Chapter 352: Stone Men (1/2)
Chapter 352: Stone Men
After three days, the five chiefs of the mountain people once again met in Brettel City. Apart from the aged Adleman, the other four comparatively young leaders actually all agreed to Han Shuo’s demands.
Eventually, even Adleman who lacked the others’ lofty ambitions, agreed with the four young mountain leaders to bring down the majority of the mountain people in the mines to join the army. Adleman would be responsible for extracting ore from the five nearby mines and a portion of the ore would be allocated to the four young leaders.
Brettel City was now brimming with life. Eight thousand people came from the five mines to join the city’s burgeoning populace. Dorcas, called back by the news, decided to reorganize his troops. He broke up their traditional formations to form four large units, placing Han Shuo’s people as their commanders.
Even though the mountain people had previously acquired a smattering of weapons and armor, Brettel City didn’t have the equipment to fully arm eight thousand new recruits.
An armaments workshop funded by the Boozt Merchant Guild was quickly set up by Jack and Dorcas. It began operating at the site of the former workshops on Mount Silk. In addition, Brettel City also allocated funds to purchase smelting facilities, while the Boozt Merchant Guild was put in charge of hiring skilled metalworkers.
Since Han Shuo still had the assistance of the dwarves from the Dark Forest, he instructed the weaponsmiths at Mount Silk to focus on forging armour. The dwarves’ ability to forge weapons was far superior to anything a human could make, but in return, their armor weren’t as refined compared to those forged by humans.
Dorcas sent every one of the four mountain people units into harsh training, a regimen of his own devising. A former student of the Lancelot Imperial Academy, Dorcas was definitely a talented field commander. Under his training, the eight thousand mountain people saw a noticeable improvement in their strength.
After Faulke returned, he began instructing the mountain people in the proper usage of combat wagons, ballista wagons, and catapults. This type of powerful defensive weaponry required strong people to operate them, and the mountain people were perfectly suited to this task. Under the auspices of Faulke, the mountain people learned how to properly operate Brettel City’s gates and the combat wagons.
As the days passed, Dorcas found Han Shuo one day, and proposed a suggestion. “My Lord, the moat outside of Brettel City’s gates is full of shallow sewage. Now that we have the eight thousand mountain people at our disposal, we can spend some time making the moat even deeper. This way, even if the seven grand duchies decide to invade, the moat will cause them to lose a lot of men.”
Brettel City’s moat had originally only been half completed, but since Brettel City had been sacked again and again by the seven grand duchies, the construction of the moat had been left as an unfinished project. In the end, Brettel City became a lost cause, and the moat was eventually forgotten.
Dorcas was indeed a skilled strategist, immediately seeing the value in the moat outside Brettel City’s gates. Since the moat had already been given an initial shape, it wouldn’t take too much time and material to finish building it. When Brettel City’s moat was complete, it would act as a severe blow to the invaders.
This suggestion was immediately taken to heart by Han Shuo. The mountain people, relaxing after learning how to operate the defensive siege weaponry, were immediately put to work again on expanding the city’s moats and making them deeper.
Han Shuo’s arrival had also drastically increased the number of Dark Mantle agents operating in Brettel City. With Dick managing them, they then proceeded to infiltrate the seven grand duchies, resulting in a steady stream of information. If information concerning Brettel City was brought up, that would also be dutifully recorded and passed on to Dick, then Han Shuo.
As an emissary of Second Dark Star, Han Shuo far outranked Dick. In fact, Han Shuo even possessed the authority to award medals and citations to members who had contributions to their name. Amongst those select few stood Chester. Under Han Shuo’s deliberate recommendation, he became the second most powerful person in Brettel City’s Dark Mantle branch, second only to Dick. In addition, Chester had also risen in rank within Dark Mantle.
One day, Adleman suddenly sought out Han Shuo, who was studying necromancy magic. Delia of Mount Silk, who’d entered the military by now, also entered by his side.
“My lord, numerous stone men have appeared at the mines halfway up the mountain. These stone men have been attacking miners at the deepest places in the mines, causing scores of deaths. These stone men don’t fear magic, and their bodies are too tough. We don’t know how to deal with them, so we were wondering if you would be able to help us.” Upon finding Han Shuo, Adleman immediately told him what had happened.
Han Shuo was shocked. Frowning, he asked “Stone men? How can there be stone men in the mines? Was there anything like this in the past?”
Wearing soft armour, the heroic and imposing Delia had a tall nose and long legs. Standing ramrod straight, she presented an imposing figure. She shook her head at Han Shuo’s question, replying, “No, this has never happened before. Even since my father took over Mount Silk, there were never been any traces of stone men in there.”
Delia was originally the leader of Mount Silk. Even now, Delia still had many subordinates on the mountain. The people of Delia’s father’s generation had lived there before. Now that stone men had appeared, the former leader of the mountain people was now the focus of attention.
“Those stone men found halfway up Mount Silk… did you suddenly find them after re-opening an area?” Han Shuo continued to ask, brows furrowed.
Nowadays, not only did Mount Silk have mountain people mining there, but it also had a collaborative armaments workshop jointly owned by the Boozt Merchant Guild and Brettel City. It produced ten or so sets of high-quality armor every day. When more metalworkers arrived, the weapons workshop would then be able to operate more to Han Shuo’s satisfaction.
The mines on Mount Silk had abundant supplies of iron and copper ore. Taking advantage of this, the ore could be directly smelted into iron and copper. They would then be mixed with various other metals and forged into suits of armour by experienced metalworkers. In the eyes of Han Shuo, not only was Mount Silk an important source of ore, but also the crux of his armament campaign. As such, Han Shuo was greatly concerned about what Adleman had said.
“It is, My Lord. When we were excavating further below, we found that the iron deposits seemed to become even richer. When we were planning to send people down, a bunch of stone men appeared from an unknown place. These stone men seemed to have a very pitiful intelligence, making it impossible to communicate with them. They immediately began attacking us, and killed quite a few of our miners.” Adleman replied.
“So it’s like this!” Han Shuo thought for a moment and nodded. He said “I’ll go with you to Mount Silk to see what’s going on with the stone men in the mines.”