Eastern Wilderness Reforms

Among the five major tribes, the Wind-Fire Tribe had the largest population, with more than three thousand people.

Next was the Marsh Tribe, with over two thousand people.

Then came the Lin Tribe and the Lukun Tribe, each with more than a thousand people, close to two thousand.

The Red Iron Tribe had just over a thousand people.

If the five major tribes merged, their total population could exceed ten thousand.

Their scale would be second only to the Central Wilderness Tribe.

"Why do you suddenly want to merge?"

The merger of the five major tribes was a good thing, so Feng Xu naturally would not refuse.

"Friction and clashes in the central Great Wilderness are becoming more frequent. Fighting could break out at any time. We thought that if we became one family, we could unite and defend against foreign enemies."

Jiang Ze spoke on behalf of the other chiefs.

In truth, they had seen that the Wind-Fire Tribe was about to establish trade with the Great Wilderness and wanted a share of the benefits as well.

The Wind-Fire Tribe had a deep foundation. Merging with it could only benefit them.

Besides, they had originally been one family. There was nothing wrong with returning to one place.

"All right. Then what do you plan to do? Move here and live together, or remain as you are?"

If everyone moved to the Wind-Fire Tribe, setting aside whether there would be enough room, relocating every tribesperson would not be easy in itself.

But if they remained unchanged, what would be the difference from not merging?

"Everything will be arranged by the Wind-Fire Tribe."

Jiang Ze exchanged glances with the others and answered after a brief consideration.

Feng Xu pondered for a long while, and the atmosphere suddenly fell silent.

"Then I'll briefly explain my thoughts..."

Feng Xu took out pen and paper from a snakeskin sack, writing as he spoke.

The five major tribes would merge and be renamed the East Wilderness Tribe. Feng Sui would serve as tribal chief, while the other four chiefs would be appointed elders to assist him in managing the Eastern Wilderness.

People would remain at the original tribal sites and continue developing them as outlying branches of the Eastern Wilderness.

All core members would move to Vermilion Ridge, which would temporarily serve as the Eastern Wilderness's main city.

To speed up tribal integration, the Wind-Fire Tribe would also relocate some of its people to live at the former sites of the other tribes.

Next came the arrangements for all kinds of details, and Feng Xu did not participate in the discussion.

Before leaving, he informed everyone that the tribe was about to undergo reforms and told them to prepare themselves.

Feng Xu rode Bai Hao to the Blood Pool.

The Blood Pool would soon undergo a full upgrade and needed more management personnel.

For the time being, these people would all be selected from the old sites.

Feng Xu refined some copper into cauldrons to hold Battle Mark dye.

Since the other tribes were about to merge with them, they should also be allowed to possess Battle Marks.

But they could not be given out directly.

Other than elders and children of the proper age, everyone else had to make major contributions to the tribe or work continuously for three years before they could receive a Battle Mark.

Elders held honored status, so that went without saying.

Childhood was the best time to lay a foundation. As long as they attended the academy for a full year, they could receive a Battle Mark.

Feng Xu turned the revised Five Qi Transformation Art and Soul-Nurturing Formula into Battle Marks and taught the methods for managing the Blood Pool.

When Feng Xu was away from the tribe in the future, others would have to handle these matters.

The Five Qi Transformation Art was not a top-tier cultivation method, but it had no flaws and was best suited for widespread use as a foundational method.

It could be cultivated as far as the Golden Immortal realm.

The Soul-Nurturing Formula was a cultivation method specifically for spiritual consciousness and could be practiced alongside the Five Qi Transformation Art.

Feng Xu compiled the Bloodline Secret Art into a booklet and drew the two sets of Battle Marks on paper for the Blood Pool managers to study.

He also selected a new site and had people begin excavating it. This would become the new Blood Pool.

After finishing these matters, Feng Xu headed to Vermilion Ridge.

The Red Iron Tribe had originally been part of the Wind-Fire Tribe, so its merger proceeded most efficiently.

It had now basically been completed.

Feng Xu selected over twenty blacksmiths and five tailors to establish a Dharma Artifact factory.

All of them possessed dharma power.

Feng Xu divided the entire artifact-refining process into several stages and converted it to assembly-line production.

