Chapter 10: This Land

The horse was clearly a fine one, carefully selected by Aldo.

Its hooves were steady and strong on the gravel road, several times faster than the one Rex had ridden here.

The journey from Frostwind City to Wangfeng Fortress took only a little over half a day.

The sun hadn’t even set yet when they entered the town.

The carriage slowly made its way down the main street.

Rex’s gaze seemed to be searching for something.

Until noisy voices and cheap music drifted out from a roadside tavern, and several red-faced, drunken merchants stumbled out the door, arms around each other’s shoulders.

Through the tavern window, Rex caught a glimpse of a familiar figure.

Scar-Face was sitting in the innermost seat, several empty tankards in front of him.

He had a dancer in a red dress in his arms, laughing so hard he was swaying, shouting something unintelligible.

The candle on the table made his scar particularly prominent.

‘Found you.’

The carriage stopped in a secluded spot outside the town.

Rex tied the horse to a withered tree, then he and Hilda silently waited across from the tavern.

Not long after, the tavern door was pushed open, and Scar-Face staggered out.

He was thoroughly drunk, his steps unsteady, walking as if on cotton.

The money pouch in his embrace was gone, his collar stained with alcohol, and he was muttering curses under his breath.

He headed south along the street.

After about twenty steps, he suddenly felt a light tap on his shoulder.

“Fuck! Who’s the blind bastard?”

He spun around, his drunken eyes blearily scanning the area.

He discovered the street was completely empty at this moment?

“…Damn it.”

He mumbled, seemingly not noticing anything amiss, and continued forward.

He almost felt like he was home, but when he looked up, he found himself back at the tavern entrance.

The crooked tankard pattern on the sign was clearly visible.

He froze, rubbed his eyes, turned, and walked again.

Once again, he was back at the tavern entrance.

He began to break out in a cold sweat.

Half his drunkenness fled, and he quickened his pace, almost running across the street and turning into an alley.

He remembered the alley should lead to another street, but why was there a wall here?!

He turned and ran back…

Only to find himself once again back at the tavern.

“Who?!”

His voice began to tremble.

“Who’s fucking with me?! Come out!”

No one answered.

He began to run like a madman.

Left turn, right turn, through the market, over a ditch, stumbling into a mud puddle, getting up and continuing to run.

His lungs felt like they were on fire, his legs weak as if filled with lead, but he didn’t dare stop.

But when he looked up, he was still back at the tavern entrance.

Scar-Face’s legs began to give way.

He collapsed to the ground, his pupils dilated, his lips trembling, unable to speak.

He wanted to scream, but no sound came from his throat.

He wanted to crawl, but his limbs felt nailed to the ground, immobile.

In the shadows across the street, something moved.

Two figures emerged from the darkness, approaching him.

Their steps were heavy, each one like a stomp on his heart.

The torchlight illuminated the two figures.

Scar-Face saw their faces clearly…

Those weren’t human faces!!!

The skin was gray-white, like rotten leather.

There were no eyeballs in the eye sockets, only two dark, hollow pits.

Their mouths were split open to their ears, revealing two rows of jagged yellow teeth.

One of them raised the thing in its hand…

It was a rusty cleaver!

There were dark red stains on the blade!

“No… don’t come over…”

Scar-Face’s voice was as thin as a mosquito’s hum.

A warm stream flowed from his crotch, soaking a dark patch on the ground.

“Ahhhhhhhhh!!!”

A scream tore through Wangfeng Fortress’s night sky.

Countless passersby stopped, looking strangely at him running in circles alone in the open area outside the tavern.

He’d run a few steps, stop, look around, then run again.

Then he suddenly collapsed to the ground, screaming at two passing guards.

The two guards were startled by him.

“What’s wrong with this guy?”

The young guard frowned.

“Had too much to drink,” the older guard said, unfazed.

He walked over and kicked Scar-Face’s shoe.

“Hey, get up. Don’t make a scene here.”

Scar-Face looked up at the guard, making vague whimpering noises.

In his eyes, the person standing before him wasn’t human; it was a gray-skinned monster raising a rusty cleaver to chop his head off.

He rolled his eyes back and fainted on the spot.

“…”

The older guard looked speechlessly at the puddle on the ground.

