The Magus Era

Ji Hao stood by the roadside, looking at that livestock belonging to the few so-called migratory clans crossing the straight road slowly.

That livestock were all in big shapes, like flat-horn black cattle and spiral-horn goats. Each of those flat-horn black cattle was over three-zhang long, extra plump and sturdy; they even looked like small and thick walls when standing on the ground. Spiral-horned goats were as big as ordinary young bulls, their whole bodies covered in long and curly fur; those thick curly fur made them look even a size larger than flat-horn black cattle.

Millions of large livestock like these had lined up in long and compact queues, unhurriedly crossing over the straight road. Without a big half a day, this enormous number of livestock couldn’t possibly all cross the road.

On the other side of this great group of livestock, the other captive-escorting troops which had been moving in the front had gone far. No one in the front contacted Ji Hao and other troop commanders who were on the backside. They just left as if they didn’t see all those livestock.

Deep and resonant horns rose from the long line of captive-escorting troops in the backside, some troop commanders had given out the order of pitching a camp on the spot.

Ji Hao saw some human warriors in captive-escorting troops walk to that large livestock, chatting and laughing with those migratory clansmen as if they were rather familiar with each other. Some migratory clansmen even took out their wineskins and warmly offered wine to those warriors in the captive-escorting troops.

Soon, those human warriors and migratory clansmen put their arms around each other’s shoulders with happiness and knowing no bounds, as though they were actually families.

“Damn it.” Ji Hao helplessly spread his hands and gave a bitter grin to Po, who was standing next to him. He then turned around, walked to his own captive-escorting troop. The road was blocked, and they couldn’t keep moving. Instead, they had to pitch a camp. The campsite should be tougher than usual this time and should have greater defensive power.

“Think about Wuzhi Qi.” Po smiled faintly and said, “I, as you big brother, know that he was punished to face the wall and ponder about his own misdeeds for a hundred years by the human emperor. Yet, he sneaked out just like this...When we get back to Pu Ban city, Ji Hao, you will know that being the human emperor is not an easy job. The humankind... humankind!”

Ji Hao threw a glance at that huge group of livestock, which were now peeing and defecating on the road and made a great mess on the straight road. He couldn’t help but grin and ceaselessly shake his head. Humankind, the humankind, if it wasn’t because of all the great pressure for survival that came from the outside, the current humankind probably have already become like those Yu Clan nobles.

Ji Hao walked back to the campsite of his troop and locked himself in a tent.

Outside the tent, Zhamu and his over ten thousand warriors had been singing a work song and building an ordered campsite. Ji Hao’s troop was located on the side of the straight road. He directly pitched the camp in the wilderness, which was miles away from the straight road.

The surrounding area was flat and open. Zhamu and his warriors dug deep ditches around the campsite, and sharpened wooden stakes and bamboo sticks were thickly plugged into the bottoms of those ditches. Additionally, Yu Mu had spread potent poison on each of those sharpened wooden stakes and bamboo sticks. In this way, the defensive power of this campsite had reached a mentionable level.

What made Ji Hao feel speechless was that when Ji Hao and his people had been intensely preparing for a battle, not a single person came to even take a look.

Whether those migratory clan people or those Ink Ape Clan warriors, no one had thought of coming over and looking into the current situation on Ji Hao’s side. Perhaps, in some people’s eyes, Ji Hao and his people were already like a fleshy piece of meat inside the mouth of a beast, and that they could never make out of this.

When the night fell, only less than a half of that large livestock had crossed the road.

Ji Hao had already made three-hundred and sixty jade talismans that could be used to set up magic formations. He had even tried and made nine magic formation flags with those materials he captured in Chi Ban Mountain. The flag poles were cast from a mixture of pure gold and scrap jade, while the flags were woven from the silk threads that came from Yu Clan nobles’ luxury silk cloaks.

Those Yu Clan nobles’ long cloaks were all made from silk produced by thousand-year-old sky silkworms, thousand-year-old ice silkworms or ten-thousand-year-old fire silkworms. These few types of silk had excellent textures and had many ingenious uses. Those Yu Clan nobles were indeed misusing these rare and great materials by using them to make clothes.

