Volume One: The Monarch's Command Chapter One: Night Bears the Deepest Grudge

August in Sanshan City was a time when horse-drawn carts laden with mountain goods filled the streets. The eagle’s beak mushrooms from Cang Mountain and the blazing flower grass from Mo Mountain were at their finest, and for the next three months, the five hundred paces from Baili Lane to the southern city gate would become the official mountain goods market. Until the end of the year, buyers and traders would come and go.

At the foot of the southern gate, an old soldier, who had spent thirty years risking his life on the battlefield and returned unharmed, could have secured a respectable post in the Central State. Instead, he chose to return to Sanshan City and guard the southern gate, living well enough on the small profits he gleaned from passing merchants to drink his fill.

Inside the city, taverns and teahouses clustered along both sides of Wanfu Street. Owning property here meant that rent alone could support a family. The first two establishments, Wanfu Tavern and Blossoms Garden, stood opposite each other, famed throughout the Southern Wilds. Even the gentry and officials from Central State would occasionally visit in plain clothes.

They came for the renowned dishes of Wanfu Tavern and the lovely maidens of Blossoms Garden.

It was said that Sanshan City had no taboos. In the alleys behind Wanfu Street lived wandering souls of the martial world, who rested by day and roamed by night, lending the city its peculiar charm. Often, at dawn, the cold light would reveal nameless corpses in the street’s center, and the rooftops bore the scars of broken tiles from the night before.

In this corner of the Southern Wilds, even the appointment of the city lord arrived only after a month’s journey by carriage. The official roads were notoriously slow; hence, dignitaries traveled incognito.

Here, the days were shorter by an hour than in Central State—perhaps so the heroes of the realm could practice their arts, for every night was eerily quiet, devoid of insects or beasts.

Soft footsteps and finely sewn nightwear traced the moonlit winding roads. Only one shop remained open at night—the northern city’s smithy.

Wherever the martial world thrived, so did blades and spears, and whenever heroes emerged, the smith’s back grew straighter.

The owner of the northern smithy, Yuan Qingtai, was a one-armed, unusually built man whose hammer bore the engraving of a peach blossom. He had just heated his forge and opened the doors when a visitor clad in night clothes arrived as expected.

He ignored the guest crossing his threshold, focused on striking the iron on his anvil.

After a thousand blows, Yuan Qingtai wiped his brow with a damp towel slung over his shoulder and, without raising his head, said, “What do you want made? Blueprint, materials, payment.”

The visitor was familiar with the routine, unloading his bundle and spreading out various materials on the table, laying out the blueprint, weighed down by three gold bars.

“Seven days from now, same hour. Collect it then,” Yuan Qingtai said tersely. He was a man of few words, pouring his soul into the dancing flames of the forge—a devotion spanning forty years, with ever hotter fires and ever finer craft.

Suddenly, he lifted his hammer and strode outside. He had never before paid attention to the scene beyond his shop.

His ears twitched, catching one, two, then the brittle snap of metal breaking, carried on the breeze—a sound that made the night feel fragile.

“He should have paid extra, but he refused. Missing three taels of bright silver sand,” Yuan Qingtai muttered, swinging his hammer idly into the air, then moving the door board to close up for the night.

Following the direction of his hammer, in a square courtyard behind Wanfu Street, a burly man with a full beard stood against the wall, dressed in a short tunic. His eyes wide with disbelief, he faced a black-clad rival, a broken sword in his hand.

That treasured sword had been forged by Yuan Qingtai. The courtyard was strewn with a dozen corpses, now joined by another as the bearded man fell.

The black-clad man wiped the blood from the blade with a handkerchief, then used it to cover his fallen opponent’s face, shielding lifeless eyes from the moonlight.

He drew a deep breath, sheathed his sword, and walked to the hall’s entrance. The door was ajar, and inside, a young child peered out, having witnessed everything.

The black-clad man pushed the doors open, and the child struck his waist with tiny fists.

On the table lay a wooden box. Opening it, he found a finely crafted copper token, the kind commonly seen among official or military ranks—an odd presence here.

Those in the courtyard had died for this token, sacrificing themselves to exhaust the broken sword’s power, allowing the black-clad man to seize the prize.

The child wailed as the man tucked him under his arm, leapt lightly, and landed in the street outside.

Three days later, the events were finally discovered by the landlord. The authorities arrived in several carriages, cleaned the scene, identified the bodies, and hastily buried them after registering their names.

The landlord’s records showed the tenant’s surname was Liu, a former centurion of the border army, who had arrived five years ago with an infant and rented the courtyard until that fateful night.

A ripple so small scarcely disturbed the city’s daily commerce. Yet after that night, the smithy never reopened, and the old soldier at the southern gate soon resigned, citing illness.

Word travels faster in the martial world than the fragrance of Wanfu Tavern’s wine. News that the King’s Token had appeared in Sanshan City and fallen into someone’s hands spread from the Southern Wilds to Central State, once again making the King’s Token the hottest topic of conversation.

In the 357th year of the Iron Dynasty’s opening calendar, news of the last King’s Token emerged. The calm of Central State began to shift toward the Southern Wilds.

Whoever claimed the King’s Token would share the Iron Dynasty’s fate. When all the tokens were activated, the dynasty’s fortune would be divided, and the realm of nine lands and sixty-one cities would plunge once more into chaos and conflict.

The founding emperor had wielded five tokens to topple the previous dynasty at its peak, establishing the Iron Dynasty that had endured over three centuries.

Thus, the legend of the King’s Token was inscribed in the dynasty’s annals. But after the founding emperor’s death, the tokens, once closely guarded, vanished without a trace.

Over three centuries, the royal house recovered four tokens. The last one, sought in vain, never surfaced.

A thousand gold pieces rewarded those who relayed news; ten thousand and a hereditary title for those who surrendered a token. This decree had been in force since the ascension of the second emperor.

Each day, tens of thousands of messages—both true and false—piled up before the dragon throne, awaiting the emperor’s review, exhausting the old ruler.

Unbeknownst to all, the black-clad man hastened through the streets, slipped into a gap in the northern city wall, with the child in tow, whose cries had ceased.

Sanshan City was so named for its location, nestled in a flat expanse surrounded by three low mountains. Once a hunters’ camp, it had grown into a sizable town over time.

The black-clad man exited the city gate and hurried toward Liang Mountain, so swiftly that from a distance, the dust raised by his feet might have been mistaken for a passing cavalry.