daily inspections are arranged to prevent sprouting, mold, and rodent infestations.
“Temporary grain drying stacks” are also specially set up along the route for transfers during rain.
Lord Louis had originally considered using the dium-sized river within the Wheat Wave Territory to transport grain by boat to Red Tide, saving manpower and vehicles.
However, current shipbuilding technology is not yet mature, and winter arrives early in the North, causing rivers to freeze quickly, making a hasty implentation too risky.
For this, he had personally written to Duke Calvin requesting support, hoping to dispatch several shipwrights north to assist.
Especially since the Calvin Family is renowned throughout the Empire for shipbuilding, if successful, it would not only solve inland river transportation but also be a crucial step in his future developnt of an overseas trade network.
The slanting sunlight illuminated the long train of grain carts, dust kicked up by hooves, drifting like light smoke behind the convoy.
Each horse-drawn cart was laden with heavy sacks of grain, their openings tightly sealed, and marked cloth strips swaying gently in the wind.
The drivers held long whips, their eyes fixed on the road ahead, as the wheels rolled over the stone slabs of the main road, emitting a dull rumble.
The knights in the front row raised their horsewhips and shouted loudly, “Straight ahead, no delays!”
The sound cut through the valley, and the carters responded in unison, the formation slightly picking up speed, slowly winding like a long snake into the end of the main road, advancing towards the Red Tide Territory.
The night wind grew stronger, and the chill in the depths of the valley deepened.
In the woods by the roadside, a team of barbarian scouts quietly approached.
They were a vanguard of a certain barbarian tribe from the North, numbering about fifty, riding shaggy, short-legged warhorses, their faces sared with black mud, wielding short bows and axe-spears, moving as stealthily as a pack of wolves.
Seeing the vast grain convoy in the valley, they lay hidden behind rocks, their eyes like hungry wolves staring at a pile of at, gleaming with greed.
“What’s going on? There are nearly a hundred grain carts alone!”
“Hmph, look at those sacks, they’re all dried and sun-cured grain. Stealing just one cart would be a huge profit.”
“But there are also many knights,” the barbarian leader at the head frowned.
He wasn't a fool; he could see at a glance that this team of grain-escorting knights was very well-organized. Although their numbers weren’t large,
Each ten carts were accompanied by a team of Elite Knights. If they launched a frontal assault, they could easily be wiped out.
But greed had already made them itch with impatience.
That was a true mountain of gold and grain; one cart could save a tribe for the winter.
“Charging in directly to steal is unrealistic.” He licked his chapped lips, his eyes turning cold. “But no matter how many people they have, there are blind spots at night. We won’t attack the whole team; we’ll just rip a gap, grab what we can, and leave.”
His gaze swept over a sloping section of the mountain road below. That area was relatively gentle, only two hundred paces from the edge of the convoy, and the guard posts were slightly farther apart.
Further ahead were a few slower-moving grain carts at the rear of the convoy.
“Go down from there. Under the cover of night, during their changing of the guard, rush in and quickly grab two carts.”
“After the raid, disperse and retreat into the woods in three routes. Don’t get bogged down in a fight.”
He made several hand gestures, indicating to divide into three groups: one to assault the convoy, one to tie up the outer knights, and another to set up an ambush in the mountain forest for support.
“Just one charge, while they’re not paying attention, cut open a small gap, and imdiately drag the carts away. Fight a quick battle—don’t dawdle.”
The n below nodded one after another, gripping their weapons, their eyes eager.
So even quietly tightened the rope on their battle-axe handles, ready for a fight.
As long as the breakthrough was successful, this trip would be worth it.
Winter was coming; who wouldn’t want to stock up on a few sacks of grain, a few barrels of flour? It was more valuable than anything.
Their figures, like ghosts, slowly surrounded the Red Tide grain convoy from three sides of the mountain forest, killing intent brewing in the night wind, silently approaching.
The night was their most familiar ally. With black mud sared on their faces and animal skins wrapped around their bodies, they almost rged with the rock face; even the wind didn't sense their approach.
But, suddenly— “Boom!!!”
A Magic Bomb suddenly exploded, firelight appearing abruptly like daylight, and a deafening roar seed to tear through the night sky,
The five or six barbarians charging at the forefront were instantly blown away by the blast, their bodies tumbling in the air, shattering beyond recognition upon hitting the rocks, their flesh and bones mixing with gravel.
