Chapter 23 - A Game Decider, Loser Leaves the Field_1
"Squeak, squeak." The wagon wheel rolled, leaving a slight friction sound that echoed further and further across the wide-open plains. This was the winter wilderness, the gap between civilizations, known as the Neutral Land. By the second day's afternoon, the convoy gradually left the vicinity of the last supply village within the City of Knowledge. It entered this wilder part of the world, devoid of any trace of civilization. The village in the distance behind them grew blurry while what laid before them was an endless, vast plain. Apart from a road made of asphalt and broken stones, there were no indications of any man-made structures or traces of cultivation. Only the small wild creatures occasionally hopping by the roadside reminded people that this place was not a land of absolute silence.