With flying cavalry as backup, the whole force pulled to within the stone wall. Instead of a ring around the mine, they only had to form a shield wall in the gate. Anyone that wanted to come over the wall would have to deal with the Vulture Geckos. The work picked back up again and the fortifications were completed without any further interruption. The wall rose higher and higher. Their makeshift quarry, a rocky hill, had already disappeared and now a squad of Vulture Geckos were using Storage Rings to carry dozens of huge rocks back and forth from a place outside of the Cloudmetal Consortium perimeter. They had thought about preventing the action, but Black Saber had prepared his hundred elites for battle. The Consortium backed down again.

Li Song on the other hand, was not willing to back down. He gave an order to one of their subordinates and fixed a chilling smile on Li Zhen, “If the detachment from the main branch arrives and we haven’t already secured a deal, we will seem incompetent! Don’t try to stop me, Sister.”

Li Zhen merely shook her head. Li Song’s plans did not include the direct action of the Consortium, and he was paying out of his own pocket this time. She wanted calmer heads to take over, but she could tell her brother was taking this matter as a personal affront rather than the business deal it actually was. What did it matter to them if a local mercenary company suffered large losses? They’d already been paid handsomely for their services. The outcome of the job was up to them.

For the rest of the day, and the next one after, the Jade Horde worked tirelessly upon their defensive fortifications. The wall rose up thirty feet in the air now, and a wooden rampart was built on the inside so the Hoplites could patrol the perimeter. Sage had specially refined a stone gate to be lighter and stronger than normal. The number of arrays had been increased from one to a dozen. It was quite a large expenditure of manpower and materials, but with the Vulture Geckos, they were able to pick up supplies at the nearby towns. The whole thing put a large dent in Sage’s funds, but if they could hold out against the Cloudmetal Consortium’s reinforcements, they were sure to get a huge payday.

As night fell, Sage made a tour of the mine compound. When the local stone had run out, work had slowed down greatly so much of the workforce started clearing the nearby forest. The new lumber was turned into the ramparts and a set of buildings. A huge barracks, a storehouse, and a large hall. They already had plans for a stone keep to be built on top of the mine itself, so for now the large hall was acting as a sort of headquarters. Sage had been focused completely upon setting up array formations, and had left the other buildings to be handled by his subordinates. Now that he was finished with the arrays he was just taking a look at the other buildings to plan out how to protect them.

I already set up an array to block underground sappers, and another to douse flaming arrows. That should be good enough.

If they made a deal with the Consortium, nobody else would be brave enough to go against them. If they couldn’t come to an agreement with the Consortium then that meant the whole place would probably already be destroyed anyway. There was no sense in planning for a long term occupation at this point. That could all be worried about later if they were to survive through the immediate threat. Sage passed through the barracks and walked into the storeroom. One of the teams had been out purchasing food and water, stacking up Storage Chests and Storage Vats. With the storage treasures, the supplies for hundreds of troops could be stored in a small room. Sage even had many times more supplies than this hidden within the Universe Ring, but he wouldn’t reveal them easily.

Click!

Sage heard only the faintest noise before he felt a sharp pain in his chest. He had reacted to the unexpected noise by diving to the side. He was far from dodging the attack, but he had succeeded in taking a large silver bolt in the lung rather than the heart.

Assassin!

He knew it was far from over after one fired shot. Sage immediately released the full force of his Divine Breath. All the air he kept stored and compressed in his lungs exploded forth like a horizontal tornado. Due to the bolt piercing his lung, Divine Breath was not at full strength. He didn’t have full control or force, but given the circumstances he didn’t need to. The storehouse he was in was blasted into scrap, the wood from the structure and their supplies were blasted out over the area. A shadowy figure was launched into the air along with the rest of the room. Sage’s Spiritual Sense had swept out to identify threats and he felt a sharp response from behind him. It was like he’d touched a sharp object, blood started to run from his nose.

Urgently needing to buy time in order to activate Foresight, the Twin Soul flew out behind him. He felt another flare of pain. The killer behind him had instantly noticed the Spirit form and had a way to damage it. Sage cursed at the circumstances. The enemy behind him was only barely slowed down by the Twin Soul, while the one he’d sent flying into the distance was already darting back towards him. Destroying the storehouse had alerted the Hoplites nearby, but these killers would reach him again before his men did.

A huge boxlike metal object appeared in front of him and Sage leapt into it. He had just enough time to reach back and slam a door closed before the two killers caught back up with him. The big metal box rocked back and forth, parts of it deforming slightly from the killer’s strikes. Each of the killers struck it three times before giving up. Each of them threw out a kite shaped shadow and then leaped into the air. The two figures in black grabbed the underside of the kites and were carried off through the air, disappearing into the darkness of the night.

Sage stayed locked up tight for quite some time after they left. He was both healing his injuries and annoyed that he’d had to bring out another of his secret weapons. On the plus side, he hadn’t yet activated it. Given how dark it was, even the spies that the Cloudmetal Consortium had watching them would probably have little idea of the capabilities of this new device. Once he was sure the guards were on high alert and the two killers wouldn’t be able to double back on them, Sage finally came out of the metal box and stored it back into the Universe Ring.

The Hoplites who had been in charge of patrolling around the storehouse had been swallowed up into a cloud of darkness. They were all still unconscious, and Sage couldn’t blame them. Such killers were far out of their league. It just meant he needed to add a powerful sensory array formation to the mine. He’d been focused on making the place impregnable to an assault and overlooked infiltration. He got complacent, thinking that with a hundred eyes on guard nobody would be able to sneak in. While it was expensive, Sage returned to the hall and activated some of the defensive arrays. The Cloudmetal Consortium was going to arrive pretty soon, so he could afford the extra price to run the arrays. He also quickly wrote up a shopping list on a scroll and gave it to Black Saber.

His wounds healed up quite quickly, but he kept up the act. Covered in bloody bandages and resting in the hall with a heavy guard around him. Even if the assassination attempt didn’t succeed, he could let the Cloudmetal Consortium think it had left him weak and infirm. That might give them more confidence for the next negotiation if he were unable to participate in battle. Combined with the increased guard it might also discourage more attempts. If there was a personal and deep grudge involved it might encourage sending more assassins, but Sage still had more tricks. Also, if he showed a quick recovery they’d be more wary of him and next time they might hire more than just basic fifth rank killers.

Instead of guys in the low 50s, they might send a level 60 or even a 61.

While he could somewhat hold out against a Cultivator with a golden core making use of all his tricks, he was sure someone in the sixth rank would make short work of him. His true body, Foresight, and the use of many Formation Plates had given him the ability to contend with people in the fifth rank, but that was about the limit of his abilities. Even those battles were already terrifying experiences. Any hit he took caused immense damage and only by getting a glimpse into the future was he able to avoid death. Usually. The run in he’d had with the Fu Clan was still very fresh in his mind. He was not eager to get killed and start his cultivation over again for a third time.