Chongming Xianzong

Chapter 408: Opening up the Spiritual Land (I)

According to the rules set by David's ancestors, whenever there was a war, if each family contributed one out of three, it would be considered a great success.

This time, the scale of Kangda County's conscription is much milder than this "big one", and it may be less than one in seven.

Even the head of Kangda was so lenient in his actions, so naturally, the prominent figures in each household would give him face and refuse the punishment.

After all, the master who is now in charge of the affairs of Ping and Jin counties is not someone who is easy to fool. Although the conditions of the ordinary people in the two counties have improved a lot, many practitioners who broke the rules have also died.

At first, Kang Dabao hung the heads of those who committed crimes on the beams of the archway in Chongmingfang Market.

Later, perhaps because he felt that his business was ruined or there was no more room to hang the scroll on the crossbeam of the archway, Kang Dabao sent people to seal them with wax and sent them to various village elders' homes to serve as a warning.

After all, no one is able to resist the evil practices, just like an ordinary cultivator who would risk his head to earn a pill; but the evil cultivators only need to visit a few unattended wild villages, kill a hundred people, and spend half a day absorbing their blood and energy, and they may even make progress faster than the righteous practitioners.

Greed, anger, ignorance, arrogance and doubt, the five poisons in human hearts, have a long history and are deeply rooted. Not to mention a small cultivator like Kang Dabao who has some skills, even the gods and Buddhas above our heads cannot cure them.

If we want to find the root cause of this problem, perhaps we should blame the fact that Goddess Nuwa did not wash her hands when she used the whip to shake off the mud.

However, in the previous barbaric situation, not only were the mortals in danger of losing their lives at any time, but even the monks had to be careful all the time, worrying that their heads would be taken away by evil cultivators passing by one day.

Therefore, the monks were more or less grateful to Master Kang for allowing them to live a relatively peaceful life. Not to mention the fact that the two counties and temples also distributed money and grain according to the number of people and reduced taxes, which was a very considerate and benevolent policy.

Kang Dabao had no time to care about what the people in the training ground were thinking. That was why he was not as kind and righteous as most people in the training ground thought.

Strictly speaking, the conscription of troops from the two counties without the tiger seal of the Sima Mansion and the written order of the Governor's Mansion was already an act beyond the rules. Not to mention that they were using the stored grain in the two county treasuries to open up spiritual land for themselves, which was a real misappropriation of public resources for private purposes.

However, Master Kang had no intention of not paying back this amount of funds. Once the profits from the newly opened spiritual land were counted, all the money would be returned to the treasury.

In addition, the state court has never paid much attention to such matters. How can those senior officials be as dedicated as the county magistrate Kang? It is enough to mobilize the local soldiers in war and collect money and food in leisure time.

The more you do, the more mistakes you make, and the less you do, the less mistakes you make. This is not a rule that only applies to a small world.

Therefore, the head of Kangda Sect was not worried about being reprimanded by his superiors for this matter. He only glanced at the list presented by Ye Zhengwen. Seeing that in addition to the troops gathered from the small families in Ping and Jin counties, there were also elites selected from the various families of Chongming League, he opened his mouth and read softly:
"Three hundred people from the Ma family of Chang County, one hundred people from the Chongming Sect, one hundred people from the Hanshan School, one hundred people from the Qiaogong Fort, one hundred people from the Feiyue Shan family, one hundred people from the Hemu Dao, sixty people from the Xuelinshan Ming family, eighty people from the Hong County He family, and fifty people from the Caishi Lu family."

These figures are currently only on paper and it will take time for the data to arrive from various counties.

It is impossible that each company only has this number of people.

But if we only focus on Mingzong's own family, there are situations where the girls and boys in Yulin Hall cannot go out, those who look after the mines cannot go out, those who tend the spiritual fields cannot go out, those who are in seclusion to break through cannot go out, etc. It is already good enough for other families to send so many people.

"Ma Yanwen is quite proactive," Kang Dabao knew just by looking at the figure that this was probably most of the capital left by the Ma family in Chang County.

From this, it can be seen that although Ma Yanwen is a useless person who cannot build a foundation, he is not completely useless. At least he still has some courage. Knowing that his family's predicament cannot be reversed by himself, he still has some courage to gamble everything on it.

After the head of the Kang sect returned the jade slip of the roster to Ye Zhengwen, he asked again, "The two parties together only have a few thousand people, which is not enough. Has the news of recruiting independent cultivators been leaked?"

