Fairy, Please Forgive Me, I Never Meant to Impersonate Your Husband - Chapter 19

Chapter 19: Sudden Wealth

The Spineflinger Centipede had no intention of leaving the dead brute alone. Instead, it lowered its head, clamped its jaws around the corpse, and swallowed him whole without chewing.

“Damn you! Give my brother back!”

By the time the surviving eldest brother charged forward, he witnessed the centipede devouring his sibling’s body. Rage flooded his veins as he raised his blade and slashed at the monstrosity.

The centipede dodged. Already wounded, it couldn’t afford a fierce battle, its strength would only wane further.

But the brute’s attack was a feint. His real goal wasn’t revenge but forcing the centipede aside to escape.

Perhaps he’d initially rushed in with vengeance in mind, but after seeing his brother’s strongest strike fail, fear had taken hold. Retreating into the insect swarm behind him was suicide, whereas the injured centipede before him posed a calculated risk.

His gambit was cunning—just not honorable.

Wu Yuan, observing from afar, shook his head in silent disapproval.

The eldest brother escaped—but not unscathed.

Though the centipede initially recoiled, it quickly retaliated, firing its last few dozen spikes into the man’s back as he fled. Pierced and shrieking, the brute vanished into the distance.

His desertion shattered the caravan’s morale.

The obese slaver boss howled curses, but no amount of rage could alter their fate.

Yet despair made men dangerous.

Cornered, the remaining fighters resisted fiercely. One by one, they fell—but not before slaughtering many more insects.

Even with the centipede and reinforcements joining the fray, only three wounded iron chariot beetles and a handful of millstone beetles remained standing by the end.

Every hound beetle lay dead.

As for the Spineflinger Centipede? It became the unluckiest “victor” of all.

Assuming the slavers were spent, it never anticipated the truth: Even a rabbit bites when cornered.

The fat boss, though weak in combat, was still a genuine Organ Refinement expert. While he couldn’t kill an iron chariot beetle alone, he had one final card—a Yuan Thunder Bomb, a true weapon of mass destruction.

Just as the centipede drooled over the boss’s succulent blubber, the bomb struck.

The explosion tore the monster in half, its carapace and flesh scattering in a gruesome rain. It died with its eyes wide open—outsmarted by prey.

Wu Yuan almost pitied it.

This thing died from sheer stupidity.

And its idiocy meant its surviving underlings would claim no spoils—because the fisherman was about to collect.

Wu Yuan led his team forward.

Wild iron chariot beetles were fearsome, especially three at once. But these were badly injured, their strength halved. Against Wu Yuan’s squad—armed with multiple Divine Arm Crossbows—they stood no chance.

The few remaining millstone beetles fared even worse.

With the enemies swiftly dispatched, the looting began.

An entire slave caravan’s wealth lay before them. Though much had been lost to chaos, the remaining spoils—scattered slaves, pack beasts, horses, and mountains of monster materials—left no doubt:

He was about to get rich.

Filthy, obscenely rich.

The haul included dozens of millstone beetles, over a dozen iron chariot beetles, and the Spineflinger Centipede’s massive carcass (minus its exploded upper half). Enough to fill two entire rooms in the station’s public vault.

The sheer volume forced Huang Tie and five couriers to ferry the first batch back while summoning reinforcements.

Soon, thirty additional hands arrived under Caiyu’s lead, rounding up slaves, livestock, and horses.

Fortunately, the Spineflinger had seemingly gathered all local insects beforehand, and demonic humanoids were scarce here. Multiple trips proceeded without incident.

After two straight days of hauling, every last scrap was cataloged and stored.

Five public vault rooms overflowed. Wu Yuan’s private vault neared capacity.

As for mundane supplies—grain, oil, cloth, common jade, iron ingots, metalware, salt, medicine, stationery, livestock feed—they crammed every remaining storage room.

Finally satisfied, Wu Yuan turned to Caiyu, who was gleefully finalizing the ledger.

“Give me the totals. Start with ordinary goods.”

