The Strongest Businessman

Unable to come up with a possible answer to his question, Dylan could only shake his head.

'I'll just have to figure it out.' Dylan thought to himself. Dylan dismissed this thought for now because the information and lead were to scarce. He turned his attention to the journey ahead.

Dylan and company proceeded with their journey. Having no mounts with them, they were forced to travel by foot. They travelled by day and rested at night. Their belongings were all stored in the 16 storage rings that they got from the fight against the rebel army.

The storage rings had the capacity of 20 cubic meters each. That is why they were able to store their clothing, food and beverages, money, weapons and manuals. They had no problems with supplies as they prepared enough food for everyone to eat for 2 whole months.

They travelled an average of 150 kilometers a day which was already quite slow despite all of the being above Spirit Veins Realm.. They crossed hills and fields as well as forest in just a week. Dylan and hus employees did not slack off as they did their training at night during their night shifts.

Dylan instructed each one of them to pick a pair of Movement techniques and Battle Techniques to learn during their travels. The collection of manuals they had were many. There 40 sets of Low Spirit Rank Techniques, 23 sets of Middle Spirit Rank Techniques and a set of High Spirit Rank Technique!

Among the 40 Low Spirit Rank Techniques, there were 20 Battle Techniques and 11 Movement Techniques​ as well as 9 Secret Techniques while among the 23 sets of Middle Spirit Rank Technique, there were 12 sets of Battle Techniques, 8 sets of Movement Techniques, and 3 Secret Techniques. The sole High Spirit Rank Technique was a High Spirit Rank Technique called the Triple Tiger Breaker that the three tanks practiced.

Dylan presented that manuals to them but he excluded the Low Spirit Rank Techniques because they were all commonly used and would not really increase the strength of the employees that much. But Middle Spirit Rank Techniques could provide significant increase in strength even in the Initial Mastery of the technique and it could progress even further depending on the level of mastery that a cultivator trained a certain technique.

Dylan also said that the first three to be able to reach the Expert Mastery of their respective techniques will be the one to cultivate the Triple Tiger Breaker. This further ignited the desires of the employees to grow stronger because they knew how helpless the powerless is in the face of overwhelming might.

They wanted to be able to have the strength to fight for themselves and for the ones important to them. They don't want to stay weak and abused like what happened during the fight at Gardenford Restaurant.

Seeing the desire and intent of his employees, Dylan nodded approvingly. But he knew that the reason for them wanting to become stronger was because the powerlessness they felt with the fight against Byron. But, he knew that this scar in the past would give them the drive in order to become stronger and not let the same thing happen ever again.

For the second week of travel, the group encountered 5 bandit attacks at a large grasslands already. Fortunately, all of them were only in the Spirit Veins Realm so nothing bad truly happened. These encounters even became the employees' avenue to try out their newly learned techniques in battle. Dylan did not interfere with the the clash of his employees and the group of bandits for that reason. They were able to finish the bandits with​ ease.

Dylan was quite satisfied at the rate of the improvement that his employees were doing. At the end of the second week, Dylan used the excuse of everyone's rapid Improvement in strength to distribute the 89 Spirit Stones that they gained from the corpses of the rebel army. He each gave them a Spirit Stone to use to quickly improve in strength.

The employees felt touched with Dylan's generosity to them. They had the urge to reject but could not due to the impending need to grow stronger. They all thanked Dylan individually and cultivated the Spirit Stones for that entire night.

Dylan took the responsibility of watching over his employees as they cultivated. The Spirit Stones were useless to him to begin with so it would be better for him to gift it to his employees that will enable them to quickly grow in strength.

After guarding his employees for a whole night, Dylan let out a sigh of relief as there was no trouble that came during his employees' cultivation retreats. Dylan was also satisfied by the results of the training that Jack, Roland, Larry and the others had.

