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The battle ended as quickly as it started. Once he was done, Cheng Yang walked out of the car park.

"The rest is up to you. Don't tell anyone about my involvement in this matter." Cheng Yang called over his shoulder.

Xiao Zhen opened her mouth to stop Cheng Yang from leaving, but the words never left her lips. In the end, all she could do was sigh.

A few minutes later, the rest of Xiao Zhen's mercenary group entered the car park.

When they did, they were filled with the same shock and rage as the group before them.

At that time, Xiao Zhen kicked out all of the men. Once she set up the women in the group to take care of the victims, she went up to the surface.

"Beans, did you see where Mr. Cheng went?"

A young man shook his head. "No, he was gone by the time we arrived."

"Warn everyone in the team about it. Be very respectful if you ever meet that man and don't mention him to anyone outside our team."

"Elder sister, don't worry." Beans said, "We saw that guys strength, how could any of us even think about offending him."

"Just so you know, Mr. Cheng is even more dangerous than you think. If we ever pissed him off, not even the army would be able to save us."

Bean was skeptical. "How is that possible? Even if every soldier only attacked once, he'd still die."

"Maybe if we were still in the old world, but not anymore. Numbers don't hold the advantage they used to. Mr. Cheng crushed those bandits without them being able to fight back. How much more powerful do you think the soldiers are?"

"This…" Beans felt a chill go up his spine.

"Like I said." Xiao Zhen continued. "Mr. Cheng is far more dangerous than you think."

"My Lord, they seemed like good people. Why didn't you offer them the opportunity to come to Phoenix Village." Liu Wei asked.

"I don't want information about Phoenix Village to be made public yet. We also can't guarantee their loyalty. I have a way to control people who performed a class change ceremony in Phoenix Village, but I can't guarantee that for outsiders. Maybe if they had more to offer me, I would have let them come with us, but they were just a couple of Low-Grade Apprentices." Cheng Yang replied.

Liu Wei vaguely understood, so she nodded.

When they finally returned to Phoenix Village, it was one in the morning. Since it was so late, they didn't have time to hunt monsters.

Cheng Yang gave Liu Wei the Experience Fragments needed for thirty-two times training speed and then left to visit Liu Hau in Joyous River Village. He had promised to help his friend find iron ore earlier.

After collecting Liu Hau, Cheng Yang brought Liu Hau into the forest.

"Yoko, is there really iron ore under that mound?" Liu Hau asked cautiously.

"Of course, why would I lie to you?" Cheng Yang said.

"Well, it's a tiny mound, so I don't think there could possibly be much ore in there."

"Not much, I suppose." Cheng Yang said, "But, it's close to your village. It's almost impossible to find a considerable vein of iron ore waiting to be excavated, so finding anything is already pretty good. Besides, a small mine just means it has hundreds of tons of iron instead of tens of thousands. There's plenty of ore in there to build ten thousand pieces of equipment even if you consider the failure rate."

Liu Hau shook his head. Ten thousand pieces of equipment sounded like a lot, but most classes needed at least three parts that used iron. Especially Warriors that had all but two slots filled with metal equipment.

"Forget it. Start digging. At the very least, you'll be able to practice your Mining skill.

Liu Hau took out his pickaxe and used the flat head on the back to remove the dirt from the mound.

When the vein Liu Hau finally unearthed, he knew it was slag quality metal that could only be used to make the lowest quality equipment. Even so, he diligently started excavating it.

Cheng Yang left his best friend there to complete his work and returned to Phoenix Village to train.

Before that, Cheng Yang had one last chore to complete: building new buildings.

Thanks to an increase in the number of people harvesting resources, the wood and stone output of the village increased by 20% today. It would probably see some incremental improvements for the next few days until evening out. It would then stay there until enough people leveled up their Profession.

With the resources the village currently had, Cheng Yang would be able to build two of the new buildings. As for upgrading existing buildings like the Alchemy Tower, Cheng Yang decided to postpone that decision.

After a moment of contemplation, Cheng Yang built the Quest Hall and the Trial Hall.

These buildings were much smaller than the Baracks. Each one was a two-story building about the size of Cheng Yang's Meditation Hall that were run by NPC managers sent by the gods.

Cheng Yang also wanted to build the Adventurer's Guild since he planned to become an adventurer again.

If anyone else had that goal, Cheng Yang was determined to make them become a soldier. But, since the Lord wasn't allowed to be a soldier, he may as well become an adventurer.

This was because, adventurers weren't tied to anything, unlike soldiers who could only enjoy their benefits in the territory they became a soldier.

Naturally, as the Lord, there was no need to tie himself to the territory as a soldier. After all, the territory was Cheng Yang, and Cheng Yang represented the territory.

So, there were only benefits to gain by becoming an Adventurer since he could then receive quests. He could also accept adventurer team quests and bring the Pheonix Village army to complete them since he was the Lord.

The sooner Cheng Yang built the Adventurer's Guild, the faster he would be able to raise his Adventurer Rank. However, since building it would only benefit him, Cheng Yang chose not to.

Once he was done, Cheng Yang began training straight away. Since he was neither an adventurer or a soldier, he had no reason to visit the Quest Hall, and the instance dungeons in the Trial Hall were useless to Cheng Yang since he didn't need to train against low-level monsters.

When he finished training, Cheng Yang's experience bar was a half-point away from reaching twenty percent. He still had a long way to go before leveling up, but he was getting closer.

Cheng Yang then brought the Imperial Guard with him to clear the Nightmare Difficulty Blood-Soaked Cathedral.

When he got out, he visited the Territory Altar. It was time for him to use the Statue Lifting Stone he earned yesterday.

Deciding what attribute to double was an easy choice. Cheng Yang chose to double the number of slots available.

Low-level Warriors without a sub-class were nearly useless as damage dealers. They couldn't act very aggressively, couldn't attack from a distance, and were always under high pressure. However, they were an essential part of every team as a tank. So long as the Warriors in a team could block melee-type monsters, everyone else could focus on fighting to their best ability.

Unfortunately for them, Warriors were destined to be cannon-fodder. As such, Cheng Yang wanted to maximize the amount of cannon fodder in the army.

Thus, doubling the number of Warriors in Phoenix Village was a natural choice.

When he was done, Cheng Yang called Old Lee over to facilitate the class change ceremonies of the new Warriors.

Finally, Cheng Yang started the last research topic for the High-Grade Priest statue.

Once the research completed twenty hours from now, the number of Priests in the village would increase once more. Cheng Yang would also be able to see if the bonus from the Statue Lifting Stone carried over between level-ups.

Throwing the question to the back of his mind, Cheng Yang took Liu Wei with him to Joyous River Village.

Since the road built by the gods was usually clear of monsters, it took them less than half an hour to arrive.

At the time, Liu Hau was out farming monsters. So, Cheng Yang left Liu Wei in the village and followed the direction of the wall guards to find Liu Hau's hunting party.