“Selling swords! Selling swords! Three yuan fifty cents per tael, even if you don’t know how to use it you can melt it down for scrap iron! This thing may not look great, but it’s cast from top-grade alloy, smells bad but tastes good, buy it and you definitely won’t lose out!”
On the streets of the slums of Cangyun City at the foot of the southeastern mountain range of the Shanxuan Continent, a red-pupiled white-haired dog-eared girl in a tattered cloak huddled into a ball in front of a tiny stall, shouting at the top of her lungs in the cold wind.
The dry, icy wind carried her voice far away, echoing between the dilapidated corrugated steel plates and wooden shacks.
However… it was completely fucking useless.
Not a single person even glanced at the black sword in front of her.
“Fuck your mother, it’s all your fault! All your fucking fault!” After continuously shouting for a full hour with no one paying attention, the dog-eared girl finally exploded.
She leaped up with a whoosh and began furiously stomping on the black sword whose scabbard and hilt were covered in mysterious runes.
“If it weren’t for this shitty piece of junk! I… ah no, this lady would never have fallen to this state?!”
A few pedestrians hurriedly passing by from a distance uneasily glanced at the girl once, then immediately walked farther away—in this slum, all kinds of psychiatric patients were far from few.
People with normal brains clearly understood that one should deal less with this kind of “landmine.”
In fact, the dog-eared girl did not know that because of the mad behavior she occasionally erupted with, at least 114 social idlers who might have harbored evil thoughts toward her had successively dismissed the criminal ideas in their hearts 514 times… after all, doing that kind of thing to this kind of crazy woman, if a critical part got a sword in return, it simply would not be worth it.
However, these social idlers who had made wise choices also did not know that this down-and-out girl bearing the “Mark of the Sinner,” half a month ago, had still been the Crown Princess of the Elysia Federal Empire who drew the eyes of the entire empire, Imperial Marshal, Imperator, and master of the Second Legion.
To these ordinary living beings on the surface, those “people of the heavens” living thousands of meters above in the tower city-states were themselves already untouchable existences.
Although the announcement that the Crown Princess had been deposed for publicly assassinating the emperor and successfully unlocking the achievement “Mom Explodes” had long been made public over the broadcasts, who could have imagined that this top-tier existence among the “people of the heavens” would actually be going mad and selling swords in this kind of remote corner?
In fact, even Xia Li herself had never expected that she would fall to her current state.
Half a month ago, when Emperor Guangjing was assassinated right before her eyes and, like a broad-minded B*g Demon King, mysteriously disappeared by turning into particles of light in an explosion, the Xia Li who had just completed her reincarnation and was completely dumbfounded simply froze in place.
What was even more fatal was that the mysterious “voice-over” that had still been nattering earlier, after her biological mother exploded, only popped up one line of text: “Emergency evasion action suspected to have failed! Program paused and routine review begun.” Then it completely vanished without a trace and fled with the wind!
Just like that, the at-a-loss Xia Li’s brain crashed on the spot for a full hour, until the small squad of trusted Second Legion soldiers who had followed her in launching the assassination action, as well as the walking corpses that had been raised by that move “Sorrowful Night City’s Thousand Cherry Blossoms,” were all blasted into slag by the surging Imperial Guard, and the empire’s Chief Inspector pointed a gun at her forehead and read out the arrest warrant against her, before she finally reacted.
Great, she had completely fucked up!
According to Xia Li’s guess, next she would most likely be subjected to severe torture, sentenced to death, and then executed in who-knows-what manner according to the law—if her luck was good, she could probably get a beautiful beheading like a certain Nine-Day Queen; if her luck was bad, being torn apart by five horses, climbing the mountain of knives, or descending into the oil pot would all be the light options!
However, fortunately, she had guessed wrong.
The empire’s highest court did indeed conduct a trial of her… but it was only a formality lasting a few hours.
As for the reason, it was the order left behind by her biological mother in the final moment of her life—although one minute later she had been blown into particles of light, the special pardon order itself targeting the crime of treason still took effect.
Thus, the crime of treason on Xia Li’s person, as well as the crimes of armed rebellion, murder, and illegal injury to others contained under this charge, were all completely exempted just like that.
However, those extremely furious grand justices clearly did not intend to let her off so lightly.
After painstakingly flipping through the Imperial Code for several days and conducting several rounds of deliberation, Xia Li was finally prosecuted by them for the crimes of “unfilial disobedience” and “great disrespect” that did not fall under the category of “treason.”
Of course, for these two ironclad charges, she could only plead guilty in court.
As an imperial noble, the charge of “unfilial disobedience” meant that unless the parent forgave her, her noble status would be abolished.
As a motherless child like a rootless weed, Xia Li of course had no one to forgive her, and thus could only lose the titles of “Crown Princess” and “Princess.”
And based on the “crime of great disrespect,” she was ordered to be branded with the “Mark of the Sinner,” then exiled to the surface.
