213: Chapter 213 Rest and Recuperation

The remains of the last two Foundation Establishment Cultivators of the Sandao Sect were recovered simultaneously.

The two of them leaned back-to-back; one had their chest pierced by the sharp claws of a Silver-Armored Corpse Puppet, while the other was poisoned by corpse poison, their entire body blackened. Yet, the long sabers in their hands still pointed to the north—the exact direction from which the corpse tide had surged.

Their remaining dozen or so Qi Refining Disciples knelt halfway to the side, weeping silently without daring to make a sound. By this point, all four Foundation Establishment Cultivators sent by the Sandao Sect to reinforce Hongshan County had perished in battle.

When the remains of Xiao Yuanlie from the Xiao Family were carried over, Xiao Yuanzheng broke free from the medical Cultivator's hands, stumbled over to his younger clan brother, lifted the white cloth covering his face for a glance, and then slowly knelt down.

There were no wails or roars; he simply knelt there, one hand pressed against Xiao Yuanlie's cold forehead, remaining motionless for a long time.

The tallying of the spoils of war lasted for an entire morning.

The remains of the Silver-Armored Corpse Puppets were divided into two categories: five bodies with relatively intact structures were sealed separately, affixed with Seal Talismans, and would be turned over uniformly to the Tianxuan Sect as strategic Materials among the spoils.

The remaining ten completely damaged remains were disassembled and classified: useful Materials were registered and put into storage, while useless broken bones and rotten flesh were gathered and incinerated.

The Restrictions on the Demonic Cultivator's Storage Pouches were broken open one by one, and the items inside were dumped onto the tarpaulin in the center of the drill ground, to be registered, valued, and classified one by one by two Tianxuan Sect Disciples.

The complete statistics of the battle results were not compiled and handed over to Wang Daoyuan until that afternoon.

He took the roster, flipped through a few pages, his fingertips trembling slightly, yet his expression remained calm.

He copied the battle results into multiple copies, ordered Disciples to deliver them respectively to each defense zone and to Master Xuanyue in the county town, and then walked alone to the remains of the Golden-Armored Corpse Puppet, standing there for a long time.

That colossal creature, standing three zhang and six chi tall, collapsed on the ground like a collapsed iron tower.

Wang Daoyuan walked slowly around it in a circle, carefully observing the fatal wound on its chest, the fracture surface of its right arm, and the degree of shattering of its left leg bones.

These details would be written in detail into the battle report as first-hand data on the actual combat effect of the Thunderstorm Beads, for the Tianxuan Sect's Formation and Artifact Peak to study and improve.

...

On the seventh day after the battle, the battle results statistics of the Chimang Ridge frontal battlefield were officially finalized and distributed to the various factions in Hongshi County.

The principals of each family held a copy each; the wording was concise and the numbers precise.

The captured column listed: one set of Golden-Armored Corpse Puppet remains, fifteen sets of Silver-Armored Corpse Puppet remains, and several sets of Bronze-Armored Corpse Puppet remains.

A total of twenty-three Storage Pouches, Spirit Beast Pouches, and Corpse-Raising Pouches of Foundation Establishment Demonic Cultivators, among which fifteen were captured from the frontal battlefield, and another eight came from the western and eastern defense lines.

Cultivation Materials of various types such as Spirit Stones, Medicinal Pills, Spiritual Artifacts, and Talismans had a total value exceeding one hundred thousand Low-Grade Spirit Stones.

The casualty column listed: in this battle, our side's Foundation Establishment Cultivators suffered six deaths and four serious injuries; over three hundred Qi Refining Cultivators died, with the injured being twice that number; over a thousand Innate Martial Artists died.

At the end of the battle report, there was a paragraph personally written by Master Xuanyue: "This great victory is the merit of everyone bathing in blood for four months. Those with merits will be immediately rewarded according to their contributions, and none shall be buried in obscurity. Starting from today, each defense zone will have at least one month of rest and reconstruction time, and the specific deployment will be coordinated by Wang Daoyuan."

On the afternoon when the battle report was issued, the Li Family garrison received the official commendation order from the Tianxuan Sect.

The commendation order was personally delivered by Wang Daoyuan, with extremely solemn wording: "During the period when the Li Family guarded Eagle Beak Mountain, with a mere force of fifty people, they met the Demonic Path Foundation Establishment Cultivators and a large number of corpse puppets head-on, yet suffered zero casualties and harvested bountiful gains. This is truly extraordinary."

"Special commendation of three thousand Low-Grade Spirit Stones, ten bottles of Tier 2 Medicinal Pills, and fifty portions of Tier 2 Talisman Materials."

When Wang Daoyuan handed the commendation order to Li Changqing, he rarely showed a trace of a smile: "Fellow Daoist Li, to be honest, we fought on the frontal battlefield for more than four months, and this is the first time we've seen a position with zero casualties. Your Li Family fought this battle in a way that truly commands complete admiration."