Nine three-foot square magic formation flags were successfully completed. Layers of clouds were rolling inside those flags, which had been emitting a dim and clear light. Ji Hao slightly waved his hand, and the nine flags rustled loudly following his move. The inner space of the tent slightly vibrated and a great constraining force swooshed over from all directions like a fierce boa. Ji Hao couldn’t help but have his body shake slightly.

Po lifted the door curtain and walked in. He took the magic formation flags from Ji Hao’s hands, narrowed his eyes and gave those flags a close look.

As his fingers were pointing and stroking the flags, which were crafted by Ji Hao with all of his power, Po quickly pointed out thirty-six big or small flaws.

Some needed further work as the surfaces were not smooth enough; some were overdone as the flagpoles were over burned. Some only had a few spell symbols added, and those were far between each other, which would cause a reduction of the magic formation’s power. Some spell symbols were overlapped and consequently led to complicating the structure and wasting too much of the natural power...When hearing all these problems pointed out by Po, Ji Hao’s back was soaked with cold sweat.

Ji Hao was sincerely convinced. He bowed and saluted to Po, thanking him for his comments. After that, in coordination with hand gestures, Po taught Ji Hao all kinds of tricks of magic formation crafting skills, in full detail.

The secret tool crafting skills taught by Yu Yu were entirely different from the tool crafting techniques using by the Magi Palace. Magi of the Magi Palace usually liked to add as many materials as possible when crafting a tool; they did not care about the wastage of materials at all. Unlike them, Yu Yu’s secret tool crafting skills were incredibly ingenious and carried out with meticulous care that every slight little bit of material must exert its power to the top degree. Tools crafted in this way were able to deliver significant effects by consuming very little power. For example, a small magic formation tool could be used to change the operation of the great Dao of nature.

What Po taught him was particularly fine, and Ji Hao couldn’t even describe it with language. Po was talking with great interest, while Ji Hao couldn’t stop grinning and raising his eyebrows when listening to him. Ji Hao only felt that he was enlightened and filled with wisdom, and he suddenly could see the whole thing in a clear light. This even made Ji Hao feel like walking on clouds.

Po’s lecture lasted more than four hours. Abruptly, he stopped talking and slightly turned his head, seeming to hear something. He then gave a cold smile and conveniently threw those magic formation flags and jade talismans held in his hands out. All these magic formation flags and jade talismans instantly transformed into beams of fiery light and flew out, quickly setting up a ’nine-grid sky reverse formation’ around Ji Hao’s campsite.

Buzz! Ji Hao’s tent suddenly shattered as an overwhelming magic formation force swept over.

Ji Hao pointed his finger up, letting out the mountain and river stamper that Yu Yu extorted from Priest Hua for him. The immense streams of natural power drawn over by the magic formation wrapped the mountains stamp up, right after which, this yellow-colored mountain and river stamper burst a dazzling sphere of light out, and thus became the core treasure of this magic formation which could control and stabilize this great magic formation.

Roaring streams of natural powers ceaselessly surged into the mountain and river stamper. After being purified and hardened by the mountain and river stamper, these power streams then gushed to every corner of this nine-grid sky reverse formation.

After an earth-shaking series of rumbles that came from all sides of this large-scale magic formation, everything calmed back down.

Muffled footsteps then came from the surrounding areas, following which was Man Man’s loud yell, “What do you want?! Oi! I am on night duty, you bastards! You can’t come in!” Along with two thunderous booms, shrill howls rose.

Ji Hao hurriedly leaped up, trod on a fiery cloud and flew towards the frontal gate of this campsite.

Outside the gate, large groups of heavily armored warriors had been gathering over. They were holding heavy weapons and directly launching attacks on Man Man, who had been guarding the gate, without saying a single word. Long spears swished through the air, lunging swiftly. Man Man was holding her pair of hammers, crazily smashing everything around her with a huge grin on her little face. In the deep ditches on both sides of the gate, over ten heavily armored warriors were already lying in there with broken bones.

A rude voice came from the crowd of warriors, “Rush in! Kill every last one of those brats! Take all slaves in this camp! Every single one of them! Take them all!

From the other captive-escorting troops’ campsites, which were located near the straight road, large amounts of fires swooshed up. One could hear growls and shouts of those captured slave warriors and slaves in both panic and anger, and screams and all other kinds of noises, from everywhere.