The Rise of the Black Plain

In the blink of an eye, three weeks had passed since the Silva family began their actions in secret.

In the meantime, the Dry City had been silently developing as it began to receive the first citizens from Maritime City through the advertisements made by the army soldiers.

However, these numbers were not significant enough to change the reality of this city in the middle of the Black Plain. After all, only a few hundred people had arrived in this place in the meantime and already moved here.

The army was not trying to attract unnecessary attention with this advertisement, and each family had the ideal moment for their respective migrations. In the same way, as had happened to the current citizens of the Dry City who had come here through the agreement of Minos and Mirya, people from the City of Water.

But while these people of lesser talents and levels from Maritime City were beginning to migrate to the Dry City, another selection of the Black Plain Army had taken place!

With such a thing having already been completed, about 4,500 more people had joined the local army, for a total of almost 15,000 soldiers!

Of these nearly 15,000 individuals, over 3,600 were already at the 5th stage of cultivation, while ten were at the 6th stage.

None of the Sergeants had made it to the 6th stage in the meantime, so these two extra Spiritual Kings were not old soldiers.

In the meantime, a spiritual judge from the Miller family had come to the Yellow City and then signed the Soul Contracts of Regina and Angela with young Stuart. So, this addition was because these two had joined the army in the days gone by!

Anyway, in these weeks, the army had gained a great addition of personnel and strength. That had made Minos' organization for the first time in its history as strong as a medium-sized noble house, although there were still numerical disadvantages to his side.

However, now young Stuart was sure that even if all the specialists of a family similar to House Gill attacked them, his side would have the odds in their favor!

After all, now the Black Plain Army had two level 54 Spiritual Kings who were battle experts and who were learning Silver-grade techniques. As such, this organization could soon have two people as strong as a patriarch of a family similar to House Gill!

Celeste had already learned more than half of the techniques of such quality that she could learn at her level, while Angela had already learned a cultivation technique and a defensive one.

...

While many areas of the Dry City had commercial and residential buildings under construction, the midday sun was warming this beautiful city.

At the same time, young Stuart was in the courtyard of his mansion, training his attack technique while occasionally giving his orders or asking questions to Sergeant Joey.

He had already reached the point where he had problems to solve almost all the time, so recently, he started hearing specific reports even when he was practicing some of his techniques.

That didn't hinder his training, but even if there was some negative influence, for the moment, it was insignificant. That was because young Stuart had already fully understood each of his techniques for the current phase he was at in each of them. So, he only had to reach level 50 to reach new phases in each of these techniques.

But even if he no longer needed to train these techniques until he reached level 50, he still did this daily. That was for him to accumulate experience for the subsequent phases of his techniques and not to get out of his routine, which helped him keep his focus.

He could have no practical results at the moment since he had the increased energy required to conquer these new phases of his techniques. But once he managed to reach level 50, this time would not be wasted. On the contrary, he would gain those hours of training further on!

Swooish!

Anyway, as he made his sword movements to attack an array in his courtyard, beads of sweat dripped down his face, and his respiratory rate raised.

At the same time, Joey was sitting on the wooden bench nearby, with arms crossed in front of his chests, while answering the question Minos had just asked.

"Young master, we have already sent all reinforcements to the border bases. With that, we currently have 750 Sergeants at the army naval base; 1,200 soldiers of the same rank in Maritime City; 500 in the City of Waters; 414 in the Yellow City, and the rest in our city."

"Regarding these 5th stage individuals in our city, most of them are either new soldiers or newly promoted soldiers... Just as the young master had ordered."

"Huh, that's good." Minos commented as beads of sweat fell from his wet hair, and he continued with his training.

Joey then continued. "But we are still without any Spiritual King at the secret base in Yellow City. Will the young master send someone there in the short term? Perhaps we should send a letter asking for Lieutenant Elena..."

Upon hearing this, Minos finally slowed the pace of his training until he stopped his movements and walked over to a small table with a white tablecloth, a pitcher of water, and a glass cup.

"No. Elena will probably have several problems getting off Stone Island. We'd better let her come back in her own time, so we don't attract the families from that place to Dry City." He said as he dried himself with that towel and held a glass of water in his right hand.

Glub! Glub! Glub!

"Ahh!" He drank all the contents of that glass and then opened his mouth and made a characteristic sound, just before speaking again. "Soon, Celeste will finish learning the Silver-grade techniques. With that, I will leave Angela in charge of training the Elite Squad soldiers and send that woman to the army naval base."

"At the same time as that, Ernest will go to the secret base in Yellow City."

"Oh? All right." Joey said in a low voice as he jotted down some things on a clipboard that was there with him.

"Plus, when Mirya fully recovers, and Elena returns from Stone Island, we'll take some shifts between these soldiers who are out of Dry City." Minos said, just before throwing that towel from earlier on a table and then walking back to where his sword was.

Swooish!

"What about that mission, young master? Should we release it now?" Joey asked doubtfully.

Recently Minos had decided to allocate some missions in the local Mercenary Guild so that its stronger mercenaries could better prepare themselves for the fearful future of this place.

That was a measure he wanted to use to make some citizens more accustomed to deadly missions, things that would put them in more problematic situations where they would have to fight humans.

Previously such warriors who did missions in the local guild would at most have deadly fights against beasts. But the fighting style of beasts and humans was completely different!

And as much as training with beasts was good, a warrior would never be prepared to deal with the typical trickery of humans if he only trained by fighting such opponents, beasts, beings that usually rely more on their own abilities.

On the other hand, Minos wanted to give his citizens some opportunities to collect resources for themselves while earning generous rewards.

That would stimulate the growth of these mercenaries who would join such missions and be a positive thing for their respective families!

And to this end, Minos wanted to create some hunting missions for some groups of Mercenary Guild warriors to hunt down and exterminate groups of bandits and pirates...

That would get rid of some local problems and also provide a good training opportunity for the strongest citizens of his city.

But Minos would not completely risk his valuable citizens. No, he would send some of his soldiers to secretly follow those people who accepted the missions, for the case they faced groups far beyond their capabilities.

But this was only to prevent the future soldiers of his army from dying before they even entered such an organization. Hence, in other situations, the 'guardians' of these mercenaries would not get involved at all.

Anyway, after hearing Joey's question, Minos immediately gave his confirmation. "Do it."