The Rise of the Black Plain

After the fight of the young Alina, the week of battles of the last part of the selection ended in the blink of an eye. Today, on the third day after the end of this competition, the new soldiers had finally finished joining Minos' force.

In total, of the 2,400 vacancies offered in this edition of the Black Plain Army's selection, 2,155 of them had been occupied by the competitors.

From this group, following the order of the 1st stage until the 5th, there were 312, 697, 751, 352, and 43 new soldiers in each of the first five hierarchies.

Due to this new addition of personnel, the numbers of the young Stuart's army had reached the mark of 4,555 soldiers in total, of which 334 were Sergeants, individuals from the 5th stage of cultivation.

The majority of this group, Spiritual General, was at level 40. However, there were several of them at level 41, and the strongest, except for Eda, was at level 43.

And even if the numbers of sergeants weren't high yet, that would change in no time!

Of the more than 700 cultivators who had passed the selection on the exam for the 4th stage of cultivation, all were above level 37. Not only that, but most were already at the last level of this stage.

With this, and considering the Corporals who were already in the local army before this competition, Minos' forces could reach the mark of a thousand cultivators of the 5th stage of cultivation in less than a year!

Such a thing was no small thing for a newly created organization that was barely 3-years-old.

In general, low-level noble powers, or similar organizations, on average had in the range of 5,000 cultivators of that strength range. In contrast, those mid-level, like the Gill family of the Brown Kingdom, had about triple that. And finally, the great noble families, such as the Silva family, had in their ranks in the range of 40,000 or more cultivators at this stage of cultivation.

Of course, the classification did not consider the number of Spiritual Generals. Instead, the only thing that mattered was the number of Spiritual Kings present in one organization.

But it was tough for Spiritual Kings to ascend in this region. Many problems prevented this from happening, such as the low spiritual density of the area. Such a thing might seem insufficient to prevent that from happening, but the reality was far more complicated than that.

Often, spiritual energy density is what determines the characteristics of a given region. Essentially those such as the spiritual richness of food, the presence of medicines, the high ranking of these medicines, natural treasures, and crystal mines.

Because of all this, there was a lack of resources for this region to have a more significant number of Spiritual Kings.

But one would think that with enough low-grade spiritual crystals, a person could reach level 49 and then go up to level 50, right? No, after all, only those with, at least, Black talent are expected to reach this stage without outside help.

And outside of the noble families and influential organizations, the number of these cultivators was minimal. Look at the case of the Minos army, with more than 4,500 soldiers today. There were only 9 people like that!

And only 4 of them didn't belong to any other power before they came to the Black Plain Army.

That's why, for people born with Blue talent, mostly in noble families and organizations, reaching level 50 was almost impossible, given the high cost of the necessary resources.

As for why these organizations didn't invest in these people, well, they didn't even have enough for all of their original members...

Those with cultivation speed like Luke, Leroy, Davy were certainly the favored ones. But, at the same time, the rest received less significant resources!

Anyway, the ratio of 1 Spiritual King for every 1,000 Spiritual Generals was prevalent in these powers because of this problem. So, it wouldn't be wrong to think of these numbers as helpful information.

Thus, young Stuart's army had not even reached the level of a small organization in this northern part of the Central Continent.

But that was just expected. While these families, even the youngest, have existed for several centuries, Minos and the Black Plain had very little time to develop.

Even considering the abundant resources that Minos had gained from agriculture in the Dry City, he had funds comparable to those of medium-sized families. However, even with the funds, cultivation could not be elevated overnight, as the bodies of living beings needed time to 'digest' the spiritual energy.

Consequently, even though Dry City's local army soldiers had excellent salaries, they couldn't ignore the laws of nature because of that!

Most of them had only Blue talent and cultivated Black-grade techniques. Therefore, they would naturally need months to move from the end of the 4th stage to the beginning of the 5th.

As for advancing from the beginning of the 5th to the 6th, some of them could take almost ten years to achieve such a thing, even though they receive all the benefits of the army!

In short, cultivation was an arduous and laborious process, something that would not bear fruit overnight.

But Minos understood all that. It might take them a while to reach the mark of several Spiritual Kings, but that wasn't a complete disadvantage. That's because each of his soldiers had Black-grade techniques and could fight the subordinates of these regional organizations, a few levels above their own.

So, considering the growth rate of the army, Minos was satisfied. Soon, he could not have many Spiritual Kings. But, he could have even more Spiritual Generals than the great noble families.

Individual strength might be the most remarkable thing in the cultivation world, but Minos didn't neglect collective strength. Unlike those organizations that had large numbers but didn't make an effort to improve collaborative work, his army was already doing that.

The day would come when the Black Plain's Spiritual Generals would defeat Spiritual Kings!

...

After the selection was completed, the Dry City had returned to its usual vitality before the beginning of this last edition.

The citizens got excited during these competitive periods, but after that was over, they also put those thoughts behind them. Many had already gotten used to this, as the local army made new soldiers' selections every six months.

And this last edition had been the 5th since Minos' arrival in that city, so many had already got used to such a thing to come and go.

However, for the families of the more than 2,000 new soldiers, their lives were slowly changing. Even though these individuals still had to work for an entire month to receive their first payments, their families had already changed their habits.

In many homes, the economies made daily; the people who worked nearly 20 hours a day were finally taking more time for themselves and increasing their meal galore.

Many parents and grandparents largely supported their families, almost sacrificing their cultivation time to work harder and bring more crystals home. And now, with so many young people, children, and grandchildren, coming into the army, these people could finally get relief.

Now they could spend more time cultivating and training, even doing random activities, hobbies. Maybe watch some fights or go out to see the parts of the city that they usually only passed by.

Many of them could finally pay for lighting arrays, leaving the days of ordinary candles behind.

In many houses in the Dry City, people still used things like wood stoves, wax candles, fireplaces, in short, items that generated the unpleasant smoke.

And even if cultivators weren't as affected by things like this, it was undeniable that no one liked to smell smoke in their homes and clothes. Replacing such things with spiritual arrays was the dream of many families.

And finally, a few hundred houses could change this reality in a short time.