The White Reef Shore of the Valla Empire.
Oceans of this world were extraordinarily dangerous. What comes from it would never be spring warmth or blossoms, but only vile monsters of the fearsome tide.
Indeed, the White Reef Shore was not safe, even though it merely faces an inland sea called Kakatino.
That was why the Valla Empire would build a pillbox alongside a watchtower on the reefs of the shore.
As wind streamed in the pillbox from various openings, two coastal guardsmen were crouching beside a bonfire while shivering amidst the ocean winds. The climate around the area was freezing even though the flowering season was at hand, let alone the damp sea winds.
“When the heck would the weather get warmer…”
One of the guardsmen who had a bow slung over his back was warming himself and complaining unhappily. “I’ve got to get my family to pull some strings and get myself a post as a city watch soldier at a nearby town. There is just no surviving this hell.”
“Stop dreaming. In fact, it’s better if you didn’t-rumors had it that cultists are getting active for some reason, unless you planning to fight them with the city watch.”
The other guardsman who had a spear placed beside him replied casually. “It’s not so bad for us, really—it’s our comrades posted here in winter who had it worse, especially the ones stationed at the watchtower. I heard from my friend that one of them was as white as a snowman when he changed shift, that there were popsicles beneath his chin.”
“You’re being bamboozled.” The bowman retorted confidently. “I heard that they would stay inside the main citadel back there and never come out. There is no need for sentries since the sea surface would be frozen in winter and neither fishmen nor sea beasts are coming out. They just have to last through the season as long as there’s no real emergency.”
In truth, sea beasts were actually an excess worry since most sea beasts can’t move freely when they come on land. That was why the pillbox was mainly used to watch out for fishmen-like nomads of ancient times, they would only come out of the sea just before winter and wreak havoc along the coasts.
The human nations just couldn’t come up with any good solutions against those irritants that promptly flee back into the sea once their defeat was all but sealed. They could at best build fortresses to maintain a perimeter and warn nearby cities to arm their defenses beforehand. After all, the fishmen were sea creatures that did not have much potential laying siege to cities, and no major problem should occur if they were kept in check at the right time.
“Really?” The spearman was furious when he heard what the bowman had to say. “He lied to me! No wonder he kept making it sound so miserable, and would always try to claim duty in winter!”
It was a pity that his rage changed nothing here, however—his flames of anger were merely extinguished by the chilling winds that came whooshing in. “By the way, do you know why the other side is in a mess?” Feeling a little drained with his frustration gone, the spearman simply changed the conversation.
‘The other side’ he spoke of refers to the other side of the Kakatino inland sea, which was not a Valla empire territory but a federation called Tegrono.
While the federation had a rather loose internal structure and the member states were often squabbling and seemingly incohesive, they were exceedingly united whenever a foreign enemy invades. Back when the Valla Empire had claimed half of Tierra for itself, the emperor at the time had become full of himself and turned his sights to Tegrono, or at least conquered a few of its smaller nations. Naturally, he ended up being spanked all the way home by the federation, slamming heavily into the impregnable stronghold of their unity.
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If the federation’s armies didn’t quickly separate right after repelling the empire’s invasion and counter invade them, the empire would have lost a good chunk of their territory instead.
It was worth mentioning that the citizens living by the frontiers of the two nations were actually unaffected. Their lives wouldn’t change drastically regardless of which nation was in charge, and they would instead observe both sides’ situations like they were watching a drama.
Nonetheless, it appeared that there had been unrest within the Tegrono Federation recently. There were incidents of explosions across several cities, as well as ancient machines that awakened out of the blue and wreaked havoc everywhere around it. While the armies of the federation’s nobles and royals did not have problems, their sovereignty hence staying unaffected without any signs of uprisings, the various problems were blown out of proportion to the point that this side of the Kakatino inland sea caught wind of it.
“I don’t have anything concrete, but what I do know is that a bunch of people are attempting to capture something.” The bowman replied softly. “Eyewitnesses had spotted people in black robes running around inside the borders of the Tegrono Federation, and it seems that they were the ones behind the ancient machines waking up and the explosions in the cities too.”
“With such a big mess, aren’t they afraid of being captured by the Tegrono Federation themselves?” The spearman asked in confusion. “They definitely wouldn’t be followers of any normal church, right?”
“That is because the normal soldiers in the city watch can’t capture them since they have quite a few supernatural folks with them. When the Federation’s own finally arrive, they would already have left, strutting as they did so.” The bowman shook his head, hinting that it was not the Federation being reluctant to capture the culprits—they had simply failed to do so.
“But doesn’t that mean that they would be blacklisted? They would definitely have a hard time working inside the Federation in the future.” The spearman said, finding the culprit’s behavior hard to understand. “What could be so worth capturing that they would risk a culling from the Federation’s armies later on?”
“I’m not sure, but it’s alleged to be something that looks like a human.” The bowman smiled sinisterly.
“Like a human? And don’t suddenly talk so mysteriously, I’m getting a little scared here…”
“The last time I heard of the news was from a traveling merchant, just before I came for this shift. According to him, what the black robes wanted to capture ended up jumping into the Kakatino Sea.” The bowman took no notice even as the spearman began to tremble and simply continued. “The black robes had actually summoned a giant water elemental to capture that humanlike thing, but they still failed, and that humanlike thing disappeared, just like that…”
That was when the spearman rose to his feet. “What are you doing?” The bowman asked.
“I need to take a leak… Damn it, my junk is getting frosted if this continues.” The spearman replied. “I’m heading to the watchtower for my shift soon-no way I’m staying there and getting my junior blown by these winds.”
“Careful. Don’t get eaten by weird stuff.” The bowman teased.
“Bugger off!” The spearman cursed unhappily before running to a distant observation well and started to pee into the sea.
And yet, before he was relieved, he found a yellow pair of abnormal, callous eyes glaring coldly through the well at him…
“M-monster—!”