The Magus Era

No snow could be seen on the ground anymore, and in the clean farmlands of Yao Mountain territory, people had been working assiduously.

Taking Yao Mountain as the center, the surrounding area with a radius of thousands of miles was suffused with especially dense natural power, much denser than the other areas. Nourished by the dense natural power, the soil around Yao Mountain was especially rich. Picking up a handful of soil and squeezing it with one’s hand might even cause oil to ooze out of it.

The soil in here was way too fertile and those crops had already grown out for three feet in only half a month after their seeds were planted. Estimated by elderly people who were experienced in farming, crops planted in the farmlands of Earl Yao’s territory could be harvested in every one and half month, and in one year, each type of crop could be planted and harvested six to seven times. Apart from this, the harvest of every acre of farmland was twice as much as farmlands in other areas. Therefore, people living in Earl Yao’s territory would never have to worry about food.

Since the needs of food were fulfilled, people living in Earl Yao’s territory started to plant large numbers of fruits and vegetables. Same as crops like rice and wheat, these fruits and vegetables grew surprisingly fast as well. Especially for a certain types of vegetables which naturally had rapid growth, such as fragrant-flowered garlic, these vegetables could be harvest in merely ten days after being planted, and on the next day of the first round of harvest, the second round of harvest would be ready to be done.

These breathtakingly abundant agricultural products attracted large groups of wild animals, or in other words, the extra dense natural power which was still constantly growing in Yao Mountain area had drawn these creatures over. Some fierce animals wantonly intruded farmlands and even attacked people living in this area. These wild animals had brought quite a lot of troubles.

Therefore, Ji Hao opened the storage of armament and handed a big number of bows and arrows out. Additionally, Feng Xing selected over a hundred thousand young and healthy men who at least had some superficial understandings of archery from all of Ji Hao’s people. He divided them into over a hundred different sized hunting squads and sent them to every village and towns in Yao Mountain area to hunt those harmful animals in great quantities.

Those hunted animals were sent back to Yao Mountain city and became meat supplies for people living in Yao Mountain area.

With abundant grains, fruits and vegetables, and added with large amounts of meat as a source of energy, people living in Earl Yao’s territory now looked all healthy and especially strong.

In this era, when people didn’t have much of entertainment, and in this season with spring coming, flowers bloomed, and all kinds of animals started to breed. Soon, millions of newly pregnant women had emerged in Yao Mountain territory within only half a month.

Ji Hao always loved to see and hear things like this. He hurriedly let those apprentices in the department of magic medicine make sufficient amount of magic medicines and handed out to every family that had pregnant women. After taken these medicines, those pregnant women didn’t need to worry about their babies when doing daily work anymore. In addition to that, the babies nourished by these magic medicines would be stronger and healthier than the others after birth.

Most of these people living in Earl Yao’s territory were slaves. Their former owners would never treat them nicely like Ji Hao was doing. Instead, having little food to eat and little clothes to wear was the normal life that they had already gotten used to. Therefore, many of Ji Hao’s disciples who had been studying in Ji Hao’s dojo were born to be relatively weak. After Ji Hao had taken them as disciples, these kids had been taking all kinds of supportive medicines and gradually improved their body conditions.

Unlike those children, the new generations of Ji Hao’s people were nourished by magic medicine since they were still in their mothers’ wombs, because of which, their body conditions would be better than these older children, and after they joined Earl Yao’s dojo, their cultivation would raise faster. In the future, they could accomplish higher achievements than these older children.

Generation after generation, the people would grow stronger and stronger. This was how a powerful clan and a thriving territory gradually rose.

Although those pregnant women had all taken magic medicines and that allowed them to continue doing daily work, they were pregnant after all and for many heavy physical tasks were not quite suitable for them to do. For such work like the constructions of defense that had been carrying on all over the territory in all those different sized towns and cities, and strengthening buildings of those towns and villages, the plan Ji Hao made in the last winter started to be carried out.