“Alright, take him to the constabulary. When he wakes up, have him clean himself up.”

The two guards, one lifting his arms and the other his legs, dragged Scar-Face away.

The onlookers dispersed, the music in the tavern continued to play, as if nothing had happened.

In the darkness of the street corner, Hilda’s figure silently appeared at the edge of the shadows.

She glanced in the direction where Scar-Face had been dragged away, then turned and walked back to the carriage, quietly sitting back inside.

“Feel better?”

Hilda didn’t speak.

But Rex could sense she was very happy at this moment.

The ancient castle was still the same.

The stone walls were covered with the marks of time, and the weeds in front of the door had grown taller than a few days ago.

Rex parked the carriage and slowly unloaded the four chests of gold coins, carrying them one by one into the house.

Hilda offered to help, but he stopped her.

“The chests are heavy. I’ll do it.”

Hilda, of course, didn’t choose to be idle.

She used magic to light a fire in the fireplace.

The room quickly became warm and cozy, a world apart from the cold wind outside.

Rex sat in a chair, looking at the four iron chests neatly lined up before him.

Twenty thousand gold coins.

In the Empire Capital, this amount might not be much.

At the peak of the Klein family’s prosperity, their daily cash flow exceeded this number.

But here, in the North, these twenty thousand gold coins meant one thing…

It meant Rex finally had a little capital to start doing things.

“Hah.”

Rex leaned back in the chair and let out a long sigh.

“Finally solved one problem.”

Hilda didn’t respond.

She stood behind him, silently taking off her overcoat and scarf, placing them on a nearby rack.

Then she adjusted the collar of her maid’s uniform, pulling her silver hair out from inside it.

By the time Rex turned around, she had already resumed her cold, elegant maid appearance.

“There’s still plenty of time,” Rex said, standing up and stretching his shoulders.

“How about we go out again?”

Hilda nodded.

The two rode their horses, slowly following the road in front of the ancient castle.

Rex reined in his horse on a hillside.

Below the slope stretched an endless expanse of wasteland.

Snow covered everything, obscuring the original terrain, but it was clear this had once been vast farmland.

The outlines of field ridges were still there, the traces of irrigation ditches remained, but they had all been abandoned for a long time.

Rex gazed at that snowy expanse for a long time without speaking.

“What is My Lord thinking?”

Hilda’s voice came from beside him.

“Thinking about how to turn this broken place into somewhere livable.”

Hilda was silent for a moment.

“What do you need me to do?”

“First, help me find out if there are still people living nearby.”

Hilda didn’t ask why.

She simply slowly closed her eyes.

The perception ability of the Dragon Kind was beyond human imagination.

Her consciousness spread out like water, over the snowy plains, over the hills, over the dry riverbeds and collapsed houses, searching inch by inch for any living people on this land.

After about a minute, she opened her eyes.

“Found them. Not many. Scattered in various places, less than ten households in total.”

“Where are they?”

“Southeast direction, at the foot of the mountain, two hunter households. In the woods to the west, a family of lumberjacks lives. North, near the river, a few more households…”

She pointed them out one by one, and Rex silently memorized them.

The two rode their horses, visiting each household one by one.

The first household were hunters.

An elderly couple, living in a small, low wooden hut at the foot of the mountain.

Frozen animal skins hung at the door, and the yard was piled with traps and snares.

When Rex knocked, the old hunter opened the door very slowly.

It only opened a crack, revealing one wary eye.

“I am Rex von Klein,” Rex said in a flat tone.

“The lord newly enfeoffed to the North. Passing by, came to see you.”

The eye in the crack scrutinized him for a long time.

“Lord?”

The old hunter’s voice was hoarse.

“There hasn’t been a lord here for over a hundred years.”

“There is now.”

After a silence, the door slowly closed.

Rex wasn’t angry, nor did he knock again.

He just hung a bag of provisions on the door handle, then mounted his horse and left.

The second household was in the woods to the west.

A lumberjack, a man in his fifties, broad-shouldered and stout.

When he opened the door, he was still clutching an axe.

His first reaction upon seeing Rex was to shield his wife and child behind him.

“Are you sent by the Empire?”

