Greenway was the last major city in the northern part of the empire's southern territories. Beyond the city to the north stretched the vast and perilous Black Pine Forest—a sprawling woodland shrouded in shadow year-round that occupied nearly a tenth of the entire nation. Poisonous marshes, beast lairs, and the nests of ancient creatures could be found throughout its depths. Although the Black Pine Forest was also rich in rare alchemical materials and ores, its dangers and the terrifying legends lurking deep within meant that few people were willing to venture inside of their own accord.
For many years, the people of the empire had worked to develop this vast forest. After all, leaving such fertile land in the heart of the empire unused was a terrible waste. Yet the Black Pine Forest's astonishing vitality, along with the beasts of all sizes entrenched within it, made development progress exceedingly slowly. After all these years, the people of the empire had managed to establish only a handful of cities around the pine forest—Greenway was one of them.
The city could be called one of the most successful models of the "Black Pine Forest Development Project." The land it occupied had still been part of the dark forest two hundred years ago, but the efforts of generations of druids and arcanists had severed it from the Black Pine Forest's "cycle of life," halting the madly spreading and regenerating trees at the woodland barrier north of the city. Meanwhile, the people of the empire had multiplied and thrived in Greenway, building a city and cultivating fertile fields, turning it into a sturdy bastion of civilization that had finally secured its foothold.
But the price of building such a city had been far too high.
The manpower, resources, and effort spent seizing a piece