3 Land survey

The approach of the wolf was so silent, and it's appearance so frightening, half the knights peed in their pants.

Sure, a dragon is frightening, but it kills from a distance. The Dragon always gives you enough time to escape, or at least the illusion of such.

A winter wolf is not the same. Once it marks your scent, it will travel a hundred miles to kill you, and only you.

A thousand sayings exist in the south about ferocity and tenaciousness of winter wolves.

Thankfully, their outer clothes are all furs, so their embarrassing condition is not visible outside. They covered themselves all too thoroughly.

"Apprehend Prince Arthur Drakon's party, save for Sera Summer." Sasha Winterchild ordered the next moment.

Princess Sera, who fell back frightened at the sight of the white wolf, slowly gathered herself and stood up.

"Princess Sasha. Desert kingdom is only here as mediators, to offer an introduction. We are neutral.

Our armies will not take part in any armed conflicts within the continent unless we are defending ourselves.

My father Triton Summer will be quite happy to know the hospitality and care you have shown me." She curtsied, only to clutch at her stomach in pain.

"Take princess Sera to the medical wing. Have our best healer attend to her." Princess Sasha instructed.

The guards moved, and princess Sera was carried princess style to the medical wing, in the hands of the burliest guard.

After Sera went inside, Sasha looked at the remaining party, struggling in the arms of her guards.

"Any one who resisted, I will feed them to the dragon." Princess Sasha said in her coldest tone.

In a moment all the struggling men stopped, except for Dragon prince.

"Prince Arthur! I have welcomed you, a stranger to our land, with nothing but courtesy. Yet, all you have shown us till now is your contempt and disdain for my people and I. We do not welcome you in our lands, now or ever. " Sasha Winterchild spat at the dragon prince.

The color changed on the faces of apprehended men.

This was not a good sign .

Yet, it was the guards who were guarding these men that looked more frightened. As a result, the southern knights became even more apprehensive.

For what could scare the stalwart guards of Winter Princess is sure to be the worst pain one could inflict on themselves, they knew.

"May you know of no warmth in Winterland. May nightmares be your comfort, wind be your food, ice be your grave. " Sasha spoke, her voice ice cold, and a gentle monotone, that sounded all the more powerful and scary due to it's gentleness.

The guards of princess Sasha gasped. The words of the princess echoed in the winter winds with a strange resonance, as if an edict is coming down from heaven itself and inscribing itself into the earth itself.

This is the cruelest punishment to date the princess has handed out.

It is said even grown men are frightened of this punishment.

"Take them, Mark all of their party, the ones here, and otherwise. " Sasha spoke, before turning to the dragon.

The dragon, which was gleaming white and gold before is now gleaming blue and white.

" I know you do not like your old name, and neither do you think of it as your own." Sasha said.

This dragon did not like fighting, despite it's ferocious fire that could melt the hardest rock, and it's superior magic that could turn an entire continent upside down.

"I will give you a new name. Moon Snow. How is it?" She asked the dragon.

The dragon laid down on the ground, and purred at her.

Sasha nodded her head, left the courtyard to deal with the rest of the matters.

The dragon will sleep in the yard.

The wolf followed her.

The prince's party is led to the training ground.

A red herb mix is placed on their foreheads, right in the center.

The heat started dissipating from their bodies, as a bright red cross formed on their foreheads.

They started to feel the chill in their very bones, as the herb started acting.

Then, they were shaved till not even a puff of hair is seen over any of them.

And just like that, they were released in the land, with all their possessions, not a single one of them missing.

It is only when they camped for the night did the exiled party understand their predicament.

They could not feel warm no matter how many furs they put over themselves.

They could not buy a single morsel of food in any of the surrounding villages.

As soon as villagers saw the red cross, they started stoning them, starting from the youngest kid to oldest woman lacking teeth.

Sometimes, it feels like even the forest will eat them up as long as they carry the exile mark on their foreheads.

Arthur Drakon seethed with anger as his party reminisced about all the horror stories they heard about the Winterchild family.

They made it sound as if Winterchild were deities. They are obviously not. They are every bit as human as himself, and with but a stab of his sword, that winter princess will lay dead never to rise again.

