Elven cultivators

Although the war has ended, the subsequent takeover and coordination are more trivial and mentally taxing than when the fighting was at its peak.

All the city-states, large and small, the scattered tribes attached to them, the resource points, mines, and magical plant growing areas scattered throughout the fertile land all need to be re-investigated, their ownership determined, and registered.

These alone are enough to keep the document processing office extremely busy.

It wasn't until a month later that Eleanor finally managed to sort out the most arduous part of the matter, and with a thick volume of documents, she went to Anton to report in person.

"The thirteen city-states of the Crimson Fertile Land have all been taken over. With the cooperation of the Dark Elf Matriarch and the lords, the process went very smoothly and there were almost no major problems."

"The remaining small and medium-sized forces, seeing that things were not going well, mostly surrendered on their own initiative. Only four or five small tribes held out and resisted stubbornly, but they were quickly suppressed."

"Currently, all the troops in the Worang region have been disarmed. According to the clan's past practices, all tribal forces that have voluntarily surrendered will be incorporated into the vassal races and given corresponding treatment and resettlement."

"As for those tribal forces that dared to resist, including the thirteen city-states of the Crimson Blood Alliance, all their personnel were enslaved and sent to various mining areas in batches to fill the labor shortage."

Anton nodded slightly after listening, without asking for further details.

After experiencing numerous wars, the clans had accumulated a fairly mature process for post-war reorganization and disposal.

In addition, Eleanor was always meticulous in handling affairs, so he was very confident in her abilities.

"The lower-level members of these forces are relatively easy to deal with, but the mid-to-high-level combatants are more troublesome." Eleanor closed the dossier, raised her eyes to look at Anton, "Mainly the elites of the Gold rank, as well as the legendary Dark Elf Matriarchs and city-state lords."

"These people are too powerful. It would take a lot of manpower to keep them under guard if they were imprisoned. Sending them to the mining area as slaves is also not very safe. If we relax our vigilance even slightly, they could easily cause trouble."

"Especially the dark elves, those guys aren't cut out to be hard laborers. Even if you force them to go to the mines and they pretend to be submissive, they're probably already plotting their escape."

"I'm wondering if there's a more suitable way to handle this."

Anton chuckled: "Sending these guys to the mining area as slaves is indeed a waste."

"Instead of having them holed up underground digging for rocks, we should get them involved in exploration."

"They are quite strong, and having lived in the Dark Regions for many years, they are much more familiar with the terrain and the distribution of subterranean races than we are. Bringing them into the exploration team can improve efficiency and reduce the military burden on Nine Nether City."

Eleanor frowned slightly: "That's true, but I'm afraid that once they leave Nine Nether City and escape supervision, they'll try every means to escape. We can't keep the guardian generals watching them forever."

The underground races have weak racial concepts, so even if you use their tribes as leverage, it may not be effective.

Especially the dark elves.

Their ruthlessness and cold-bloodedness are ingrained in their very bones.

They don't care about the survival of their clan or family as long as it benefits them.

Unless we can control their lives, putting these guys into the exploration team is like planting a bomb that could explode at any moment.

Anton smiled slightly, as if he had expected her to ask this question, and casually took out a book, placed it on the table, and pushed it toward Eleanor.

The latter looked down.

The cover has five words written on it: "Blood Prison True Demon Art".

Eleanor paused slightly, looked up at Anton, and asked in her eyes.

"This is a strength-based cultivation technique," Anton explained. "Cultivators can temper their physical bodies by absorbing the essence and blood of all things. If they cultivate to a deeper level, they can even master a trace of blood control. The cultivation speed is not slow. Although it cannot compare to top-tier inheritances like the Eight Desolations Suppressing Prison Scripture, it is still much stronger than ordinary strength-based cultivation techniques."

"But it has a side effect: every now and then, you have to take a specific pill to suppress the backlash of blood and qi in your body, otherwise it will disintegrate from the inside out."

Upon hearing this, Eleanor's eyes lit up slightly, and she understood Anton's intention.

"Are you planning to use this technique to put shackles on those dark elves?"

"That's right." Anton smiled and nodded.

In the world of cultivation, the Blood Prison True Demon Art is not considered a top-tier inheritance. Its cultivation speed cannot compare with those methods that directly lead to the Great Dao, and its side effects negate its slight advantage among cultivation techniques of the same level, making it somewhat of a useless skill.

But in the current situation, it comes in handy.

"The bloodline of the Dark Elves is the same as that of our Elf race, so they should have no problem cultivating the Blood Prison True Demon Art. However, once they have practiced this technique, they must regularly take Blood Prison True Demon Pills to suppress the backlash, otherwise they will only face death."

"As long as we control the production of Blood Prison True Demon Pills, we can restrain the Dark Elves and make them obediently serve the clan."

"At the same time, this technique can also enhance their strength, enabling them to better serve the clan."

"Killing two birds with one stone."

Eleanor smiled knowingly after hearing this.

"That's definitely a good idea."

The more cunning, treacherous, and ruthless a person is, the more afraid of death they often are.