The aftermath of the explosion caused the entire mountain forest to tremble slightly, startling birds to scatter, their mournful cries like rain.
"There's a trap!!"
"Retreat—retreat—!"
Before they could even turn back, the second wave of fire erupted from both sides.
The Red Tide Knights had long been ambushed in the valley walls, and now, illuminated by the fire, they charged down from above!
They wore red and black armor, and red battle aura shot forth along the armor's veins, as if war gods had descended.
Long spears and swords carved arcs of blood in the night, giving the barbarians no chance to catch their breath.
"Kill!"
The cavalry surrounded them from three sides, their iron hooves thundering like thunder, and their warhorses' neighs directly broke through the rear of the barbarian's second scout party.
As a barbarian warrior drew his battle-axe, he was impaled through the chest by a long spear, sending him flying backward.
"Don't leave a single one alive," Lambert shouted, this was Lord Louis's command.
Lord Louis remained seated on the lead carriage of the convoy, the carriage body as steady as a rock.
He was looking down at so recent news from the Empire, as if this bloody battle was nothing more than the chirping of insects at night, irrelevant to him.
In fact, all of this had long been within his control.
This morning, the Daily Intelligence System had inford Lord Louis of the barbarians' intention to intercept the grain.
Therefore, even before the barbarians encountered the convoy, their fate was already sealed.
The battle lasted less than a quarter of an hour; the last barbarian scout, attempting to climb the cliff, was cut in half from the spine by a Red Tide Knight.
The bodies were quickly dragged to a mountain hollow, gathered, and incinerated, doused with pine oil and waste cloth, burning into a pile of charcoal ash with a single spark.
The Red Tide Knights quickly reford their ranks, returning to their escort formation, the team appearing as if it had never separated.
After this small interlude, the carriage wheels once again pressed onto the valley road, rolling over the scorched earth, dust and ash rising together.
On the way back from transporting the grain, Lord Louis temporarily changed his itinerary.
Before the convoy reached Red Tide Territory, he personally led a small team to detour to a location rarely ntioned to outsiders: the Shadow Ancient Tomb.
That was a special facility he personally planned and secretly modified.
Now it had a new na: the Shadow Proving Ground, or more precisely, the core base of Red Tide Territory's internal codena "Spirit Forge."
"Go see the progress there," he said briefly, without explaining much.
To those unaware, it was rely an abandoned ancient tomb in the north.
But in Lord Louis's heart, it was the furnace where hundreds of knights would ascend in the future, the crucible he would use to forge true Red Tide elites.
The disguise on the surface still maintained the ancient tomb's original appearance, with scaled rocks, weathered steles, and broken slopes, looking like nothing more than a forgotten old tomb.
Only the hidden beacons and sparsely distributed outposts revealed the actual purpose of this place.
As the sound of hooves approached, a middle-aged man in gray-patterned training armor quickly ca to greet them.
He had a solemn expression and steady steps; he was the person in charge here, Aryan, the training commander of the Red Tide Knights.
"Lord Louis, you've arrived." Aryan bowed respectfully.
"How are things?" Lord Louis dismounted, responding briefly, his gaze already passing him to look at the crevice entrance hidden in the mist.
"The construction progress is smooth, and the four core areas have taken initial shape. Today is a good day; the training officers and apothecaries are conducting tests. If you don't mind the simplicity, you can observe."
So they walked deep into the underground cavern, t by recording stations, atomization equipnt, and stone paths leading to various sections.
Luminescent moss hung from the walls, its faint purple light like fireflies in an eternal night, creating an eerie and solemn atmosphere.
The first place they arrived at was the Shadow Moss cultivation station.
"Currently, we can stably cultivate three types of mutant moss," a young technician in a pharmacist's robe ca to report, "respectively, for enhancing focus, catalyzing battle aura circulation, and suppressing hallucinatory reactions. We are attempting to synthesize and refine spray solutions for portable use on the front lines."
"Very good." Lord Louis's gaze sharpened. "What range can the purification concentration of the catalytic moss be stably maintained at?"
"Approximately between 1.2 and 1.5. Any higher and it's prone to causing short-term hallucinatory backlash."
"Then mass-produce it based on 1.3." He paused, then turned to instruct his adjutant, "Record this in the war preparation plan, prioritize it for the knight squad training packs. Consider equipping it in batches in the future."