Caiyu beamed. “At your command, Master!”

“Excluding grain, the common supplies alone could sustain 100,000 people in luxury for a year!”

Breakdown:

10,000 bolts of plain cloth

3,000 rolls of premium white satin

20,000 jin of common jade

1,000 dan (100 jin each) of iron ingots

1,000 sacks (100 jin each) of salt

300 barrels (200 jin each) of cooking oil

200 dan of medicinal herbs and drugs

2,000 dan of livestock feed

1,000 sets of high-end stationery

627 pieces of assorted metalware

2,785 common weapons/armor

890 tents/collapsible furniture

Grain Stores:

5,000 dan of coarse slave rations

1,000 dan of unpolished rice

2,000 dan of premium grains (including white rice)

→ Total: 300,000 jin

Meat:

700+ dead/injured livestock butchered

530,000 jin of edible meat

→ 50,000 jin preserved; 3,000 jin for immediate use

Estimated total value: 3,000 gold coins

“We lost 20-30% of common goods to fleeing pack animals,” Caiyu added ruefully. “But chasing them wasn’t worth the risk.”

Wu Yuan agreed. Station manpower was too tight for reckless hunts.

“Now—cultivation resources in the public vault. Appraised values.”

“Yes, Master!”

5,000 dan of mid-grade White Cloud Spirit Rice → 1,000 gold

20,000 standardized low-grade Yuan-qi spears → 2,000 gold

233 assorted Yuan-qi equipment (looted from dead warriors) → 60 gold

100,000 stalks of high-grade Moonlight Blossoms (1,000 boxes) → 10,000 gold

500 crates of high-grade Thousand Autumn Vines → 15,000 gold

Total: 31,060 gold

Wu Yuan grinned. “This caravan specialized in spirit rice, mass-produced arms, and bulk herbs. Slave trading was just a side hustle.”

At the mention of slaves, Caiyu’s expression soured—as if foreseeing logistical nightmares.

“Where did they even get so many? We’ve recovered 2,500+, and more fled into the wild. How do we house them all? Keep them in Redleaf Gorge indefinitely?”

Wu Yuan, however, saw only opportunity.

One could never have too many slaves.

If not for the lack of manpower to conduct thorough searches, Wu Yuan would have hunted down every escaped slave hiding in the wilderness.

Those fugitives would struggle to survive in the wild anyway—better to bolster his workforce than let them be slaughtered by monsters, torn apart by beasts, or starve to death.

Previously, the sudden influx of slaves had overwhelmed the relay station’s capacity, so he ordered the logging team to oversee a group of slaves in felling ordinary trees from nearby woods. The timber was hauled back to construct a wooden fort in the Crimson Leaf Ravine.

This fort had long been part of his plans, originally intended to house refugees fleeing Windreturn Town.

Its location was carefully chosen.

The ravine’s abundant crimson-leaf grass served as a natural barrier, dampening human activity’s allure to swarms of fiendish insects or demonic humanoids.

Of course, the fort couldn’t block the ravine entirely.

First, the ravine was a vital path to the Insect Demon Hills. Sealing it would risk clashes with passing mercenary bands.

Second, demonic humanoids and fiendish insects periodically traversed the ravine to venture beyond Crimson Leaf Cliff. Blocking their route would concentrate their forces, increasing the intensity of their assaults on both the relay station and the fort. What seemed like a defensive measure could become a death trap.

With a confident wave, Wu Yuan reassured Caiyu: “Don’t worry. Even with these slaves, I’ll still need refugees from Windreturn Town.”

“Really?” Caiyu’s beautiful eyes widened in disbelief.

Wu Yuan chuckled. “The relay station will keep expanding. I’ll need far more hands than a few thousand slaves. You’ll understand later.”

“Mhm! Mhm! Mhm!” Caiyu nodded vigorously. She trusted her boss completely—he was simply too capable.

Just a routine check on Stationmaster Chen’s return route had led him to a merchant caravan annihilated by fiendish insects, netting him mountains of supplies and slaves. Was there anything he couldn’t do?

