Beside a bend in the Black Origin River, where its waters had gathered into a powerful current, stood a bustling commandery city of the Black Retention Kingdom: Black Spring Commandery.
Viewed from high in the sky, Black Spring Commandery seemed fairly close to Black Retention Snow Mountain, but in reality, nearly two hundred li lay between them.
Moreover, the terrain dropped sharply from the snow mountain to Black Spring Commandery, while intervening peaks blocked some of the descending cold air, leaving these two seemingly nearby places with vastly different climates.
Black Retention Snow Mountain was covered in ice and snow year-round, whereas the area around Black Spring Commandery enjoyed relatively normal springs, summers, autumns, and winters.
The mountains in the transitional region also teemed with plants and animals and yielded abundant resources, with the famous Black Retention snow ginseng growing closer to the snow mountain. Thus, Black Spring Commandery was no small city.
Though it did not rank among the Black Retention Kingdom's most prosperous places, it was a large, populous city with the kingdom's biggest medicinal herb market. Merchants arrived in an endless stream from across the country and even from foreign lands.
This was precisely where Yi Shuyuan had come after leaving the Dragonkind behind. He descended on the wind, and as he approached Black Spring Commandery’s city, the intense bustle of its New Year festivities swept over him.
Although the Golden Toad Palace lay within Black Retention Snow Mountain, it was now nothing more than a stretch of ruins buried beneath ice and snow. As for rebuilding it, that remained merely a thought.
Besides, the Great Toad King's original arrangements had been made with his daughter's safety in mind. She could not stay at the former site of the Golden Toad Palace forever, and Black Spring Commandery