Novel

World Background: Introduction to the Four Major Nations

The "Fantasy World" setting merges elements of Xianxia (cultivation), magic, and exotic arts, featuring four distinct nations, each with its own unique culture, factions, and political structures.

Different regions host various sects and skills, all intertwined in a complex web of grievances and alliances.

The world is primarily divided into four nations: the Shuntian Dynasty on the eastern mainland; the Moonrise Empire on a northwest island; the Commercial Republic on a western island; and the Changfeng Republic on a southwest island.

Shuntian Dynasty: Occupies the majority of the Central Plains, modeled after the Ming Dynasty. It is surrounded by various ethnic tribes and local strongmen. As it has been established for less than a century, there are many internal resistance forces. Some sects and gangs are even more powerful than the government. Threats from northern demons and eastern foreign tribes prevent the dynasty from unifying or expanding further.

Moonrise Empire: Located in the northwest and composed of two crescent-shaped islands, this nation is modeled after the Japanese Sengoku (Warring States) period. Local Daimyos hold significant power, while the Emperor is revered by the people as a symbolic leader.

Commercial Republic: A circular island in the west with a square Mediterranean-like sea in the center, resembling an ancient coin. Modeled after Hong Kong and ancient Venice, its population consists mainly of merchants and sailors. Due to the conflicts between the other three nations, the neutral Commercial Republic has become a major hub for international espionage.

Changfeng Republic: An island nation in the southwest. Many of its people are descendants of those who fled the mainland due to dissatisfaction or failed opposition to the Shuntian Dynasty. Although theoretically a democratic republic, actual power is largely held by corporate conglomerates and underworld syndicates.

Northern Demons: Reside in the cold northern lands. Despite the harsh environment, the demons possess great power and constantly seek to seize Shuntian territory for a better living environment.

Eastern Foreign Tribes: Various tribes roam to the east, with the "Canglang (Blue Wolf) Tribe" being the most prominent threat to Shuntian. There are also legends of distant, mysterious empires, though little information reaches the mainland.

Jingbei Port — The Northern Frontier Built by All Four Nations Together

At the far north of the Myriad Seas lies a continent locked in eternal ice — the Frozen North (Hanbei Continent). It is no land of humans: it is where the northern demons gather and take root after crossing through their portal into this world. At the southernmost tip of the Frozen North stretches a long, narrow peninsula, like a finger jabbed into the North Sea, facing the northern border of the Shuntian Dynasty across the water. On the very point of that peninsula, humans built a city — Jingbei Port.

What makes Jingbei Port remarkable is that it is the only city the four great nations funded, garrisoned, and built together. The Shuntian Dynasty, the Moonrise Empire, the Changfeng Republic, and the Commercial Republic — four powers who normally scheme against one another — set aside their grudges, for once, before the shared threat of the northern demons. In the city stands a stone stele inscribed with the Jingbei Pact, and at its heart, the Four-Nation Council Hall holds a round table with no head seat: any nation's envoy may take any chair. It is a sight you will find nowhere else in the Fantasy World.

Being the front line, Jingbei Port is also the best-stocked place in the whole northern reach: nearly every sect of the four nations keeps a liaison office here, and smiths, weapons, armor, talisman scrolls, firearms, medicine, food, and drink are all readily at hand. To the south lies the harbor, where the ferryman's boat crosses the North Sea to and from the human nations of the south; to the north stands a heavy North Gate, carved with six characters — "Guard This Land Together; Never Retreat but only Death!." Beyond the North Gate lie the snowfields and wilderness of the Frozen North, and the farther north you walk, the thicker the demon-aura grows, until you reach the very entrances to the demons' lairs. For most who are newly out in the world, Jingbei Port is "the edge of the human world"; for those resolved to slay demons and banish evil, this is where the real journey begins.

The Northern Demons — Invaders from Another World

Where the Demons Come From

The demons are not native creatures of the Fantasy World. They come from another space — an otherworld unconnected to this one, which we may call the Demon Abyss. The Demon Abyss and the Fantasy World were meant to be two utterly sealed-off realms; the only reason demons can step across is a portal forcibly torn open through space and time.

But crossing the portal is an extremely perilous thing. To send a living being through the seam between two worlds takes power and energy on an unimaginable scale — and the stronger the demon, the more staggering the energy required to send it across. If the energy falls short, the portal collapses midway through the crossing, and whatever is passing through is lost forever in the turbulence of space and time, not even a soul remaining. For this very reason, the beings that truly stand at the summit of the demon race have not been able to cross — not a single one: the cost of sending them over is more than any portal can bear.

So everything now appearing on the Frozen North belongs only to the lower ranks of the demon race — those weak enough to be sent across safely. And even so, it has been more than enough to rob the four great nations of their sleep.

The Seven Demon Ranks

The demons hold to a strict hierarchy, divided from strongest to weakest into seven ranks — the First Rank the mightiest, the Seventh the lowest:

• 🔹 Rank 1 · Demon Emperor — the true sovereigns of the Demon Abyss, said to be of the eight-tailed and nine-tailed kind. Their energy is too vast, and to this day none can be sent across the portal. They have never appeared in the Fantasy World. Should they ever cross over, it would be a catastrophe capable of toppling the entire world.
• 🔹 Rank 2 · Demon King — overlords who each rule a region of the Demon Abyss. Likewise, the cost of crossing being too great, they remain trapped in the Abyss, unable to appear.
• 🔹 Rank 3 · General — the highest rank to have successfully crossed and appeared on the Frozen North. To this day there is only one: the Seven-Tailed Demon Fox, who commands the demon legions of the Frozen North. It is the supreme commander of this northern invasion, and the most terrifying foe humankind currently knows.
• 🔹 Rank 4 · Legion Commander — the several commanding generals beneath the Seven-Tailed Demon Fox, each leading a demon legion and holding a different stronghold across the Frozen North.
• 🔹 Rank 5 · Demon Officer — the elite officers of the legions, most having cultivated a human form and mind, able to wield demon arts and marshal troops into formation.
• 🔹 Rank 6 · Elite Demon Soldier — trained demon warriors, the backbone of the legions.
• 🔹 Rank 7 · Lesser Demon — the most numerous rabble, savage and fearless, the demons humans most often meet in the wilds and the lairs.

It is worth noting that a demon fox's number of tails corresponds exactly to its rank — seven tails already marks a "General"; the never-seen eight-tailed and nine-tailed foxes are the Demon Kings and Demon Emperors trapped on the far side of the Abyss. A single Seven-Tailed Demon Fox has already forced the four nations to join hands just to barely hold the line; should the day ever come when a portal is stretched wide enough to send across an eight-tailed or nine-tailed body… no one dares to imagine that day.

The Current Situation

The Frozen North today is held at its center by that Seven-Tailed Demon Fox, with several Rank 4 Legion Commanders guarding its various reaches, and below them, layer upon layer of demon officers, demon soldiers, and lesser demons. Again and again they pour south from the Frozen North, cross the North Sea, and raid the northern border of the Shuntian Dynasty — and the human settlements farther southwest as well. After being plundered and burned out countless times, the four great nations finally understood: rather than fighting apart, better to push the battle line right up to the demons' doorstep.

And so came Jingbei Port, the Jingbei Pact, and that North Gate with its vow of "Never Retreat but only Death." For humankind, this is a war they cannot afford to lose — every inch of snowfield north of that gate is a battlefield contested with the Seven-Tailed Demon Fox and its legions.