“Go manage the storerooms. Report any issues immediately. Leave the fort to me—I’ve got it handled.” With that, he dismissed her.

Truthfully, Wu Yuan was eager to inventory his private stash—the real treasure trove from the caravan. But some things were best left unspoken.

“Yes, Boss.” Caiyu withdrew.

Wu Yuan strode outside while mentally accessing his private storage. He’d hastily dumped countless items inside—now it was time to assess their value.

Inventory:

Green Jade Corn (low-tier Grade-2 spirit grain): 1,000 dan (≈60,000 kg). Nearly mid-tier Grade-2, priced at 4 silver per jin—total value: 4,000 gold.

Heartwood Blossoms (mid-tier Grade-2 spirit herb): 100 boxes (10,000 blossoms). At 3 gold per blossom (bulk purchases were rare), total: 30,000+ gold.

Mid-tier spirit artifact long blades: 2 (left by the slain caravan guards). Worth 70 gold.

Supreme-grade spirit artifact—Dragon Mountain Mistrain Sword: 1 (the fat merchant’s relic). Value: 500 gold.

Mid-tier spirit artifact set—Dragon Mountain Autumn Robe (3-piece): Also from the merchant. 4,000 gold.

Coin chests:

1 chest of gold coins: 10,000 gold.

2 chests of silver: 20,000 silver (≈200 gold).

10 chests of copper: 100,000 copper (≈10 gold).

Spineflinger Centipede materials:

1,300 projectile spines.

Piles of chitin.

Hundreds of mandibles and antennae.

Most valuable: Two intact centipede eyes (undamaged by the Yuan Thunder Bombs). Total: 200 gold.

Ironchariot Beetle materials: 12 sets of bladed legs (spirit artifact-grade). 360 gold.

As for the dozens of Millstone Beetle parts? They didn’t even qualify for his private stash. And the worthless “mutt insects” (barely 100 copper for the whole carcass)? Disregarded entirely.

Total windfall (including 2,500 slaves): Over 100,000 gold. A staggeringly lucrative haul.

Wu Yuan hadn’t expected such luck—his dream memories held no record of this merchant-caravan-versus-insects mutual annihilation.

If the dreams predicted the future, then the future has already shifted. The dreams were now just a reference, not gospel.

He’d steeled himself for this. Adaptability was key.

Outside the relay station, slave logging teams drove towering pack beasts dragging entire tree trunks from beyond the cliffs.

Constructing the fort demanded vast quantities of timber. The safe harvesting zones near the station were too small, and dense human activity risked attracting monsters. Thus, they sourced lumber from the forests south of the cliff mouth—a marginally safer area, though still perilous.

Anticipating threats, Wu Yuan had tasked Huang You, Huang Tie, and Black Loach with recruiting 200 compliant slaves each to form militia squads.

The 600-strong militia comprised robust young men. Though lacking cultivation, they’d been handpicked by the caravan for their strength. In life-or-death struggles, they could still inflict damage.

Their weapons? 600 red-copperwood spears.

Discovered during logging, red-copperwood was an ordinary tree with unnaturally dense, hard timber—perfect for crude polearms.

Each spear was crafted from the tree’s toughest core, cut to three zhang (≈9 meters) lengths and sharpened with Yuan artifact blades.

No fancy techniques were needed. The militia simply fought in formation, leveraging reach to stab en masse.

Field tests showed promising results: Low-tier humanoids and fiendish insects retreated before the spear wall.

Only the weapons’ mediocre sharpness limited their effectiveness—unless striking weak points, they often failed to pierce tougher hides. With upgrades, even higher-tier monsters might falter.

To motivate the militia, Wu Yuan publicly vowed:

“Serve with loyalty and courage, and you’ll be clothed, fed, and sheltered. Registered family members will receive preferential treatment.”

Many slaves were shrewd enough to recognize the truth: Escape meant almost certain death in the wild. Their “master,” however forcibly imposed, was now their best hope for survival.

And so, they traded obedience for a chance to endure this terrifying world.