Ji Mountain was not as stifling as Shangqiu.
The climate was dry and fierce. The sky seemed to hang a golden hedgehog, and naked sunlight stabbed into one's body. Yet after climbing up here, it turned cold again; block the sunlight even slightly, and the wind carried frost.
After fighting here for seven years, the young nobleman's delicate skin and tender flesh had long since worn away, replaced by a tawny brown.
Wen Yong still could not get used to this place.
Not because of the climate, nor because he missed the warm fragrance and soft jade of Hundred Flowers Street.
It was because the taut string within him, every hour of every day, trembled with a note demanding rest—
At the edge of the Civilization Basin, one could only replace sleep with cultivation. Sword in hand whether walking, standing, sitting, or lying down; the moment one opened one's eyes, there was slaughter.
Only during the monthly rotation and respite, when their squad of garrison soldiers withdrew to Pillow on Halberd City behind Ji Mountain, could they sleep soundly for one night and soothe their wounds and exhaustion.
The war between humans and demons had lasted for so many years. The Hundred Thousand Mountains surrounding the Civilization Basin, with all their strange passes and perilous strongholds, had long become a quagmire of flesh and blood.
The fiercest battlefields among them were the "Two Waters, Three Passes, and Four Mountains."
The "Two Waters" were Dragon-Sorrow Crossing and the Scorched Sea.
The Three Passes were Rust Buddha, Drowned Moon, and the Mystic Shrine.
The Four Mountains were Dong, Xian, Fu, and Ji.
Compared to the Two Waters and Three Passes scattered haphazardly along the lengthy border, the Four Mountains occupied more "proper" positions, respectively guarding the southeast, southwest, northwest, and northeast of