Li Changqing received the commendation order with both hands, his expression calm, only slightly bowing as he said: "Fellow Daoist Wang flatters me too much. Eagle Beak Mountain has terrain that is easy to defend and difficult to attack, my Li Family merely took advantage of the geographical convenience."

"Moreover, what was fought on the Chimang Ridge frontal battlefield were the real tough battles; those Fellow Daoists who died in battle are the true heroes."

Wang Daoyuan was silent for a moment, then solemnly nodded.

He could see that Li Changqing's words were not polite pleasantries, but heartfelt respect, and his favorable impression in his heart increased by a few more points.

Aside from these immediately distributed rewards, the Li Family, in this defensive battle, killed a total of one Foundation Establishment Middle Stage Demonic Cultivator and sixty-eight Qi Refining stage Demonic Cultivators, accumulating a total of one hundred and thirty-three battle merit points.

Battle merit was a reward mechanism designed by the Tianxuan Sect to incentivize all participating personnel in Tianxuan Prefecture.

Among them, Qi Refining stage Demonic Cultivators were uniformly counted as one point, Foundation Establishment Early Stage Demonic Cultivators counted as fifty points, Foundation Establishment Middle Stage Demonic Cultivators counted as sixty-five points, Foundation Establishment Late Stage Demonic Cultivators counted as eighty points, and Foundation Establishment Peak Demonic Cultivators counted as one hundred points.

The battle merit points for killing Golden Core Stage Demonic Cultivators, from lowest to highest, were: Golden Core Early Stage five thousand points, Golden Core Middle Stage six thousand five hundred points, Golden Core Late Stage eight thousand points, and Golden Core Peak ten thousand points.

For reasons unknown, the Tianxuan Sect did not include Bronze-Armored Corpse Puppets, Silver-Armored Corpse Puppets, as well as Tier 1 and Tier 2 Spirit Beasts of Demonic Path Cultivators into the battle merit calculations; only the kills of Spirit Beasts and corpse refiners above Tier 3 could be counted towards battle merit points.

As for the method of identifying the number of slain Demonic Path Cultivators, it did not use image-recording Talismans or image-recording beads, but adopted the most primitive and reliable means—using the tongues of the demonic Cultivators as the standard.

The Tianxuan Sect possessed various methods to accurately determine their pre-mortem cultivation level based on the tongues of the demonic Cultivators.

The main use of battle merit points was to exchange them with the Tianxuan Sect for various Heaven And Earth Treasures, including Core Formation spiritual items most attractive to Foundation Establishment Cultivators such as Golden Core Condensation Pills, Metal Spirit Pills, and nascent-infant spiritual items highly yearned for by Golden Core Cultivators such as Nascent Soul Formation Pill, Infant Transformation Pill, Nascent Soul Gathering Pill, Nascent Soul Condensation Pill, and Nascent Soul Transformation Pill.

...

On the fifteenth day after the great battle, Hongshi County welcomed the second batch of reinforcing Cultivators.

Three Medium Grade Spirit Boats landed on the drill ground of Hongshi County city, their cabin doors opening to let down batches of Cultivators and Martial Artists with varying expressions.

There were a total of nine Foundation Establishment Cultivators—among whom two Foundation Establishment Middle Stage ones were Outer Sect Disciples of the Tianxuan Sect, and the other seven Foundation Establishment Early and Middle Stage Cultivators were all drafted Loose Cultivators.

There were five hundred Qi Refining Cultivators and fifteen hundred Innate Martial Artists.

Most of these people looked to be in fair spirits and fully equipped, yet their eyes lacked the proper composure and vigilance.

This time, Wang Daoyuan received the personnel on the drill ground and allocated them one by one to each defense zone according to the pre-formulated distribution plan.

The Xiao Family was supplemented with three Foundation Establishment Cultivators, one hundred and fifty Qi Refining Cultivators, and four hundred Innate Realm Martial Artists.

The Sandao Sect of Qingyang Prefecture and the Huang Family were reorganized into a combined establishment, supplemented with one Foundation Establishment Cultivator, one hundred Qi Refining Cultivators, and two hundred and fifty Innate Realm Martial Artists.

By this point, the Sandao Sect could be said to have become the first faction in Hongshi County to be completely wiped out.

The Yuan Family was supplemented with fifty Qi Refining Cultivators and one hundred and fifty Innate Realm Martial Artists; the Li Family was supplemented with twenty Qi Refining stage Cultivators and one hundred Innate Realm Martial Artists.

In addition, five Foundation Establishment Cultivators, one hundred and eighty Qi Refining stage Cultivators, and six hundred Innate Martial Artists were combined to form a single team.

Clan Leader Li Huaming represented the Li Family in receiving this batch of Qi Refining Cultivators and Innate Martial Artists.

Among these twenty Qi Refining Cultivators, the person with the highest cultivation level was only at the eighth layer of Qi Refining.

Some of these Loose Cultivators had come to the battlefield voluntarily after being brainwashed, while others had been forcibly coerced along the way.