Rewarding Merit, Punishing Fault

The rain had stopped. Not a wisp of cloud remained in the sky, and scorching, blazing light poured over Twin Sun Red Dragon City. The entire city reeked of a dense, unbearable stench of blood. Every street and alley was covered in dark-red clotted blood. This perfectly suited the aesthetic tastes of the Blood Qin Empire's people—the union of blood-red and iron-black was so savage, carrying a wicked sort of beauty.

The fires in many residences had only just been put out, yet thick smoke still rose into the heavens. Black columns of smoke danced high in the air like soul-summoning banners, bearing an ominous message—more people would die, and very, very many more at that!

Laborers with white cloths covering their faces bustled through the streets. Using iron shovels, they scraped up the thick clotted blood from the ground and loaded it into carts beside them to be hauled out of the city and dumped. If this blood were left in the city, it could rot and spoil, giving rise to plague. It could only be cleared away by hand and taken outside to fertilize the fields.

The corpses of those who had died in battle—especially those of the Imperial Guards in golden armor—were carefully carried away for disposal. Those guards loyal to the imperial family would receive grand burials, and because of their deaths tonight, their clans would also take a step toward good fortune and receive lavish rewards from the Empire.

The corpses of the rebel soldiers, however, had no such luck. Their armor and weapons were stripped clean away; even their shirts and trousers were removed. Their naked bodies were piled carelessly onto corpse carts and thrown into the farmlands outside the city as fertilizer.

It had to be admitted that these corpses and clotted blood