"Rumble."
Wagons laden with all kinds of resources slowly passed through the gates into the city, hauled along with great effort by cultivators and mortals.
Everything took place under the eyes of overseers and demon beasts.
Toying with black whips covered in barbs, the overseers looked at their fellow humans with eyes full of cruelty and delight.
If anyone slacked off even slightly, a black whip would immediately lash out.
"Crack!" "Aaargh!"
The black whips fell swiftly, immediately drawing screams, yet those being beaten did not dare resist.
The Annam Protectorate had fallen six thousand years ago. To ordinary mortals, that was an unimaginably long stretch of time.
Once the elders who had witnessed that "dark history" had all died, each new generation of mortals was born into slavery.
From the very beginning, they were indoctrinated with the mindset of slaves and taught how to please their demon beast "masters."
Creating value for their masters was held up as their sole mission and destiny.
Passed down from generation to generation, this had left most mortals long accustomed to their status as slaves. They saw nothing wrong with it.
The history of this land was no longer their history!
Only those who happened to learn to read and discovered that past would feel a raging fire of anger ignite in their hearts when subjected to suffering and torment!
Such people were few, but they still existed.
Yet now, faced with whips lashing their bodies and pain that tore at their hearts and lungs, they could only lower their heads in silence.
They understood that lashing out now would be meaningless. They would only throw their lives away.
They had a more important mission: to tell more of the younger generation about their former history and pass the "embers" down from one