In Trissa, in the eastern Holy Sword Territory, stood Black Ink City. Strictly speaking, it was the first Military Capital with a civilian population, and the ancient city belonging to the Holy Temple closest to the Three Great Territories' Convergence.
Thus, almost everywhere one looked, its residents were Fulin Taiyou People there to do business: liquor merchants, medicine peddlers, prostitutes, performers, all chasing money...
Almost every four or five months, a new batch would replace them. Yet some people lived there permanently. They were not frightened by flimsy rumors of enemy attacks; their ancestors had lived there for generations. They were farmers, carpenters, masons, tailors...
Black Ink City was therefore a capital that retained both the Knights' Order's stern military atmosphere and the bustle of ordinary life. Founded two hundred years ago, it had a history longer than those of Sand City and Morgaya City combined.
Its walls were not high, and even looked somewhat dilapidated by present-day standards, but Black Ink City's distinction lay in its design, filled with mechanisms and treacherous passages.
There were no rivers around Black Ink City, so it lacked the conditions needed for a defensive moat. Its unique advantage, however, was that it lay in an enormous basin more than ten kilometers across, densely covered by an expanse of primeval forest.
It was said that the thousands of Knights' Order members who had built Black Ink City two hundred years ago had spent two full years merely gathering the stone and cutting down and clearing the trees.
It was like a military stronghold built inside an egg. Any enemy who tried to attack could only return empty-handed. Even the Vikings' prized war chariots and the arrows so prized by the Qin Kingdom and the six kingdoms could not achieve even a third of their