Chapter 018: Treatment

Watching the green shuttle flying slowly in the sky, the dwarf warriors on the ground rushed after it nervously.
From above, it seemed the dwarves had adopted a defensive posture in their camp—clearly, Chenchen had caused quite a stir! Otherwise, they wouldn’t have taken defensive stances even on their own territory.
After some thought, Du Fan landed at the entrance of the dwarf camp.
Originally, this was just a temporary settlement without gates. But ever since the dwarves of the Bilu tribe moved in, they quickly built simple walls and gates. Though crude, these defenses could still be useful in case of war. Moreover, the Bilu tribe had only arrived here a couple of days ago.
When the green shuttle landed, a group of dwarf warriors immediately surrounded it. Du Fan observed carefully—one-third of these warriors still had youthful faces. Due to the continuous battles of the Bilu tribe, most of their elite warriors had been depleted. Along the Twilight Mountains, there were many magical beasts, and even though there was a non-aggression pact between the magical beasts and the dwarves, such agreements meant little to those that acted alone.
“Is your leader here?” Seeing this, Du Fan quickly retrieved the green shuttle and smiled at the group of dwarf warriors.
“Duke Du Fan! It’s Duke Du Fan!” someone among the dwarves exclaimed immediately.
During the internal strife among the dwarves, Du Fan had also been a prominent figure, and many warriors from the Bilu tribe recognized him.
“That’s right. I’ve just returned today. Is your leader here?” Du Fan asked politely again.
“Yes! Yes! Duke Du Fan, please come with me!” one of the dwarf warriors said promptly.
Smiling slightly, Du Fan followed the warrior.
Along the way, Du Fan walked silently, paying attention to the expressions of those around him. The dwarves showed anger and confusion, but Du Fan also noticed that their gazes toward him were mostly filled with expectation!

It seems that after going through many hardships, the dwarves of the Bilu tribe have managed to rid themselves of much of their impatience and directness. Under normal circumstances, if our own people scolded the dwarves, they would surely make a fuss around us.

Soon, in front of a slightly larger house, one of the dwarf warriors said to Du Fan, “Duke Du Fan, this house is the leader’s room.”

“Okay, I understand,” Du Fan replied with a smile to the dwarf warrior.

As soon as he finished speaking, Du Fan stepped into the room.

Upon entering, Du Fan saw three dwarves lying side by side in the room.

“Duke Du Fan! You’re finally back!” The former leader, now the head of the Bilu tribe, said with red eyes upon seeing Du Fan.

“Yes! Leader Li, what exactly happened?” Du Fan asked urgently, looking at the three dwarves lying there, unsure whether they were alive or dead.

“Duke Du Fan, didn’t we agree that our Bilu tribe could settle in your mines for free? All we asked was that you handle the sale of the items we produce according to our dwarf market prices. Was that not correct?” Leader Li said, trembling.

“That’s indeed what we agreed upon,” Du Fan nodded.

“But your Miss Chenchen insisted that we pay taxes as usual! My three guards, unable to tolerate this, cursed her a bit. As you know, we dwarves tend to curse when we’re upset, and that angered Miss Chenchen, who then attacked and knocked my three guards unconscious. Duke Du Fan, since you’re here, please save my three guards!” Leader Li pleaded repeatedly.

Nodding, Du Fan went over to the three guards and examined them carefully.

“They’ve just been afflicted by a soul-binding spell. Don’t worry, Leader Li!” Du Fan said.

He stretched out his right hand, with a milky-white glow swirling around it. He placed one hand on one of the dwarves’ heads, and the white light penetrated into the dwarf’s skull. Soon, the dwarf let out a soft groan and opened his eyes.

“Leader, why am I here?” The guard asked in confusion after waking up.

“Good, good! It’s good that you’re awake!” Leader Li said repeatedly upon seeing the guard awake.

These three guards were the remaining three holy-grade experts of the Bilu tribe. They had always served as the guards for the leader of the Bilu tribe. After the wars, the tribe faced a severe shortage of talents, especially warriors. To some extent, these three holy-grade experts had become the pillars of hope for the Bilu dwarves!

Since those three holy-grade experts were knocked unconscious by Chenchen, the tribe leader had been sighing day and night, extremely frustrated!

So when he saw Du Fan, he trembled with excitement.

Seeing Du Fan awaken one of the holy-grade guards, the tribe leader felt greatly relieved!

