Northern Province

Come on, if some god-level old monster really were sealed in there, why would anyone leave a way to unlock it? Tian Meng really did still think like a soul beast. Far too naive~

For now, though, she had no way to open this place ahead of time. It seemed she would have to figure something out later.

Now that Tian Meng had awakened, Leng Xiyue had no intention of lingering in this godforsaken place, so she prepared to return to the Heaven Dou Empire's territory.

On the way here, she had followed the river upstream without encountering any cities, passing only the Heaven Dou Empire's northern border pass.

This pass was like a dividing line between the central lands and the north. Beyond that line lay a land of bitter cold.

Between the Far North and this pass stretched a vast expanse called the Northern Province. Though cold, it was still a fair distance from the extremes of the Far North, and humans could survive there. Over generations, the locals had developed resistance to the cold. Its people were fierce, and it was famed for its beautiful women. That was how Heaven Dou's books described it, anyway. In reality, everyone knew that meant it was famed for its bandits and robbers.

On the surface, the Northern Province belonged to the Heaven Dou Empire. In reality, it had already become a country within a country. The Luo family, its hereditary governors, held absolute power here. The governor's office exercised every power independently of the Heaven Dou Empire, retaining its imperial affiliation in name alone.

Thus, the Northern Province was entirely outside the Heaven Dou Empire's jurisdiction. Spirit Hall's authority here was also more symbolic than real. For Spirit Hall members, who enjoyed respect everywhere else, coming here was practically a prison sentence, because this truly was a land beyond the law.

Just like Slaughter City, no matter what heinous crime someone had committed, as long as they could make it through the Heaven Dou Empire's border pass and into the Northern Province, even a maniac who had slaughtered hundreds would be protected by the Northern Province's "laws."

Unlike the utter lawlessness of Slaughter City, however, any villain with money or strength could become a master above others here. They could join criminal organizations or pledge their lives to the governor's office. Even cultists who had killed several Spirit Hall guards could find sanctuary here.

Under this order, the class of ordinary people had vanished entirely. Ordinary people were born slaves, with a dizzying array of categories, while soul masters were also divided into rigid ranks. Native-born soul masters of the north occupied the bottom rung of those considered "people." Most were taken by the governor's office and brainwashed from childhood into emotionless killing machines; the "freemen," made up of tyrants who had migrated from elsewhere, formed the middle ranks; at the top stood great powers like the governor's office, whose lineages stretched back thousands of years, perhaps even further than the Heaven Dou Empire's history. They had only become the Northern Province after the Heaven Dou Empire's loosely assembled armies had beaten them into submission.

After that, however, the Heaven Dou Empire lacked the strength to keep them subservient forever. The Northern Province's military strength was not to be underestimated either. None of the "people" living here would give up such a paradise. The tyrants united to defend the Northern Province, heedless of life and death, and in the end, the Heaven Dou Empire could only build border passes to keep the Northern Province's illicit trade from entering its territory.

The slave trade, for instance. After thousands of years of the survival of the fittest, handsome men and beautiful women were everywhere in the north, and they were the finest merchandise. The walls built by the people of Heaven Dou were high, but the border administration had long since rotted away. Once a trading network was established, the defenses against merchant caravans existed in name alone. Some checkpoints had even established "lifelines" specifically for tyrants fleeing the interior. With money, anything was possible.

Likewise, the north lacked food resources, and successive Heaven Dou emperors had strictly restricted and forbidden the flow of grain into the Northern Province. As for the results... there were practically none. Instead, several emperors who had vigorously enforced this policy had died under mysterious circumstances.

For Heaven Dou's nobles, slaves were always more useful than hired commoners. They needed a stable source that could supply slaves in large numbers, so most nobles protected the Northern Province. With the noble class supporting it, anything the emperor said might as well have gone unsaid.

"I see." Leng Xiyue nodded, then looked at the sleazy bald man kneeling before her. "Finished?"

"Merciful lady, I've told you everything you wanted to know! I'm just an errand runner, really, not anyone in charge. Please let me go!" Staring at the gleaming muzzle in her hand, the burly bald man hastily knocked his head against the ground several times, hard enough to draw blood.

Beside him, more than a dozen corpses lay sprawled every which way, all shot through the forehead and killed on the spot. In life, they had all been Soul Elders, with a few Soul Ancestors among them, yet after the girl fired a dozen or so shots in succession, every one of them had met a grisly death here.

"A decent story. But if you want forgiveness, go ask those poor people you killed." Leng Xiyue kicked him to the ground, then pulled the trigger without even looking. With a gunshot, a flower of blood bloomed on the burly bald man's forehead, and he collapsed, unwilling to accept his fate.

Leaning against a nearby tree, Xiao Bai watched and praised her. "Nicely done. Any unnecessary emotion toward people like these is foolish. Looks like you've already adapted to this cruel world~"

Before they came here, she had still been a little worried. Killing one person was different from killing a dozen, after all. Even counting both her lives, Leng Xiyue was only twenty, still a delicate young girl. If a moment's hesitation had given these tyrants an opening to kill her instead, that would have been a joke.

Leng Xiyue rolled her eyes at that. "I'm kind, not some bleeding-heart saint. He said it himself: in the Northern Province, everyone above the slave class is either a puppet or a tyrant. How could I let him live? Never mind a dozen-even if I personally killed tens of thousands of people like him, I'd have nothing to feel guilty about."

"Good! You've got the right mindset!" Xiao Bai praised her, then glanced toward Tian Meng nearby. "So, what are you planning to do with these young ladies you rescued?"

Leng Xiyue had originally had no interest in asking about the Northern Province. She had only wanted to hurry back to the Heaven Dou Empire and get some proper rest. But an escort party had happened to pass by, lusted after her beauty, and decided to tie her up too and haul her back to sell. With no other choice, she could only give them a taste of "American quick draw" and ask about the local situation while she was at it.

The twenty-odd women they had rescued had all been abducted from the Heaven Dou Empire by these tyrants. Tian Meng was currently using his handsome, dashing, and quite approachable appearance to soothe the young ladies. It was fortunate he was there; otherwise, Leng Xiyue would not have had the experience to calm these still-terrified women.

"Them..." Now, though, Leng Xiyue also had a headache. She and Tian Meng had been making perfectly good progress on their journey, only for her to suddenly land herself with such a huge problem.