When Irelia emerged from the shadows of the ancient temple, sword "Dawn" in hand, the world outside remained as stormy as ever.
The muddy wilderness, illuminated by lightning, revealed an apocalyptic desolation. Yet, her heart was filled with an unprecedented flame. That flame was called hope, and also... resistance.
She didn't immediately return to "Resource Zone Seven." She knew she was alone now, and even with this incredible power, going back would be tantamount to throwing an egg against a rock. She needed allies, she needed to gather strength. Father Jacob's death made her fully understand that faith and hope must be defended with power.
Her first thought was of her compatriots, like herself, whose homes had been crushed by the empire's iron heel, whose families had been torn apart, yet who still clung to life. They were scattered in every corner of the continent, in mines, factories, and farmlands, like worker ants, contributing their lives and sweat to the empire's glory.
For a full month, Irelia roamed like a ghost through the wastelands and industrial zones of the New Heavenly Continent. Using the faint but pure holy power bestowed by the wooden carving left by her brother, she quietly healed the slaves wounded by their arduous labor. She never revealed herself, but secretly observed, searching for those whose eyes had not yet been completely consumed by despair.
She found a dwarf named Barton. He had once been a warrior of Ironforge, but was now forced to forge weapons for his enemies in the Imperial Armory. His arms were atrophied from overwork, but his eyes still burned with fury as he looked at the Imperial soldiers.
She found a catwoman, an orc, named Lina. Because of her agility, she was assigned to perform the most dangerous maintenance work among the high-speed machines. Her body was covered with scars, both old and new, but her ears were always listening for any clues about the Imperial troop movements in the overseers' conversations.
She also found many others like them. Humans, elves, dwarves, orcs... Hatred was their common language; freedom was their common desire.
On a night when lightning tore through the sky, Irelia gathered a dozen or so people she had secretly contacted at the foot of an abandoned cell tower.
When she drew the unadorned sword "Dawn," and its warm, holy golden light illuminated everyone's weathered faces, everyone was stunned.
“Holy power…it’s holy power!” Barton, the stubborn dwarf who never believed in God, was the first to kneel down excitedly. “Ancestors of the dwarves above, the glory of the hero has not been extinguished!”
That night, no one slept. Irelia told them Father Jacob's last words, the fragments of the holy sword "Dawn," and the will she carried that belonged to the "Sword of Rebellion."
“My strength alone is insignificant.” Irelia’s gaze swept across each person’s eyes, her voice, though young, carrying an undeniable firmness. “However, when our strength is combined, it will be enough to ignite a raging fire! What I need is not believers, but comrades! True warriors willing to shed their last drop of blood to reclaim everything we have lost!”
There were no grand pronouncements, no eloquent speeches. But everyone present saw in her burning eyes a path leading to dawn.
"Barton Bronzebeard, son of Ironforge, offers my battleaxe and my life for the Dawnblade!" The dwarf Barton pounded his chest with his fist.
"Lina, daughter of the Windwhisper Plains, is willing to offer my claws and loyalty for freedom!" The catwoman Lina's amber eyes gleamed with a resolute light.
"..."
One by one, souls from different races, burdened with the same deep-seated hatred, made their vows to this newborn light.
A resistance organization called "Dawn of Light" was quietly born in the heart of the empire.
Their initial actions were cautious yet efficient.
Their goal was not to confront the Empire's regular army head-on, but rather to act like a sharp scalpel, precisely cutting through the blood vessels and nerves of the Empire's massive machine.
Using the intelligence she gathered in the factory, Lina drew up a simplified map of the Empire's supply lines. Barton, leveraging the dwarves' mechanical talents, led a small group to secretly sabotage the tracks of the maglev trains transporting nutritional supplements and weapons. Meanwhile, Irelia led the remaining men, ambushing lone, small Imperial escort units along the transport routes with lightning speed.
The battle went more smoothly than expected.