Every single one of them has reached the 8th level of Spirit Veins Realm and above! Some even reached the 9th level of Spirit Veins! Although most was only able to reach the 8th level, all of them were already able to unlock 75 spirit veins which meant that they were already at the Pinnacle stage of the 8th level! Among the 81 employees, 21 were able to reach the 9th level. Within that number, 11 reached the Initial stage of the 9th level, 7 reached the Intermediate level and 3 reached the High 9th level Spirit Veins Realm

The reason for their sudden leap in strength is because of the pure spirit energy that the Spirit Stones contain is much more superior than the natural energy they possess. By refining the Spirit Stones, they were able to fuse the spirit energy and the natural energy and created an influx of energy that supported their breakthroughs for two levels. Additionally, refining the Spirit Stones' spirit energy will enable them to have an easier time to breakthrough to the Awakened Spirit Realm in the future.

Such results went beyond Dylan's expectations especially the three who reached the High 9th level Spirit Veins: Jack Hale, Arnold Palmer, and Tom Watson. He was especially shocked for the latter two because according to his memory, Arnold was only a Initial 7th level Spirit Veins cultivator while Tom was at the Intermediate stage of the same level. Although he was stunned, Dylan still smiled because their sudden growth in strength would only mean that their desire to become stronger is burning like flames.

After working together to prepare the breakfast, Dylan decided to do a celebratory feast for the amazing progress that his employees had made. It was a truly joyous occasion and everyone ate happily and chat merrily with each other.

After the festive occasion, Dylan gathered his employees because he wanted to talk about something.

"Sir Dylan, what do you want to talk about?" Larry asked.

"For the next bandit attack, let's surrender." Dylan calmly smiled.

"What?! Why do we have to surrender?" The employees were shocked and strangely answered together.

"Don't worry, I have a plan. So for today, we will camp in this area." Dylan smiled with confidence. Knowing their boss, he will surely have a plan especially with the that confident smile hanging on his face.

Like what Dylan instructed, they camped there for the whole day.

Several kilometers away, a scout was watching their every movements with the use of a telescope-like artifact from a bundle of grass. After watching for several hours, the scout carefully moved backwards and ran to a hill. On the hill, it could be observed that there is a large hole that that created a large cave. The scout entered the cave in the hill and inside was a bandit troupe that was about 200 in numbers.

"Boss, I have sighted a camp of 81 people and all are within the Spirit Veins level about 3 kilometers away from my station. They seemed to be taking a rest after their travels. Should we send the troops and capture them?" The bandit reported to the one who was sitting one a throne made from bones which appeared to be the leader of the bandit troupe. He was a Pinnacle 12th level Awakened Spirit Realm practitioner!

"Oho, are they rich?" The boss bandit said intriguingly with his raspy and hoarse voice.

"From the looks of it, boss, they are. They just had a feast of spirit beast meat like it was nothing!" The scout reported and grinned.

"Hahaha, it seems like this group is some sort of meat business! Another dumb group of travellers who travel without steeds! Hahahaha! It seems like we're going to have meat for dinner, boys! Let's raid them! Take half of the troupe in order to intimidate them! Bring all 100 Jagger Wolves as well! Make them surrender or kill them all!" The boss bandit ordered his men to raid Dylan and his employees while laughing.

"Yes, sir. Hehehe." The scout chuckled while grinning.

Half an hour later...

"Boss, they surrendered so we brought them here. The manager was so scared when he saw us coming and started begging the moment we got to their camp. They are also quite wealthy, boss. We also have A-grade beauties with us here. Hahahahaha! We've truly strucked it rich this time, boss!" The Scout was laughing loudly the moment they returned.

"Hahahaha, excellent! We're going to feast on not only food but also beauties! Nice work, Dave!" The boss laughed in response also.

"Hahahaha, thank you, boss! Of course, boss has the first pick to everything! Be it treasure or beauties,​ Rodney the Executioner, will have it all!" Dave praised the boss which was named Rodney.

"Very good! You will be the next to pick after me! Hahahaha!" Rodney laughed as he approached Dylan.

" Hmm, oh I like the two beauties who seemed to be like twins. Hahaha, come and bring those beauties to me. Oh, you must be the spineless and cowardly Manager they have? You have an annoyingly handsome face with you. Fine, I'll kill you, first!" Rodney pointed at Mary and Marie and had his subordinates fetch them. When he looked at Dylan's outstanding looks, he was annoyed so he decided to kill him first.

