"What do you mean 'talk to you like that'? Look at what you've done!"
"It has been nearly two months since you've been given this job! The Mountain of Springs where you and these slaves came from are only hundreds of miles away from here. And these slaves haven't even built up their own shelters by now!"
"You had plenty of time and all these people! But you haven't even started building the mine hole! What have you all been doing these days?"
"I'm not finished yet. Could you please tell me where the food for these slaves are? Where are the meat for our fighting beasts and beasts of burden? Where are all the equipment we're gonna need for exploration and mining work? You just wasted the whole two months here!"
Under the starlight, Ji Xia was waving his arms and yelling at two men who seemed lazy and haughty.
The two men were wearing metal armours that were very rare in the Southern Wasteland. Ji Hao heard Ji Xia's voice; he then stopped walking, quietly watching them from the shade of the cave. He sensed strong power from the heavy swords worn around their waists. Faced with Ji Xia's reprimand, the two men just showed arrogant faces and seemed to not take Ji Xia's words seriously at all.
"Ji Xia, you're allowed to say whatever you want. We have sent five thousand slaves to you as what we've been told. From now on, you're responsible for the mining work in the Cold Stream Valley, as well as all the other affairs around here which has nothing to do with us."
The two men laughed out loud and whistled sharply. Two 'iron claw bald eagles' with the wingspans of tens of feet soon landed in front of them. The two man hopped on the eagles backs; the eagles then rapidly rose high into the air, hovered around and flew towards the Gold Black Mountain.
Ji Xia raised his right arm angrily, then he paused; his arm froze in the air.
Before, if Ji Xia found any man muddling through his work, he would never hesitate to slap him hard in the face. However, as the two men had said, he was no longer the leader of the Holy Land warriors at this point in time, which meant he had no right to do so.
Mr. Crow abruptly landed on Ji Hao's shoulder.
Ji Hao then walked up to Ji Xia, looked at the two eagles which were gradually becoming smaller in the sky, and said, "Abba, are they Ji Shu's people? Do you want me to shoot them down?"
Mr. Crow cawed loudly, spurting wisps of fire from his beak.
Qing Ying quietly showed up beside Ji Hao. He pulled out an arrow and started yelling excitedly while he was waving that arrow.
"Yes! Hao's right! Let's shoot those bastards down! I only need a single shot for that from this distance!"
Ji Xia laid his arm down, tapped Ji Hao's head and said smilingly, "Don't. That was their own fault for not doing their jobs well. But we can never violate the rule of our clan. We can never take the initiative to hurt our own people."
Ji Hao gazed at Ji Xia's pale face. His mind flashed back to what he saw at the time when he fainted. He clearly remembered that Ji Xia blocked the attack with his own body; the boiling hot blood of Ji Xia splashed on his body and face. Ji Hao could never forget this.
"Sure, I won't do anything to them. Unless they do something to me first." Ji Hao smiled at Ji Xia, then turned around and started to observe this valley carefully.
The starlight was bright and clear. Where Ji Hao had stood was the center of the valley. This valley was tens of miles long and miles wide; a thousand-foot-wide stream was rapidly flowing through the middle of the valley. By the streamside, there were piles of gold and jade pieces.
The water of the stream was ice-cold. Though Ji Hao was a mile away from the stream, he could still sense the chill from it. Ji Hao could hear the swish and gurgle of water washing out those gold and jade pieces by the streamside; those gold and jade pieces shone with an alluring light.
"Such an amazing lode!" Said Ji Hao.
"Indeed, it's a surprisingly large and rich lode. After we got here, your Amma did some exploration; she found out that the mineral resources here were buried relatively shallow, which will be easy to dig. We can easily get a hundred thousand pieces of gold and tens of thousands pieces of jade from this valley." Ji Xia then frowned and continued, "But those bastards from the Mountain of Spring only sent us five thousands of slaves with nothing else."
All kinds of knocking noises resounded throughout the valley. Thousands of slaves were singing their working songs and were busy at building their shelters. On the other side of the valley, tens of stilt cabins were already built up.
On the cliff, tens of Fire Crow Clan warriors were working hard on building the watch post. A few long vines were dropped down from the cliff and it pulled thick logs up to the cliff from time to time.
Near the entrances of both sides of the valley, a group of warriors were supervising hundreds of slaves building the wall. The slaves laid the foundation of the wall with thick logs; then filled two lines of logs with rocks and clay. This kind of wall would be firm enough to block the attacks from beasts.
The Cold Stream Valley was in the extreme North of the Fire Crow Clan's territory. The valley was surrounded by primitive jungle. A lot of dire beasts were living in the surrounding jungle of the Cold Stream Valley, added with other unpredictable dangers; if they don't build this wall as quick as possible, these slaves' lives would be in great danger.
Qing Fu came with a few warriors.
She smiled when she saw Ji Hao and intimately patted his head. Qing Fu then handed a fist-sized piece of red jade to Ji Xia and said, "Xia, this lode not only produces gold and jade. I asked these warriors dug thirty feet deep and we found this."
Ji Hao looked at that red jade piece curiously. That red jade was translucent and contained great heat; there seemed to have some kind of liquid flowing inside it. Under the starlight, this red jade piece was shining with a bright fiery light.
"Hmm? 'Fire Jade Pith'? This is the treasure which can largely and rapidly improve the power of Senior Magi with the natural abilities of fire control, and also is a kind of excellent material for making magus tools." Ji Xia popped up his eyes and said delightfully. "If we send this to the Clan as tribute, one piece of 'Fire Jade Pith' can be worth more than thousands of pieces of gold and jade!"
"We have to let those elder Maguspriests know that we have found the 'Fire Jade Pith' here as quick as possible. Tell them that they should send more warriors to guard this valley. And, Xia, you need to start hunting with Ying after the sunrise. The Mountain of Spring people haven't brought any food for these slaves." Said Ji Fu in a low voice.
Ji Hao took the 'Fire Jade Pith' from Ji Xia's hand then sent his spiritual power into the jade piece. He suddenly sensed a great power which rushed into his body from his palms. He felt like that he was drawn into a lake of lava and almost screamed out.
Ji Hao was half-shocked and half-surprised. This piece of red jade was not 'Fire Jade Pith', instead, it was a piece of 'Fire Essence Crystal'. In Ji Hao's previous life, he had seen hundreds of powerful warriors fighting for a small piece of a 'Fire Essence Crystal', which was less than one percent of the piece in size he was holding right now.
This was truly precious. The Cold Stream Valley was a great treasure indeed.
No matter who guarded this valley well, and sent the gold and jade to the clan as he had been required, he would earn the reward and thankfulness from the clan. Would Ji Shu be so kind to let Ji Xia have this credit?
