Chapter146

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After agreeing to the deal with Mr. Yu, the first battle in Marigold City's future was finally starting to take shape with a clear direction.

Elara wasn't worried that Mr. Yu would secretly change things after settling the agreement with her.

Just like she had said earlier, Mr. Yu ruled the most powerful third-tier independent nation in the southwest corner of the continent. Because of this, other third-tier powers under the suzerain country excluded him, and he had no protection from a suzerain country. The small and medium nations mostly didn't want to get involved in something that could easily bring the downfall of their own lands, so Mr. Yu had to look for outside help if he wanted to break the stalemate with Inferno and Gold Nation.

Elara couldn't offer him much, but what she could give was already enough to make a difference.

She also needed to use Mr. Yu's momentum to eliminate Yudan, take parts of Inferno's land to grow her own strength, and secure the southeast border of Plumera so there would be no threats behind her. That way, three months later, she would have the space and power to face Lord Gregory and others in the capital.

But before all that, the key was that she had to get rid of Yudan first.

She had already gone over Yudan's data from System 92 many times.

Yudan was too weak. Most of the country's power was under the control of the Puppet Cult.

What made Yudan dangerous wasn't their army, which outnumbered hers by a hundred thousand, but the secret poison techniques inside the Puppet Cult.

However, this threat had been greatly reduced after Elara got the mother insect of the poison strain and also received a golden elixir from the white-haired master Wanyi Tan in the Valley of Divine Medicine that could activate the holy spirit blood in her body.

After learning about all the effects that the golden elixir could trigger when combined with the poison in her body, Elara came up with an even bolder idea.

If it worked, the benefits would be much greater than what she originally expected.

She decided that in a few days, once she finished handling things in Marigold City, she would quietly go to the southeastern border near Yudan to run an experiment.

If the experiment worked, conquering Yudan would be much easier than planned.

Leif was extremely efficient.

In the past half month, the Zhaiyun Market had already made several trade runs to and from Marigold City.

Because the goods produced in Marigold were new in style, good in quality, and affordable, with many clever items that solved small daily troubles, the market quickly sold out the products from their first trip and gained popularity across all levels of society.

So on the next few trips, Zhaiyun Market brought bigger trade caravans with more silver, ready to buy more goods to take back.

During the second trade visit, Hector and Egbert led their new soldiers to clear out the bandits around the key trade routes between Marigold and Zhaiyun Market.

Under the guidance of Scholar Fu and Kristof, the construction team quickly repaired the roads and built guard stations along the way, making trade between Zhaiyun Market and Marigold much safer and smoother.

That was why, that very afternoon after finalizing the paper business with Leif, he sent several carts full of silver to Elara's city governor mansion by nightfall.

He even delivered the full deposit for Mr. Yu's order of two hundred thousand sheets of paper on the same night.

At the time, Elara had just returned to the governor's mansion, taken a bath, and eaten dinner.

She hadn't even had the chance to review the report from Scholar Fu and Kristof about the recent developments in Marigold when she saw carts packed with silver being delivered to the mansion entrance.

Then, a familiar voice rang in her mind from System 92.

[Beep. Congratulations. Fourth mission: possess one million taels of circulating funds (1.07 million/1 million taels) completed. You've received "Complete Guide to Ancient Weapons and Armor Forging."]

[Beep. New mission updated. Sixth mission: fire one million bricks and stones. Currently completed: 119,000 out of 1 million. Reward upon completion: "Complete Guide to Basic Ancient Construction."]

As soon as the voice ended, a translucent book appeared in Elara's mind.

For someone about to go to war, this book was extremely important. It might even affect the outcome of the battles.

So Elara didn't care about the countless carts of silver filling the governor's mansion. She simply told the calm Scholar Fu and the now grinning Kristof to count and check the delivery.

Then she turned around and quickly returned to the study to carefully flip through the newly received weapon and armor guide.

The more she read, the more she couldn't hide her smile.

This "Complete Guide to Ancient Weapons and Armor Forging" not only included detailed blueprints for over a hundred cold weapons, but also designs for basic armor, military gear, horse armor, chariot plating, and more.

What made Elara's heart race the most were the powerful and advanced ancient weapons for both attack and defense: crossbows.

Crossbows were the core weapons in this guide and took up dozens of pages.

It included everything from the smallest wrist-mounted sleeve crossbows for soldiers to mid-sized hand-held bows, repeating crossbows, and large-scale siege crossbows like the bed-mounted versions that soldiers could push into battle.

There were also defensive crossbows placed on walls that could sweep the battlefield below with devastating force, and the strongest of all: oversized crossbows with a range up to a thousand meters, almost king-level among crossbows.

In ancient times, before firearms, the crossbow was the king of long-range weapons.

Now this book had given her the designs for all of them.

If she could build seven or eight powerful crossbows before the war started, then she could already rest easy about the coming battle with Yudan.

After carefully reading the whole book, Elara quickly thought things over and used Marigold's current production ability to select and redraw the most efficient and deadly weapons and armor designs that could be made quickly.

She then carefully drew out the plans for defensive wall crossbows, oversized siege crossbows, and bed-mounted repeating crossbows.

