The next morning the group woke up and packed their things and made their way deeper into the forest. Van doing his best to remember his way around and figure out the place he had in mind. He remembered seeing a fairly large open area that would be perfect for his group the last time he was here, and only hoped he could get them on the right path towards it.

After spending half the day, they finally arrived at the place Van was searching for, far from the campsite they originally stayed at.

“This is it.” Van said with some relief, “the place we will be staying at for the next six months.”

Luna, Kella, and Anna looked at the place before them. Taking into account the small stream of crystal clear water, the large steep cliff hillside off in the distance, the large trees surrounding the area, and the small mound that they would probably make their base on.

Van pointed at the stream of water, “with that we have clean drinking water,” then pointed at the cliffside of in the distance, “and while far, we could probably check to see if there is anything to mine, I think I saw a cave last I was here.” then to the mound, “this will give us a nice view of the open area, and at the edges of the clearing the trees are big and crowded, so we probably won’t have to worry about monsters coming at us in a big horde or all at once, all the while we can chop them for their wood. What do you guys think?” He turned to hear their opinion.

Kella was first to answer, looking around with a discerning eye as if assessing the place's future defensive potential.

“It’s not bad… I’m sure there are better places than this, but it’s definitely decent by all regards.

Anna gave the place another look. “I’ve read the books about proper geographical locations for buildings and defensives, but I have no experience, so if Kella and master are fine with it, then so am I.”

Luna looked around, still a little nervous. “If you are sure this is a safe place, then it's fine… but if we're going to stay, we should get to making camp and the defenses now so we can sleep safely… ” worried that something may attack them during their sleep. She really didn’t like the thought of being surrounded by the forest, where anything can attack them in any direction.

“You're right,” Van said kindly, knowing that Luna had been a bundle of nerves the whole time they were making their way here. “I’ll get right on it to make sure we have a nice safe place to rest tonight.”

He then turned around and closed his eyes. (“hey, Isa! It’s time, get ready because I’m pulling you all through.”)

And he did just that a few seconds later, not really giving Isa or the rest of the girls anytime to prepare.

“Ugg, I kind of hate this.” Van thought as he pushed his small army slowly in two’s and three’s out of him. “It always feels so weird having so much stuff enter and exit me, in a way… it kind of hurts…”

(that’s because it should hurt.”) Ren’s voice all of a sudden rang through his head, grabbing Van’s attention. (“it’s not really normal to carry a freaking army or for that matter, a small kingdom in someone's own soul realm. Every time you bring too much in or take too much out, you're stretching and in some places, ripping the membrane of your soul realm. No matter how big or powerful, or how quickly you heal, that’s got to hurt.”) he said.

(“When you have the free time, make sure you do something about it, otherwise it will bite you later when you need it most. You don’t want to constantly make small holes or tears in your soul realm. It could cause problems. The same goes for when a soul bond dies like when Anna did when you fought yourself. Don’t think it’s a matter of just getting used to it, too much all at once can send you into shock. So some form of careful preparation to fix this should be done before it’s too late.”) he finished.

(“You couldn’t have told me about this before!?”) Van asked, annoyed.

(Well, I’m telling you now, right? Anyway, see ya.”) and then the connection on Ren’s end was cut and Van was left with himself again. He sighed in annoyance and promised to get back at him one day.

Deciding to push Ren out of his mind he turned to Isa who was the last to come out. “Did you enjoy the ride?” he asked, genuinely curious.

“It was… an interesting experience…” Isa said, unsure how to answer such a question. “I had never before believed a soul realm could be so… big…” as if she was still taken by the experience of going through such a wonder, something that would be mostly unheard of before.

“As Ren would say… that’s what she said.” Van thought but instead asked. “Was it uncomfortable?” a little worried that the experience might have hidden negative effects.

“Oh, not at all! I honestly wouldn’t mind going through it again. I just felt a little weird is all, but I quickly got used to it, and so did the rest of the girls. The only problem I can say is how empty everything felt. There were barely any birds or animals, no feeling of wind blowing through the landscape, few trees, and Lyn had to remind you that one time to turn your day into night. So… that was weird…”

Van went a little red with embarrassment. “Ya… sorry about that.”

Isa shook her head. “It’s fine, really. Anyway,” she said changing the subject. “Are we here?” looking around at their new surroundings.

Van inwardly promised to himself to make sure to add more stuff to his soul realm and a proper day and night cycle that didn’t revolve around him having to check in every time to make sure it was the right hour.

“Yes, and I need you and Kella to start getting to work on making camp. I had prepared a few tools beforehand, courtesy of my dad, so you should have everything you need to make a decent campsite and then we can start talking about cutting down a few trees and turning this into a proper fort.” Van said somewhat excitedly. “Also, I want you to tell the harpies to start scouting around and make sure there aren’t any immediate dangers we have to worry about.”