The latter replied, "The Dragon Beast Master sent out Qinghan Court disciples riding on Golden Winged Owls yesterday to distribute the message in the prosperous places in the nearby counties. Ping and Jin counties haven't finished yet, but more than 500 people have gathered there today. I think some independent cultivators from other counties will arrive in a while."

"Well, even if more supplies are wasted, it is better than letting more of our disciples lose their lives." Kang Dabao was obviously quite satisfied with the number. He turned around and invited Mo Wen, the head of Qiaogong Fort, to come over, and asked their disciples to find some places to control the mechanical puppets to build some temporary residences for the people in the training ground.

Afterwards, Jin Shilun, the defender of Chongming Town, and Zhou Xinran, the disciple in charge of wealth and goods, were also entrusted with important tasks.

The former needs to gather strong men and women to provide food for the scattered cultivators and the soldiers from the two counties. The head of Kangda Sect can no longer provide spiritual food for so many people. If you want to eat, you can go to the new dining hall outside the mountain gate of Chongming Sect to buy it. Half of the food is sold and half of it is given away, and the price is absolutely fair.

The latter needs to prepare the supplies that Kang Dabao had asked them to store in advance.

After all, there are suddenly so many monks from other places lingering around Chongming Sect. Wouldn't it be a pity if we can't spend some time to earn back some of the Settlement Spirit Stones that Sect Master Kang gave to them?
Of course, Zhongming Xiaolou's family could not afford this business, so he discussed it with Deng Baichuan beforehand.

After all, Chongming Market was a business built up by the two Simas. Even though they were not as caring towards him, Kang Dabao, as before, the filial duties they should perform could not be reduced.

Otherwise, the relationship would become really bad and difficult to reverse.

After staying like this for more than a month, 990 elite soldiers of the Chongming League, more than 600 militiamen from the two counties, and more than 2,000 scattered cultivators from various counties were finally assembled and trained.

When it comes to fame, it can be said to be useless, but it can also be said to be useful.

Otherwise, how could the head of Kangda only have a mid-stage true cultivation, and gather more than 3,000 cultivators with a single order? This performance is much better than the useless governors like Huo Bing who were justified in the past.

But with so many practitioners gathered in one place, it’s hard to manage them.

After all, those unruly evil cultivators and bandit cultivators are still rare in Ping and Jin counties nowadays, but they still live a comfortable life in other counties.

If Kang Dabao's methods were weaker, the paradise that Chongming Sect had worked so hard to build would be ruined by these people as soon as he lost his mind.

Jiang Qing and Ji Yunsheng selected elite disciples from each school and organized them into a law enforcement team.

They had no other way to make a living every day but to classify those cunning independent cultivators who had received the spiritual stones from the leader Kang to settle down but wanted to sneak out, the children of various families who could not understand the strict rules and regulations, and the brave and fierce wanderers, and then classify them into different categories, and use iron rulers and spiritual shackles to charge them with crimes.

This time, the head of Kangda was quite merciful and did not kill anyone. Those with minor crimes were sent to serve as miners in various mines, and those with serious crimes just happened to have a few military certificates left.

Although these first-level items can be described as rare, they are not precious to the current Chongming Sect. Once they are used up, they are gone.

After setting the right tone among the troops, the next thing to do is to reorganize the team.

If the local soldiers of the two counties had experienced several military exercises, they might have some rules when going into battle. However, if the newly recruited scattered cultivators from various counties were not reorganized, they would be a pure mob.

Kang Dabao would certainly not let them ruin the big thing. Otherwise, the loss of the lives of the independent cultivators would be a small matter, but the big matter would be that he, the Great Sect Leader Kang, spent spirit stones but got no effect.

They also selected some capable men from each family and mixed them into the scattered cultivators to serve as officers at all levels. If there were no people to send, they would select some taller ones from the short ones. There are always some scattered cultivators who are outstanding and can take on important tasks. As long as the law of collective responsibility is strictly enforced, there is no need to worry too much.

Then the method of teaching the students how to fight together and explaining the gongs and drums was explained. Those who practice Buddhism are always more intelligent and less foolish.

After more than a month, the team of independent cultivators also got into good shape, and it was no longer as serious as when they first arrived, when it seemed that more than 2,000 people would be overwhelmed by a single attack of 600 local soldiers.

This time, the head of Kangda still left Yuan Jin to guard the house, and Ye Zhengwen and Pei Yi stayed behind to assist, just in case something happened.

