Great changes often begin almost imperceptibly, like a breeze rising over the plains before it turns into a storm.
Ever since the Blackwood family took the initiative and joined forces with the leading figures of Alberta’s industry, commerce, and agriculture to support Mithburn for the position of Director General of the Tax Administration, political circles throughout Canada had been seriously shaken.
Various tax privileges accelerated Alberta’s economic development, so all the families involved in that alliance rejoiced over the enormous profits.
As the main driving force behind the entire plan, the Blackwood family naturally took the largest share of the benefits.
Relying on enormous financial resources, powerful armed units, and the support of influential government officials, it continuously expanded its existing enterprises and entered new branches of industry.
Aron’s name was now even better known in Alberta than that of Lord Metcalfe, the Governor General of Canada, while in Edmonton his prestige was almost incomparable.
It could freely be said that in Alberta’s largest city, more than half of all enterprises already belonged to the Blackwood family.
Because of that, some people began calling Aron the Lord of Half of Edmonton.
No one dared casually speak his name, fearing that a careless word might offend the increasingly powerful Blackwood family.
Over the past ten years, Edmonton had changed its city administration three times.
Whoever was elected, the first thing they did was visit the Blackwood estate and express respect to its owner.
A mayor without the support of the Blackwood family would not even manage to pass his own orders down to the officials of the city administration.
By contrast, a mayor who gained their support would quickly achieve outstanding results and advance to a higher position.
When Aron became angry, the dignitaries trembled.
When he was satisfied, the entire region lived in peace.
The prestige of the Blackwood family had reached precisely such a level.
During the past ten years, Lord Metcalfe had never abandoned his intention to weaken the Blackwood family.
However, because of the growing number of conflicting interests within the colonial administration, he had never managed to fully carry out his own will.
Now, faced with the enormous influence of the Blackwood family, he no longer had sufficient means or political power to oppose them.
He had spent too much energy fighting the Blackwoods.
Although he had ruled for ten years, Canada had not changed particularly much under his administration.
On the other side of the border, the United States of America, which had been founded only a few decades earlier, was going through increasingly serious internal turmoil.
More and more supporters of abolishing slavery were appearing within the Democratic and Whig parties.
The abolitionist movement was becoming increasingly powerful and threatened to sweep across the entire country.
In 1850, the Compromise of 1850 was reached, and five laws related to the issue of slavery were passed.
The Southern slaveholding states attempted to expand the area in which slavery was permitted, while conflicts between the North and South over the geographical boundaries of slavery became increasingly fierce.
The Fugitive Slave Act provoked even broader resistance to slavery than the laws connected with California, Texas, Utah, and Washington, which were more favorable to abolitionist liberals.
The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 further intensified the conflict between the North and South.
That law abolished earlier restrictions that had prevented the spread of slavery into newly settled areas of the West, allowing slaveholders to expand slavery into those territories as well.
That same year, armed clashes broke out between supporters and opponents of slavery over control of Kansas.
The violence lasted for the next five years and practically turned into a small civil war.
Most of the two hundred thousand acres of land purchased by the Blackwood family in the United States of America were located in free states, while a smaller portion was in slaveholding states.
However, thanks to the protection of the Holden family, neither supporters of slavery nor their opponents dared threaten the interests of the Blackwood family.
Despite the unrest of that era, Aron’s life was not particularly disturbed.
The enormous network of relationships the Blackwood family had built over the years was extremely solid.
Neither pressure from the Canadian Governor General nor internal conflicts in the United States of America could seriously shake their position.
In recent years, Aron had devoted most of his time to teaching his old comrades.
In his free moments, he studied new scientific and technological achievements to ensure that the development of the Blackwood family did not fall behind the changes of the times.
Edward Grant was responsible for the family finances, while Charles Whitmore managed the transfer and allocation of people within the various enterprises.
Although Aron had largely withdrawn from day-to-day management, the wealth of the Blackwood family continued to grow day by day, and its influence slowly spread throughout Canada.
The Dragon Tiger Gate version of the Yi Jin Jing was created by Bodhidharma, the founder of Shaolin.
After Bodhidharma developed the Twelve-Level Golden Bell, he realized that the skill was too complex and that future generations would probably not be able to reach its highest level. This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
Because of that, he simplified it and created the Yi Jin Jing on those foundations.
When Aron practiced the Golden Bell Body of the Thirteen Guardians, he accidentally activated the internal energy of the Yi Jin Jing at the same time.
He had not expected that practicing those two techniques together would create such perfect compatibility.
One nourished the other like wind feeding fire and flames using the strength of the wind.
The progress achieved by practicing them simultaneously far surpassed the results he would have achieved using only one of them.
After numerous experiments confirmed that the method was safe, he passed it on to his old comrades and James.
More than twenty veterans successfully performed all nine movements of the first level of the Yi Jin Jing, which exceeded the limits of the ordinary human body.
Ever since they adopted the new training method, Aron no longer needed to constantly heal their injuries.
The suffering and hardships they had gone through during their earlier training ultimately even benefited them.
Thanks to those experiences, they understood the true nature of the technique much better, so in developing the Yi Jin Jing they gradually caught up with, and then surpassed, those who had progressed faster at the beginning.
James, however, was at a disadvantage because he did not understand the cultural and philosophical foundations from which those techniques originated.
No matter how ruthlessly he pushed his own body and tried to awaken its full potential, he simply could not manage to practice the Yi Jin Jing and the Golden Bell Body of the Thirteen Guardians simultaneously.
During the next several years, Aron did not rush to open the energy points.
Every day, he repeatedly practiced the Yi Jin Jing and the Golden Bell Body of the Thirteen Guardians.
At the same time, he used the Eight Brocades to regulate the functioning of his internal organs, bones, and the rest of his body.
