From the Border School, nearly an hour had passed since arriving home.
The setting sun sank at the edge of the town’s high wall, casting light onto the blue-gray stone slabs.
Qiu Meng had been holding her mother Shalin’s hand the whole way, while her other hand gripped the hem of her father Dante’s clothes. She had stopped crying, but her eyes were still red.
She kept her head down and had just reached their doorstep when she caught the pungent smell of alcohol.
Two men in guard uniforms sat by the stone platform. One was already slumped against the wall, drunk, clutching a bottle. The other was clearly more sober, with a few gift-wrapped packages tucked under his arm, but his face was flushed red and he wobbled as he walked.
When he heard the door open, the less-drunk man looked up, his eyes brightening.
“Captain Dante… you’re back?”
He staggered to his feet and walked over to Dante with a smile.
“How did your daughter’s test go today? Old Bran and I brought some drinks—thought we’d drop by no matter the result.”
Qiu Meng instinctively stepped back half a step, her fingers tightening on Dante’s clothes.
“What… what should I do…?”
Dante glanced down at her, his broad hand gently resting on her head.
“It’s fine. They’re Dad’s colleagues. That one’s Lao Ma, and the one about to pass out is Uncle Bran.”
“Uh… hello, uncles.”
Qiu Meng greeted them softly.
Hearing this, Lao Ma burst out laughing.
“Great! This kid is really great! Captain Dante, your daughter is way more likable than you!”
He reached out to ruffle Qiu Meng’s head, but Bran slapped his hand away.
“What are you doing, Lao Ma? You can barely walk—don’t scare the kid.”
“Tsk, I just think she’s cute.”
“You reek of booze. Stay away from her.”
The two bickered noisily, the smell of alcohol and sweat washing over her.
The odor made her nauseous, so she muttered, “I’m going to my room,” and bolted upstairs.
The moment her door closed, she heard Dante’s low but stern scolding from outside.
“You two, show some restraint in front of the child.”
Qiu Meng leaned against the door, catching her breath.
Then she raised her hand and wiped the lingering dampness from the corners of her eyes.
“Even though magic abandoned me…”
“I can’t abandon myself.”
This room wasn’t large, but it was a place she loved. It had a wooden desk by the window, a few small flowers her mother had planted on the sill, and a bookshelf filled with books she had collected over the years, along with some small, crude but earnestly made trinkets.
Qiu Meng pulled open a drawer and took out a slingshot.
She had carved it herself when she was little. The fork was a bit crooked, the rubber band wasn’t tied prettily, and the handle had a noticeable scratch. Back then, when she was using a knife to shape the wood, her hands were too small and weak—she had almost cut her finger. The final product was so ugly that even her father had to hold back a laugh for a long time.
But Qiu Meng loved it.
Because it was the first “weapon” she had ever made with her own hands.
She walked to the window, slingshot in hand, and looked at the roof across the way. A few birds were perched on the tiles, pecking at their feathers.
“If only I had a rifle from my past life,” she murmured under her breath.
‘Just pull the trigger, and the enemy is taken care of…’
But this wasn’t Earth; it was Karasel. In a world like this, let alone a rifle—it was doubtful their tech tree even reached flintlocks.
Qiu Meng sighed, put the slingshot back on the table, and pulled out a patched leather notebook from a stack of books.
This was a journal her mother had kept when she was young. Back then, Shalin worked as a cartographer and recorder at the Adventurer’s Guild, often accompanying teams to the outskirts of town to map roads, forests, ruins, and danger zones. The notebook held many rough but functional draft maps, along with historical excerpts and guild gossip.
Qiu Meng had read it dozens of times.
But every time she opened it, she was reminded anew that this world was much larger—and much more dangerous—than her small town.
The town she lived in now belonged to the direct domain of Count Tate of the Holy Kingdom’s Border Territory. To the southwest lay the Border Wall, stretching across the continent. According to the notebook, the wall had three layers: the outermost was a defense line forged from black steel, the middle layer was a mix of stone bricks and defensive mana stones, and the innermost was made of white stone engraved with vast arrays of scattered magic circles. These were meant to weaken magical bombardment and prevent monsters from crossing the border into the Holy Kingdom’s towns.
Beyond the wall was mist.
Few maps could depict the depths of the mist. There lay the old territories of the Demon Race, abandoned kingdom roads, and ancient ruins that guild records described as “unable to confirm if they still exist.”
Qiu Meng flipped a few pages and found a passage Shalin had written in neat handwriting.
In the 550th year of the Holy Kingdom, a revolution had altered the continent’s landscape.
That revolution was launched by the Holy Kingdom’s princess, targeting Regent Joseph, who held the real power at the time. In the later stages, a group formed from betrayers, disillusioned soldiers, and those abandoned by the royal family.
They called themselves the Order of the Betrayer Knights. They assassinated the princess. The revolution collapsed halfway, plunging the kingdom into a decade of darkness.
During the Dark Decade, the Order of the Betrayer Knights purged major religious sects, attacked royal family members, and even burned down multiple magic academies. Finally, the order’s leader went alone to the Holy Kingdom’s royal court—and vanished. Without their leader, the order quickly disbanded, and the Holy Kingdom was jointly taken over by three major powers.
