The dust cloud on the western horizon didn’t settle. It rolled forward like a living sea.
By the time the morning sun climbed above the eastern ridge, the plains outside Azure-Mist City were packed solid.
Two hundred thousand people stood shoulder to shoulder along the outer moat. There were herb-farmers in coarse burlap tunics carrying baskets of mountain roots, scarred iron-miners with soot stained deep into their skin, and wandering loose cultivators with chipped swords strapped to their backs. Mothers held bundled infants against their chests. Wounded elders rested their weight on walking sticks carved from wild pine.
General Meng Tie stood atop the ninety-foot border wall. His massive dragon-slaying halberd was planted firmly in the stone battlement, its black blade catching the morning glare.
“Boss Lin,” General Meng reported as Lin Mo stepped up beside him. “The line stretches five miles back into the canyon. Every honest worker within three hundred leagues heard about our free public buses and our zero-stone hospital. They broke through their sect checkposts during the night and ran across the passes.”
Lin Mo walked to the edge of the parapet and looked down.
He activated his [Pure-Heart Eye Lv.6].
A vast ocean of shimmering emerald and bright golden halos illuminated the valley.