Broadly speaking, it could be divided into physical shaping, fine adjustment with dharma power, restriction inscription, and centralized refinement.

Physical shaping alone was divided into six stages.

He strictly required product specifications and implemented standards of standardization, normalization, intensification, controllability, and traceability.

This was a rather troublesome process. Feng Xu had to visit the factory every day, staying there for two or three shichen at a time.

He spent the afternoons at the factory and the mornings in the stockade tower.

Feng Xu selected thirty people to establish the Ritual Bureau.

The Ritual Bureau's main duty was promoting ritual studies. Its everyday work was to accompany the patrol teams as they inspected various places.

Whenever they saw conduct that violated propriety, they had to stop it promptly and point out its harm. When they encountered conduct that conformed to propriety, they had to praise it on the spot.

They also posted large-character notices throughout the tribe to promote the principles of propriety.

With patrol warriors accompanying them, it would not be as simple as merely talking.

Basic punishments were established.

They mainly consisted of corporal punishment, deductions from resource allocations, and labor service. There would be no severe punishments or death penalties, nor any punishments that crippled people.

After all, the population was still small, and labor was scarce.

A literacy-based selection system was established.

Apart from the first batch of temporary selections, all future low-level clerks would be required to possess a certain degree of literacy.

Higher positions would be selected from among the grassroots. Performance evaluations would be the standard. Anyone found showing favoritism would be stripped of their post, permanently barred from employment, and punished with labor service.

"Besides these reforms, we also need to arrange the tribe's main construction work for the future."

Inside the stockade tower, Feng Xu pointed at the map and spoke with great enthusiasm.

Develop the plains beneath the mountain as a fallback route for the tribe.

The main work included reclaiming land for farming, expanding housing, digging deep cellars, and connecting them with tunnels to establish an underground network.

Food could be stored there in ordinary times, while people could hide underground for shelter in times of crisis.

Build docks along the river, construct large numbers of boats, and prepare for waterborne trade.

Cut roads through the mountains to connect every tribe to Vermilion Ridge by land and promote trade and exchange.

These projects were part of the tribe's development plan for the next twenty years, so they could be carried out gradually.

Feng Xu drew one unprecedented blueprint after another for the East Wilderness Tribe's future, leaving the elders stunned by his many ideas.

Was this how the Wind-Fire Tribe had developed in the past?

Why did it sound as though it could be done, yet when they compared the goals with their current circumstances, the goals seemed far too vast, completely impossible to achieve?

"Feng Xu, can we truly accomplish all that you've described?"

"Of course. Divide every project into forty phases, and simply complete the assigned tasks for each phase on time."

Many things that seemed impossibly distant were accomplished step by step.

The primitive Human Race was powerful, but they lacked the ability to plan for the future. Feng Xu set goals for them and allowed them to fully exert their individual strength.

Put bluntly, he was still exploiting labor.

But this work was not for Feng Xu. It was for the tribe, for the Human Race of the Great Wilderness.

Two months later, the Dharma Artifact factory finally refined its first set of Houtian Dharma Artifacts. With this experience, production would proceed faster from then on.

It was expected to produce two sets of Dharma Artifacts per month.

For the time being, this would do. Once the techniques matured, they would expand according to demand. The experienced would train the newcomers, rapidly cultivating talent.

More than ten days later, envoys from the Central Wilderness Tribe arrived.

Each of them carried two Storage Bags. There were three of them in total, all Early Heavenly Immortals, and they had brought thirty-one Early Heavenly Immortal ferocious beasts.

The extra beast was to be exchanged for various daily necessities.

The leader was called Dashan. After the transaction ended, he asked Feng Xu whether he was willing to travel to the central Great Wilderness.

Feng Xu nodded in agreement, but he needed several days to hand over the matters at hand.

The main task was refining the Blood Pool.

Feng Xu instructed the Blood Pool managers on how to refine essence blood. Under Feng Xu's observation, they completed the filling and maintenance of the Blood Pool.

The three envoys also entered to try it out.

All of them broke through to the Mid Heavenly Immortal realm.

The Human Race had accumulated strength for more than a century, and many people below the Mid Heavenly Immortal realm had long reached the bottleneck for a breakthrough.