“I am the lord of this place.”

The lumberjack looked him up and down, his gaze lingering on Rex’s clean overcoat.

“The last person who said he was a lord stayed for three days and then left,” he said, planting his axe on the ground.

“How long can you stay?”

“A long time.”

The lumberjack snorted and didn’t reply.

Rex didn’t say much more.

He just took a bag of provisions and some salt from his horse and handed them over.

“Take it. Winters in the North are hard. And your child seems to have some symptoms of salt deficiency.”

The lumberjack looked at the provisions and the bag of salt, hesitated for a long time, but finally accepted them.

“…Thank you.”

Rex nodded and turned to leave.

Next were the third, fourth, fifth households…

Their attitudes were all similar.

Wary, distrustful, indifferent.

Some didn’t even open the door, just spoke a few words through the wooden planks and dismissed him.

Others accepted the items, but the expression on their faces clearly showed suspicion.

Rex wasn’t annoyed or impatient.

He knew what these people were thinking.

A place without a lord for over a hundred years, suddenly a young man appears claiming to be the lord, well-dressed, speaking politely, and giving things away for free.

Pies don’t fall from the sky.

This was a truth the people of the North had learned through generations of hardship.

The last household was by the river.

It was a larger wooden cabin than the previous ones, with chopped firewood stacked at the door, and warm yellow light shining from the windows.

An old woman with completely white hair opened the door.

A young man stood behind her.

Probably her son, holding a bowl of hot soup, looking warily at the people outside.

“Good evening,” Rex said, standing at the door without stepping inside.

“I am the new lord, Rex von Klein. Passing through, came to see you.”

The old woman didn’t speak, just looked at him.

Her gaze was very calm, as calm as the snowy plains of the North.

Her son spoke first.

“Lord? What lord is here? Has the Empire ever cared for us?”

“Child,” the old woman raised her hand to stop him.

She looked at Rex for a long time.

Then her gaze went past Rex, landing on Hilda behind him, then on the horse, and finally on the bag of provisions he had brought.

“My dear lord,” her voice was soft, carrying a calmness that had seen through worldly affairs, “thank you for your generosity. But this place…”

She paused.

“Besides being able to provide us with temporary relief for a while… what else can you give us?”

The question was very direct, so direct that even her son was taken aback.

Rex was silent for a moment.

“I can’t give you anything right now,” Rex said.

The old woman didn’t speak, just looked at him quietly.

“But at the very least,” Rex met her gaze, “I won’t run away.”

The oil lamp at the cabin door swayed in the wind, the light and shadow dancing briefly on Rex’s face.

The old woman looked at him calmly.

She smiled, not a polite smile, but one that seemed to recall something from long ago.

“My lord, with those words from you, they are worth more than anything.”

She stepped aside, pushing the door open a little wider.

“It’s cold outside. Come in and have a bowl of hot soup.”

Rex shook his head.

“No. It’s late. You should rest early.”

He motioned for Hilda to give the old woman all the remaining provisions.

The old woman was about to say something, but she only saw the two mount their horses, take up the reins, and ride away without looking back.

Their figures quickly disappeared into the night.

The old woman stood at the door for a long time.

“Mom,” her son called from behind, “who was that?”

The old woman didn’t answer.

She just closed the door, shutting out the cold wind.

“A man who won’t run away. A man who will bring prosperity back to the North,” she said softly.

Rex and Hilda rode side by side back.

The moon had already risen overhead, casting a silvery-white light over the entire snowy plain.

“My Lord.”

“Hmm?”

“They don’t believe you.”

“Hmm.”

“You’re not angry?”

Rex thought about it.

“If it were me, I wouldn’t believe it either. A place with no one in charge for over a hundred years, suddenly a young man comes saying he wants to be the lord. Would you believe it?”

“Those words you said,” Hilda paused, “were you serious?”

“What words?”

“‘I won’t run away.'”

Rex didn’t answer immediately.

The wind blew over, ruffling his hair.

He reached up and brushed it aside, his movements casual.

“If I ran away, wouldn’t all these years of effort have been in vain?”

“Besides, you’re here, aren’t you?”

Hilda didn’t ask anything more.

The two rode their horses slowly back to the ancient castle like that.