Over the course of five short lives, I refined my idea for ‘medicinal baths’ to the point where the results were… tolerable. Sinking into these baths still caused severe pain, and hardly any of the medicinal energy actually went toward strengthening one’s body. However, they worked, and they could be ‘brewed’ with cheap, locally sourced ingredients—mostly. Aside from a tub of hot water and two common herbs that were already being grown by the green-robed farmers, all one needed was a portion of blood from a Rank 1 demon ox.

These medicinal baths caused a person’s physical body to undergo a complete transformation. Their muscles became more powerful, their bones became sturdier, and their skin became tougher. These enhancements were in no way comparable to what could be accomplished through body cultivation, but they improved the body as a whole, and they were more than enough to give my recruits a significant advantage over most mortals.

That said, these medicinal baths were not something that could change a person overnight. Each bath only lasted half an hour, and very little energy could be absorbed during a given session. Also, for these baths to be most effective, they needed to be done when a person was physically exhausted.

So, over the following year, I increased the intensity of my recruits’ training and pushed them to their limits every single night. Then, I sent them to soak in a medicinal bath, before returning them home for some well-deserved rest.

At first, even with herbal teas to aid them, two hours of training a night was all that my recruits could handle. But, thanks to the medicinal baths, their bodies steadily improved, and they gradually needed less sleep. By the end of the year, the top performers were able to get by on just a couple of hours of rest each night.

We started this enhanced training with just my four recruits and their twenty lieutenants. After three months, I was satisfied with everyone’s progress, so I allowed each of the twenty lieutenants to recruit five villagers to serve as their subordinates. Then, three months later, these subordinates recruited every remaining villager who was willing to fight.

At the nine-month mark, the villagers began trying to recruit the black-robed soldiers. This significantly increased the odds that our rebellion would be exposed, but there were enough tensions between the black-robes and the overseers that more than a few were eager to defect. And, after the first group joined us, they were able to convince their friends to join us as well.

I had to step in a couple of times, when a black-robe suddenly decided they needed to alert the overseers, but overall, our recruitment efforts went rather smoothly. After a full year of enhanced training and recruitment, my four recruits had enlisted more than 95% of the peasant farmers and more than 75% of the black-robed soldiers.

As the strength of my recruits increased, so did their confidence and, for some, their arrogance.

While locked away in my underground training chamber, my recruits were the leaders of their village, with nearly unquestioned authority. The only checks on their power were me and their three peers. During the day, however, while they were in the outside world, they were technically under the authority of the black-robed soldiers.

This created tension between the black-robes and the villagers that they were supposed to be monitoring. If my recruits and their lieutenants were the masters of the village at night, then how could any of the black-robes treat them harshly during the day?

At first, this wasn’t much of an issue. My recruits were hardworking, and they kept their lieutenants in check, eliminating the need for the black-robes to punish them. After over a year of training, however, their attitudes started to shift.

They had become powerful—the entire village had become powerful. So, why should they continue following the orders of those who were now their subordinates?

Not everyone felt this way, but enough did that any admonitions I made against acting recklessly fell on deaf ears. Some were willing to listen, especially the villagers who followed Ling. Most, however, were not.

The worst offenders were Dak and his lieutenants. While they continued to push themselves during the nightly training sessions, during the day, they slacked off. I warned them against this. I even issued them punishments. Sadly, though, these punishments only hardened their hearts against me. The more I pushed them to work hard, the less they listened.

If I had a way to reward them for good behavior, things might have gone differently, but due to the village’s unique circumstances, I had little to offer them other than good advice.

Eventually, Dak’s reluctance to listen to the black-robes’ orders came to the attention of their red-robed overseer. And when the overseer appeared, intent on making an example out of Dak, the boy fought back. The overseer was well-trained, but caught entirely by surprise, Dak’s enhanced strength and supernatural agility allowed him to end the man before he could even draw his weapon.

Seizing the spear of the now-deceased overseer, Dak looked at the villagers and soldiers who surrounded him. “It’s time to end this! This is our land, and I refuse to listen to those red-robed bastards any longer!”