Jiang Qing led the "Yunjiao Yicong" composed of more than 2,000 scattered cultivators and walked in the front to clear the way. Ming Hui led the militia from two counties in the center of the army, and Kang Dabao led the elite troops of the Chongming League at the end.

There are not many monsters at the edge of the Jackdaw Mountains near ** and Jin counties. After all, if there were too many, there would be no reason for the Chongming Sect to rebuild the mountain gate here.

Under such circumstances, more than 2,000 scattered cultivators could not stay together. Jin Shilun passed on Jiang Qing's letter, and the large team dispersed in units of hundreds.

Each general took the maps distributed in advance with him. This was obtained by Master Kang in exchange for the good deeds done on credit from the Fearless Tower.

The elite in the building collected a lot of information from mountain miners over the years, and eliminated those that were self-contradictory, bizarre, and incredible. It took them years to complete the map, which is hundreds of times better than the crude maps circulating in the market.

The quality of the cultivation of the independent cultivators varies greatly, and many of them are only at the first or second level of Qi training. Not only do they not have one or two high-quality magical instruments, many of them don't even have a Taoist technique that they have refined to a rough level.

Naturally, this kind of person would feel awe when they suddenly came into the notorious Jackdaw Mountains.

This was the case with You Xiaobao, who was born in Chongming City. He was holding an iron-bone hammer known as the "top-grade talisman weapon" in his hand, and walked forward with the team with trepidation in his heart.

Speaking of You Xiaobao, who has been on the path of cultivation since he was a child, he has never had any experience of fighting with others before. Even this iron bone hammer was taken out from the pocket of a casual cultivator who was still lying on the sickbed.

The You family was not originally from this place. Their family had been tenant farmers in a mortal fortress elsewhere for generations.

After being fortunate enough to move to Chongming City, when it came to You Xiaobao's father You Ersheng's generation, because he knew a little bit of martial arts, he was recruited to the Lingshi Mine in Tanggu County to work as a teacher for several years.

Because of his outstanding performance during the service, he obtained some rare elixirs and secret books in the eyes of ordinary people, and achieved the status of Wu Zong. Thus, he had a certain foundation in Chongming City.

By the time of You Xiaobao's generation, there were already more than a hundred brothers of the same generation. It was a great fortune for a spiritual root like him to emerge.

The You family had a longevity tablet of the head of the Kang family in front of and outside the hall. You Xiaobao had spiritual roots, so the You family naturally hoped that he could join the Chongming Sect. However, You Xiaobao's spiritual roots were too inferior, and his character was not good, so he was dismissed at the Ascension Assembly. You Ersheng spent 90% of his family wealth to buy You Xiaobao the opportunity to join a casual cultivator who lived in Chongming City.

But the good times did not last long. When You Xiaobao had finally broken through to the second level of Qi training after ten years of practice, his master, a casual cultivator, nearly died in his meditation room because his Qi circulation was disrupted when he was forcibly breaking through the bottleneck of the middle stage of Qi training. He urgently needed elixirs to save his life.

If it weren't for this relationship, You Xiaobao would not have been greedy for the twenty spirit stones given by Emperor Zhong Ming as a settlement fee and put himself in this extremely dangerous expedition.

Not everyone has the ambition to become an immortal. You Xiaobao, who is not even twenty years old, feels that living a good life and having many wives and concubines and many children like his father You Ersheng in the future would be enough to make him happy.

However, as he was distracted and slowed down his pace a little, he was stared at fiercely by his fire chief, a young man dressed in the clothes of an outer disciple of the Chongming Sect.

"Don't slow down! Hurry up! Hurry up!!"

You Xiaobao was so shocked by the young man's urging that his slippery iron bone hammer almost fell from his hand. However, he did not dare to delay for a moment and immediately used his unskilled low-grade flying bird skills to catch up.

The unusual movement here naturally attracted the attention of the leader of the hundred troops.

The general wore a jade talisman of the Qiaogong Fortress on his waist. He glanced at You Xiaobao and turned to the young man and said, "It's still early. Brother Xing, don't be so anxious."

When Xing Bing heard this, he immediately bowed and apologized, saying, "Brother Dao is right. I was just impatient."

If it was someone else who was a true disciple of Qiaogong Fort, as a disciple of Chongming Sect, he would not need to be so respectful.

But the Xiu Ming in front of him was no ordinary person, not only because he was the last disciple of Mo Wen, the head of Qiaogong Fort, and was able to control several first-grade top-quality mechanical puppets with the sixth level of Qi training. He could be regarded as a rising star among this generation of Qiaogong Fort.