Races like the Dark Elves, accustomed to surviving amidst intrigue and betrayal, become more adept at understanding boundaries than anyone else once their lives are truly in someone else's hands.

The Blood Prison True Demon Art is undoubtedly an excellent means of controlling dark elves.

Eleanor carefully put the book away and smiled, "I'll make the arrangements later. All dark elves who want to escape their slave status must cultivate this technique. Once they've mastered it, they'll be incorporated into exploration teams. That should speed up their progress in venturing deeper into the Underdark."

Anton nodded and didn't continue the topic.

If possible, he wouldn't really want to resort to such coercive measures.

Rather than threatening people with their lives, he preferred to win people's hearts with benefits and future prospects.

That's the long-term solution, far more reliable than coercion.

Unfortunately, when dealing with creatures like dark elves, the best methods are often ineffective; you have to use some drastic measures to control the situation.

The two chatted for a while longer before Eleanor steered the conversation back to the overall conclusion of the Crimson Soil project.

"The initial estimate of the Blood Soul Crystal production in the Crimson Blood Cave is more than three times that of the previous caves. For a long time to come, we will not have to worry about the supply of Blood Soul Crystals."

Eleanor wore a faint smile.

As more and more elves in the clan practiced strength-based techniques, Blood Soul Crystals went from being plentiful to being in short supply.

This is even though the clan has not opened up the exchange of Blood Soul Crystals to its vassal races; otherwise, the shortage would only be greater.

Now that a larger Blood Soul Crystal production point has been added, this problem has been greatly alleviated.

The combined annual output of the two Blood Soul Crystal Caves is more than enough to supply the cultivation power of forty to fifty thousand of our own kind of elves.

"In addition," Eleanor continued, "we also discovered an ancient base at the bottom of the Crimson Blood Cave, which is larger than the previous one, but we didn't find anything of value inside, only the remains of more than fifty damaged golems."

"What about the materials used for the base itself?" Anton asked.

"Like the previous base, it is made of special materials that can block divine sense detection."

Anton nodded in satisfaction: "That's good. The base itself is the biggest gain. Have the base dismantled and all the materials transported to the Primordial City warehouse, which will be used to refine the Flying Radiance Tower."

"The same goes for the golem wreckage; it's all dismantled into materials."

Eleanor nodded in agreement, then took out a roll of leather and unfolded it on the table.

It was a map.

The map is quite large, taking up almost half of the desktop when unfolded. Although the lines are not particularly fine, the outlines are clear and the annotations are detailed.

Anton noticed that there was an area marked with a dotted line on the far right of the map, with the words "Nine Netherworld City Domain" written next to it.

This area only occupies about one-fifth of the entire map.

The remaining part is a vast, unfamiliar area marked with many unfamiliar place names and symbols.

Eleanor smiled and said, "The thirteen city-states of the Crimson Fertile Land all have maps of the surrounding areas. I'll have them collected and compiled into a more complete new map."

"Although it's not very detailed, it will be of great help to our future exploration work."

Anton looked down at it for a moment, then nodded slightly: "Not bad. With this, we can avoid a lot of detours in the next stage of exploration... Are there any other fertile areas marked on the map?"

Eleanor shook her head: "They are all scattered city-states, without any fertile regions."

Anton was not surprised to hear this.

Fertile soil is rare in dark regions.

The two chatted for a few more minutes about some key markers on the map before finally shifting their focus away from the matter of the Crimson Fertile Land.

"How's it going over at the Holy Dragon Mountains?" Anton asked casually.

Eleanor said solemnly, "It's still the same as before. The five major powers have been fighting for so long and still haven't been able to reach an agreement. In fact, the scale of the war has expanded, and now even the outer areas of the Holy Dragon Mountains have become battlefields."

"In addition, friction frequently breaks out in the border areas where their respective territories meet. If this trend continues, the flames of war may spread to their respective territories in the future."

After listening, Anton nodded calmly.

This trajectory largely matches the path he remembered.

The war between the five major powers is far from reaching its most intense stage.

The real chaos is yet to come.

When allies and vassals are completely drawn in, most of the Dawn Continent will be engulfed in continuous warfare.

Just then, there was a gentle knock on the palace door.

Eleanor stopped speaking, turned her head and said, "Come in."

Flora pushed open the door and entered with light steps. She bowed to each of the two men and then said after she stopped:

"Teacher, Lady Eleanor, the Steelmane Tribe has sent someone to request an audience with you."

Anton and Eleanor both looked over at the same time.

"Who came?" Anton asked.

"The leader was an elder from the Steelmane tribe, accompanied by a dozen or so guards."

Upon hearing this, Eleanor's brow furrowed almost imperceptibly.

Because of the slave-hunting incident, she didn't have a good impression of the Steelmane Tribe, and upon hearing this, she immediately snorted coldly: "An elder wants to see the chieftain? Does he really think he's someone important?"

She turned to Anton, "Chief, I'll handle the Steelmane Tribe."

Anton had never taken the Steelfur Tribe seriously, so he nodded when he heard her say that.

"Alright."

Eleanor then got up and left Tianyuan Palace with Flora.

Anton didn't stay long and returned to his meditation room to continue his cultivation.