Not everyone cheered at this pronouncement. Some didn’t want to fight, and others believed that they weren’t ready. However, no one was willing to speak out against the boy. So, feeling emboldened, Dak gathered up his villagers and took them to subdue the other work crews, targeting the groups that held his lieutenants and greatest loyalists first.

The second of my recruits to join this group was the other boy, Zan. Then, it was one of the girls, Ngoi. With Zan being Dak’s closest ally and Ngoi remaining neutral, Dak solidified his position as the leader of the rebellion. By the time Ling joined, there was nothing that she could do other than follow Dak’s orders. Anything else would have meant fracturing the unity of the rebellion before it could even get started.

After gathering everyone in the northern fields, Dak led them on a march toward the village.

The red-robed overseers, who were all mostly training on the outskirts to the southwest of the village, did not immediately respond to this rebellion.

At first, this was because they didn’t know it was happening. Dak’s focus was on the work crews in the northern fields, and with most of the black-robed soldiers having already been suborned, the few who remained loyal to Mandakh couldn’t escape to warn them of what was happening.

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After Dak began his assault on the village, however, messengers were immediately sent across the river to warn the red-robes of the uprising.

I had expected this news to cause the red-robed overseers to swarm across the river in full force. But when the cyan-robed trainer received this report, he calmly ordered all of the overseers to assemble in an open field to the south of the village. Then, once everyone was gathered, he sent out three five-man teams to assess the strength of Dak’s troops.

Not burdened by the need to spend their days farming, the overseers were able to spend nearly all their time learning to fight. Because of this, every person in these three teams was far more skilled than anyone the rebellion had to offer, including my five recruits.

When these overseers engaged the villagers to measure their combat strength, however, they were quickly overwhelmed. The overseers might have been more proficient with their weapons, but enhanced by medicinal baths, the villagers were all significantly stronger. Of course, a person needed more than just raw strength to defeat a talented opponent, but with the hundreds of villagers attacking a dozen overseers, the outcome was never in doubt.

After less than five minutes of combat, all that remained of the three groups of enemies were a couple of stragglers who had immediately fled to report the outcome of the battle.

By now, the red-robes were all gathered in the southern field. I thought that, when the cyan-robed trainer received the report of this defeat, he would immediately march across the river in full force. However, to my surprise, he broke off a fifth of his troops—about 50 overseers—and sent them out to quell the uprising on their own.

This time, with enough warriors to form a solid spear line across the main street that ran through the center of the village, our numerical advantage was much less impactful. And, since we had spent all of our time focused on improving everyone’s individual combat ability, the villagers had little understanding of battle formations or how to counter them.

Thankfully, though, everyone was still mortal, and the overseers were wearing nothing more than mundane lamellar armor. So, with the enhanced speed and strength that came from the medicinal baths, the villagers were able to work together and punch a few holes in the overseers’ line. As soon as these holes appeared, the overseers’ line crumbled, and they were forced to retreat.

20 of the overseers were able to escape back across the river. The other 30 were all killed or captured.

Upon seeing this result, the cyan-robed trainer showed no signs of anger or regret. He simply reorganized his troops with a look of utter calm. Then, he sent everyone forward to attack as a single unit.

The overseers advanced at a steady, measured pace, ensuring there were no openings through which they could be attacked. The villagers did their best, but with little training in large-scale combat, there was little they could do to stop the oncoming tide.

My five recruits stayed at the rear of the battle, protected by the villagers in front of them, as they played commander and directed their troops as effectively as they were able. As the villagers started to fall and the overseers’ victory began to look inevitable, Zan and Ngoi frantically tried to organize a retreat, but Dak ordered everyone to press forward with full force.

On their own, either of these orders might have been viable, but with different leaders issuing contradictory commands, the battlefield fell into chaos.

Seeing this, and seeing none of the other recruits doing anything to fix it, Ling charged forward, directly at the line of red-robed overseers.

While all the villagers had spent time in the medicinal baths, only my original four recruits had been allowed to use them every day, and only Ling had pushed herself to the brink to ensure that these baths had the greatest effect possible.

