The Lord stroked the blueprints on the workbench. Each line was meticulously inked on parchment with a quill, and his expression was like that of a man who’d just discovered plans for a doomsday weapon in a back-alley workshop.

"Did you design all this?"

"I just studied some books passed down by my ancestors. It’s nothing, really." Mier scratched his head shyly.

"That’s still incredible!"

Levi said with genuine sincerity.

Building on the wisdom of others might sound easy, but how could someone without talent of their own truly absorb it?

Even those nobles who Mastered profound Combat Qi Secret Manuals didn’t all become Combat Qi Masters; some were even weaker than common Swordsmen.

The saying, ’An incapable man will return empty-handed, even from a mountain of treasure,’ was the perfect explanation for this.

Originally, when Tina had said Mier liked to tinker with strange contraptions, Levi had dismissed it as childish games. Besides, when it came to tinkering, ’I know about things from another world; no one can beat me at this.’

It seemed he had underestimated the people of this world, and he had underestimated Mier.

The Lord placed his hands on Mier’s sturdy shoulders, looking at the burly young boy. "Mier, if your sister ever calls you a good-for-nothing again for tinkering with your strange gadgets, you come find me."

At this, Levi shook his fist. "Hmph, hmph. I’ll spank her so hard she won’t be able to sit for a week!"

This certain someone, however, had completely forgotten how he had just criticized Tina for saying the exact same thing not long ago.

Mier’s status had just skyrocketed in the Lord’s mind, even surpassing that of High Cliff Castle’s Chief Steward of the Imperial Palace.

"Mier, I have high hopes for you. Once things are settled here, I’ll make you High Cliff Castle’s Chief Armament Officer."

High Cliff Castle’s military industry was still just a twinkle in his eye, but that didn’t stop the Lord from dangling the carrot.

Levi’s enthusiasm left Mier at a bit of a loss.

"What’s its range? And its accuracy?"

"It hasn’t been built yet, so it’s still a conceptual weapon. But based on my many calculations, as long as the materials are high-quality, I can conservatively estimate it can pierce a layer of Iron Armor at a thousand paces. However, its accuracy becomes uncontrollable beyond four hundred paces."

When speaking about his area of expertise, Mier radiated confidence and pride—a completely different person from the listless, wilted eggplant he’d resembled on the battlefield.

"In fact, I don’t think the bolt’s trajectory will deviate much even at seven or eight hundred paces. The problem is that the operator can’t aim with the naked eye at that distance."

"The magnifying glass I tinkered with was made for exactly this purpose."

"Awesome!" Levi couldn’t help but give him a thumbs-up.

As everyone knew, both in his past life and this one, whenever someone gave a ’conservative estimate,’ the actual performance always far exceeded the official numbers.

In other words, if this Bed Crossbow from the blueprints was actually built, its real performance would likely be 30% to 50% better than the conservative estimate!

Zat and Muto, the two big oafs, stared at the blueprints from every angle. They couldn’t understand a thing, but seeing their boss’s shocked expression, they were impressed despite their confusion and figured this thing had to be something special.

Based on the on-paper stats alone, this designed Bed Crossbow was a whole tier above the standard-issue Bed Crossbows used in Debei in terms of both range and accuracy.

Of course, it probably still couldn’t compare to a Dragon-Hunting Crossbow.

However, while the power of the Dragon-Hunting Crossbow was certainly related to its unique design, its construction materials accounted for nearly seventy percent of its effectiveness.

Its bow arms, which released the kinetic energy, were made entirely of Mountain Copper.

This metal was purple throughout, incredibly tough, and had excellent resilience. Along with Mithril and Refined Gold, it was an extremely rare Magic Metal, making it the top choice for crafting the bow arms of a Bed Crossbow.

Its powerful elasticity was too much for an ordinary Bowstring to handle; only Dragon Sinew from the Magical Creature known as a Giant Dragon could make this weapon of mass destruction function.

The combination of the two gave it the power to hunt Giant Dragons in the sky.

Debei’s military technology was considered second-rate on the entire Middle Ages Continent. Although its standard-issue Bed Crossbow was surely a product of cost-effectiveness and far from represented the nation’s best, Mier’s design was still enough to make the jaws of Debei’s old-guard designers drop.

After discussing a few more details with Mier in the small hut, Levi finally left, hands clasped behind his back in satisfaction.

Meanwhile, Mier’s impression of his future brother-in-law was once again completely overturned. He had thought Levi was just a brute with exceptional military talent, but he never expected him to possess such remarkable design abilities as well.

Many of Levi’s unique insights brought him sudden enlightenment, and difficult problems he’d been stuck on were solved one after another. He quickly picked up his quill and began jotting down this precious knowledge on a sheet of parchment.

After looking around for a bit, Levi found Baisitina.

"Does your Tribe have any Gold Coins?"

"Gold Coins?" Baisitina paused for a moment, then quickly replied, "Because our Tribe is deep in the Wilderness, we’re basically self-sufficient. We only sell furs and other things when a merchant caravan happens to pass by, so we only have about three thousand Gold Coins."

Baisitina didn’t know why Levi needed money at a time like this. ’But since I’ve decided we will become his subjects, it wouldn’t matter even if we gave all of our supplies to the Lord.’

Levi, who was so poor he was six hundred Gold Coins in debt, started looking at Baisitina differently. ’So this is the power of a wealthy heiress?’

"Count out One Thousand Gold Coins for me," Levi said slowly, taking a deep breath.

Levi planned to use the money to buy standard-issue equipment for the Barbarians from the system shop, fully arming them to face the coming crisis.

Buying equipment from the system was not only expensive, but it also risked making people wonder how he could conjure so much gear out of thin air.

But Levi had to do it. There was no telling how fierce the upcoming assault from the Wilderness Natives would be, and he couldn’t afford not to use the system shop just because he was afraid of exposing its existence.

Besides, after something as outrageous as the "Gift of the War God" had occurred, no matter what other absurd things happened around him, these people would automatically come up with their own rationalizations.

"I’ll go get it right away." Without a hint of hesitation, Baisitina turned and walked toward the Feder Tribe’s storehouse.

A full chest of gold coins was soon carried by two Feder Remnants into Levi’s lodging, and then, even faster, it appeared as the balance in his system shop.

To be honest, the system’s inventory was dazzling.

There were not only all sorts of weapons and Armor, but also a wide variety of food. It was practically a portable supermarket.

Levi scrolled straight to the bottom of the item list. He wanted to see if the system sold any Magic Weapons.

But soon enough, he returned to his own page, his face completely blank.

The items at the very bottom of the system shop all had extremely flashy names, like the "Spear That Pierces Heaven and Earth" or the "Sky Magic Staff." The Lord, who considered himself a low-key and modest man, felt that such pretentious things didn’t suit him. ’Of course, my decision has absolutely nothing to do with the long string of zeroes in their prices.’