"Do you know what rime is?"

In the carriage, Loran Hill was talking to a thin girl with blonde hair, who was looking out the window curiously.

Along the mountain road, trees are blooming with tiny "white flowers", making the bare treetops look lush and beautiful.

"Rime?" The girl repeated the unfamiliar word, tilted her head in confusion, and looked at Loran Hill in front of her.

"Although hoarfrost looks like snowflakes, it is not snow." Loran Hill recalled the scientific explanation he had seen in the past.

"It's not snowflakes falling from the sky, nor are they ice hooks left by flowing water. Instead, it's ice crystals that appear naturally on the tree without any reason."

"In fact, it is essentially a crystal formed by the condensation of colorless water vapor. But because it does not accumulate, accumulate and break like snowflakes, it is more complete and beautiful." The girl stretched her hand out of the window, and a small ice crystal floated down from the treetops, landed on the palm of her hand, and gently floated and rotated. Then she placed it on the colder book cover and handed it over.

Naturally condensed ice crystals appear in standard hexagonal rhombuses with subtle branches, which looks very beautiful.

"It's so beautiful." The girl carefully bent down and lay in front of the table to look at the ice crystal.

Seeing her interested expression, Loran Hill smiled. She had rescued this girl from beneath the ruins, and later discovered she was the key to unlocking the seal. Viscount Moruo had taken her from the prison cell in Iron Hill City because he needed her blood.

"Do you have any other family members?" the girl asked after she woke up.

"I don't know." The girl shook her head. In her memory, her father was away from home all year round. It was not until the day when the guards came to her house to arrest someone that she knew what her father had done.

Because they were involved in an underground resistance organization, their family was arrested. Only her brother escaped because he was away on business. Later, her mother died of illness in prison, leaving her alone.

"Father, he's probably gone. I heard from the guards." The girl pinched her fingers nervously.

"I don't know if my brother survived."

"Have you ever thought about revenge?"

"I don't know. I hate people who abuse themselves, but I also know that some of them are just doing their job." The girl said hesitantly.

"I don't know who I should hate specifically, I just feel sad."

"Is that so?" Loran Hill also sighed.

Many times when we encounter misfortune, we can always find a specific person or thing, and all we have to do is defeat them, just like the snowflakes falling from the sky and the frost condensing in the canal, everything has a traceable path.

But sometimes, misfortune and sadness are like the rime in the mountains, quietly condensing for no reason and hanging all over the branches.

I couldn't find its origin, nor did I know why it just happened. Even if I wanted to defeat it, I couldn't find anyone to fight against. It was like all my strength was hitting nothing, a hollow and uncomfortable feeling.

If the problem were just a matter of fighting, it would be so simple and clear.

Unfortunately, everything is not that easy.

You are not a specific thing, but the entire era and environment that have created everything in the present. Countless people are caught up in it and cannot extricate themselves, just like the cold water vapor in the night that slowly seeps in, and no one can escape the severe cold of this winter.

Outside the carriage where the two were, everything was covered with white snow and ice crystals. A convoy of about a hundred people was slowly moving through the mountains, heading towards a distant city.

——————

Longya Province.

Originally, this was a county province in the inland of the empire, but due to the cession of land after the war, it has now become an important border town in the west of the empire.

Newly built towers rose from the ground among the rolling mountains. Soldiers in white-gray armor occasionally appeared on the towers' observation decks, monitoring the border near Cransia.

These three-story stone towers were equipped with fodder and kerosene, which could be ignited once the enemy attacked, sending out strong smoke signals to attract the defenders stationed in the rear.

Although a contract was signed with Clancy, the Empire did not completely trust the other party, and a large number of elite legions were stationed here.

However, unlike before, the flags flying from the towers here were not the black-and-red dragon flag of the Pascal family, nor the blood-red rose flag of the imperial family, but the white griffin flag on a gold background. They were the lions from the mountains of the western border of the empire, soldiers of the Mountain Kingdom.

The Salius family is a relatively special branch in the empire. The history of the Griffin Duke is no shorter than that of the Imperial family, but is an equally long country.

In the era of the Cang Yue Kingdom, the Griffin Duchy was a famous country among the mountains in the western border. The magical beast with a lion's body and an eagle's head flying among the cliffs became the family's emblem, and they were indeed good at cultivating this ferocious magical beast.

Those griffin knights wielding lightning spears, traveling in groups among the mountains, are a powerful legion that can slay dragons.

During the rise of the Verdant Kingdom, the Griffin Duchy also gradually developed, gradually annexing and unifying the countries in the west, and the two sides even had several conflicts.

Later, when the Verdant Kingdom expanded southward, it encountered the extremely powerful magical kingdom, Oz, and suffered a huge setback.

After that, the expansion of the Verdant Kingdom gradually stalled, and the Griffin Kingdom also found it difficult to break through the mountains and hills and fight a decisive battle with the Verdant Empire in the vast plains.

So, with the mediation of the Sages' Council, the two countries entered into an alliance and merger. The Griffin Kingdom became part of the Verdant Empire, and the original royal family was named the Grand Duke of Griffin and continued to rule this land.

This move eliminated the war, stabilized the green flanks and rear, and made the empire stronger.

Now, after the Empire's defeat, the Regent personally traveled to the Griffin Duchy, bringing numerous promises and conditions. After negotiations and agreements, the Griffin Duchy agreed to send troops, dispatching the mountain legions to the south of the Empire to build fortresses and city walls to defend against possible attacks.

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