Moreover, when it comes to his relationship with the high-level officials of Chongming Sect, Xiuming is much closer than Xing Bing's master Niu Kuang, who is the outer sect deacon.

Xing Bing took out some palm petals to offer, but Xiuming politely declined. He turned his gaze to the marching team, and his spiritual sense swept across the distributed map before he said:

"We are still 120 miles away from the old site of the Wusha tribe. The sun is not too strong today. When we pass the bush forest after another 16 miles, there should be four-flower miasma. Fellow Daoist Xing, please inform the team and take the miasma-repelling pills that we have prepared in advance."

"I obey your command, my humble brother." After Xing Bing responded, he rode on the Qiyunju to deliver the message.

Even though they had made full preparations beforehand, there were still casualties when passing through the four-flower miasma.

Several independent cultivators who thought they had the ability to ward off miasma did not take the miasma-warding pill made of superior ingredients in order to save it for future use. As a result, one person died and two were injured.

These three people were all from Xing Bing's fiery group, which made him so angry that he almost laughed out loud.

But no matter what, things have already happened, and we must always find a solution first.

The dead were relatively easy to deal with, they could be cremated on the spot, and the ashes and compensation would be given to their families in the future. The living were much more troublesome, after all, the entry-level alchemists were very valuable, and their Yicong had no equipment. The few alchemy apprentices in the team could only scratch their heads when they saw the poisonous miasma.

Seeing this, General Xiu Ming whispered, "It looks like we can only save him if we send him back to the Central Army's local soldiers."

Xiuming's words made You Xiaobao's eyes light up, and then he looked expectantly at the other two people being called by Xiuming's name. Before You Xiaobao could sigh for too long, Fire Chief Xing Bing, with a dark face, urged him and his fellow soldiers to move faster.

The cultivators were much more careful along the way. Except for one person who was bitten by a poisonous insect that could block spiritual consciousness and turned into a pool of pus, everyone else was relatively safe.

Xiuming blankly marked the danger of this place on the jade slip, and then pinched the poisonous insects and stuffed them into the jade bottle, to be used for writing battle reports later. Afterwards, he looked at the ruins of a fortress built of spiritual wood and huge rocks on the mountainside in the distance.

Although he was young, it was not difficult for him to tell from the common sense he had learned from the classics and travel notes he had read in his spare time that this must have been the main village of the chieftain of a small mountain barbarian tribe.

According to the map, this small tribe of mountain barbarians should have had dozens of monks and hundreds of thousands of people in the past, but now...
"Mumble. Roar."

A strange cry was clearly heard, Xiuming looked over and saw several gray shadows.

"Just as recorded in the map, this place has become the hiding place of a small group of fire-fanged tree goblins!" Xing Bing was overjoyed and looked at Xiu Ming with sharp eyes, almost wanting to take his men to make the contribution before the other party could say anything.

"Don't worry, fellow Daoist," Xiu Ming pointed his finger, and several mechanical puppets of different shapes rushed in front of Yunjiao Yicong and rushed towards the group of tree goblins.

These brutal and ugly beasts seemed to have already discovered the evil guests and were not frightened by these huge iron guys.

A first-class top-grade tree goblin led his servants and concubines to meet them head-on. The piece of spiritual wood trunk in its hand, which was as tall as a man and as thick as a jar, had not been tempered by spiritual fire, but because of its great force and heaviness, it still smashed these not-so-remarkable mid-grade puppets, causing sparks to fly.

The mechanical puppet was unexpectedly obstructed, Xiuming's expression changed slightly, but he was not anxious. He exchanged glances with an old monk behind him, and his hand gestures changed.

The middle-grade mechanical puppets fled back at the cost of the spiritual ink in their bodies, and lured most of the Fire Fang Tree Goblins out of the fortress.

There was a reason why the leading tree goblin leader had the courage to attack. He dodged most of the hundreds of talismans and Taoist spells that came towards him with his agile steps, and the remaining ones were swept away by the spiritual wood in his hand.

The leader showed his might, so it was natural for the tree goblins not to be excited. They beat their chests and stamped their feet, with flames hanging on their fangs, looking extremely ferocious.

Xiu Ming looked coldly at the last puppet he released being chased by the tree goblin leader. The puppet's body made of several kinds of spiritual gold was shattered to the ground, but there was no panic on his face.

With a wave of his hand, the only two other disciples of Qiaogong Fort in the team released a few medium and low-quality mechanical puppets to block the attack.

