"The supporters of Shrek Academy will never give up on trying to revive it, yet the revival of Shrek Academy is something that none of the major powers on the continent want to see. Hence, you can imagine how much pressure he'll be under in the future. A man like him is destined to have an extraordinary life, but also one that's fraught with peril, do you understand what I'm getting at?"

Long Yuxue said, "But our Blood God Legion is almost completely independent from the federation; what does this have to do with anything? No one will try to hunt him down here!"

Long Tianwu slapped his own forehead in a resigned manner. "What I'm saying is that he's going to leave someday, you silly girl! He's not going to stay in the Blood God Legion forever!"

Long Yuxue faltered slightly upon hearing this. He was going to leave someday? In her memory, all truly exceptional soldiers would choose to stay here and serve the legion generation after generation. She was born here and had spent her entire life here, and she'd never thought about leaving this place. However, her father's words had enlightened her. Tang Wulin was different from her, and he was inevitably going to leave someday.

An indescribable feeling suddenly welled up in her heart, and she abruptly turned before rushing away. "I have to ask him about this!"

Long Tianwu looked on as his daughter quickly departed, and he heaved a forlorn internal sigh. Perhaps his daughter had developed feelings for Tang Wulin already. Thankfully, he'd cautioned her before it was too late, and he could only hope that she wouldn't go beyond the point of no return.

He pressed down on the communicator on his desk.

"Major General."

"I have an order to announce with immediate effect; from now on, all accolades earned through secondary occupations will be increased by 120%, but those accolades can't contribute toward promotions; only accolades earned through battle will be applicable for promotions."

"Yes!"

It would be far too easy for a Saint Blacksmith to earn accolades, and he couldn't allow Tang Wulin to rise up the ranks too quickly as that would not be a good thing for the Blood God Legion.

Unbeknownst to Tang Wulin, Long Yuxue's excitement had led her to do something that would shatter his dream of earning promotions through his forging skills.

After Lu Ni departed with her cannon barrel, Tang Wulin had thought that he'd immediately be inundated by a flood of customers, but that was not the case. Only in the afternoon did Lu Ni bring two military officials to see him. Both of them were female military officials; one of them was a major while the other was a colonel.

Neither of them said much; all they did was ask for quotes from Tang Wulin before asking him to forge a spirit refined part for each of them.

Thus, Tang Wulin displayed his enormous forging ability again, and forged a pair of high-quality parts in an extremely short time right before the astonished eyes of the three female military officials.

After issuing him the required accolades, the two military officials didn't say much before departing with Lu Ni. After that, Tang Wulin received no more customers for that day, and Long Yuexue didn't come to visit him again, either.

That night, after ascertaining that there was no way he'd receive any more customers, Tang Wulin finally returned to his room. He was rather perplexed; why was it that he hadn't received any more customers with his forging skills? What had he done wrong to result in this lack of customers?

Only during the next day did he understand why this was happening. The reason was very simple; Lu Ni had kept his forging room a secret.

Everyone knew the value of a Saint Blacksmith, and everyone was also inevitably selfish to some extent. Lu Ni had taken two of her friends to Tang Wulin for those spirit refined parts in order to further test his abilities, and no one else came to employ his services after that as Lu Ni and her close friends had gone back to prepare everything that they needed forged. They wanted to get all of their things forged before news of Tang Wulin's status as a Saint Blacksmith spread through the entire Blood God Legion.

As such, when Lu Ni returned the next morning, there were five female military officials with her, and the amount of work they brought was quite startling even to Tang Wulin. Three of the majors wanted him to forge spirit refined metals for full suits of battle armor, and for this purpose, they had taken out massive accolade loans the night before.

Hence, this was undoubtedly a huge job.

"Would you like spirit refined metals or spirit refined alloys consisting of multiple types of metals?" Tang Wulin asked. He was not a Grandmaster Blacksmith who was capable of simple spirit refinement, but instead, a Saint Blacksmith. The difference between the two lay not only in the ability to soul refine, but also the ability to easily forge spirit alloys consisting of multiple types of metals.