So, when Ling met the line of overseers, the enemy’s spears were barely able to graze her skin, and these grazes left little more than light scratches behind.

Once in position, with feet firmly planted on the ground, Ling swung her guandao with enough force that half a dozen men were knocked off their feet as the wooden shaft of her weapon shattered to pieces.

This powerful attack caused the surrounding overseers to take a step back in horror, and Ling capitalized on this by picking up one of her fallen opponents’ spears and charging.

The villagers behind Ling were just as startled by this attack as the overseers were, but they recovered more quickly and used this opportunity to finally break through the enemy’s ranks.

The villagers finally started pushing the overseers back, and it looked like my recruits might be able to emerge victorious, but then, the cyan-robed trainer jumped into the fight.

As he charged forward, the trainer pulled in environmental spear qi. Then, when he read the front lines, he used it to send out a powerful attack that forced both sides to back up, separating them, and creating a wide, empty swath of land between the opposing armies.

The cyan-robed trained silently walked into this no-man’s land and pointed his spear directly at Ling.

With a look of grim determination, Ling grabbed a guandao from one of the villagers and rushed forward to meet the trainer’s challenge.

If this had been a test of pure skill, the winner of this fight would never have been in doubt. Based on the trainer’s appearance and the inactive Lord-level core in his body, I placed his age at over 200 years old, and he had likely spent a good number of those years learning to fight. With only a year of training to support her, Ling didn’t stand a chance.

Ling’s strengthened body, however, compensated for her lack of skill. She was able to move significantly faster than the trainer, and she was strong enough that she could cave in his chest with one solid punch.

Using her heightened reflexes, Ling dodged one of the man’s thrusts and brought down her guandao, intending to cut the man in two, from shoulder to hip.

The trainer was able to raise the haft of his spear to block this strike, but Ling didn’t seem to care. She just gritted her teeth and slammed down her weapon with even more force.

Unfortunately, this was a mistake.

The moment Ling’s guandao touched the trainer’s spear, the spear released a violent burst of qi that shattered the head of Ling’s guandao and sent the young woman reeling backwards. Then, before she could regain her balance, the trainer charged forward, in an attempt to skewer her.

I was hoping that one of my other recruits would step in at this point, but they all remained fixed in place, protected by a wall of villagers.

Seeing this, I began channeling energy to my soul, intending to stop the trainer personally, if necessary, but then, something odd occurred. Just as the cyan-robed trainer was nearly on top of Ling, his steps faltered. This was barely noticeable, and no one else seemed to catch it, but this slight hesitation allowed Ling the fraction of a second she needed to dodge out of the way of his attack.

Ling rushed to one of the villagers, grabbed a new weapon, and rejoined the fight in full force.

Now more wary of the trainer’s weapon, Ling was much more careful with her strikes, only taking shots that couldn’t be blocked.

It appeared as if the two were evenly matched. Ling was faster and stronger, but the trainer was more skilled and had access to both spear qi and a refined weapon. However, watching closely, I could tell that the trainer was putting on an act. Not entirely—he truly was being pushed to his limits—but he had more than one opportunity to end the fight if he had wanted to.

Finally, after more than a quarter hour of fighting, Ling swung her guandao and struck the trainer hard on the shoulder, breaking his collarbone.

Stunned by this attack, the trainer dropped to his knees, and Ling raised her guandao to finish him.

Just as Ling’s killing blow was about to land, however, the trainer clenched his jaw and froze Ling’s weapon with a will-lock. Then, he jumped away and darted through the rows of overseers.

This caused the villagers to burst into cheers as they charged at their red-robed opponents.

With their morale destroyed, the overseers were barely able to fight back, and the battle was over only minutes later.

My recruits had won the day, but… where was Lord Mandakh? Why hadn’t he participated in the fight?

By the time the villagers reached the Lord’s mansion, it was already abandoned, and there were no signs of either Mandakh or his cyan-robed subordinate. They had both fled, and from the look of things, they had been preparing for this departure for weeks.