The empire's ordinary soldiers, accustomed to long-lasting peace and absolute superiority, had long since lost their vigilance. They never imagined that on this planet, utterly conquered by His Majesty the Emperor, there would still be someone who dared to rebel.
Irelia's power was so formidable that they were terrified of her.
When the sword "Dawn" is drawn, its warm and sacred light is, in itself, a judgment on the soul for these imperial soldiers who have long been accustomed to ruling with violence and fear. The energy fired from their particle rifles is inexplicably deflected under the holy light. Their will is trembled by the power that represents "protection" and "hope," and even the courage to raise their guns disappears.
Irelia's swordsmanship was not sophisticated; in fact, it could be described as simple and unadorned. But every strike seemed to carry the wrath of the entire earth. Her power resonated with the lamentations of this enslaved planet.
The first real battle took place in a place called "Blackrock Canyon." It was a convoy of thirty Imperial soldiers escorting over a hundred newly captured elven slaves.
When Irelia, wielding "Dawn," descended from the sky like divine punishment before them, the Imperial soldiers even thought they were hallucinating.
"A...human girl?" The captain paused for a moment, then let out a contemptuous laugh. "Where did this little brat come from? Is she tired of living? Brothers, grab her! Her delicate skin is much more interesting than those elves!"
However, his laughter abruptly stopped.
Irelia didn't utter a single unnecessary word. She simply raised the sword in her hand.
Golden light, like a miniature sun, burst forth in the dim canyon.
"For freedom!"
Her petite figure shot forward like an arrow, instantly plunging into the ranks of the imperial soldiers.
A flash of sword light, and the two soldiers at the forefront didn't even have time to scream before their power armor was silently sliced through, as if it were made of paper. The cut was as smooth as a mirror, without any trace of energy burning.
"Fire! Fire!" the captain roared in terror.
Dense beams of particle light rained down on Irelia. But the moment they reached her body, they were all deflected by an invisible shield flowing with golden runes.
That is the sword of "Dawn," possessing inherent protective power. It protects not only the wielder, but also the wielder's resolve to protect others.
The battle was less a battle and more a one-sided massacre.
Barton, leading a group of dwarves, launched powerful bombs—modified from Imperial energy blocks—from both sides of the canyon, instantly shattering the Imperial formation. Lina, like a ghost, moved through the shadows, silently severing the throats of enemy after enemy with her sharp claws.
In less than ten minutes, all thirty imperial soldiers fell into pools of blood.
When Irelia, with her sword "Dawn," severed the shackles binding the elves, those beautiful elves, whose hearts had already turned to ashes, looked at this girl, covered in blood yet radiating a divine glow, and for the first time, a flame called "hope" was rekindled in their eyes.
This victory acted like a shot in the arm for this nascent resistance organization. They distributed the captured weapons and supplies to the rescued elves. And these elves, who harbored a deep-seated hatred for the Empire, joined them without hesitation.
The "Dawn of Light" team grew rapidly, from an initial dozen or so members to over a hundred.
Their actions also became increasingly daring.
Their existence eventually attracted the attention of the imperial local authorities.
The highest administrative official of Resource Zone Seven was a bloated, third-class baron of the Empire named Wang Defa. For him, the occurrence of slave escapes or small-scale uprisings within his jurisdiction was perfectly normal.
Usually, he only needs to send out one or two "security patrols" composed of combat robots to easily crush those "pests" into powder.
So when he first received the report that the "Black Rock Canyon" escort team had been completely wiped out, his first reaction was not vigilance, but anger.
"A bunch of useless trash!" He slammed his wine glass to the ground. "Thirty fully armed Imperial soldiers were actually killed by a bunch of unarmed slaves? It's a disgrace to the Empire!"
He simply didn't believe the "glowing girl" and "mysterious golden power" mentioned in the report. In his view, it was nothing more than a ridiculous lie fabricated by the frontline troops to shirk responsibility.
