The clouds hung dark with the shadows of sorrow, casting a gloomy shroud over the battlefield. The air was thick with the stench of blood, dust, and death—a strange, suffocating smell that carried sorrow itself. Faint cries of pain echoed across the blood-soaked ground, where bodies lay piled in endless mounds. Tens of thousands lay scattered, some without heads or limbs, others riddled with stab wounds. The sight was horrifying, a devastating testament to the bloodshed that had consumed the Xin Kingdom.
"We've lost," a man clad in gold armor muttered. He bore countless wounds, his hair tangled and soaked with blood. A long gash ran down his shoulder, and a dagger had pierced his armor, embedding itself deep in his stomach. Another brutal cut traced from his left eyebrow, across his eye, and down to his cheek. Blood flowed freely from him, yet he had not moved from his spot since the battle began.
Behind him stood the towering wall of the Xin Kingdom. He looked back at it with unwavering resolve. “The Xin people must survive,” he whispered. Before him lay the corpses of his enemies, a testament to his strength and the lives he had taken to protect his people. Yet, his face bore fresh tears as he gazed upon his own fallen soldiers—fathers, mothers, children, his people—all lying lifeless on the ground. His heart ached, knowing his kingdom had been razed to ruin.
This man was King Xin Wuku, the ruler who had defended the Xin Kingdom for decades. Known for its lush green lands and wealth, the Xin Kingdom was a prize envied by other rulers. Under King Xin Wuku’s reign, the kingdom had won many battles, bringing prosperity and peace to his people. But no glory endures forever. And now, more than five kingdoms had allied to bring down the mighty Xin.
Outnumbered and overpowered, the soldiers of Xin fought valiantly, felling foes far beyond their own numbers. But courage alone couldn’t turn the tide of war. All King Xin Wuku saw now were the bodies of his people, and memories of his sons being cut down one by one. The war had consumed everything his kingdom might have become.
“The Xin people must survive, no matter what,” he said, gripping his sword and forcing himself to stand. Blood poured from his wounds, his single remaining eye blazing with a fierce, unyielding determination. He stood before the massive wall, sword in one hand, the other clutching his bleeding stomach. The kingdom’s final line of defense.
Some whispered why he remained by the wall. Was he guarding some hidden treasure? Was he protecting the last remnants of his kingdom?
The war had nearly ended. The surviving soldiers of the Xin Kingdom were either captured or too wounded to fight. The enemy soldiers began rounding up the survivors, and they all knew what awaited them—enslavement.
As they were bound, one dying man whispered, “The Xin people must never be slaves.” Blood bubbled from his mouth as he forced his shoulders back, lifting his head with the last of his strength. His words stirred a quiet echo among the few remaining Xin soldiers, each mustering their fading strength to utter the same defiant phrase. The words of their ancestors resounded once more.
Their captors laughed, amused at their defiance. These men could barely stand—yet they dared proclaim they wouldn’t be slaves? Who did they expect to save them? Their king, who himself was barely alive, sword embedded in his chest?
“Xin Wuku, know when you’ve lost,” one of the enemy kings sneered.
Wuku clenched his jaw, his bloodshot eye fixed upon the man. “I know defeat,” he spat, “but that doesn’t mean you’ve won. The Xin people must never be slaves.”
With a sudden roar, Wuku punched the ground and seized an ancient chain buried beneath the soil. As he yanked it free, the earth trembled, and the ground began splitting open across the kingdom, releasing plumes of toxic gas.
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Long ago, before the Xin Kingdom was founded, the mountain of Death Peak leaked deadly gases. The land, though rich in minerals, was uninhabitable. When the Xin ancestors arrived, skilled artisans and craftsmen without a land of their own, they discovered a way to contain the toxic gas beneath the soil, allowing them to build a kingdom above it.
“What’s happening?” enemy soldiers shouted as the air filled with a foul, sulfurous stench.
One wounded Xin soldier, lying nearby, managed a weak, painful laugh. “The Xin people…will never be slaves,” he rasped, blood trickling from his lips as he succumbed.
“Run!” came a frantic shout. But it was too late.
With an earth-shattering explosion, the kingdom erupted in flames. The entire land was consumed in a raging inferno that devoured everyone and everything—enemies and Xin alike, the dead and the dying, all lost to the firestorm.
Yet, behind the mighty wall King Xin Wuku had guarded, a hidden passage led deep into the earth. Through this tunnel, a group of children and a few women were fleeing, guided by the king’s foresight. Wuku had known they were unlikely to win this war, and so he had ordered the evacuation of women and children, ensuring a future for his people.
Among them was maidservant Qing, known as the most beautiful woman in the kingdom, second only to the queen. She had a boy named An Xian, whose origins were shrouded in mystery. Rumors whispered he was the king’s child, for no one else would dare father a child with a royal maid. Yet, An Xian looked nothing like the Xin people—his skin was dark, a pure contrast from the white skin of the Xin people, his eyes a pale blue, unlike the Xin’s gray, the Xin people could easily be recognized due to their brownish tiny dreadlocks but Ming An Xian dreads was completely white.
As they ran, the tunnel shuddered with the force of the explosions above. Stones began to crumble, blocking the path behind them.
“It’s over,” the queen murmured, tears streaking down her cheeks.
“What do you mean?” asked Yu Qian, the king’s second wife.
The king had two wives and three concubines, and Yu Qian was his second.
“Everything... everything is over. There is no more Xin Kingdom. Everyone is gone. The Kingdom has been destroyed,” she whispered, her voice barely carrying through the dim tunnel. As queen, she had known what was coming if they couldn’t win the war. The earth's tremors just now were like a cruel confirmation of her worst fears.
The ancient gas tunnels—the ones their ancestors had constructed to contain the deadly leaks from the Mountain of Death—had been shattered. The battle’s raging flames had ignited the volatile gas, leading to a monstrous explosion that tore their world apart.
Yu Qian’s heart grew heavier with each step as they made their way through the darkness. She had foreseen this outcome, though her husband, the King, had tried to calm them, vowing that he would return once the danger had passed. But deep down, she knew it wouldn’t be that easy. She’d overheard his conversation with the Queen about the last resort. If it came to that, the Queen was to take care of the survivors—the future of the Xin Kingdom, if anything of it remained.
Thinking of all she’d lost—her husband, her son, her father, and her brothers who had all perished in battle—she felt her heart shatter anew. She looked down at her seven-year-old daughter, Xin Tianshi, who was peering up at her with innocent, questioning eyes in the cave’s murky light. Swallowing her grief, Yu Qian wiped her tears with the back of her hand and gently caressed her daughter’s head, whispering the very words her husband had once used to comfort her, though they felt hollow now. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. It will all be okay soon.” Her ten-year-old brother, Yu Long, walked in silence at her side, his young face burdened with the same grief.
Around them, the tunnel was filled with the soft murmurs of children, most of them from the royal family or close relatives, while others were orphans from the nearby orphanage by the palace gates. Eight-year-old Xin Yao, the Queen’s only surviving child, clung tightly to her mother’s shoulder, her small face buried against her mother’s neck. Her snow-white skin looked ghostly in the faint torchlight, and she seemed like a fragile echo of a world that had now vanished.
Five or six carts rumbled behind them, loaded with food, water, and medicine—the last provisions the King had managed to secure for them. Some of the youngest children, too exhausted to walk, lay huddled on the carts, while others, like Ming An Xian, trudged beside them, silent as shadows.
Their footsteps, heavy with sorrow, echoed in the cavernous silence of the tunnel, a dirge for the fallen kingdom above.