31. The Spirit Gathering Array is Complete

"Princess..."
"Don't call me Princess, just call me Erin. That's what my mother always called me," the princess said playfully.
"Erin, how about this? You and your guards can stay in my little house," Mofei said, looking at the girl before him.
"If I stay in your house, then where will you go?" Erin's bright, mischievous eyes sparkled.
"I'll just find some other place. There are still plenty of empty rooms around here."

The slaves standing nearby saw that the city lord was not one to speak idly. Those elves had already received gold coins and weapons and were on their way. Encouraged, they made their own decisions.
"City Lord," a werewolf stepped forward just as Mofei was speaking with the princess. He bowed and said, "My lord, we all trust in your sincerity. Only a few of us have parents left and wish to go home and see them. The rest are willing to stay. Please assign us tasks—we will serve you loyally."
"Only a few have parents?" Mofei was surprised, as they were all so young.
"Our parents were mostly killed when the slaver squads raided our villages," the werewolf replied. At this, the thousand-odd young slaves could not help but weep quietly.
"Those bastards... Don't worry, I swear I will wipe out those wretched slaver squads and avenge your parents."
With those words, Mofei had effectively sentenced the slaver squads to death.
"Please avenge us, my lord!"
Mofei quickly turned to Cain, who had come at the noise, and said, "Cain, please help arrange everything for them. Find out what skills they have, and make sure they get some food."
"Oh, I just remembered—where is that pregnant elf?" Mofei recalled the expectant mother.
"Here we are," a male elf, supporting his pregnant wife, stepped forward. They bowed before the princess. "Your Highness."
"There's no need for such formality, please rise," the princess helped the pregnant elf up. "Take care of your baby. From now on, you don't need to bow to me. I snuck out just to have some fun anyway."

Though the princess’s guards were elite elves, they had run into a slaver squad just as they left the city. The princess, wanting to teach the slavetraders a lesson, had ordered her party not to resist—she meant to wait until they reached the slavemaster’s home to punish him herself. Who could have guessed, as soon as they entered the city, they were sent to the slave market. Before the princess could act, Mofei arrived.
After bowing to the princess, the elven couple turned to pay respects to Mofei, who stopped them. He said to Cain, "Give them the best accommodations, and make sure they get extra nutrition."
"I will, my lord," Cain replied.
"If you need anything, just ask Cain. He’ll arrange everything for you." Mofei was straightforward—if he had to manage over a thousand people himself, it would drive him mad. Besides, he had little time; he needed to focus on building the magic spirit-gathering array.
Cain could only sigh at his city lord’s bluntness.
"Erin, you have forty-six guards. I’ll organize them as your personal escort," Mofei said.
"Thank you so much!" Erin replied, then skipped off toward Mofei’s little house.
Mofei said to Cain, "Take her guards to Elder Off. Have him teach them to use crossbows and arm them properly—they’re the princess’s honor guard and must not be neglected."
"Yes, my lord. I’ll take them immediately."

With these matters settled, Mofei returned to his house, sitting on a stone bench by the lake. Ever since he’d heard how the slavers had slaughtered the parents of these young captives, his rage had burned without ceasing. Having grown up an orphan himself, Mofei knew all too well the pain of loss. Had he not met his master, he would have died long ago. He would never let those who destroy families go unpunished.
"I’ll make those scum live in terror. I’ll let them taste what it means to be hunted, to lose everything," Mofei vowed darkly.
Werewolves excelled at tracking, elves at assassination. He would train them as assassination squads, targeting the slaver squads specifically. He’d form several small teams, each with a few berserkers, and equip the elves with crossbows—let’s see how the slavers fared then.
Within days, Mofei had formed over twenty assassination squads. The young former slaves, eager for vengeance, scrambled to sign up, and soon there were more than twenty squads.
The benefit was clear: Misty City now had a shadowy force working from the darkness, adding another layer of defense. The berserkers, too, learned the power of cooperating with different types of fighters, and soon they were rotating through the assassination squads for tactical training. At their peak, there were more than a hundred such teams, including larger squads formed by several small ones joining forces to take down the most powerful slaver groups.

