Chapter 322 - 320: Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil

Chapter 322: Chapter 320: Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil

Count Kais agreed to Duane’s two requests without any hesitation.

However, he gave a word of caution when he had Natalia give Duane the Spell Models for the Hardening Technique and Middle Level Extraction.

If Duane needed to pass them on, he first had to inform the Kennedy Clan.

This verbal agreement relied purely on Duane’s integrity. If he truly wanted to teach the spells to others, it wasn’t really binding.

Of course, this also demonstrated Count Kais’s trust in Duane.

In addition, Delilah agreed that the Kennedy Magic Research Institute would provide the Enchanting Materials for Duane to help produce Wind-Held Crossbows.

The terms of their collaboration were simple: for every ten Wind-Held Crossbows Duane delivered, he could keep one for himself.

Duane had no objection to this. It was like he was getting paid to use someone else’s materials to raise his Skill Level, while also earning a little on the side.

So, Duane went ahead and signed a cooperation agreement with Lady Delilah and the Kennedy Magic Research Institute for the Blazing Fire Enchantment.

Similarly, they would provide the weapons and Enchanting Materials. After Duane finished enchanting them, he could keep one or two for himself, and the rest would go to the Magic Research Institute.

As Duane’s Skill Level in Blazing Fire Enchantment increased, the number of times the effect could be used also grew.

These kinds of Enchanted Weapons were relatively rare, and by selling them, the Kennedy Clan could secure a significant share of the enchantment market.

After staying at the Silent Shore for two days, Duane returned to Black Forest Island.

With the grand wedding of the Kennedy Clan’s heir over and King Eric delaying his move against the Holy Radiance Court, the escalating tension within the Kingdom suddenly subsided.

For a long time afterward, things were quiet. The Nobility had little to discuss besides minor news, like a new small Secret Realm appearing in Lintao Territory, Lloyd being officially promoted to Kingdom Viscount, or the completion of the castle renovations in the Golden Ears Territory. There were no particularly noteworthy events or headlines.

The major nobles all focused on diligently managing and peacefully developing their own territories.

This naturally gave Duane an excellent window of time to grow.

He shifted the main focus of his training to four Basic Skills: Basic Planting, Basic Herbs, Basic Fishing, and Basic Tailoring.

As a result, the people of Black Forest Island often saw Duane tending the mulberry fields, pruning tea trees, carrying red bricks, and building various structures like pavilions and tiled houses.

They went from suspecting their Lord merely had a hobby of manual labor to being utterly convinced of it.

A "dignity in labor" movement gradually swept across the island.

It got to the point where even his Civil Officers and Military Generals would go out and work in the fields for a while or add a few bricks and tiles to their new houses in their spare time.

The general attitude on Black Forest Island gradually became more pragmatic. The establishment of schools, in particular, gave commoners the opportunity to become literate.

And as tax reductions allowed the peasants to eat their fill, three Basic-level Warriors of commoner origin were selected for the Guard Team during the recruitment in March of the following year.

Duane’s Territory was off to a good start in terms of culture, education, and military defense.

By September of 3052, just over ten thousand people had been relocated.

These people were settled in various locations; some remained in Broken Wave City, while others were sent to the Southen Plain and Silver Jade Territory.

These were all Free People who brought some of their own assets with them. After Duane promised them a rent-free first year, reduced taxes for the next two, and a tax of only 15% of their output thereafter, they were more than willing to clear new fields for themselves.

After all, back on the Silent Shore, it was difficult for them to own even a dozen acres of land.

But here, a single family could potentially acquire fifty acres of farmland—this was an incredible blessing!

They could even clear and cultivate more land after reaching the fifty-acre limit. However, that additional land would belong to the Lord, and they would effectively be tenant farmers, paying 25% of their yield.

When the "fifty-acre limit" per household for Free People was being discussed, Julian and the others had thought it was too much. Duane, however, made the final decision.

In his view, Black Forest Island was vast and sparsely populated, with an enormous amount of arable land. Setting the limit at fifty acres was no problem at all.

As long as his people were willing to work, he was willing to give them the land.

As for Julian’s concerns about running out of farmland in the future, by the time that became an issue, Black Forest Island’s population would likely exceed one million.

By then, Black Forest Island would surely need workers in many other sectors. Not everyone would have to rely on farming to get by.