"Pass on my orders!" His fat finger tapped heavily on the star map. "Mobilize the entire force of 'Rust Town,' three 'hundred-man squads,' personally led by Sheriff Kruger. I don't care what methods they use, within three days, those damned rats must be dragged out and hung in the central square of the resource zone to dry!"
"Yes, sir!"
To Baron Wang Defa, and indeed to the vast majority of imperial officials, this was still just a trivial, routine "bandit suppression" operation. Their imperial rule was deeply ingrained and unbreakable. These occasional rebels were merely a few harmless noises in the perfect machine of the empire. They could be easily eliminated.
They were completely unaware of the kind of power they were about to face, a power capable of overturning the entire world.
Sheriff Kruger is a typical Imperial officer: arrogant, cruel, and with an almost blind faith in the Empire's power. He leads three hundred Imperial soldiers and over a hundred of the latest combat robots, aggressively marching into the "Dawn of Light," the industrial ruins stretching for hundreds of kilometers, where it might be hiding.
In his view, this was simply using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
However, for two whole days, they didn't find a single trace of the resistance fighters. The ruins were a complex area, filled with abandoned factories and pipes offering hiding places. The resistance fighters, like a pack of cunning foxes, were playing hide-and-seek with them.
Kruger's patience was quickly worn out.
"A bunch of hiding vermin!" he roared into the communicator. "Use 'scorched earth' tactics! Order the artillery to conduct indiscriminate, blanket bombardment of all suspected hiding places! I refuse to believe we can't find them!"
However, his order had just been issued.
"boom--!"
A deafening roar suddenly came from beneath his flagship. The entire small, magnetically levitated command ship, dozens of meters above the ground, shuddered violently, then lost power and began to veer and plummet toward the ground.
It was Patton! He led a group of dwarves, using their familiarity with the terrain, and stealthily infiltrated beneath Kruger's command ship, detonating their most powerful explosives.
The command system's instantaneous failure threw the entire Imperial forces into chaos.
And just then, Irelia appeared.
She didn't emerge from some corner; instead, she stood directly atop the tallest "Material Transformation Tower" in these ruins.
She raised the sword "Dawn".
At that moment, the dark clouds in the sky seemed to be dispelled by that golden pillar of light that shot into the heavens. A warm, sacred light instantly enveloped the entire battlefield.
The moment all members of "Dawn of Light" were bathed in this light, they felt their fatigue and pain vanish, replaced by boundless courage and strength.
The imperial soldiers felt as if they had been thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil. For these executioners, whose hands were stained with the blood of innocents, that light was more agonizing than the most vicious curse. They even saw visions of the slaves they had tortured and slaughtered coming to claim their lives.
"For the dawn!"
Irelia's voice, amplified by holy power, reached clearly into the ears of everyone on the battlefield.
"kill!"
Hundreds of ragged, but vengeful rebel fighters emerged from all sides of the ruins. Their weapons were a motley crew: captured particle rifles, dwarven-forged battle axes, and even spears hastily made from factory parts.
But their momentum was like a torrent bursting its banks, instantly engulfing the leaderless and demoralized imperial troops.
Kruger crawled out of the crashed command ship in a disheveled state. When he saw the girl standing atop the tower like a Valkyrie, for the first time, an expression of "fear" appeared on his face.
"A demon...it's a demon!" he roared incoherently, turning around to run away.
However, a golden sword light, like a bolt of lightning that traversed space, caught up with him in an instant.
Kruger's body froze on the spot. A thin line of blood ran from his forehead down to his jaw. Then, his body split into two even halves, falling to either side.
The head coach was killed on the spot.
The remaining Imperial soldiers completely collapsed. They threw down their weapons and fled in all directions. But what awaited them was the endless rage of the rebels, pent up for years.
The battle lasted less than an hour.
Three hundred elite Imperial soldiers and over a hundred combat robots were completely wiped out.
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