Chapter 317: Chapter 290: Shadow Soldiers

"The Alien Race army was only recently established, so many races are still taking a wait-and-see approach. Once they gradually understand the benefits of joining, more and more of them will change their minds and eagerly enlist."

Eleanor said with certainty.

She was right. While the benefits couldn’t compare to the Silver Moon Legion, or even the city guard, they were a tier above what the vast majority of other factions offered their armies.

A stable salary, ample supplies, comprehensive medical care, and a clear path for advancement through exchanging merit points for Cultivation Resources and equipment.

These were all things other factions couldn’t provide.

Anyone who wasn’t too shortsighted would know what the right choice was.

Anton nodded with satisfaction.

With this 128,000-strong Alien Race army, the Clan’s long-standing predicament of being stretched thin would be greatly alleviated.

The Silver Moon Legion could be freed from labor-intensive tasks like garrisoning resource points and escorting supplies, allowing them to focus more on training and war preparations.

The city guard could also dedicate more personnel to daily patrols and maintaining order within the Taichu Spirit Realm.

Seeing the satisfaction on Anton’s face, Eleanor’s smile deepened as she continued her report.

"The number of disciples in Taichu City has also grown significantly in recent years, now exceeding eight hundred."

Anton thought for a moment and understood the reason.

After all, the Clan’s current mainstream cultivation paths were essentially threefold.

Qi Dao, Strength Dao, and the Seed Pill Technique.

The number of traditional Warriors and Casters was extremely small.

Over half of our own Elves were Strength Dao Cultivators.

And now, as long as these people met the conditions, they could apply to become disciples of Taichu City.

It was normal for a large number of disciples to appear in the short term.

Once this wave of enthusiasm passed, the growth curve would gradually stabilize.

"Currently, a total of eighteen disciples have successfully reached Foundation Establishment. The one with the highest Cultivation Level, Laine, is already at the Third-Layer Foundation Establishment," Eleanor added.

Anton nodded to himself.

The cultivation speed of a Spirit Body was indeed astonishingly fast.

’Judging from Laine’s current progress, he might even reach the peak of Foundation Establishment within a century.’

’Whether he can succeed at Solidifying Pill, and what grade of Golden Core he can form, will be up to him.’

"What’s the status of our exploration of that fertile land?" Anton asked.

Eleanor immediately opened another document. "According to the intelligence we’ve gathered, the local subterranean creatures call that region the ’Red Blood Fertile Soil.’"

"Red Blood?" Anton raised an eyebrow.

"Because there’s a Blood Soul Crystal cluster there," Eleanor replied. "And it’s even larger than the one we previously discovered."

Anton’s eyes flickered, lost in thought.

’Another Blood Soul Crystal cluster.’

’The one we found in the Nine Nether City Domain had an ancient experimental base hidden beneath it.’

’So, could this one in the Red Blood Fertile Soil also have similar ruins beneath it?’

’If so, this region is probably far from simple.’

’The appearance of a Blood Soul Crystal cluster is no coincidence. The entire Red Blood Fertile Soil might have been an experimental zone for some ancient civilization.’

"The Red Blood Fertile Soil is home to numerous factions, at least forty or fifty of them, large and small."

Eleanor’s voice pulled Anton back from his thoughts.

"However, only thirteen city-state factions are worth our attention, including the Dark Elf city of Vion."

"These factions are currently cooperating to mine the large Blood Soul Crystal cluster, dividing the harvested Blood Soul Crystals each month according to a set quota. But their relationships are not harmonious, and there is constant friction behind the scenes."

"Vion takes nearly forty percent of the Blood Soul Crystal shares, while the remaining twelve city-states split the other sixty percent. This distribution has always been a point of contention for the other twelve."

"They seem to have formed an alliance to jointly oppose Vion."

Anton understood.

He was all too familiar with the ways of the Dark Elves.

Those creatures believe in survival of the fittest, act tyrannically, and prefer to solve problems with schemes and violence.

As a result, they have a terrible reputation in the Dark Nether Realm.

Given that Dark Elf city-states are often quite powerful, it’s not at all surprising that the other twelve have united against them with suspicion and hostility.

"How many Dark Elves are in Vion?" Anton asked.

"No fewer than twenty thousand," Eleanor replied. "The other twelve city-states have a combined population of no less than two hundred thousand, with an estimated total army of at least seventy thousand."

Due to the harsh environment and brutal competition of the Dark Nether Realm, the proportion of soldiers in the population is much higher than on the surface.

For a population of two hundred thousand to field an army of seventy or eighty thousand is commonplace in the Dark Nether Realm.

The Dark Elves are even more extreme in this regard; it’s practically a warrior society.

And due to their ruthless, competitive culture, their individual combat prowess far surpasses that of ordinary subterranean creatures.

So despite Vion’s smaller numbers, if a war truly broke out, the other twelve city-states would likely be no match for them.

Vion has only refrained from acting because the cost would be too devastating.

"In other words, if we attack the Red Blood Fertile Soil, we’ll likely face an army of nearly one hundred thousand," Anton mused.

"Correct," Eleanor nodded. "With our Clan’s current military strength, taking the Red Blood Fertile Soil wouldn’t be an issue, but we would likely suffer heavy casualties."

"What if we commit the Daoist Soldier Corps?" Anton asked.

Eleanor thought for a moment. "Deploying the Yellow Turban Warriors and Five Camp Divine Soldiers would reduce casualties among our people, but while the terrain of the Red Blood Fertile Soil is much flatter than other areas, it’s still more complex and treacherous than the surface. The caves and tunnels are too narrow to deploy a large number of troops at once."

"Without an overwhelming numerical advantage, the war could drag on, and our resource consumption would multiply."