The first was the Faction of Heaven’s Mandate, which revered the old royal order. It was nearly wiped out but still held onto some extremely ancient knowledge. Rumor had it that the faction had an “Apostle” responsible for secretly convening meetings, though they rarely appeared, often letting the other two forces check each other.
The second was the Church of Heavenly Construct. Its predecessor was the Heavenly Construct Group, an organization that had conducted numerous magical experiments during wartime. They manufactured special soldiers and had countless ties to the Celestial Wing Tribe of the Sky City.
To the ground-dwellers, the Celestial Wing Tribe resembled angels; they had established faiths like the Radiance Sect, the Thirteen Precepts, and the Eden Rebirth Sect, collectively known as the Sky Religion. Rumor had it they possessed minor technology for manipulating time and space, but the guild had investigated multiple times without being able to confirm the truth.
The third was the Four Alliance Merchants’ Union. This vast trade network was overseen and balanced by the Arctic Count in the north, the Fleet Governor in the west, the Tribal Prophet in the east, and the Southern Emperor.
The south had once been a vassal city-state of the Holy Kingdom, but after the revolution, it used the surviving fragments of the princess’s notes to surpass the Holy Kingdom in magical science, becoming the strongest empire on the western continent. The wall separating humans from the Demon Race was the product of the “Wall Project” orchestrated by the Southern Emperor.
The handwriting in the notebook grew heavier here.
“It is said that over thirty sages were sacrificed to build the wall, and the number of ordinary construction workers exceeded seven figures. Yet the Demon King of the Demon Race was never killed—since the revolution, he has remained silent, as if waiting for an opportunity.”
Qiu Meng stared at that line, her fingertips pausing slightly.
And now it was the United Kingdom era… no longer the Holy Kingdom era, when heroes were born one after another.
She closed the notebook, pushed it to the edge of the table, slowly stood up, and opened the door. Downstairs had quieted down. The two drunken guards seemed to have left. In the living room, only Dante and Shalin sat on the sofa, talking in low voices.
Her mother noticed her and immediately waved her over.
“Little Qiu Meng, what’s wrong…?”
Qiu Meng walked to the sofa, keeping her head down, her toes lightly brushing the floor.
“I was thinking… if I don’t have magic, what else can I do?”
The living room fell silent for a moment.
Her mother’s expression softened, as if she wanted to hug her, but left that decision to her.
Her father fell into brief thought. He crossed his arms, his brow slightly furrowed.
After a moment, he spoke:
“How about I teach you swordsmanship?”
Qiu Meng looked up.
Her father stared at her, his tone serious.
“Haven’t you been training lately? You can’t use magic, but basic physical fitness and reflexes can be trained. Swordplay isn’t just about strength—it’s about footwork, distance, and judgment.”
Qiu Meng’s eyes slowly lit up.
“Can I?”
“Of course you can,” Dante said with a smile. “But I won’t go easy on you just because you’re my daughter.”
“I’m not afraid.”
She clenched her fists and looked at her father.
“I want to try.”
Three minutes later, father and daughter arrived at a small training ground beside their home.
This was where Dante usually practiced. Wooden posts, straw dummies, target boards, old shields, training bows, and crossbows were neatly arranged on one side, and some places even bore shallow scuffs from years of training.
Dante took a wooden sword suited to Qiu Meng’s size from the weapon rack and handed it to her.
Qiu Meng took the wooden sword, her palms slightly sweaty.
Her father also picked up a wooden sword and stood across from her. He had been relatively laid-back at home, but the moment he gripped the hilt, his demeanor changed completely.
“Come on.”
His eyes grew calm.
“You attack first.”
Qiu Meng took a deep breath, stepped forward with her right foot, and thrust forward almost on instinct.
But her father merely sidestepped, and the wooden sword grazed past his linen shirt. The next instant, he stepped forward with his left foot, closing in with almost the same lunge—only his speed, angle, and center of gravity were far steadier than hers.
“Too slow!”
The wooden sword swept toward her.
Smack!
Pain shot through Qiu Meng’s hand. The wooden sword flew out of her grip and spun twice on the ground.
She stood frozen.
Her father used his toe to flip the sword up, caught it with his right hand, and tossed it back to her.
“First, daughter, you lift your shoulders too obviously before swinging—it’s easy for an enemy to read you and dodge! Second, after a thrust, you don’t prepare to defend—that’s a major combat taboo. And third, enemies won’t stand still waiting for you to finish your full combo without attacking!”
Qiu Meng had just caught the sword when she realized her father was already closing in again.
This time, he swung two consecutive strikes. Qiu Meng hastily raised her sword to block, but she was too slow.
Heavy force slammed into the wooden sword, numbing her arms and sending her stumbling backward before she fell to the ground.
“Again!”
She gritted her teeth and stood up.
The pain made her eyes sting, but it also cleared her head. She gripped the wooden sword tightly, imitating Dante’s lunge as she charged forward, trying to seize the initiative with speed.
But she only copied the form, not the techniques of weight transfer and back-and-core power.
When she swung a diagonal slash, Dante stepped back lightly to dodge, then pressed his sword along the edge of hers.