“No problem, I’ll make sure they get the message,” she said, giving Van a salute.

With a nod and a polite dismissal, Van sent Isa on her way. He then surveyed the making of his camp for a bit, proud of how diligent his goblins were in setting it up and how quickly they were getting at it.

He then remembered that he still had a few Annas still inside him and brought them out. Soon, twenty-three Annas were in front of him, and he gave the order for them to help out in the making of the camp. This left him with two Annas left inside him, plus the two Annas that followed him everywhere. For a total of twenty-seven Annas. In other words, their numbers increased again.

He addressed the Annas in front of him. “I’m going to go out for a bit and hunt around for any monsters. I want two of you to stick by Luna, she doesn’t seem to be feeling well. The rest of you split up and one group will patrol the perimeter and the other will help with setting up camp alongside the goblins, giving them direction as needed. Any questions?” When he got none he dismissed them and they all went on their way.

“At least they are all wearing proper clothing now.” Van thought as he walked away. Glad that they fixed the issue of not having enough clothes for the Annas before they left.

“Wait! Are you going somewhere?” Luna said as he passed through on his way out. A mix of concern for his safety and worry about being left behind on her face.

Van did his best to gently convey that everything will be alright. “Don’t worry love, I’ll be fine. I’ve hunted in these woods before. You don’t have to worry…” he then leaned and pulled her close, giving a gentle kiss on her forehead.

Luna accepted the kiss but didn’t seem to have fully accepted his leaving. Though she did not say anything as she watched his back recede into the forest. Nervous as she was.

Van moved into the forest, then started jumping around until he was high on the branches, slowly followed by the two Annas who were not used to moving around in a thick forest.

Van then started his hunt, using his aura to enhance his eyes, he looked for clues for anything he could hunt as he leaped from branch to branch in smooth and quick motions. Having to stop for the Annas every so often for them to catch up.

Soon he found what he was looking for. A small group of three wolves walked right beneath him. Nothing overly special about these wolves, unfortunately, just normal grey wolves. But by what he can sense of their mana levels, their mana cores must at least be sixth, seven, or higher.

Slowly, he pulled out his sword and started to use the technique his father taught him. The seven-layer sword slash technique. A silly name to be sure, but he wasn’t going to complain about how people named their attacks so long as they worked.

First and foremost he had to create a layer of aura around his blade, the first layer. Then compress it tightly, which he did. And with only that, his blade became sharper and if he so wished to, he could fling the energy out as an attack. But not yet.

He then set another energy layer that cost him twice as much aura than the first one and compressed it tighter around his sword until there was friction between the two layers. Through force of will and some heavy control, he forced the two layers to harmonize.

The seven-layer sword slash technique was a technique where each layer you add to the sword had to have double the energy of the previous layer. If one were to reach the maximum of the technique and reach the seventh layer, the strike is rumored to cut whole swathes of forest and small mountains. Though Van wasn’t so sure about that.

Either way, Van did an acrobatic leap through the air and with a twist of his body, sent the wave of energy from his sword down on the unexpecting wolves below.

Before the wolves even realized what was going on, one was already dead and the other two severely injured. The shockwave blast as the energy cut through the head of the first wolf continued through to hit the ground and blew the other two wolves away with one wolf having a shallow cut on his left side and the other having a shallow cut on its right from when they were walking alongside their leader.

Without hesitation, both Annas took the opportunity to jump from above and strike at the confused and injured wolves. Killing them instantly with their swords. After that, they got off and used a cantrip spell to clean the blood that got on their bodies.

Van frowned at the corpses of the wolves. Forgetting during his joy of hunting that he actually hated killing and seeing the corpse of innocent animals ruined. Then looking at the two Annas, realized that this must be their first time killing a living creature if their expression was anything to go by. Yet despite that, they carried out the attack flawlessly as their training took over. Making him feel impressed by how much they have grown.

“I should probably look for actual bad or dangerous monsters in the future. There's no honor in killing such weak prey, even if they are pretty big for wolves.” He then went up to the corpses and brought them into his soul realm.

He then looked up at Anna. “Let's head back, we’ve already been out here for a little over an hour, and we got what we need.”

The two Annas nodded and the group started to head back to the camp.

Entering back in camp, Van sat down near the center but out of the way of everyone else and prepared a magic circle for his use. Taking out the wolf corpses, he took out the mana cores with the help of some magic and placed them in the center of the circle. “Hmm, not bad, a six, a seven, and an eight rank mana core.”

