Me with you, me with it. When I let go of expectation and purpose and enter into a relationship with a person or something in my whole true nature, I will encounter the whole true nature of this being, this relationship without any expectation and purpose, which is my relationship with you.

- Martin Buber (Israeli Jewish philosopher, translator, educator)

The power of the Bai family in the south has developed by leaps and bounds twice in the past year, and it is these two leaps and bounds that have made the Bai family, which is in a corner of the southern border, grow into a top powerful family in the empire in just a few months!

The first leap forward of the Bai family came from the birth of the Twin Sword Saints, and the birth of two saint-level powerhouses was a major event affecting the overall strength of any country on the mainland, not to mention that the Bai family was only a mere marquis family.

From the marquis family in the southern realm region to the duke family of the empire, the strength of the Bai family has increased by at least five times! In the Southern Border Alliance secretly formed by the five major families in the southern realm, why the Bai family is tied with the strongest dragon family in the past is not because of the existence of the twin sword saints.

The Eleventh Legion, which was expanded to 20,000 soldiers, the Knights of the Rose formed by Bai Anyun, and the Southern Swordsman Regiment led by Bai Haowen and Bai Haowu, these are all the strength of the Bai family on the surface, excluding the 20,000 soldiers they hid in Rome.

The second leap forward of the Bai family comes from Bai Feng's strong rise in the Sunset Fortress, Bai Feng, who is in charge of two royal legions, six standing legions, and five Eastern legions, has almost one-seventh of the entire army of the empire!

The total number of troops in the Celestial Dragon Empire, which was expanding while fighting wars, now exceeded two million; the troops assembled on the Eastern Front alone were nearly one million, and the troops assembled on the Northern Front were no less than those on the Eastern Front, and the number of troops stationed on the various frontiers added up was also quite large.

Even so, Bai Feng, who had 300,000 troops under his command, was still one of the generals who commanded the most troops in the Celestial Dragon Empire, and Duke Gna, who nominally commanded a million-strong army on the Eastern Front, could not effectively command the army under Bai Feng's command.

Bai Feng's powerful position in the imperial army, to a certain extent, also represents the vigorous development of the Bai family in the imperial military circles, and among the southern provinces closest to the southern border of the empire, there are not a few who have taken refuge in the Bai family.

Everyone knows that a family that has successively produced twin sword saints and generals in the army will inevitably usher in prosperity for at least a hundred years, and relying on such a powerful family is really a good result for the middle and low-level nobles who are not strong.

In the face of these southern nobles of the empire who actively took refuge in their own families, the Bai family, who lacked background, naturally had no reason not to accept it; this kind of dependence between the nobles allowed the Bai family's power to quickly extend to the southern provinces of the empire.

By the time Prince GLP apologized to the Bai family, the number of southern nobles loyal to the Bai family had already exceeded the 500 mark, even if these more than 500 nobles were viscounts and barons, their combined strength was also amazing.

The Bai family, which has great strength, has to take some necessary countermeasures after sensing the intentions of Prince GLP, but in the Celestial Dragon Empire, which is in the midst of an eventful season, what kind of measures can ensure that their family will continue to prosper?

Undoubtedly, there are two factors that can ensure the prosperity of a family: one is strong force, and the other is huge power.

In terms of force, the Bai family has a well-known twin sword saint, and Bai Haotian is also working hard towards the saint level, at most in three or five years, the Bai family's saint-level powerhouse will reach a terrifying three! In terms of power, the only ones that really belong to the Bai family are the Eleventh Legion and the Rose Knights.

The Southern Swordsman Regiment led by Bai Haowen and Bai Haowu, like the Southern Knights led by Long Ze, are all forces belonging to the Southern Alliance, and they cannot be counted as part of the Bai family's strength at all, which is also clear to the people of the Bai family.

As for Bai Anjun's Rose Knights, in the final analysis, it is a knight order formed entirely by women; it is not that the people of the Bai family look down on women's combat effectiveness, but that women are not so trustworthy when they go to the battlefield.

From this point of view, what the Bai family really needs to strengthen is the power of their own family, and the core of the power is the army; the 11th Army Corps, which is full of 20,000 soldiers, is far from meeting the needs of the Bai family, and the Bai family needs to form more and more elite troops!

In the context of the expansion of all standing legions to 20,000 by the Imperial Military Department, the 11th Legion of the Bai family, which has 20,000 soldiers, is no longer the supernumerary legion it once had, which means that the Bai family can better use the advantages of its own family of one family and three dukes.

According to the law of the high nobility of the empire, each imperial duke has the right to form a personal guard with a size of 5,000 people, and the iron-clad guard formed by Bai Feng in the imperial capital only occupies the quota of one of the three dukes of the Bai family, and the Bai family still has two dukes to use.

The Bai family, who was determined to expand their family's strength, formed the Twin Guards in the name of the Twin Sword Saints, and the Twin Guards, which were full of 10,000 soldiers, were formed in less than a month with the full support of the southern nobles who were attached to the Bai family.

In order to show their loyalty to the southern nobles, in the way that your family has produced twenty junior swordsmen, and my family has produced ten intermediate swordsmen, a total of more than 12,000 professionals with the lowest strength of junior swordsmen have contributed to the Twin Guards.

The Twin Guards, which were not well established, no longer accepted a steady stream of recruits after recruiting 10,000 soldiers, and those who could not enter the Twin Guards all appeared in the city defense army of Llorente Province after the reorganization of the Bai family half a month later.

After the Bai family's painstaking rectification, the city defense troops in Llorente Province were expanded to 15,000, and the overall combat effectiveness rose by at least two levels!

The incorporation of a large number of junior swordsmen with good strength and the reloading of elven weapons and equipment have transformed the city defense army of Llorente Province into an existence that is not inferior to the standing army in combat effectiveness, and in this way, the Bai family's army in the south has reached 45,000.

If in the future, after Bai Feng returns to the southern border, and then brings back the 20,000 soldiers hidden by the Bai family in Rome City, then the number of the Bai family's troops in the southern border will reach an astonishing 65,000 people, which is more than the three imperial standing legions!

Of course, among the five major families in the southern border, not only the Bai family is expanding their strength, the tenth legion of the Sun family, the twelfth legion of the Andre family, and the thirteenth legion of the Li family have all been expanded from 15,000 to 20,000 people one after another, and the city defense forces of each family have also expanded to a certain extent.

The second largest expansion after the Bai family is the Long family, which has two saint-level powerhouses like the Bai family, and the formation of two duke guards with a scale of 5,000 and the expansion of the city defense army, the number of the Long family's army has also reached a shocking 40,000.

The Bai family's 45,000 troops, the Long family's 40,000 troops, the Sun family, the Andre family, and the Li family each had 30,000 troops; before they knew it, the total strength of the southern region had reached 175,000, not including the special forces such as the Southern Swordsman Regiment and the Southern Knight Order.

The five major families in the southern realm, headed by the Bai family and the Long family, are allies who are united in the same spirit, one is prosperous and the other is lost; the strength of the Bai family is the development of the Southern Alliance, and the strength of the Southern Alliance is also the confidence of the Bai family!