True Lord Qingyuan Miaodao, Under Supreme Xuanwei

Green mountains stretched on and on, while the human world seemed boundless. Spring passed and autumn came, through countless cycles of cold and heat. In the end, the years of youth slipped away in an instant; the children of the jianghu grew old in the jianghu. Many made names for themselves for a time, but few came through unscathed. After the unification of the human world, the Hundred Schools of Thought coexisted beneath the sun. The surviving royal clans and nobles of the former kingdoms still occasionally tried to stir up trouble, but they never amounted to much.

The last disturbance of any consequence was quelled by the sudden emergence of the School of Diplomacy.

The age of the kingdoms was over. The desperate battles fought by those with royal blood became footnotes to the School of Diplomacy's rise to prominence, left behind in some line of history. Time passed, and no one remembered the era when the world had been divided among rival states. Everyone believed the world had always been one.

The Human Emperors of successive generations had exhausted themselves in service to the realm. Some had sunk into indulgence, but the nature of Human Dao Destiny had always jolted them awake; they would either abdicate or rein in their excesses. Thus, the Human Dao flourished.

Before they knew it, a thousand years of prosperity had passed.

"The Mohist School's mechanical marvel has arrived in Jin Province Prefectural City. Please step back, everyone. Jin Province is prosperous; you can enjoy yourselves to your heart's content..."

The clear, bright voice carried far. A gigantic mechanical beast, resembling both a dragon and a serpent, came to a halt. Commoners emerged from its body, while a young man dressed in black, with an air of nobility about him, exclaimed in