Anton pondered for a moment before speaking slowly. "Let’s not act rashly."

"Continue terraforming the region and expand the Nine Nether City Domain’s radius of control."

"The shorter the distance between the Nine Nether City Domain and the Red Blood Fertile Soil, the easier it will be to dispatch troops and manage logistics in the future."

Eleanor keenly sensed a hidden meaning in Anton’s words and asked tentatively, "Clan Leader, do you have a plan in mind?"

Anton smiled faintly. "I plan to create a new type of Daoist Soldier, one suited for combat in environments like the Dark Nether Realm. If I’m successful, it should significantly reduce the difficulty of conquering the Red Blood Fertile Soil."

Hearing this, Eleanor’s curiosity was immediately piqued.

’A new type of Daoist Soldier?’

’Anton hasn’t put much thought into Daoist Soldiers for a long time.’

’In recent years, he’s either been busy with his cultivation or with creating the Six Ding and Six Jia Guardian Divine Generals, barely paying any mind to conventional Daoist Soldiers.’

’Why bring it up now? Does he have a new idea?’

However, seeing that Anton had no intention of continuing, Eleanor tactfully did not ask further.

’The Clan Leader always did things with a sense of propriety. He would tell her when the time was right.’

In fact, the new type of Daoist Soldier Anton planned to create was the Shadow Soldier.

Also known as Nether-soldiers or Ghost-soldiers.

Shadow Soldiers are combat units created when Ghost Dao Cultivators use Residual Souls as material, Yin Qi as sustenance, and a special technique to refine the souls into soldiers.

They have no physical bodies, existing purely as soul-forms. They can pass through walls and earth, ignore physical obstacles, and possess extremely high resistance to physical attacks.

In an environment like the Dark Nether Realm—with its complex terrain, sheer rock walls, and countless caves—Shadow Soldiers are natural-born warriors.

They don’t need passages; they can directly pass through rock walls to appear behind the enemy.

They need no light source to see their surroundings and are even more at home in the darkness.

They are immune to poison gas and unafraid of ambushes.

Any physical attack aimed at a creature of flesh and blood is completely useless against Shadow Soldiers.

They are perfectly suited for dealing with the subterranean races.

Anton had actually had the idea of creating Shadow Soldiers long ago.

However, creating Shadow Soldiers had one prerequisite: a large quantity of Yin Attribute materials were needed to craft a Soul-Gathering Banner. Without one, it was impossible to collect Residual Souls.

And materials suitable for crafting Yin Attribute Magical Treasures had always been difficult to find on the Dawn Continent.

Coincidentally, the materials seized from the Dragon Race included a large quantity of high-quality Death Breath Stone.

This strange crystal, which forms in environments with extremely high concentrations of deathly energy, was perfect for crafting the Soul-Gathering Banner.

Once the Soul-Gathering Banner was complete, he could give it to the disciples of Taichu City to go out and gather Residual Souls.

This would both hone the disciples’ practical combat skills and accumulate a new source of soldiers for the Clan.

It would kill two birds with one stone.

It was worth noting that the Residual Souls used to create Shadow Soldiers were not true souls. In essence, they were life-like entities naturally formed from the gradual condensation of spiritual energy left behind after a creature’s soul dissipates upon death.

They possessed no self-awareness, only an instinct to devour the souls of the living.

They typically appeared on battlefields, in plague-stricken towns, or other places where a large number of people had died in a short time.

Thus, while creating Shadow Soldiers might sound evil, in the Cultivation Realm, it was actually considered a righteous practice.

To put it simply, it was the act of utilizing pre-existing Residual Souls—which would otherwise dissipate or evolve into more dangerous entities—making it a form of resource recycling.

This was unlike the demonic path, which involved capturing people to forcibly extract their souls for refining puppets.

Anton brought his thoughts back to the present and looked at Eleanor. "Any recent movements in the surrounding regions?"

At this, Eleanor’s expression turned serious.

She unfurled a parchment map covered in dense markings. Her finger traced across it as she spoke in a grave tone, "The Frost Ridge Plateau, the Thundering River Basin, the Tide Sound Plain, the River Valley, the Iron Hill Kingdom... None of these areas have been peaceful lately. Various factions have already engaged in multiple small-scale conflicts over resource points. While it hasn’t escalated into all-out war, the signs are clear."

"It’s just as you predicted, Clan Leader. It won’t be long before turmoil erupts everywhere."

The places Eleanor mentioned were all located in the eastern part of the continent, scattered around the Eldron Plain and the Green Highlands.

Ever since Anton’s last directive, she had been secretly gathering intelligence on these regions.

She had dispatched a dedicated intelligence team to establish a network in the surrounding areas.

The moment there was a hint of trouble, she would receive a report.

Fortunately, among the five supreme powers, Blood Roar Fortress and the Heart of the Mountains were located in the continent’s north, the Freedom Alliance was in the west, the Jade Royal Court was near the continent’s center, and the Great Vortex Islands, home to the Tide Hall, were in the middle of the ocean, far beyond the continental shelf.

Only the southern part of the continent and the eastern part, where the Eldron Plain lies, were devoid of any supreme powers.

This meant the Silver Moon Race faced far less pressure to expand than factions in other regions.

They only needed to deal with the surrounding first-rate and local powers.

Anton nodded slightly. "Continue to monitor the surrounding regions. Once the turmoil begins, some factions might set their sights on us."

Eleanor nodded solemnly.

The profits from the trade network controlled by the Clan were so immense each year that they were a source of envy.

Many factions had long coveted it, held back only by their fear of the Clan’s military might.

But once the turmoil began, there was no telling who might take a desperate gamble.

Taking precautions was, of course, essential.

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