One afternoon, in the woods on the mountainside by the new castle, Duane set the last flat stone step in place and used the Hardening Technique to reinforce the surrounding earth.

At that moment, an octagonal pavilion on the mountainside was officially complete.

[You have successfully built a pavilion. Basic Construction Skill Level +3]

[Congratulations, your Basic Construction Skill Level has reached Perfection.]

[Attribute Points +0.5]

Seeing this string of notifications, Duane couldn’t help but smile.

’After nearly a year of hard work, this time-consuming and troublesome skill has finally reached Perfection!’

Construction wasn’t like learning magic, where a single attempt, success or fail, would take three to five minutes at most.

Building a pavilion took far more than just three or five days.

Duane stared at the notification text, waiting for the Enlightenment information.

[Perfection Level Basic Construction has brought you an Enlightenment. You have obtained the construction blueprints and methods for the Black Soil Purification Magic Array, Magic Flow Magic Array, and Teleportation Array. Attribute Points +3]

His eyes lit up.

First off, the Magic Flow Magic Array was something he had wanted for a long time. Only with it could he raise Nebula Silkworms.

Even though he hadn’t cultivated any Starlight Mulberry Trees yet, having the construction method for the Magic Flow Magic Array meant he now had all the preparatory techniques he needed.

He began to review the information for the other two Magic Arrays.

Black Soil Purification Magic Array: The Black Soil in the Ancient Divine Secret Realm is contaminated by the Ancient God’s Blood. This Purification Magic Array can remove the contaminating energy to produce Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil. Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil promotes plant growth and increases crop yields.

Duane was shocked at first, but his shock quickly turned into a pleasant surprise!

This Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil was basically a version of Fertile Soil.

’Wheat fertilized with Fertile Soil can yield an astonishing six or seven hundred pounds per acre, an effect comparable to modern fertilizer!’

’The fertilizing effect of this Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil is probably just as good as Fertile Soil!’

Black Forest Island now had over ninety thousand acres of cultivated land. If he used seventy thousand of those acres to plant rice, all fertilized with Filthy Blood Spiritual Soil, then assuming a yield of seven hundred pounds per acre, the annual output could reach forty-nine million pounds!

That was enough grain to feed nearly a hundred thousand people, and the current population of Black Forest Island was just over fifty thousand.

’Excellent. With this, I won’t have to worry about food shortages at all.’

He began to check the materials needed for the Black Soil Purification Magic Array. This was too important for his "Amass Grain" strategy; he had to build it as soon as possible.

Building the Array primarily required three types of materials:

secret silver alloy plates to construct the Array Base, a material with high Magic Conductivity that could be carved with intricate array runes.

Magic Energy Conductors to link the Rune Nodes. These could be enchanted Rune Coils or, as a temporary substitute, the stems of the Jade Demon Vine.

And finally, a power source: Mid-Level Magic Crystal Stones or other Elemental Ores of equivalent quality.

’The materials aren’t too difficult to obtain!’

’I’ve already mastered Middle Level Enchantment and Middle Level Extraction, so I can make my own Rune Coils. I just need to buy some Mithril, and then I can start building the Black Soil Purification Magic Array!’

Mithril was a resource as valuable as Meteorite Iron. It couldn’t be bought on the open market and required special channels.

Fortunately, Duane had established a trade relationship with Viscount Freddy and was able to buy some Meteorite Iron.

The Viscount’s Secret Realm also produced Mithril. Duane wondered if he could negotiate the right to purchase some.

’I’ll contact Count Kais first and see if the Kennedy Magic Research Institute has any in stock.’

Duane turned his attention to the third Magic Array: the Teleportation Array.

The value of this Magic Array was exactly what its name implied: teleportation.

It could teleport items, including living creatures, to a designated spatio-temporal node, which involved Space Magic.

Although its effect was incredible, the requirements for its creator were astonishingly high—only a Saint Mage of the Extraordinary Level was qualified to build one.

This was because only a Saint Mage could sense the spatial nodes needed to find a suitable location for a Teleportation Array.

After all, it wasn’t the kind of Magic Array you could just build on any random patch of empty ground.

Duane was currently just a Level 7 Mage, a far cry from a Saint Mage.

’Still, if my Territory expands over a great distance in the future, a Teleportation Array would be incredibly convenient.’

The voyage from Black Forest Island to the Starfall Islands already took a month. A trip to an even more distant place would take even longer.

A Teleportation Array would make things so much easier.