Imperial City Of Snowland Chapter 8: Centenary Killing [Ii] (2)

The old man knocked on my door and asked gently, “Your Highness, could you come outside and meet me?”

I said, “Yes.”

He didn’t light up a candle this time. I walked out of my room in the midst of Xiao’s smoothly breathing. I stood at the doorway in the darkness. I couldn’t see his eyes, but my eyes glistered with light.

“Your Highness, could I ask you for one thing?”

“I’ll promise anything as long as you tell me what I want to know.”

“Your Highness, I’m so sorry I can’t tell you now. But, can you still help me with this matter?”

I lapsed into silence. The wind sound arose beside my ears and swept over the earth.

“Speak it out.”

“Your Highness, you’ve seen the war between Kingdom Liang and Kingdom Wei, haven’t you?”

“Yes, I have. But, it broke out in the mortal world, which the divine spirits don’t have the rights and don’t need to interfere in.”

“However, Your Highness, can you help me out?”

“Why?”

“Your Highness, can you sit down and hear a story out?” He pointed at a nearby table.

“OK.”

“Your Highness, here is the story.”

“Kingdom Liang and Kingdom Wei used to a unified one called Kingdom Daliang. The King of Kingdom Liang turns out the first son of the last King of Kingdom Daliang. However, the last King of Kingdom Daliang wanted to give his throne to the second son, because he considered the first son incapable of bearing the burdens. The first son knew this and dispatched a.s.sa.s.sins to kill the second son who successfully escaped in the end, of course. Having seen his secrets exposed, the first son killed his father to succeed to the throne and embarked on chasing after the second son again.”

The second son rose in arms in the south of Kingdom Liang after knowing that and founded  Kingdom Wei, the name of which meant that he just defended himself.

As the smartest guys in the mortal world, the two princes had adopted every vicious means to fight against each other for a decade. Instead of getting tired of it, they became even braver. Each time there was a victory or failure, they fought against each other there attempting to contest every inch of ground. As the Kings of kingdoms, they were quite leisurely, which was rested upon the sufferings of the people.

“Therefore, Your Highness, could you help me destroy either Kingdom Liang or Kingdom Wei?” asked the old man with a slight tremble.

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“That’s what happened in the mortal world.”

“Okay, Your Highness.” I turned around and walked inside.

This story was like the one of me and my elder brother. I didn’t know who would be the winner of the long-lasting war. I wonder if my brother knew this war.

I sat on the bed until it was bright.

Xiao Rang made a move and rushed outside before I realized what happened as soon as he heard the old man’s painful screams. When I rushed out of my room, I saw bodies everywhere and the old man who was dying.

After I rushed to the old man, he got close to my ears and said with his eyes strangely fixed on Xiao Rang, “Your Highness...” He died without being done talking.

“What happened?”

“Your Highness, look at the nameplates. They are soldiers of Kingdom Liang, and they killed the old man.”

“Really?” I stood up, put the body of the old man down, and looked at Xiao Rang.

Xiao Rang felt stunned first and then looked at me with a smile. His smile was so warm that it could melt the snowland. The l.u.s.ter in his eyes was much brighter than that of the stars in the night sky.

“Yes, Your Highness. That’s what happened.”

“Alright, let’s go.” I held the old man’s body.

“Go to where, Your Highness.”

“To destroy Kingdom Liang.”

“Okay, Your Highness.”

“Why don’t you ask me the reason?”

“Your Highness, I’ll do if you even ask me to kill all the divine spirits, let alone just a mortal kingdom.”

“Bury him here.”

Although the old man hadn’t told me about many things, my intuition told me that he was the one whom my father or I made blind. I wondered when Shadow let me see the following scenes. I felt lost and confused suddenly, because a soldier like the old man shouldn’t have been killed so easily by those weak soldiers of Kingdom Liang. However, Xiao Rang still stared at me with a big smile.

I nodded at him. I used my right hand to cover my left ring finger to release my wizardry, froze the body, and placed it into the tomb dug by Xiao Rang, which was a funeral of the highest honor for Ice Wizards. Each Ice Wizard would rather die at home than at battlefield, for they wanted such a funeral. It was rumored that an Ice Wizard would be an Ice Wizard again in the next life if he was buried like this.