The dark-kind army under Zhamu’s command, the army of warriors Ji Hao purchased from Pu Ban city who were under Feng Xing and Yu Mu’s command, along with the two elite troops of warriors from Candle Dragon Clan and Zhu Rong Country, were mixed together. They were divided into several troops and launched attacks on those local clans near Yao Mountain.

All troop headed to those local clans with official letters that had Earl Yao’s official seal on them. At first, warriors under Ji Hao’s command would try to persuade those local clans to join Earl Yao’s big family warmly and nicely and allow them to move to the surrounding area of Yao Mountain, to Ji Hao’s territory and become Ji Hao’s people. They would ask them to wholeheartedly devote into the construction of Earl Yao’s territory after that.

Some weak, small clans were afraid of Earl Yao’s power and the reputation of the human emperor, and as a result obediently moved their entire clan to Earl Yao’s territory. But some relatively stronger clans like Black Mouse Clan, Tusk Tiger Clan and Gust Fox Clan, assumed that they were rather powerful by relying on one or two Magus Kings of their clans. These clans thus neglected the people sent by Ji Hao completely.

Therefore, the troops sent out by Earl Yao launched their moves. With the twelve Divine Magi from Candle Dragon Clan and Zhu Rong Country, all of these clans, including Black Mouse Clan which had an extra tough defense, were defeated thoroughly. The leaders and elders of these clans were beheaded in public, after which, all their clansmen were downgraded to slaves and escorted back to Yao Mountain.

Since Ji Hao sent out these tens of mixed troops to sweep across the surrounding area, several batches of new clansmen or slaves would be sent back to Yao Mountain one after another. These new clansmen and slaves, who had all been separated from their clansmen and mixed together, formed numerous new villages and towns one after another and reclaimed countless new pieces of farmlands in the nearly a thousand mile in radius territory around Yao Mountain.

Within the short span of three months, Ji Hao’s troops had brought over thirty million new clansmen back for him from all directions.

Thousands of Senior Magi and hundreds of thousands of Junior Magi among these people were reorganized into military troops. After a severe training and a lot of practicing, these troops were incorporated into the regular army forces, and sent out under the orders of Ji Hao, to summon more local clans to surrender.

All these new warriors had their lives controlled by a secret Magi Palace magic. Because of that, not a single one of them dared to flee from Ji Hao’s territory, and all of them wholeheartedly followed him and his orders. On the other hand, the continuously growing army forces under Ji Hao’s command made those new clansmen hold him in awe and veneration. Consequently, over thirty million new clansmen moved into Earl Yao’s territory, but not a single newly built village or town had any troubles occur.

Tons of crops were harvested and stored in warehouses, and batches of livestock were turned into meat supplies. The output of products like honey, wool, cattle horn, leather and beast tendons had also been rising day by day. In the tens of mines surrounding Yao Mountain, pure gold, fine jade, copper, iron and other mineral resources were excavated. Especially the few magic crystal mines, they had been bringing ceaseless wealth to the Yao Mountain territory.

The number of warriors who were sent to the surrounding areas to ask local clans to surrender had already reached over a million. Among all these warriors, the number of Senior Magi who had been serving as the mainstay of their troops was more than three hundred thousand. As the number of troops and warriors both rose quickly, their working efficiency rose sharply as well. Till the last month of this year, fifteen million local people were brought back to Yao Mountain by those troop sent out by Ji Hao.

The total population of Earl Yao’s territory had already exceeded ten million. These people lived in thousands of different-sized villages and towns spread in area three thousand miles in radius around Yao Mountain.

With abundant grains and meat, fruits and vegetables that could not be consumed fully, with the strong military strength and a suzerain who possessed a royal title that was given by the human emperor himself, along with all other kinds of power Ji Hao and shown, these new clansmen who were forcibly brought to Ji Hao’s territory quickly settled their minds down. Thus, the entire territory seemed to be flourishing rapidly.

When the first flake of snow landed on the earth, multitudinous clansmen gathered around Yao Mountain.