He determined once he goes back, he will tame his aunt's other dragon Rykal, named for his aunt's lost brother, who was by all means the most talented of his generation. Then he will come back and burn the pretentious little bitch and her castle to ashes.

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The map of Winterland and the world was spread in front of Sasha.

This is the world of the Eldaria.

Winterland is but the middle part in the continent of thousand kingdoms.

To the North of Winterland is the Frontier, or forbidden land, where an ice sorceress was sealed. Barrier is the man-made wall that separates the frontier from Winterland.

The seal was not enough to hold the power of the sorceress. Ice sorceress's power leaked through the seal, freezing the entire land around her for all of time.

Thus, the frontier is forever in winter, with razing snow and cold. That is not to say nothing survived beyond the frontier.

Barrier separated the frontier from Winterland. It's said a first Winterchild built it to protect Winterland from the worst of the sorceresses power, which freezes the very land.

The Barrier did work to an extent, leaving Winterland a lush green land in summer, albeit a little cold compared to Summerland. However, their winters are harshest known, only second to the frontier.

Winterland accounted for more than half of the continent. The continent used to be called thousand kingdoms, of which the Winterchild family subdued more than nine hundred, forming Winterland.

The remaining hundred kingdoms, separated from Winterland by a great river called Red river, formed the current Summerland.

Twenty years ago, Beor Hawthorn and Edward Winterchild led the greatest army in the land against Rykkor Drakon, for the offense of kidnapping Edward's sister Lydia. In the process, Beor united Summerland save for the desert kingdom, and became the first emperor.

Black mountains split the south into two, deserted summer kingdom at the southernmost tip, and the ever changing hundred kingdoms in the land adjacent to Winterland. Now, the continent has only four parts.

Frontier in far north, Winterland in north, Summerland in south, desert kingdom in far south.

Frontier is lawless, multiple clans forever warring. Winterland is ruled by Winterchild, Summerland, by Hawthorns, desert kingdom, by Summer family.

Only, it took two weeks to traverse the entire width of Summerland nonstop on horse, while it took five weeks to do the same with Winterland. That's how vast the Winterland is.

After the unification of Summerland, Mountain kingdom, and water kingdom, both of which are to the north of Red River joined Winterland as autonomous subjects.

Water kingdom's princess Iris Redfin married Edward Winterchild, and Mountain Kingdom's king, married her sister Lobelia Redfin. They forged a marriage contract between their children and the mountain king submitted to Edward peacefully.

The war in the thousand kingdoms ended with unification of lands of winter and summer.

Vast sea separated east and west.

Islands dotted the sea, with the biggest being the island nation of Espana, which is a trade hub, given it's free trade policy.

It is said Espana was found from the descendants of all the eastern clans, which refused to be enslaved by the Drakon family. Espana remained on good terms with the Winterchild family.

Further south, a string of volcanoes connected east to west at the narrowest strip on the sea. Together, they are called the wall of smoke, and they line up with the mouth of the red river, the border between Winterland and hundred kingdoms.

Valhalla, the land where all the dragon lord families were established, was destroyed in a fiery disaster a thousand years ago. Dragon lords perished, and dragons thrived.

Now, the entire south east was lost to dragons.

The Drakon family, which was but a minor noble house of the Valhalla was the only surviving family of the disaster, by the virtue of being far too unimportant.

However, they still had the blood of dragon lords, and they were the only ones remaining in the world who could tame dragons.

Soon, the Drakon family's power grew, and most of the east was conquered by them, forming the fire empire. However, the fire empire is vast, and it's local warlords rise and fall in power, keeping the Drakon family focused on the east.

Now, the only free countries remain on the continent of Winterland, along with Espana.

Sure, there's a jade kingdom in the south, however, it's too far, and it's military and technological might are too strong. One can not provoke it on a whim, not even the dragon riding fire monarchs.

This is not the first time a fire empire had tried to conquer the thousand kingdoms continent.

Fire Monarch's heirs are known to wreak havoc in thousand kingdoms, and occasionally even in Winterland once every fifty years.

The incidents were small and big, and Sasha feared this time, it was big, almost big enough to embroil the entire continent.