I hope that he was born an Ice Wizard in the next life.

Afterward, Xiao Rang started singing the same song he kept singing when his father pa.s.sed away. Dismayed and pa.s.sionate, the song spread over to the skyline and echoed continuously.

I had never asked what this song was. According to Xiao Rang, that was a song sung by divine spirits at the battlefield. They kept singing it at the war between them and the mortals. Since then, they always sang it after a battle no matter there was a victory or a failure or they were dejected or high-spirited.

“Who started singing it?”

When Xiao Rang slowly buried the frozen old man with mud, his look became extremely sad. I seemed to see something transparent coming out of his eyes.

“My father.”

His sorrow seemed to be able to melt an entire town.

War.

When we walked toward the capital of Kingdom Wei, it was already in danger. Rumor has it that the entire army of nearly 30,000 soldiers of Kingdom Wei was completely wiped out, because the King of Kingdom Liang robbed the army provisions, leaving its soldiers and horses no food to eat. Even if civilians rushed toward the capital of Kingdom Wei in silence, they also felt afraid. What would happen to them when Kingdom Wei was destroyed? After all, the King of Kingdom Liang was quite heartless.

Xiao Rang and I attracted almost everyone’s attention. I was still clad in white with snow-white long hair in such a turmoil era. Compared with me, Xiao Rang looked more like a mortal person. But, he was too big to be one with his shoulders twice as wide as that of a mortal. His hair was black, but his weapon was a huge knight’s spear.

After all, we were not mortals.

All divine spirits were stripped of the ability to fly in the mortal world, so we couldn’t fly. That was all. We could still use other kinds of wizardry and depend on the physical body.

We saw more and more people around a few days later, so I knew we were getting close to the capital. It was hard to depict the King of Kingdom Wei who bore responsibilities and burdens as incompetent. He was literally a hero, for he survived so long when he fell short soldiers and horses.

The capital city wasn’t that prosperous, and many vendors weren’t in the mood to sell their goods. Rows of soldiers patrolled the streets and tightly held their spears upon seeing us.

Based on what the old man said the other night, the people all hoped that the King of Kingdom Wei won this war, because the King of Kingdom Liang was too brutal. His people led a rich life, but the taxes he imposed on them were too heavy. Consequentially, they had to hand over almost all the grain they harvested.

The King of Kingdom Wei had fallen short of soldiers and army provisions, so it was already his limit that he fought against the King of Kingdom Liang so many years. Now, his old enemy collected nearly tens of thousands of soldiers and moved toward his capital. His soldiers had decided to put up a desperate fight, so the streets were crowded with soldiers.

Now, he was racking his brain for means to resist the attack that was capable of ruining Kingdom Wei.

“Your Majesty, two people outside ask to meet you,” said one soldier while getting one knee down.

“Two? I need 20,000 people now. I won’t meet them. Besides, check out how many soldiers we still have.” Like a cat on hot bricks, he kept pacing up and down. He hadn’t slept for at least three days. He didn’t want to die, much less with so many soldiers and civilians.

“Your Majesty, but...”

“But what! You’d better do it in a hurry.”

“They...” The soldier nodded his head upon thinking of something more important. “They’re the two divine spirits who showed up at the Jiangning Battlefield two days ago.”

“Invite them inside as soon as possible!” The King of Kingdom Wei became calm again. The two divine spirits from the snowland were rather powerful. Although only two came here, he believed that they would render great help to his army.

“You are the King of Kingdom Wei?”

“Yes, I am. Please have a seat.”

“No, thanks. We still have other things to attend to. I think...uh.”

“Please feel free to speak it out.” The King of Kingdom Wei thought that even if they weren’t here to help him, he didn’t want to turn them as his enemies, which would only make the already bad situation even worse.

“I think I can do you a favor to kill the King of Kingdom of Liang.” When I spoke this, all those present stared at me with their vacant eyes.