Sage felt a bit deficient as a leader, not even bothering to truly remember the names of the first Seven Stars. At least a few of them were very promising talents, but they still hadn’t ever joined a sect. That meant they either didn’t have the natural talent for cultivation, or they despised joining such rigid organizations. As such, it would be difficult to find the people that he truly envisioned as being the Seven Stars. If he could find seven truly powerful and skilled leaders to act as his generals it would magnify the might the Hoplites could display and also serve as a great smokescreen to his real goals. If they were led by truly strong heroes, then it would be completely normal for them to spread across the whole of the Dou Kingdom.

On the other hand, if he was only to rely upon these randomly recruited mercenaries, he would either have to forcibly increase their cultivation levels with pills and resources or waste many decades slowly expanding and recruiting members to forge a deeper foundation. While the Hoplites would form the core shock troops, they wouldn’t withstand close scrutiny. If he forcefully propped them up as leaders, their many shortcomings would be too apparent.

Sage split up the new recruits into seven squads. Each of them is headed by one of the Seven Stars along with two of the other humans. The Seven Stars were to first act as Lieutenants and the other two humans were their Sergeants. Each Sergeant was put in command of five Hoplites forming temporary squads of thirteen. These new one hundred Hoplites were all part of a later generation and had no idea that Sage was their creator, they had all grown up in a Hoplite village and completely believed the story he was spinning. Seventy of them were assigned to the new Seven Stars while Sage kept the remaining thirty along with the original dozen.

The hundred new Hoplites as well as the new twenty one members of the Jade Horde registered with the Black Dog Company and each squad took a mission. They weren’t given any time to adjust to each other and directly thrown into an assignment. It was quite likely there would be more than a few screw ups, casualties, and even deaths, but the fastest way to forge them into a team was to throw them into a fire. It definitely wasn’t efficient and would likely lead to a few tragedies, but it would quickly bind them together, even if it was in hatred of their commander, Ling Sheng.

Sage left the teams with directions and maps for where to meet next and left for the location on his own. In the last few years King had been in charge of setting up villages for the Hoplites and they were heading to one of them now. In the future, they should have three to five Hoplite villages in each of the provinces of the Dou Kingdom and in an ideal world, more than twice that number, one per county. As it was now, the Bronze Tiger province already had about three villages, but it was really only two at the moment since the first one was a hidden reserve deep in the unclaimed wilderness. Once they arrived at the Hoplite village, Sage met up with King. The little white haired girl was with him as always, and Sage smiled to see that her cultivation had nearly caught up with his own.

“King! Nice to see you again. Did you recover back to the fifth rank? Very impressive!”

He flattered them for a while, not wanting their relationship to be based only upon their business dealings. Especially considering the contract with Ruanfu was extremely loose and there was nothing binding Sage to King’s increasingly large number of wives and children. They ate dinner together and then Sage explained the next part of his plans.

“As the squads get in some more training they will start to build a reputation for the Jade Horde. Then we’ll recruit more squads and let them start to compete for higher rankings. We should always have the seven best in the slots as the Seven Stars. It’ll take time to build more Hoplite villages and spread our influence so in the meantime I want you to come with me.”

He glanced over at Ruanfu as well, “You can come along as well, Little One, but only if you’re willing to suffer. You won’t be allowed to just lounge in Tiankong Palace and come outside for the fun parts, you’ll have to face hardships with us.”

Of course he was exaggerating, as he’d mostly just be sitting on King’s back as they flew around. It was just a bit of tempering for her character on whether or not she wanted to commit to the adventure.

“You can pick out a few of your wives, children, or even a Hoplite that has shown the most promise to take over when we’re gone. We’re going to be out looking for more talent, and scouting around possible village locations. Bandit leaders, strong mercenaries, wandering cultivators, unclaimed resources, or powerful beasts. There will be lots of beasts. The better job we do the better start the Hoplite villages will have and the better the support they can provide for the Jade Horde. It’s also a decent way to train.”

Ruanfu was excited by the prospect of so much adventure and exploration. She fixed her piercing blue eyes on King and stared at him a bit intensely for a few seconds, “Father, you must take me along or I’ll tell all the aunties you’ve been bullying me.”

Sage zipped his mouth shut and stayed out of this one. The little girl was far too good at misbehaving and he didn’t want a fight to break out. Demonic Beasts could exert a sort of suppression upon those of their bloodline, which King used to keep the little girl in line. On the other hand, if Sage tried anything the opposite would be true. He was technically one of Ruanfu’s descendants now and it would give him a disadvantage against her.

Best to let parents handle their own children after all…

He picked up the wine jug and mimed like it was empty. Careful not to spill any he left the table looking for another bottle of wine, even though there were dozens of them inside his Universe Ring he could call out in an instant. Pretending not to see the girl starting to throw a little tantrum when King started laying out ground rules for their trip. He also didn’t listen when cups and bowls were smashed on the floor. Nor did he hear the splintering of wood when the table and chairs got added into the mix.

A few days later, Sage and Ruanfu were sitting on the back of a huge hawk soaring through the air. They were flying a sort of circular search pattern, starting at a proposed village location and flying gradually larger circles around it. King had sent some of the birds in the Tiankong Palace out to search the province for suitable locations. He used the tasks as a gift, letting them out of their human forms and giving them a bit of freedom. They had to swear oaths before going, and after experiencing some hardship along the way, King was hoping to sweep them off their feet on their return and offer them cushy lives back in his palace as his wives. Once they had a chance to compare the two lives, he was sure to reel in a few more of the stubborn ones.

Sage found this all amusing, especially when King had Sage capture all of the female bird type Demonic Beasts they ran into on their trip. The most astounding moment was when they ran into a golden eagle covered with lightning. Ruanfu grabbed Sage’s arm and then pointed at the eagle.

“I want it! Bring him home for me, Big Brother!”

Sage was confused, both by her actions and her name for him. He’d tried to refrain from using any terms relating to seniority or familial relationship between them since it was quite a mess. She could be counted as both his grandmother and also something like a god-daughter as he helped create her, and that was without even mentioning their age gap. She didn’t give him more time to think and tugged on his arm, “Hurry, before he gets away! He will be a good first husband, he’s very pretty.”

Seems she takes after her father.