He then concentrated, using alchemy, he split the cores into two. The six went down to five, the seven went down to five and so did the eight until he had three fifth rank mana cores. He then took the split off mana cores and combined two of them together to create a fourth-fifth rank mana core.

Van then wiped his brow, even though there wasn’t any sweat, it was still a hard task to do. Taking the cores out of the circle he then looked over to the corpses and used his blood magic to extract the blood out. He then concentrated the blood down and put it into a very large bowl. “Now then, mana infused monster blood, check,” then he took the spare mana core and crushed it, and added it to the bowl. “Crushed mana core, check,” he then took out a few herbs from his soul realm and added it to the bowl and then some black stuff. “Paint, herbs, and more… check.” he then added the mana stone from the wolves for good measure, crushing it beforehand.

After that, he started stirring the bowl, for the next fifteen minutes until it became viscous and looked ready and properly mixed. Setting that aside he put a fifth rank mana core into the circle and took some of the bones and added it to the circle. He then used magic again to rip the flesh from the wolves, because of course, he didn’t want to touch it himself and burned it to ash very quickly and added it to the pile. Then he took some of the pelts but made sure to keep most of it for later, and added it to the circle.

Taking a mana potion, he then concentrated, and for the next half hour, he started making shadow wolves. Soon he had four of them of equal strength and power, nodding in satisfaction at his work. He then called Isa mentally to come to him.

“You called?” Isa asked, wondering what Van wanted.

“Yes, can you please bring four hobgoblins to me? The ones you think are most deserving of gaining an upgrade.” Van said.

Isa tilted her head in thought and gave her an answer. “Yes, I think I know a few. Are you finally going to go through with your plan?” she asked, curious and growing a little excited.

Van smiled. “Yes, I think we can finally set things in motion to start making this army of ours truly something.

“Then I'll get right on it,” she said, quickly turning to get the goblins in question.

He then turned to Anna who was patiently waiting for him all this time. “Do you have the clothes for the hobgoblins I asked you to make?”

Anna nodded, “all right here, we had a lot of spare time to get good at making them. Unfortunately, we did not have the resources to make them into actual armor, and they were not as good as we wished we could make them.” she said a little sadly.

“Don’t worry about that, I’m sure they are perfect for what I need them for,” Van said, taking the four sets of clothes from Anna who took them out of her soul realm and handed them over.

Van then took the clothes, which were far better than the ones the goblins wore which hide practically nothing, and added them into the circle. Taking another potion, he then threw the wolf pelts in and concentrated. And with a bit of magic, the two items fused into one, becoming a set of long fur boots, clothes, and armor with a proper skirt. He also made sure to add some black paint to the mixture so as to darken the set and match with Isa. By the time he was done, Isa returned with four hobgoblins standing behind him.

Turning to address them, he told them to strip. “Alright girls, I want all of you to strip, and no, it's not for that.” completely dashing the look of hope on their faces before it had time to truly set in. Taking off their clothes, or rags as Van thought of them, they stood completely naked in front of him, showing off their nude form.

It was actually amazing how different hobgoblins could be from one another. Some were very lithe, and others had breasts that seemed a bit too big for their size. But in the end, they were all cute he supposed.

With a nod, Van took the bowl with black goop and got to work. Using his magic, he manipulated the goop to slowly hug their bodies, sometimes getting up close and personal, putting the paint on them himself, making his way, and working on them one by one. A little over an hour later and another mana potion and he was done, completing a set of magic tattoos and runic symbols all over their bodies that looked very cool and tribal if he did say so himself. With an emblazoned black sun on their backs and empty space on their thigh. The tattoos, of course, could disappear and reappear on the whim of the owner.

Summoning the shadow wolves he made, he then mixed them with the black paint and fused them into the tattoo network he made on the hobgoblins. The shadow wolves took their place on the thighs of the hobgoblins, matching Isa.

Taking a step back, Van nodded, satisfied with his work. He then handed out the new fur clothes and armor to them, which they wore happily, glad to not have to wear the rags anymore and a chance to don proper armor.

After that, Van took out some well-made spears, bows, shields, and swords and handed it to them. Something he had to beg and convince his father for, promising to put it to good use. Now the hobgoblins looked like a proper fighting force. Though he was going to have to find metal and figure out a proper way to get leather so that they would better match with Isa. Not to mention he only had a few more spare weapons to hand out before he ran out so he was also going to have to figure that out. And then he was going to have to figure out how to get more mana potions or at least a method to reduce costs so he can…

Van shook his head, not wanting to ruin the moment. Instead, he looked proudly at the small group in front of him and encouraged them to train harder from now on to prove their worth. Which they happily agreed to.

That done, Van decided to turn in early. It had been a long day after all, and he wanted to snuggle with his wife.