In the two months following the formation of the assassination squads, targeted killings erupted across Longrock Empire. Slaver squads were eliminated with deadly efficiency, and slavemasters’ entire households were wiped out, their wealth plundered. The slave trade plummeted. Occasionally, slavemasters tried to band together, but these efforts were quickly crushed—their leaders dead before the day was out.
Mofei had not expected the assassination squads to become so formidable after only two months of training. What surprised him even more was the sheer number of gold coins they brought back to the city when resting. He, Elder Off, and the others could only curse the damn slavemasters as they gazed at the piles of gold.

With the wealth seized by the assassination squads, plus the military funds allocated by the empire, Misty City armed a berserker legion of fifty thousand. More than thirty additional long-range giant crossbows were built, far exceeding expectations. Most astonishing of all, Elder Off managed to construct a siege crossbow several times larger than Mofei’s designs—the arrow itself required a berserker to handle, for the dwarves could no longer lift it. Mofei tested its power: from hundreds of meters away, a single shot shattered an iron-bound wooden gate a meter thick into splinters.
The power of this siege crossbow was matched only by the difficulty of drawing its string. Human strength was insufficient, so Elder Off invented a gear-based mechanism, which two berserkers operated. Watching this, Mofei thought, "It’ll take half a day just to load the thing!" But perhaps it would rarely be needed, so only one was built.

Over the past months, the berserkers not only received full equipment, but also conducted several live exercises in the mountains nearby. Thanks to the assassination squads’ efforts, finances were not a concern, and recruitment was ample. Many of the slaves rescued from slaver squads joined Misty City at the urging of the assassins. Gradually, thousands of elves and werewolves took up residence there.
As a result, Mofei formed a crossbow corps of ten thousand—eight thousand dwarves, two thousand elves.
Within months, the city’s armed forces numbered sixty thousand, and guards began to appear atop the city walls. The dwarves were so busy outfitting the berserker legions that plans for a market near the gates were postponed. As a result, no one could buy dwarf-made equipment on the open market for months. When the dwarves’ trading post outside Misty City finally opened, hordes of mercenary companies rushed in, buying up the limited stock in a single day.

After two months in Misty City, the elven princess was escorted back to the Elven Royal City by a squad sent by her mother, the queen. Thanks to Mofei’s help, she had come to no harm. In gratitude, the Elven Kingdom forged an alliance with Mofei: mutual assistance and defense against outside threats.
With Misty City running smoothly, Mofei finally had time to focus on constructing the magic spirit-gathering array. In the city lord’s exclusive courtyard, built by dwarven craftsmen to his design, he had them leave a space at the center paved entirely with stone slabs. Here, he would engrave the array.
Carving a large spirit-gathering array was nothing like etching a small stone. For better effect, Mofei had purchased a high-grade magic carving knife from the Mage Guild, along with a batch of sixth-tier magic cores of various elements. The ink for the array’s lines would be made from the blood of magical beasts, hunted and gathered by the berserkers.
Now all was ready, and only the engraving remained. The array was so large that it would be a tremendous test of Mofei’s endurance.
Before starting, Mofei meditated in the courtyard, instructing Cain not to let anyone disturb him.
From his research, Mofei divided the array into five parts, each to gather one element.
He followed the pattern in his mind, carefully engraving the array onto the stones. He worked slowly, fearing any mistake. Fortunately, with his experience and preparation, he managed to finish after an entire day of focused labor.
All that remained was to set the magic cores into their sockets, activating the array. When that was done, the array would provide him with a constant supply of spiritual energy, and his cultivation would soon return to the Golden Core stage.
Once his strength was restored, Mofei would truly be considered a powerhouse on the continent. He longed to see for himself how the so-called Mage Gods and Sword Saints of this world compared to a true cultivator—who, in the end, was stronger?