However, while these large weapons were extremely powerful, they were also very complex to make. The craftsmanship required was high, and even if she gave the diagrams and explained everything to the blacksmiths, they would still need a lot of time for testing and trials before producing anything.

And based on Marigold's current capabilities, mass-producing these heavy weapons wasn't possible yet.

So Elara's current plan was to build just four wall-mounted crossbows for the four city walls, one oversized siege crossbow for central defense, and two bed-mounted repeaters for defending the city.

As for the rest, she still planned to start with personal-use crossbows and protective armor for soldiers. That was what the army needed most right now before battle.

Over the next few days,

Elara became completely absorbed in making the new equipment.

She spent every day either in the workshops or calling together all the blacksmiths from the construction department for large meetings.

They were preparing for the major transformation about to take place in Marigold City.

With this kind of workload, Elara didn't have time to handle the matter of one million units of grain herself anymore.

She simply had Scholar Fu and Kristof check the silver and food storage, then told them to go to Leif and buy enough food to last at least the next three months.

At the same time, the blacksmiths were being pulled in every day to learn "new knowledge" and "new technology" from her.

Though their heads were spinning from all the information, their skills and ideas for making cold weapons were improving rapidly with Elara's guidance.

Especially when she explained the principles behind crossbows, the blacksmiths all widened their eyes in amazement.

They wished they could build such powerful weapons that looked like something from the heavens right away.

Even though they had been busy nonstop ever since Elara gave them official positions, this kind of busy work was completely different from the desperate and hopeless work they used to do when fleeing from disaster.

Back then, they were full of despair, always running from hunger and cold. But now, they were working for a future they could clearly see getting better.

So even though all the craftsmen were exhausted, they also felt more energetic than ever.

Every day, if they didn't exceed their assigned quota, they couldn't even fall asleep at night.

In the past, even though they had skills as craftsmen, they were basically treated like half-slaves. But now, under the new rules from their new leader and new superior, their status was almost equal to scholars, something they had never dared to dream of before.

Now, their inherited skills were finally being used and respected, and they could proudly watch Marigold grow better each day under their hands. The people in the city even started treating them with the same respect usually reserved for scholars.

Many families even brought their children to them, begging them to take the children as apprentices.

With such a dreamlike and wonderful life, of course they were fully determined to keep it going.

And now, their new leader and superior had brought something even more exciting and shocking to them.

The craftsmen looked at the blueprints in Elara's hands and listened to her explanation, and their hearts couldn't help but stir with excitement.

For them, it was the best feeling to make progress in their craft while also contributing to the development of the city they lived in.

Every time Elara gave a big speech, even though her mouth would go dry from all the talking, she was filled with passion, and the craftsmen listened so carefully they even forgot to eat or rest.

It was like they were making up for all the years they missed out on studying and learning.

At the same time, during the time she was training the craftsmen, Elara also issued a series of new policies.

She had the construction department build more smelting factories in the city to prepare for the future demand of large-scale iron refining and forging.

Then, on the early morning of the third day,

Several batches of iron ore finally arrived from Anqu Town, transported under the guard of elite soldiers from the Francis family.

This meant that the transport road between Anqu Town and Marigold was now fully open.

From now on, different ores would be continuously delivered from Anqu Town, supporting the needs of Marigold, while goods made in Marigold could be transported back to Anqu Town to help with its development.

The smelting factories in Marigold, which had been practicing with stone and brick due to a lack of iron ore for almost twenty days, finally returned to their main job of refining iron that night.

This marked the official start of a new stage in Marigold's growth.

After that, Elara spent four full days to finally finish training the craftsmen.

She had them go back and experiment using the iron refined in the factory. If they didn't understand something, they could return to the governor's office to ask her.

After finishing all this, she was finally able to rest a little.

That evening, Elara left the construction department where she had stayed for a few days and returned to the governor's office.

On the way, Kristof came to pick her up and reported that he had already discussed the grain supplies with Leif.

When the Zhaikun Market came to Marigold next time, they would bring enough grain with them.

Elara nodded. She was so tired she just wanted to go back to the governor's office and sleep.

But after walking just a few streets, she suddenly heard loud shouting and the sounds of kicking and scolding coming from deeper in the alley.

She turned her head instinctively and saw several teenagers bullying a younger child at the far end of the street.

The child was tightly holding onto something in his arms. The older kids were trying to snatch it from him, kicking and punching him, but he wouldn't let go.

Elara frowned at the scene.

Fighting, gathering in gangs, and group violence were all forbidden in Marigold. She had issued that law the day she moved into the governor's residence.

Where were the patrol soldiers? How could they ignore such a loud commotion? Did they think they didn't need to interfere just because it was a group of children?

In fact, fights between children could sometimes be even more dangerous. They didn't know how to hold back, and they didn't understand the consequences of the law, which made accidents more likely.

Elara's recently relaxed mood was immediately ruined by this situation.

She turned without hesitation and walked toward the deeper part of the street.

As she got closer and saw the face of the child being beaten, she suddenly froze, unable to breathe.

It was Haocen.

Why was this child here? And how could he be in a situation where others were beating him up?