The next morning, Alex woke up early as usual. After having completed his morning training and he practiced a repetition of the Unnamed Technique in his room, but this time he didn't stop because he was very close in breaking the barrier to the next grade.
After being in meditation for an hour, Alex felt his body loosening suddenly. He felt his muscles and tendons becoming stronger as the impurites gets discharged and the amount of pure Qi also tripled after breaking through 5th grade of Body Tempering Realm. Even his spiritual power had increased which in turn increases his spiritual sense range and density.
Even with his body strength, Alex can fight head on with a 9th grade realm master and still have a high winning percentage. He made yet another breakthrough in his cultivation, what he needs to do now is to check the Myriad Book of Changes and see if it had unlocked any new feature for him.
Sitting in the same position, Alex appeared in his soul space. There he felt the strong connection between him and the book same as before.
Moving his hands on the book, a panel popped out with all the 4 option. Giving a look at the amount of currency, Faith and Merit points he had gathered till now really made his mood to go downhill. It was not enough to buy a single good thing.
'Maybe I should try using the random roll function again' Alex murmured in a low voice.
He checked every option to find if there's anything new before clicking on the Function menu to use the Random roll option. But here he really got the big surprise, a third new option has appeared just after Inventory and Random Roll option from the options which grey options.
"…Artificial Puppet Personnel" even though the name was self-explanatory, it might really be something else than what Alex is immagining .
"Oh, you got some dumb ass luck, you stupid pig" said the heavenly Spirit who suddenly appeared behind him like a ghost.
"You know what this is?" Alex relaxed a little hearing after hearing her voice.
"All I can say is that you have won a small lottery. This option had a very very low chance for appearing now. You might not have unlocked this option till you have crossed at least 5 major realms. Congratulation you got yourself an army." The heavenly spirit said with a look that says 'mister you just got lucky'.
"Army?"
"Just open the damn option and you will understand. Stop asking such silly question."
Ignoring the bookworm Alex clicked on the panel with some expectations.
A long list of names appeared in front of him. Merchant, Sailor, Chef, Tailor, Manager, Commander, Thief, Assassin, Spy, Carriage driver, Carpenter etc. Checking them all one by one, Alex finally understood what she said about getting lucky. He literally got an army that will never disobey him and will be fully loyal to him no matter what happens.
These artificial puppets have the same appearance as humans and are just as intelligent. Except that they cannot reproduce, these puppets are not any different than real humans.
Alex can buy these puppets with the real currency that is gold and use 1 point of Faith energy for each he purchase. He can choose puppets with different skills and professions that are normal like Merchant or prominent like Alchemist.
The good thing is that even the puppet with normal profession like merchant or chef can become a highly trained soldier at any time and fight when the need arises.
They all have strong survival skill as soldiers. One limitations is that his puppets cannot have cultivation higher than him. For example, he can choose a puppet having Chefs profession with normal currency like gold. It will also have all the skills that a Mortal trained soldier should have. Cultivation levels same or below his can also be chosen, but then he would have to pay extra money.
Alex quickly wanted to buy one first and see if he has the right understanding.
Alex had stored some of his money in the inventory which amounted to 200 gold coins. The price for a puppet with normal skill like sailor or carpenter with no cultivation is 10 gold coins. To upgrade their cultivation Alex need to give 100 gold coins for every grade. If he wants his puppet to have cultivation equaling to 3rd grade of Body Tempering Realm then Alex needs to pay 310 which also includes the basic price for normal Puppet.
Alex bought one sailor puppet with cultivation of 1st grade. He can also choose the gender and change the looks for free before purchasing.
The heavenly spirit explained after she saw Alex waiting for the puppet "Go outside, the puppet will appear in front of you in the real world approximately 1 minute after your purchase. You can't bring it in your soul space, nor can it stay in inventory"
"Oh!" Alex then quickly woke up from his meditation. After a minute, a middle age man in his twenties suddenly appeared in the room like he was standing there from the beginning.
"Greeting master" Said the man with lifelike expression. If Alex didn't know about his identity, he might really mistake him for a real human. Even under his spiritual sense, Alex couldn't find any differences between himthe puppet and a real human.
"What can you do?" Ale satrted with a simple question first.
"Master, I can do any work related to the profession Sailor. I can also fight within the limit of my cultivation" replied the puppet.
He then explained the various skills that a sailor has in his arsenal like navigation, weather forecasting, can easily operate any ship made in this world etc.
Alex can also purchase a commanding skill for him so that the puppet can also command the non-puppet crew for maritime battle.
A sailor is very much different than a sailor with commanding skill as the latter can use effective battle strategies to command the people under him and fight more efficiently.
This skill needs 500 gold coins; Alex didn't have that much money at this moment so he thought about purchasing the skill when he has enough money.