"No, please don't kill me. I- I will do anything. Just don't kill me. I beg of you!" Dylan pleaded as he was trembling.

"Hahaha, that's it beg! The more you beg, the more it would be to kill you! Now, die!" Rodney laughed even maniacally as his sword slashed down to Dylan's neck.

But what happened next was something the bandit troupe never would have imagined to happen. The "spineless" manager broke the constraints for a Spirit Veins Cultivator easily and leisurely evaded the attack that Rodney did as he retaliated by cutting of his left arm which held the sword.

"Arrrrrghhhhhhh! What-what weren't you supposed to be a spineless and weak manager? How come you're​ this strong?!" Rodney was ashened face and was trembling as he felt like the one in front of him is the Angel of Death.

'Was my acting that convincing? Maybe I could have won an Oscar as an actor back at Earth if I tried to act. Hahahaha.' Dylan joked to himself.

"Well, that's what you call acting. I and my employees just acted to make your men lead us to your hideout. The truth is I was able to sense that young dude right there hours ago. Seeing that he was only at sixth Level Spirit Veins Realm, I estimated​ the strength of the boss which would be you around the Awakened Spirit Realm at the very least. Of course, I wouldn't have made that conclusion if it wasn't for the previous attacks that we experienced. So, I decided to station ourselves to that area so that the scout would be able to scout us." Dylan explained.

"You sensed from that far?" Dave was shocked as his face was already white because he kept on insulting this man on their way to this hideout. He and Rodney had the same thought in mind. 'I shouldn't have offended this man.'

Dylan did not reply to Dave's question because he himself was unsure why he was able to meticulously​ scan his surroundings via observation. It all started to happen ever since he comprehended the Law of Business. His vision and senses has become more sharp to an extremely high level that he was able to see Dave who was hiding in the bundle of grass 3 kilometers away!

Dylan released his employees from their contraints by simply slashing it.

"Has anyone told you that the name Rodney isn't very intimidating? Even if you add the title "the Executioner", it will just sound absurd" Ronald couldn't help but speak out.

The employees laughed out loud when they heard Ronald's comment.

"You fucking brat! Men, kill them all! Leave none alive!" Rodney hated his name being insulted the most! He was so enraged as he held his bleeding shoulder.

"Kiiiillll!!!" The bandits attacked from all sides.

"Shut up!" Dylan loudened his voice as he released a "Crescent Moon Slash" that killed 30 bandits at the 7-9 level Spirit Veins in an instant!

This sudden strike caused a deterrent to the bandit troupe. A casual attack could kill 30 Spirit Veins cultivators?! They stopped on their tracks and did not attack any longer. They were too​ shakened by the amount of strength that Dylan possessed.

Although it may seem casual, it already depleted 20% of Dylan's energy reserves but Dylan still needed to maintain his stand in order to maximize the effects of the deterrence.

"Nice hideout, you've got here. But I'm much more interested in your mounts than your hideout. So, hand them over." Dylan spoke as he scanned the area.

"So you won't be killing us if we hand them over?" Dave asked.

"Of course...all of you would still be killed." Dylan calmly spoke.

"What? Why?!" Dave cried indignantly together with the entire bandit troupe.

"I'm pretty sure this isn't the first time you've started doing this type of thing. From the condition of you're hideout, it seems that you've done for a couple of years now and I could only imagine the numver of people you've killed and families you've caused suffering to. Even if I let you off, you will still regroup and continue to kill people somewhere else. That is why I will kill all of you or you could start repenting by comting suicide here and now!" Dylan stated with his expression calm but his voice as cold as ice.

"I- we..." The bandits couldn't rebut.

Some regretted their wrongdoings and committed suicide but there were also some who tried to escape and executed by Dylan and his employees.

After gathering their loot and the mount, they burned the cave and prayed for the victims of the bandit troupe to rest in peace.

With their newly gained mounts, their speed of travel improved to 400 kilometers a day.

One month passed...

A group of people riding Jagger Wolves arrived at the walls of the Inner Proximity City-Thunder Clouds City.

"Finally, we've arrived." Dylan smiled at the entrance of this city because he knew this is where their new stage will be!