Sage wasn’t stupid enough to think that the Emerald Hoplites could be left alone. He was conducting missions here in Bronze Tiger province for a few reasons. First, to test the capabilities of the Hoplites. Second, to raise the reputation of the Jade Horde. Third, and most importantly, he aimed to recruit talents. It would be far too suspicious to have only Emerald Hoplites in his mercenary company. While it wasn’t an unheard of thing for demi-humans to form their own groups, they were treated as somewhat second class citizens in many places. Most of them chose to migrate towards the Tianren Kingdom for this reason, making them somewhat rare in the neighboring nations.

After doing a few dozen missions, his Black Dog Company badge had finally been ranked up to Silver. The ranking was an indicator of an individual’s strength. Black Iron, Copper, Silver, Gold. Four ranks to denote cultivators from the 2nd to 5th rank. A Qi Building cultivator was considered at the level of a child in the cultivation world, so they weren’t even allowed to join the Black Dog Company. Sage’s personal strength had fallen somewhat after his metamorphosis, but he was still level 43: rank 4, stage 3. He’d already regained one stage while doing mercenary missions, but since he felt it more important to establish a greater reputation for the Jade Horde, he didn’t want to go into seclusion for training. He could feel that he would improve far faster than in the past, especially since it was his third time in the early stages of rank 4, but it could wait. The longer it took, the better grasp he could have over his new abilities.

Sage didn’t want the Jade Horde to seem too impressive, so the Emerald Hoplites that he registered we’re all leveled to the mid and late 30s. If a completely unknown group showed up with a hundred Formation Building members, it would definitely turn heads. It could be explained as a new demi-human tribe entering the human mercenary world, but he felt it more prudent to be cautious. Since he didn’t want to reach too high too fast, the Jade Horde stayed as a Copper rank team. Since Sage was their only registered Silver rank member, it was better to keep things modest for now. The mercenary world was a bit different from that of sects and big clans. Most of those in the mercenary world were those without heaven defying talents and other extraordinary paths to glory.

They were just like Sage had been long ago. People with average or low level talents that didn’t want to join a sect just to be the lowest man on the totem pole. Instead of being servants for others, they choose to accept a lesser status in order to keep their freedom. The life of a soldier for hire instead of cannon fodder for the highest echelons of society. Given the lack of resources and lower talent levels, most mercenaries didn’t have a lot of advancement in their cultivation levels. They would spend years if not decades at each stage, and only the luckiest ones would improve their rank. With all this in mind, teams were formed of mixed level mercenaries and the teams held their own ranks. It wasn’t an indicator of the average strength or the minimum strength of the members, but more of a hierarchy between teams.

Sage, as a Silver badge, was the second strongest rank in the company. The Jade Horde had only earned a Copper ranking, but that was the mark of it being a legitimate team. Any team that registered would start as Black Iron so that level of team badge was practically useless as anything other than a signifier that they followed Black Dog Company rules. Now that the Jade Horde had reached Copper it meant they could apply for many more assignments. Most of the jobs for Black Iron teams were those assigned by the Black Dog Company itself. It was only after reaching Copper that most outside forces would choose to hire a mercenary team. It was also when they could start recruiting.

Obviously, anyone could recruit for a mercenary team that was part of the company. That said, most mercenaries weren’t willing to form teams with strangers, or join Black Iron teams. On the other hand, once a team had reached Copper they would have an obvious sign of their competence and could more easily recruit other mercenaries. He chose the largest town in Moonfire County, the southernmost country in Bronze Tiger Province, and held a recruiting drive. The dozen registered Hoplites stood behind him in a perfectly straight row holding their shields and spears. They looked suitably intimidating as he ran the forty plus candidates through a series of tests. They were only basic fitness and fighting tests, nothing all that complicated. Then he picked out the top twenty four and lined them up opposite the Hoplites.

“You’ve all passed the first test, and if you so choose can now join the Jade Horde. Those who feel up to it can continue on with two more tests. Those that can persist will be given a higher ranking, and pay, in the team. Now then, anyone that can stand their ground against one of the hoplites for a full minute will continue on to the third test.”

There was a simple of chalk drawn in the dirt and the twenty four remaining realized the simplicity of the test and all of them chose to compete. A hoplite, with shield and a blunted spear, little more than a padded staff, stood opposite from them. The trainees also had to use blunted weapons and all they had to do was keep from being pushed out of the ring for a minute. A simple enough task, but the Hoplites didn’t make it easy. Their ancestral memories for combat were filled with formation knowledge, but they really only had three combat styles. They knew how to harass, hold ground, and advance. Harassing was to be used with javelins, or bows, and mainly consisted of attacking from range and keeping on the move. Holding ground was pretty simple, they knew how to build fortifications, form a shield wall, and how to adapt their shield wall and fortifications against different types of attacks.

What they did now was to advance. They held up their shields with their spears poking over the top, marching steadily towards their target. Their spear darted out to strike at any openings the opponent presented and when they got close enough they lowered their shoulder and smashed their shield against the enemy, knocking them backwards. Sage didn’t waste any of the Hoplite’s limited ancestral memory capacity on complicated tricks and fighting techniques. They only knew how to shoot arrows, thrust spears, and swing swords at the least armored part of an enemy they could see. Most of the trainees had a hard time at first. They easily fended off the crude spear thrusts, but then they got smashed backwards and nearly thrown out of the ring. Nearly a quarter of them ended up failing and getting knocked out, but the rest quickly recovered and showed a remarkable number of different skills and tricks.

Mercenaries didn’t advance all that fast, but it also meant they had many years to perfect the skills and techniques they learned. They weren’t constantly advancing and changing, they didn’t have to keep adjusting to different power levels and physical capabilities. They became experts at using what they had and long amounts of time spent on the road escorting caravans gave them a lot of time to share tricks and tips between each other. The imposing, yet simple minded, Hoplites weren’t all that hard to avoid for a minute, and a few of them even knocked the Hoplites out before the timer was up.

There were still 17 of the trainees left for the last test, and Sage had already picked out a couple that had impressive levels of skill. The remaining 17 were quite pleased as the testing process so far was pretty simple, so they expect the same from the last test. That is, except for some of the most veteran mercs, they seemed to have an idea of what to expect. Of course, the last test was the most difficult, and when they saw it, the majority of them let out pained groans. Sage sliced some large trees in half lengthwise and created a bunch of crude long tables. Each of the trainees sat down on a log with a scroll, inkwell, and quill in front of them.

“The final test is a written exam. You have two hours to finish. Begin!”