Continuing deeper, they arrived at the Lizard Beast breeding room.
The temperature here was noticeably higher; inside the enclosed compartnts of the rock cavern, a massive Soul-Devouring Lizard Beast lay quietly, a faint purplish glow subtly flowing beneath its scales.
A ntal barrier isolated the ntal fluctuations it released, but the air still felt subtly oppressive, making one's mind involuntarily tense.
"This one is from the most stable batch." The chief technician displayed a gray-silver device. "This is the 'ntal Shock Bomb' we are testing. It has a built-in magic crystal, and once triggered, it can create short-term fear illusions."
"Suitable for breaking formations and disturbing the mind." Lord Louis's gaze turned cold. "Note it down. In the future, equip it to scout knights to break the enemy's ntal defenses."
"Yes, my Lord." The adjutant responded.
But what attracted his attention the most was still the core of the proving ground—the Will Breakthrough Altar.
The central circular hall was ticulously refined into a place of secluded cultivation; the surrounding stone walls still retained the ancient tomb's sacrificial patterns, and nitrogen-boxed phosphorescence floated in the air, illuminating the Elite Knight ditating on the altar.
The other party sat cross-legged with eyes closed, battle aura swirling around him like a spring, sotis condensing into threads, sotis dispersing like smoke, clearly at a critical mont of breakthrough.
"This is—the how manyeth person?" Lord Louis asked in a low voice.
Aryan nodded: "Since being transferred here three weeks ago, seven people have been promoted to elite, and three are breaking through to transcendent. The training process is gradually stabilizing, combining steaming, potions, and Breath Control Technique in a three-stage thod—the consumption is not small, but the efficiency is astonishing."
"What is the cycle period?"
"Normally, seven days of food supplentation are needed for recovery. If supplented with catalytic potions, it's one cycle every three days."
"How many people can cultivate simultaneously?"
"Currently, twelve people can be maintained in parallel. Once potion production increases, it can be expanded to twenty."
Lord Louis was silent for a mont, his gaze fixed on the young knight sitting cross-legged before the altar, his entire body enveloped in battle aura, in the midst of a breakthrough.
The man's fingertips trembled slightly, and a faint glow pulsed around his body, as if so kind of steel was being repeatedly heated, forged, and shaped.
"If this efficiency is maintained—"
His voice was low, yet it couldn't suppress the surging excitent within it, "How many newly promoted elites can I get within three months?"
"A conservative estimate is thirty to thirty-five."
At this mont, the air seed to stand still.
Lord Louis slowly took a breath, staring intently at the figure before the proving platform, his mind already sweeping across the entire military landscape of the Northern Territory.
There were countless special breakthrough thods in the Empire, but none so stable, so mass-producible, and so controllable.
Within three months, thirty-five elites.
Thirty-five sharp blades with will, discipline, and passion.
And this was only three months.
Given enough ti, he could forge Red Tide into the sharpest fangs in the Northern Territory!
"You're using a factory to cast ordinary knights into elites, batch by batch—" Emily stood beside him, her voice soft, yet she too was shaken by the scene before her.
"Precisely why it must be included in the Red Tide strategic core." Lord Louis almost blurted out, his voice already faintly revealing excitent.
He suddenly turned to look at his adjutant, his speech quickening,
"Starting today, transfer all relevant dicinal materials here, prioritize supplying the Shadow Moss catalytic pools, and transfer two more senior apothecaries to assist with equipnt optimization. Not a single day's delay is allowed."
"Yes, my Lord."
"Also," Lord Louis lowered his voice, "transfer that batch of Cang Wen Honey and Frost Blood Red Berry here as well. Mix them with the Shadow catalyst and see if they produce an even faster breakthrough effect."
The adjutant, montarily stunned, imdiately acknowledged the order and departed.
The underground was silent, with only the distant Shadow Moss faintly trembling, like dark light rising from a furnace.
Lord Louis narrowed his eyes, looking at this Spirit Forge, as quiet as if being cast.
At this mont, he was no longer calm; this was the sharpest, most terrifying strategic weapon in his hands.
When disaster arrived, he was no longer anxious; as long as he had this "forge," he could continuously transform ordinary knights into elites, and elites into transcendents!
"Very good—" he murmured softly, a faint smile finally appearing at the corner of his mouth.
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