Under Du Fan’s treatment, the three holy-grade experts gradually regained consciousness. Seeing the guards awake, the tribe leader’s mood improved significantly.

Originally, his greatest concern was that after arriving in the Siluo Province, Du Fan might turn against them and force the Bilu tribe to submit by force. If that happened, the entire tribe would surely be doomed!

Now it seemed that Du Fan would at least not do such a thing.

“I’m truly sorry for all this!” Du Fan said sincerely. Seeing the three men still weak and disoriented, he took out three cups of Water of Life and placed them on the table.

“Guys, this is Water of Life from the elves. Drink it, and you’ll quickly return to normal. Give it a try,” Du Fan said with a smile.

The three guards looked at the tribe leader, their faces clearly expressing their hesitation.

“Drink it. If Duke Du Fan wanted to harm you, he wouldn’t have awakened you,” the tribe leader said to them.

Hearing this, the three guards didn’t hesitate anymore and drank the Water of Life right away. Soon, a fresh energy full of vitality began to flow through their bodies.

After drinking this cup of water, the three experts felt as though the realm they had struggled to break through for so long was finally showing signs of progress.

It should be noted that dwarves have extremely long lifespans, so it takes them much longer to advance in their cultivation. This sense of impending breakthrough was especially precious for these experts who had been stuck at the early stages of the holy grade for so long.

“The three of them had better find a place to cultivate quickly!” Du Fan could sense, through his keen intuition, the continuous fluctuations of energy in those three dwarves—such a situation was indeed a precursor to a breakthrough in their cultivation level. Hearing Du Fan’s words, the three dwarf guards immediately ran outside. “Duke Du Fan, what’s going on with them?” The leader Li didn’t have enough cultivation skill to detect what was happening to those three saint-class dwarf warriors. “It’s nothing serious. The water from the Spring of Life has triggered the energy they’ve accumulated over time. They’re looking for a place to meditate. If nothing goes wrong, their cultivation level will surely rise after they finish meditating,” Du Fan said with a smile. Hearing this, Leader Li finally felt relieved. “By the way, Leader Li, in our Siluo Province, there are four discovered mineral veins. Initially, I planned to distribute them to you over two days. But now that my territory has expanded by three more provinces, I’ve decided to give you another vein. This vein is more than enough to accommodate your Bilu tribe’s population,” Du Fan said. “Really? Does that mean our tribe won’t have to split up anymore?” Leader Li was overjoyed at this news. “That’s right. The mountains and rivers surrounding that vein stretch for 800 miles. Even if your Bilu tribe’s population increases fivefold, it will still be more than sufficient,” Du Fan said with a smile. Hearing this, a special glow appeared in Leader Li’s eyes—as if the revival of the Bilu tribe was right before their eyes. Du Fan sighed inwardly. He feared he would never see the revival of the Bilu tribe. For the dwarf race, it takes 200 years for a dwarf infant to grow up into an adult. For the Bilu tribe to thrive again, it would likely take the efforts of three generations—or 600 years. Six hundred years still seemed like an extremely long time to Du Fan. Of course, Leader Li didn’t think so. Six hundred years was merely a relatively long period for the dwarf race. In fact, it wouldn’t even leave much trace on Leader Li’s face. “However, that vein is in the Ohai Province. It will take about eight days to get there from here,” Du Fan said. “Eight days? That’s not a problem at all,” Leader Li repeated repeatedly after hearing this.

“Alright, since that’s the case, I’ll arrange for someone to take you to the Rio Tinto mines in the Ohio Province shortly. Consider it a trip this time! Along the way, I’ll have the locals prepare all the necessities to accommodate you,” Du Fan said with a smile.
“That can’t be right, that really can’t be right,” the leader of the Li tribe repeated after hearing Du Fan’s words.
“Hehe, since you’ve come with me, I can’t let you suffer any more on my territory,” Du Fan said seriously. “You’ve come all the way from the Twilight Mountains—your food supply must be running low, right?” he asked further.
“Yeah, it’s pretty low,” the leader replied, his face turning red.
Not only was their food supply low, but along the way, if the Bi Lu tribe hadn’t kept hunting and gathering edible plants in the mountains, many of them would have starved to death during the journey from the Twilight Mountains.
For the dwarves, food had always been a scarce resource. After all, the Twilight Mountains weren’t suitable for growing crops. It was precisely this lack of food that greatly restricted the growth of the dwarf population.