For battle armor masters, their suits of two-word battle armor were extremely important as that was the true beginning for their suits of battle armor. A strong foundation would undoubtedly be immensely beneficial to them in the future. As such, among three female military officials in question, two of them requested for spirit alloys with two types of different metals, while one of them hailed from quite a wealthy and influential family within the legion, and she chose spirit alloys consisting of three different types of metals.

Taking into account all of the weapons that they were also requesting for him to forge, the total accolades he would receive from the jobs numbered in excess of 100,000. This was definitely a massive haul as those female military officials had to provide their own materials, so he was only being paid for his service!

However, his excitement quickly fizzled out. 100,000 accolades would normally be enough to promote him straight to the major rank, but at around noon, someone from the commissariat came to his forging room and inform him of a decision from the higher-ups not to accept accolades earned from non-battle sources for promotions. This was very disheartening news to Tang Wulin, and it was quite apparent that this new rule had been implemented specifically to target him!

He knew that the legion was simply restricting from rising up the ranks too quickly through his forging, but he was still feeling quite frustrated.

Thus, he made a decision and hung a sign outside his workshop, stating that he was only going to be taking soul refinement jobs from now on.

"Why?" Long Yuxue finally came to visit the forging room again, and she was quite bemused by the sign hanging outside.

Tang Wulin silently extended his Blood God Bracelet toward her. "These are the 12,000 accolades I borrowed from you to open this workshop. I'm returning the money to you now, and we'll still split the rest of the workshop's earnings 50:50. My apologies, but I don't want to take on too many forging jobs anymore. However, if you find anyone who requires soul refined metals, you can bring them to me."

Long Yuxue was quite surprised by Tang Wulin's cold expression. "What's going on with you? Didn't Sister Lu Ni bring you a lot of work this morning?"

Tang Wulin replied in an indifferent manner, "It was great in the beginning, but the commissariat informed me that the accolades I accrue through forging can't contribute to promotions. In that case, what use do I have for such accolades? I have more than enough to feed me for a long time already."

Long Yuxue faltered slightly upon hearing this. She hadn't been made aware of this yet, and she was quite stunned to hear this from Tang Wulin. "Who did you hear this from? Could there have been a misunderstanding involved?"

Tang Wulin handed over the order that the commissariat had delivered to him earlier, and the red stamp of the legion control center had been imprinted upon it.

As soon as Long Yuxue saw the signature of the person who had signed off on the order, her face turned deathly pale. She immediately understood that her father was behind this, and that this definitely had something to do with her.

"I'll go ask them about the details!" Long Yuxue immediately turned and rushed away.

Tang Wulin heaved a faint sigh at the sight of her departing figure, but a sharp look appeared in his eyes. So what if they are prohibiting him from earning promotions through his forging? He'd just have to earn promotions through battle then!

His Blood God Bracelet had just been updated by the people from the commissariat not long ago, and it had split his accolades up into the two categories; one of them would be for his forging, while the other was for the accolades he earned through killing abyssal creatures.

The decision to only take on soul refinement jobs was not a rash one that was made based on an enraged impulse. Instead, it was a very well-thought-out decision. If he could earn promotions through his forging, then he wouldn't mind taking on more jobs, even if it was going to be quite tiring to him. He wasn't afraid of physical hardships anyway. However, if his forging couldn't contribute toward promotions, then he couldn't waste too much of his time on it. He had to rise up through the ranks as quickly as possible, so he had to conserve his time in order to participate in more battles.

Of course, he was still going to complete the future soul refinement jobs to the best of his abilities.

By the time Long Yuxue returned, it was already night time, and the rims of her eyes were quite red, clearly indicating that she'd just cried not long ago.

"I'm sorry, Wulin, I, I wasn't able to convince them..." Her voice was a little hoarse.

Tang Wulin had just completed the metals required for the suits of two-word battle armor, and he smiled in response. "That's alright. Look! I earned 100,000 accolades in such a short time. After we split it, we'll be able to buy a lot of good things. Also, exclusively taking on soul refinement jobs is the best use of my time anyway. At my current level, only through practicing soul refinement can I continue to improve. Perhaps more soul refinement jobs will come our way soon. It's just a pity that we won't be able to use those accolades to earn promotions. But then again, accolades are still accolades; we can save up some and make you a top-grade mecha."