The sound of metal exploding rang in his ears, causing Xing Bing, who was eager to fight just now, to tremble slightly. But he forced himself to remain calm, and held up a golden shield as tall as his body, standing in the front with several other fire chiefs.

The screams of dozens of ferocious beasts almost frightened You Xiaobao paralyzed. He watched Xing Bing take a blow from the tree goblin leader, his shield shattered, and his body was almost blown to pieces.

You can also hear the latter urging as he fell down: "Push up, push up!"

The results of the joint training over a month have been evident. Without the serious training before, how could the front line of defense composed of more than ten mid-stage Qi training monks withstand the fierce attacks of the tree goblins for such a long time.

You Xiaobao tremblingly offered up several talismans, but perhaps due to poor quality or lack of skill, the Water Arrow Talisman dissipated into gas after catching up with the Fireball Talisman. The latter was also left with only a ball of flames accompanying the Golden Spear Talisman as it rushed forward.

As luck would have it, the tree goblin leader, who had predicted in advance, happened to be stabbed in the left eye socket by the golden spear that was deflected by the flames.

"Roar!" The tree goblin leader screamed in pain, and became even more crazy. He swung the spiritual wood wildly, and swept away two or three backbones of the formation, including Xing Bing, and their lives or deaths were unknown.

Then he opened his mouth wide, and the fishy smell gushed out along with the flames. If an ordinary Qigong practitioner was hit by this, he would be roasted into charcoal immediately. How could he still be alive? !
"Have you aimed?!!!"

In answer to Xiuming's question, there was a silver crossbow arrow that was ten feet long and as thick as an arm. The experienced monk pulled the trigger and fired it with force. The silver crossbow arrow carrying spiritual light whizzed away and hit the chest of the tree goblin leader heavily.

Nothing unexpected happened. The solid body of the middle-grade cultivator, which could not be broken by ordinary magic weapons, was completely blown into pieces.

Because of this, the wild attack of the mandrills suddenly came to a halt. The ferocious beasts looked at the debris formed by their leader in a trance for a moment, and therefore there was a very brief moment of stunned silence.

"Kill! Kill! Kill!" Xiu Ming had no time to check on the injuries of the people on the field. He immediately released his favorite puppet to kill the group of monsters.

You Xiaobao didn't know whether his own Fire Chief was dead or alive, and he didn't feel any joy at injuring the monster leader. After randomly unleashing a few Taoist spells that almost hit his own people, he was trembling again, holding the talisman, and was forced to the front of the formation by the people behind him.

Not long into this battle, You Xiaobao's brocade clothes were stained red. He didn't know whose blood it was, and he had no time to identify it. He just screamed loudly like the smelly beasts on the opposite side.

"Don't think of yourself as a human. The monster is ferocious. You have to be more ferocious than it to survive!"

The master's earnest instructions rang in his ears. You Xiaobao felt his eyes turn red. He didn't dare to hold back any more strength. He swung the iron bone hammer hard and smashed it hard on the hard skull of a middle-grade fire-fanged tree goblin.
The talisman shattered into pieces, but the skull remained intact. The Fire Fang Mandrill was furious and wanted to take revenge, but was evenly cut apart from top to bottom by a mechanical puppet holding a sword.

You Xiaobao's face was covered with the internal organs, which was extremely smelly. He did not feel sick, but was just glad.

When he came to his senses, he realized that except for the one he was currently in, all the dozens of Fire-fanged Tree Goblins had been killed and scattered by the other monks who outnumbered them. He then collapsed to the ground, unable to get up.

Xiuming recorded the war situation on a jade slip and said to himself, "There is still a lot of false or outdated information on this map. I need to send someone to report it to my uncle as soon as possible."

He looked at the bloody mud and the mess on the ground, and thought to himself, "I can't rest for too long. There are still many places to conquer. Fortunately, I have already gnawed the hardest bones."

He used the robot to amplify his voice and shouted, "Rest for half a day and set out in the evening. No delay!"

This Jackdaw Mountain Range is quite large.
(PS: I would like to recommend a sincere work by Mr. Lingyun, "The Rise of the Family: From a Widow in the Borderland to the Immortal Taoist Lord". It is a completed masterpiece with one million words. Readers who like young seedlings are welcome to appreciate it.

This guy was the only author who came to read my book and left a message after Lao Bai left messages everywhere because Lao Bai couldn't sign a contract at that time. I am still grateful to him. I hope you can take a look at it when you have time. Thank you! )
(End of this chapter)