Behind the stone monument, plumes of smoke slowly rose into the sky from chimneys. Houses built of bluestone blocks, and noisy hawking sounds drifted over. As the caravan slowly approached the town, the smell of fish and sweat assailed their nostrils, as if small insects were crawling in their brains.
Byrne had never been to such a place, neither before nor after his transmigration. The environment here was truly terrible. Dark, black mud was stuck in the cracks of every stone slab, and passersby's trouser legs were more or less stained with grime.
The caravan came to a stop, and the townsfolk froze, all eyes turning toward Byrne and his knights. From the crowd, a bald man in patched sackcloth hurried forward, clutching a small leather pouch that likely contained only ten or twenty silver coins.
"Sir! Here… here are twenty silver coins," he stammered, holding it up with both hands.
Byrne's expression remained neutral. He reached down, took the bag, and then returned it to the man. "Keep it. I am not here to take from you," he said firmly, releasing the man's arm.
The man's eyes widened at Byrne's words, disbelief written across his face. He knelt, gripping the pouch tightly. "Please… give us more time, sir!"
Byrne crouched slightly, helping him back to his feet. "I am the Lord here, not a bandit come to demand your money. Tell me your name."
The man's shoulders hunched, still clutching the bag. "Lord… my name is Clyde," he said, his voice trembling.
"Very well, Clyde," Byrne replied. "You'll show me around the town."
The guardian knights followed Byrne closely, ready to act should trouble arise. Byrne instructed the remaining knights to stay with the caravan and guard the goods.
Looking around, the town's structure was simple: a dock, a Living Area, and a slaughtering area merged together. Houses were two stories, with fish butchering and pig farming on the first floor and people living and sleeping on the second, with no regard for hygiene.
There was even a pregnant woman, nine months along with a swollen belly, butchering fish, completely unaware her water had broken until someone told her. Only then did she run behind her stall, where her husband used a black cloth to screen her off while she gave birth inside. The scissors used to cut the umbilical cord were only briefly heated over a fire.
Residents ate at their stalls, completely unconcerned about cleanliness, only shooing away rats when they climbed onto the fish stalls. The children here most loved and most frequently played a game where they poked out rats' eyes and put them in jars to fight. They completely disregarded the possibility of viruses or the Black Death.
But surprisingly, residents who managed to survive lived very long lives, as if their bodies had developed antibodies to resist diseases.
All of this gave Byrne a clear understanding of his territory.
As he walked back to where the knight squad was located, he asked Clyde, "Who are those bandits who demand money from you?"
Clyde sighed three times, each heavier than the last. "Those bandits come from Border Fortress. The kingdom is in decline, and they can't pay their soldiers, so they often come to plunder money and women. If we don't give them what they want, they start killing people."
He paused, looked up at Byrne, and said heavily, "Lord, you should leave here. It's very dangerous."
Byrne looked into Clyde's eyes. "I came here to solve all of this."
Regardless of whether Clyde believed him, Byrne couldn't possibly leave now; this was his territory.
"Is there anywhere I can see the entire territory clearly, and that's also a bit cleaner?"
Clyde raised his hand and pointed above the town. "That's a cliff. Standing up there, you can see the entire Storm Territory, and there's also a dilapidated castle up there."
The cliff was located to the upper right of the town, offering an extremely open view and beautiful scenery. Byrne called the knight squad and had them bring supplies to that location. It was impossible to live in the town. He would rather pitch a tent than live in the town.
Turning right out of town and following a grassy path for ten minutes led to the top of the cliff. Indeed, as Clyde said, there was a castle, but this castle needed to be called that loosely. Only a foundation and an archway remained, with "Wind Castle" written on it.