When Gu Hang raised his second finger and proposed his second condition, Matins was already numb.
Even the kind of oath that he had just taken, chanting along with the Priest of the battle group, what other condition could there be that he couldn’t agree to?
And indeed, the second condition that followed, along with the third condition that came closely after, didn’t seem too demanding—not from their post-oath perspective.
Gu Hang’s second condition was that the battle group must unconditionally obey all of his orders.
No problem, obedience is obedience, what else does pledging loyalty mean?
However, it was the third condition that gave them some worry.
This condition stated that all future new members of the Phoenix Battle Group, from recruitment to training, would be handled solely by Gu Hang.
Essentially, this was to take over the training of T1-level soldiers, as well as training ‘political officers’ at Loyal Heir Academy.
The former was to raise the trainees’ basic qualifications as much as possible because according to the traditional ways of cultivating interstellar warriors, bringing in a boy just over ten years old would mean at least five to six years of training, or seven to eight years at most, to select the best out of the good ones upon reaching near adulthood.
That was too slow, Gu Hang couldn’t wait for such a slow nurturing process.
He needed to produce soldiers rapidly!
By directly spending gift points, he could bring talented boys up to the T1 level, which is a far more reliable method.
Not everyone could be trained to the T1 level; during the times Gu Hang used the [Soldier Card] function for training, he had often come across situations where no further enhancement was possible. That was related to the soldier’s innate potential.
But that was also good, in a way. If out of a hundred boys, there are those who could be raised to the T1 level by the [Soldier Card], it would prove that their innate potential was quite impressive. If they didn’t even possess the potential to endure the upgrade to T1 level by the [Soldier Card], then there was no point wasting gene seeds on them, nor their own lives.
This indirectly served as a rather useful selection feature.
Those who were eliminated, those who couldn’t be promoted to the T1 stage, wouldn’t go to waste either. If they didn’t have the aptitude to become interstellar warriors, they could well enter the 10th Special Warfare Brigade to become special forces.
Being a Stormtrooper was also quite honorable.
As for the regular training, a visit to Loyal Heir Academy was certainly necessary. Before those young men became interstellar warriors, they must first receive proper education in loyalty.
Matins had doubts about this, not because of ideological training.
The entire battle group had already sworn allegiance to the Military Governor, what else was there to fret about?
What worried him was whether the Military Governor knew how to train interstellar warriors.
Gu Hang had no explanations for this, just as he wouldn’t explain how he intended to obtain gene seeds.
As for how to deal with Matins’ doubts, that was actually quite simple.
Gu Hang said a few words to him, his speech was very tactful, but the meaning was very direct: next month he planned to conduct the gene seed implantation surgery, did Matins have the capability with the regular methods of cultivating interstellar warriors to train a suitable candidate within a month?
Even if picking from those more than two hundred youths already undergoing training at the Phoenix Monastery, none suitable could be found.
It’s not that the training method for interstellar warriors was inadequate, but the problem was the scarcity of training time. The three consecutive failures of surgery in the past were not only due to the gene seeds not being properly preserved, resulting in decreased viability, but also another significant problem was the inadequate quality of the candidates.
If you can’t handle it, then I might as well do it myself.
In the end, Matins had no choice but to accept.
…
After seeing off the four members of the Phoenix Battle Group, Gu Hang, left alone, unusually asked someone to bring him a glass of wine and sat drinking by himself.
He did not show emotions like excitement or happiness on his face, but he was indeed very pleased.
The complete allegiance of the Phoenix Battle Group was of great significance.
The core point was certainly not those four veterans.
If it were just about borrowing their strength, there was no need to insist on their allegiance; a normal mission commission would suffice.
The greater value of this event was that Gu Hang could finally use the gene seed exchange function without too much concern to rapidly produce his own soldiers.
Unleash the seal!
Interstellar warriors are by no means a cos-effective type of soldier. The more than two hundred gift points required to cultivate an interstellar warrior, plus the cost of a set of equipment, could arm one or two infantry divisions. And yet a single interstellar warrior might not be able to defeat an entire division.
But that’s not how it should be measured. Many problems that infantry divisions can’t solve need top-tier solo combatants like interstellar warriors.
In the battle at the Quintet, if it weren’t for the efforts of Matins and the other three, giving Gu Hang four more infantry divisions wouldn’t have mattered; they wouldn’t have been able to prevent the Beastman Overlord from destroying the core engine room.
However, as impatient as Gu Hang was, he couldn’t immediately start producing soldiers.
He had run out of gift points previously.
But no matter, things could be prepared in advance.
Selecting young teenagers with potential as reserve warriors, tossing them into Loyal Heir Academy for learning, all these could be started in advance.
…
A month quickly passed.
The situation underwent many new changes.
In the Beiqing Valley Region, a sizeable battle erupted.
The Central Group Army’s efforts to cut through, compress, and eliminate the jungle were effective. The Aberrant Beasts hiding in the jungle became desperate.