His internal organs became more flexible and powerful, while the overall resilience of his body continuously increased.
He wanted to build a foundation unlike anything that had ever existed before.
Until the physical strength of his body reached a point where it could no longer improve even slightly, he would not open the energy points and release the terrifying force hidden within them.
He wanted to see what would happen when the perfect foundation built through the Yi Jin Jing combined with his experience as a peak martial arts master from his previous life, and when in this life he once again reached the highest level of martial arts—the level at which the boundary of the human body is broken and an almost divine perception is attained.
It was something he sincerely looked forward to.
It was not only the strength and wealth of the Blackwood family that continuously grew.
The number of Aron’s women and heirs also increased rapidly.
During the past ten years, he brought another twenty mistresses into the household.
Almost every one of them gave birth to at least one child for him, while some to whom he gave more attention gave birth to two or three.
Most of the rewards the system granted him were improvements to traits such as appearance and physical constitution.
Only the births of the tenth and twentieth children brought two new supernatural abilities.
For the tenth child, he received Fire Manipulation, and for the twentieth, Underwater Breathing.
Aron now had a total of twenty-eight children.
Only thirteen of them possessed mutant abilities.
The remaining fifteen differed from ordinary children only in being physically stronger and above average in intelligence.
Thanks to the continuous connections he created through his women, the Blackwood family now had family ties in thirteen Canadian provinces and territories.
Almost everywhere lived the parents or relatives of one of Aron’s women.
The oldest children were already attending the secondary school founded by the Blackwood family.
The younger ones studied at the affiliated elementary school or stayed in the Blackwood kindergarten.
One day, Aron had just finished practicing the Yi Jin Jing when Charles Whitmore, who already had wrinkles around his eyes, entered the training room.
“Master, our estate has become somewhat cramped. In a few years, there will no longer be enough space.”
He could not openly state the real reason, but Aron immediately understood him.
The old comrades and their families lived in the front section of the estate, arranged around one or two inner courtyards.
The servants, gardeners, and other workers stayed in the middle section.
The rear section, which consisted of four or five connected courtyards, was intended for Aron’s women and children.
The Blackwood family had developed too quickly in recent years.
The three-story mansion with five large courtyards had more than a hundred rooms, but now almost every one of them was occupied.
If they waited until the last available rooms were occupied, it would be too late to begin construction.
A new woman could not be placed in the same room as one of the existing ones.
The Blackwood family now possessed incredible wealth.
Its enterprises covered dozens of industrial sectors connected with food, clothing, construction, transportation, commerce, and manufacturing.
Because of that, Aron decided to solve the problem once and for all.
Building an ideal family seat that could serve for the next hundred years would require an enormous amount of money.
In size and splendor, it would not fall far behind the greatest European royal palaces.
All construction materials, including doors, windows, courtyard walls, timber, bricks, and stone, had to be of the best possible quality.
The basic design would be based on the plans of great European imperial palaces, and descendants of the most distinguished craftsmen who had built castles and royal residences for generations would be invited to carry out the construction.
Every part of the expanded estate, from the foundations to the final decoration, had to be executed flawlessly.
The complex was not only supposed to possess the luxury and magnificence of a royal palace, but also had to suit the new era, using advanced, practical, and modern construction ideas.
When Aron finished explaining his plan, Charles thought to himself:
How much is all of this even going to cost?
“Master, perhaps there is no need to build such an enormous residence after all. The largest European palaces stretch for kilometers in length and width, have dozens of great halls and more than a thousand rooms. Tens of thousands of people could live in them.”
He believed the master was exaggerating.
Building such an enormous palace would be far too conspicuous and would certainly attract unwanted attention.
Even Buckingham Palace, the residence of the British royal family to which Canada formally belonged, would appear modest beside Aron’s vision.
If people learned about the plan, the reactions would not be limited to admiration.
It would certainly provoke envy and hostility.
“Charles, a man must look far into the future, not only at what lies directly before his eyes.”
“Only ten years have passed, and the estate that once seemed almost empty is now completely full.”
“I am still in the prime of my life. In the future, I will bring in new women and have more children. I don’t want to deal with another expansion in ten or twenty years because the new house has also become too small.”
Aron patted him on the shoulder and continued speaking quietly, almost with a trace of emotion.
The Blackwood family did not lack money.
The expansion of its industrial, commercial, and agricultural businesses had currently reached its limit.
That did not mean there were no more valuable investment opportunities, but rather that the family had too few completely loyal and reliable people capable of managing further growth.
It was not good to possess enormous amounts of money that could no longer be invested wisely.
If they left it in the bank, it would lose value over time.
In an age of political unrest, such wealth could also become a source of misfortune.
Although the Blackwood family did not fear any force, constant conflicts and conspiracies would be extremely exhausting.
It was much better to use the money to build a family seat that could serve the family’s development for a thousand years.
Such a residence could be passed down to future generations while simultaneously serving as the best symbol of the family’s wealth and power.
In the end, Charles agreed with his master’s reasoning and took responsibility for expanding the estate.
He assigned twenty people under Henry’s leadership to travel across the ocean and find descendants of the most famous craftsmen specializing in palace construction.
Henry had a completely ordinary appearance, and no one would notice him in the middle of a crowd.
Because of that, he was perfect for carrying out tasks in regions under the strict rule of imperial authorities.
Another fifty people were given the task of obtaining construction materials.
They were sent throughout Canada, Europe, and the United States of America to purchase sufficient quantities of the finest timber, stone, cement, and steel.
Under Charles’s careful management, preparations for the enormous expansion of the estate began at great speed.
When news of the magnificent construction plan spread, wealthy merchants and impoverished nobles who brought their daughters to the Blackwood estate began arriving in endless lines.