456 Clues (1/2)

It was more complicated than expected to recruit soldiers from the Land of Fragrance. Gu Shenwei put forth his ideas, but when he tried to put them into practice, he could do nothing but hand them over to Zhong Heng.

The Land of Fragrance was wide but sparsely populated, and only a small piece of land around the capital was registered. It would take at least a year or two to carry out national measurement.

Zhong Heng adopted a simple method. According to the length of service and number of military exploits, the soldiers recruited would be given various plots of land with no specific location. The soldiers would receive a certificate with their names printed, noting the exact acreage.

Only at the end of the service could soldiers get real land. Their immediate family members could inherit the land if the solders died in war, but they were not allowed to privately buy or sell the land.

Even before formal recruitment, they had managed to satisfy the existing 20,000 soldiers. Some of them had followed the Dragon King for many years and made outstanding military exploits, but they had not yet received much reward.

All swordsmen from the Great Snowmountain refused to accept the land of the Land of Fragrance. They liked the women there, but they didn't like the sultry and humid climate and the overcrowded foliage. They missed their snowy hometown and their biggest wish was to return home one day.

They also had a request which they were too embarrassed to ask. The Dragon King knew what it was, but he could not publicly accept it because he had already promised Golden Roc Fort to New Moon Hall.

One of the conditions for New Moon Hall to cooperate with the Dragon King was that he would eventually take possession of Golden Roc Fort. According to Maid Lotus, Han Wuxian, the Master who had never shown himself, had greater ambitions.

Gu Shenwei was suspicious of New Moon Hall and didn't want to leave Golden Roc Fort to join this unpredictable organization. But this idea could never be heard, so he used other methods to appease the thousands of Swordsmen from the Great Snowmountain, who, though small in number, were the most trustworthy force of the Dragon King.

The Swordsmen from the Great Snowmountain had their own unique Kung Fu. Through years of killing each other and fighting with the Golden Roc Killer, the Swordsmen had grasped a set of Kung Fu perfectly effective in fighting alone and in groups. But their lack of advanced Internal Strength is a fatal flaw. This was the main reason why many outstanding swordsmen made remarkable progress when they were young, but could never become top masters as they grew older.

Gu Shen personally selected 200 swordsmen under the age of 30 and rewarded them by teaching them the first 6 chapters of Wayless Qigong.

This was Maid Lotus' idea. In fact, thanks to her, many disciples of New Moon Hall had been practicing divine kung fu for a long time and achieved great results.

Wayless Qigong was originally the supreme martial art enjoyed by Supreme King. But with the effort of the two traitors, its influence was spreading.

The other swordsmen were not awarded divine kung fu. Some of them were too old and had passed the best time to practice Internal Strength; some did not want it because they knew they were not very well talented. Gu Shenwei commissioned a large number of weapons from Wushan and gave the best of them to the swordsmen.

This way, he secured more loyalty from the swordsmen.

For them, Internal Strength and weapons awarded by Dragon King were far more valuable than the land of the Land of Fragrance.

Tuo Nengya's machetemen preferred money and land. They were the only ones who got real land, which was just outside the capital of the Land of Fragrance.

Hundreds of forest savages had gradually accepted the outside world. Their idea was simple. They did not covet land or gold or silver, and their only hope was to return to the forest alive and bring the villagers out to see the world.

They were illiterate and could not understand the advanced instructions for Internal Strength. Gu Shen made a decision on their behalf, leaving a whole piece of land adjacent to the forest for these guard troops.

When he left the forest, Gu Shenwei also took a group of children and gave them all to Hu Shining for training.

Soldiers of the five countries could choose land or money, but no matter what, they would receive the credentials, only getting the real thing after the war.

The royal families of all countries were both worried and reassured by Dragon King's move. They were worried that they might lose all of their own people but were reassured that the Dragon King would be busy focusing on running the Land of Fragrance and would leave their throne alone.

In any case, it was true that enough soldiers had been recruited in this way, and Dragon King's army expanded every day. Zhong Heng even allowed some recruits to send their families to the Land of Fragrance first.

The nobles in the Land of Fragrance had more complicated feelings than the royal families in various countries. Land of Fragrance was their country, while it was now given generously to outsiders as a gift by Dragon King.

As for the slave soldiers, they were very excited about this. They became the most proactive soldiers, training tirelessly, all wanting to make contributions in the battlefield and get more land in the future.

During this period, there were several plots by nobles to provoke slaves to stir up trouble, none of which was successful. This indicated that land was easier to understand than freedom, and it was easier to arouse fighting ambition. Gu Shenwei regretted that he had not realized this earlier.

The number of the nobles was too small and their Kung Fu was too weak. After fighting a few battles, they were all silenced.

While Zhong Heng and Dugu Xian recruited and trained new recruits, Gu Shenwei was busy cleaning up the people around him.

First of all, Hu Shining's killer apprentices had been ”polluted” by Shangguan Yun, and their credibility was greatly reduced. But it would be a pity if they were all disbanded.

Gu Shenwei personally participated in the training, showing his machete skills in front of these apprentices, hoping to offset some of the influence of Shangguan Yun.

Seeing how Dragon King's practice had achieved results, Hu Shining also helped elaborate by telling how the Dragon King had grown from a rejected apprentice to a first-class killer, arousing more respect from these apprentices. There were some exaggeration in his telling, but he was careful to hide the part where the Dragon King killed his master, which was not the ending he would want.

The hearts of people were unpredictable. Even children had to be watched out at any time. Gu Shenwei decided to continue to train these apprentices as useful killers, but he would never assign them the most important tasks.

As for the newly selected group of children, Gu Shenwei reminded Hu Shining to strictly separate them from the previous group.

Next, Gu Shenwei was to solve his biggest problem.