Chapter 17: Technically-Skilled Geniuses

Qin Shujian noticed a dozen more notable people after he glanced through all of the refugees’ attributes.

These people also mainly cultivated the Eternal Youth Technique.

That seemed to be a technique that was spread through the generations of their group.

Most of these people were Martial Entry-Level One. Other than Zhao Shanlin and Wang Hu, none of them were Martial Entry-Level Two or higher.

But, that was enough for Qin Shujian.

The overall strength of the Liangshan Stronghold had doubled now that Qin Shujian absorbed them into the stronghold.

As for the possibility of rebellion from a group with these many powerful fighters, Qin Shujian understood that in his heart. But, he didn’t view the possibility as a problem.

Strength was everything in the forest.

He was confident that he would be able to suppress any of the uprisings that would happen with his current abilities.

After accepting Zheng Fang and his group, Qin Shujian got Zhang Tieniu to settle the group in.

At the same time, he immediately gave the group a full meal.

It couldn’t be helped.

From Qin Shujian’s perspective, these newly inducted Mountain Bandits were so hungry that they only had a shred of strength left. He was worried that a batch of these people would die if he withheld food for even another hour.

They were now his subordinates since they had entered the Liangshan Stronghold.

It would pain him if a batch of people died from a preventable reason.

After all, Qin Shujian had long wanted to expand the Liangshan Stronghold. It was just that he didn’t have enough manpower in the past.

A batch of refugees showing up on his doorstep was exactly what he wanted.

Sometimes, a large population was the greatest productive force.

He couldn’t engage in many activities if he didn’t have many people.

Qin Shujian was not so naive to believe that the system would respawn NPCs who died of hunger.

…

In the Zhongyi Hall, after a series of arrangements, the newly inducted Mountain Bandits settled down in the Liangshan Stronghold.

Qin Shujian immediately called for Zheng Fang.

He valued the Martial Entry-Level Four fighter highly in his heart.

“I pay my respects to you, Stronghold Chieftain!” After having cleaned himself up, even though Zheng Fang’s complexion still looked yellowed and withered, he looked much more energetic than he was before.

“Please, have a seat!”

“Thank you, Stronghold Chieftain!”

Zheng Fang accepted Qin Shujian. He sat down on a chair at the corner after he expressed his thanks.

Qin Shujian said, “Might I ask where you guys came from?”

“We came from Linchuan Town 1,000 miles away.”

“A 1,000 miles away?” Qin Shujian asked in shock.

Zheng Fang cupped his hands together and said, “That’s right. I will not lie to you, Stronghold Chieftain. We only traveled 1,000 miles to avoid war and famine.”

“Tell me what happened,” Qin Shujian’s expression was a mix of curiosity and gravity.

Seeing this, Zheng Fang took a deep breath and said with a low voice, “Allow me to start slowly from the beginning…”

As Zheng Fang spoke, Qin Shujian finally got a good understanding of the background of Zheng Fang and his group. He also understood why Zheng Fang had such powerful abilities.

The Linchuan Town that Zheng Fang spoke of was a small town located far from the stronghold.

Qin Shujian gathered the town Zhen Fang spoke of was tiny, not much larger than a village.

Zheng Fang was the master of a private school that acted as a training hall in Linchuan Town.

However, there was war throughout the Dazhao Country. The entire land was ravaged by war. The addition of the drought and famine resulted in many refugees. Many people were unable to continue living in their original homelands.

Initially, Linchuan Town was facing tough times because of the drought.

Coincidentally, and unfortunately, they also became subject to war.

Even though Linchuan Town was a town, their overall abilities were not strong. In the face of many troops, even powerful Martial Entry-Level Four fighters like Zheng Fang were not enough to defend the town.

Thus, Linchuan Town fell.

Then a portion of townsfolk who felt indignant that they were going to perish just like that banded together and escaped.

As the teacher of a private school and the master of the training hall, Zheng Fang was relatively well-known in Linchuan Town. Thus, he was temporarily elected as the leader of the group.

The team had elderly people and young children. Thus, they moved exceptionally slowly during their journey.

Coupled with the war and famine that ravaged their land, every place they passed by was well-guarded and lacked rations. None of those places could accept a few hundred other people.

Thus, Zheng Fang and the rest of the group could only journey on and leave the war-ravaged areas before thinking about their future course of action.

But their group had more than 100 people. The number of rations they went through every day was a huge problem.

At the start, they could barely last more than a handful of days on the dry rations they brought along.

However, as time passed, they ate everything and anything they came across. The refugees had even munched on their fair share of tree bark, yet they couldn’t avoid the fate of people dying of hunger. And eventually, the group dwindled to 60-odd men.

If not for the Liangshan Stronghold taking them in, the rest of the 60 people might have all died of hunger within the next few days.

It was also for this reason that Zheng Fang felt incredibly grateful for Qin Shujian.

The other party’s decision was not as simple as giving the group something to eat. He had saved countless lives from Linchuan Town.

Qin Shujian felt respect for Zheng Fang.

After all, it was easy to see how difficult it was to lead such a large group of people and escape to a place 1,000 miles away.

“Elder Zheng, you need not worry. Now that you’ve entered the Liangshan Stronghold, as long as you do not do anything to betray me, I’ll not let you all starve,” Qin Shujian promised.

Zheng Fang stood up and bowed, “Thank you, Stronghold Chieftain!”

Then, Qin Shujian saw the elder take out three crumpled books from within his robes and hand it over to him.

“These are the techniques that I taught in the training hall. I want to give them to you as my gratitude for taking us in!”

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Qin Shujian had a glimmer in his eyes. He accepted the three books with a smile on his face.

He had thought to obtain the techniques that the other party cultivated when he saw Zheng Fang’s attributes in the past.

That was because he had already reached the limit of the Bodyforge Manual now that he reached Level Five.

Qin Shujian did not have a way to further improve his abilities. The best way he could think to enhance his abilities was to search for higher-grade main techniques and cultivate those.

Even though he did not know what grade the technique Zheng Fang cultivated was, having a frame of reference was ultimately a good thing.

This was especially so for the latter two techniques that Zheng Fang cultivated. They were clearly offensive techniques.

Qin Shujian adored techniques that could give a direct boost to his abilities without leveling up his stage.

He was more surprised that Zheng Fang was this principled.

Zheng Fang had handed the three techniques over to him before he even made the request.

After he handed Qin Shujian the three techniques, Zheng Fang said, “I observed that your stronghold is rather simple. Coincidentally, there are several carpenters and bricklayers in my group.”

“If you do not mind, we can lend a helping hand and renovate the stronghold.”

Qin Shujian’s heart shook. The smile on his face became even more apparent.

Genius!

These people were all geniuses!

He did not expect there to be such technically-skilled geniuses in the group of refugees who had just entered the stronghold.

Before this, there was only one half-hearted carpenter in the Liangshan Stronghold, Wang Tiezhu.

Qin Shujian had paid attention to how simple the stronghold was. However, the limitations of his circumstances… Mainly about the problem of manpower, caused him to stop caring about the issue for the time being.

However, now that Zheng Fang had actively mentioned the matter, there was no reason for him to reject Zheng Fang.