Of course, even though she had escaped the death penalty, this punishment was absolutely not easy to endure—on the day of execution, Xia Li only then learned that the so-called “Mark of the Sinner” was actually direct modification of the body!
She was fixed in place and stripped naked without any anesthesia, then underwent surgery in front of thousands of onlookers.
Besides carving a blood-red eight-pointed star representing a sinner on her face, a special neural implant was also implanted inside her body.
Then, amid screams that lasted for several hours, her original ears rotted and fell off, replaced by a pair of fluffy dog ears, and a pair of fluffy dog tails also grew behind her.
After that, she only received twenty copper coins and a gray cloak, then was stuffed into a transport plane and dumped onto the surface like a stray dog.
After being banished to the ground, Xia Li spent a period of time before barely adapting: although the surface world was not as bad as the X Abyss, and she had not turned into a 35-heart-energy either.
However, the current situation still could not be considered good—in this world, the living environments of the “people of the heavens” and the “people of the earth” could even be said to be two different worlds without exaggeration.
In the world of the “people of the earth,” the bizarre power called “Extra-Rational Power” was everywhere.
In a certain sense, it could be regarded as a rather unstable “magic.” When acting on the human body, living creatures, and simple inorganic matter it was still somewhat better, but complex mechanical equipment, especially everything related to computers and artificial intelligence, would become extremely unstable under it and fail within a short time.
Among the “people of the earth,” people passed down by word of mouth that in the past when developing the planet Elysia, besides making it a resort playground for the wealthy elites, developing the “Extra-Rational Power” hidden deep within the planet was also one of the purposes.
The authenticity of this legend could not be confirmed, however, in the “Great Catastrophe” a thousand years ago, the “Extra-Rational Power” had indeed undergone a massive loss of control, causing the technological civilization on the planet not only to lose contact with the outside, but also to be forced to retreat into the tower-shaped cities.
Because most convenient automated equipment could not be used, productivity on the ground was quite low, at most only equivalent to the level of the early nineteenth century.
The Elysia Empire also could not be bothered to directly rule this place, and instead chose the form of supporting “protectorates” and “dominions” to remotely manage the surface.
At the beginning, Xia Li still held a lucky mindset, thinking that she could rely on no one recognizing her and start over again on the surface.
Unfortunately, the ruthless facts quickly shattered her luck: although among the people of the earth, more than half had beast ears, beast tails, and other animal features, dog ears and dog tails seemed to be particularly lowly existences.
And what was even worse was that the blood-red eight-pointed star on her face was also extremely conspicuous.
No matter where she went to apply for a job, the other party would, upon seeing her, decisively choose to refuse.
…Well, of course, the red-light district counted as an exception, but the Xia Li who had once been “Xia Li” temporarily still did not intend to go work in that place.
Thus, Xia Li began a unique way of making money: selling swords.
After being arrested, the black sword “Weeping of the Shadow” that Xia Li had been holding was of course confiscated as well.
But strangely, as long as it was more than twenty-four hours away from her, this sword would automatically return to within ten meters of her side, no matter how it was isolated!
After testing this thing, the empire’s experts reached a conclusion: it was a special decorative weapon cast for unknown reasons in the Golden Age, but at present, aside from automatically teleporting back to the bound person’s side, it already had no abnormalities, and the originally restless “Extra-Rational Power” within it had also completely disappeared without a trace.
Thus, when Xia Li was banished, this thing was also dumped onto the surface together with her.
…Or rather, even if she wanted to get rid of it, she could not.
Thus, the flexible-minded Xia Li simply decided to directly make use of this point to earn herself some meal money.
Every morning, Xia Li would appear in different corners of the slums, set up a stall, shout loudly, and try to sell “Weeping of the Shadow.”
Although most of the time, her business was completely ignored.
But on three occasions, scrap recyclers who happened to pass by noticed her and bought “Weeping of the Shadow” at the price of scrap.
Once this thing was successfully disposed of, Xia Li would immediately grease the soles of her feet and slip away without a trace.
The next day when “Weeping of the Shadow” stuck back onto her like an inescapable piece of sticky candy, she would search for another location and restart her sword-selling business.
It was just that, because she feared that the victims of her sword-selling would come to their senses and severely deal with her afterward, Xia Li had to “wage guerrilla warfare” all over the world, and thus the places where she could safely sell swords naturally became fewer and fewer.
At this very moment, after her stomach once again began growling, Xia Li clamped her fluffy dog tail between her legs while counting the money in her pockets.
Five yuan and eighty cents, only enough for one more meal!
This was her entire fortune!
“Damn it, is there really no fourth kind-hearted scrap merchant to come help me clear out this pile of junk?!”
“Hey, stop always thinking only of selling me! Can’t you go sell yourself?!” A voice suddenly rang out in her mind, “Anyway, the one who needs to eat is you, not me!”
“You, what the fuck did you just say?! Who are you telling to go sell themselves?!” Xia Li asked in fury.
However, after a few seconds, she suddenly reacted.
The one who had just spoken to her seemed to be… Weeping of the Shadow.