Chapter 394: Chapter 376: July Fire Stream
The bright moon casts slanted black shadows on the city wall, like a crouching black panther.
Four guards followed her from behind and in front, Catherine, with her left hand on the wall, ascended the steps from the edge of the wall one by one.
As she walked up the quiet steps, she would occasionally look into the city.
Under the night wind, Rapids City was eerily silent, as if everything was under a pale blue filter, the iron rooster wind vane atop the church swinging east and west.
But if you look closely, the sleeping soldiers all over the streets, blocked river channels, and pervasive scent of blood were starkly different from the past.
The blue-gray stone bricks were full of arrow and knife marks, not to mention the blackened, coagulated blood stains.
Her fingers brushed over the rough wall, feeling a knife-cut pain from the friction at her fingertips.
It was like when she was abandoned in the forest by her mother as a child, the feeling of brambles scraping against her helplessly moving body.
If not for her teacher, she probably would have died at the hands of forest wolves, beggars, and robbers long ago.
Reaching the top of the city wall from the steps, the night wind carrying the choking smell of smoke blew on her face.
In the matter-of-fact gaze of the soldier on watch, Catherine walked to the edge of a battlement, gazing towards the port.
In the past, whenever she had insomnia, she would wander the city wall, looking at the streets and markets outside the city under the night.
But today was different from the past.
Under the wild night sky, the once bustling markets and workshop area outside the city had been turned into ruins by the flames of war, and the former port was almost razed to the ground.
After this period of siege warfare, the previously established forts outside the city had been mostly demolished, shops and workshops fully burned down, and even built tunnels filled with water or collapsed directly by the Knights.
The once fiery prosperity had fallen under the swords and knives of the Church.
"Hiss!"
Blowing in the night wind, Catherine suddenly withdrew her hand, a drop of fresh red blood oozing from her well-rounded index finger pad.
Even though she was already thirty-one years old this year, Catherine kept her hands in good care.
But today, these white hands also bore stains of blood and scars.
After all, for most of the past, these hands were used for writing, rarely for holding a sword.
When Catherine was a child at Blago Monastery, she had learned swordsmanship from Juanuo.
But as time went on, she could barely remember how to hold a sword.
She lowered her head, looking at the calluses on her fingers from holding a pen.
Fifteen years had passed since she inherited the Meigedi Commerce Association.
In fifteen years, under her manipulation, Rapids City transformed from a city of decay to the second most prosperous city in Thousand River Valley.
Catherine first utilized her connections with Juanuo and her own background to serve as a white glove for various estates, collaborating with the Secret Faction for smuggling.
Then through this network, she established the Dyeing Guild, controlling the raw materials, production, and sales process of dyes, monopolizing over half of the dye industry in Thousand River Valley.
Naturally, she secured a spot on Rapids City’s City Council and led initiatives to develop the Port District.
The Port District, with its excellent tax exemptions, law enforcement, and services, became a major source of income for Rapids City.
With the escalation of land prices, Catherine’s influence naturally increased accordingly.
Afterward, she pushed the City Council to enact the "Shareholding Bill."
Using the funds accumulated early on and investment from the Secret Faction, the Meigedi Commerce Association established Meigedi Bank five years ago.
Through loans, investments, and mortgages, Catherine bought numerous workshops and various commerce associations’ stocks.
Through the "Shareholding Bill" and the establishment of subsidiary associations, she repeatedly cross-held shares, forcing workshops and associations into mandatory participation and being held.
Gradually, most industries in Rapids City fell under her commerce association or subsidiaries.
Because of her status as an El person and Rapids City’s position as an Azik Alliance City, Meigedi controlled capital exceeding ten times her own value.
On the surface, she was just a small association dealing in dyes.
As a City Councilor of Rapids City and the headquarters of Meigedi Commerce Association, Rapids City attracted massive funds and populations, emerging as the second most prosperous city in Thousand River Valley over fifteen years.
During its peak, a City Councilor from Rapids City even proudly claimed, "Selling the Port District alone is enough to buy Feiliu Castle."
However, the Port District, which once made Rapids City citizens proud, had now become ruins in the flames of war.
Catherine reached out from behind the city wall, as if to touch the port that had turned to ruins before her.
But just as her fingers "touched" the spire of the clock tower, she withdrew her hand as if pricked.
Every brick and tile here was gradually built by her and her merchant guild, personally designed, personally constructed, and personally created policies by her.
Although the Meigedi Commerce Association took the opportunity to monopolize the stone industry, Catherine thought it was a reward she deserved.
From the broken spire of the bell tower upwards, the bright moonlight shone on Catherine’s face.
"The seventh of July, is it already the Flower Festival?"
July seventh happened to be the completion date of the Port District and was also the traditional Flower Festival in Thousand River Valley.
Every year on July seventh, the people of Rapids City would gather many fresh flowers, placing them on their heads and houses.
Each guild would fund the creation of parade floats, every tavern in the Port District would discount beer by thirty percent, and would even introduce the rare locust flower wine, alongside various entertainment activities like fencing, boating, boxing, and beauty contests.
The Flower Festival sometimes was even more lively than Ascension Day, after all, on the evening of Ascension Day, not so many people would be out on the streets.
Even Catherine herself, during this festival, would sit on the Meigedi Commerce Association’s float to throw coins.
Yes, Catherine said throw coins, she really did throw coins.
Unlike other merchant guilds throwing copper, Catherine threw Dinar, throwing out two to three hundred gold pounds in one night.
So every year in the float evaluation of the Flower Festival, the Meigedi Commerce Association continuously won the championship for three consecutive years, thanks to the votes of the audience and citizens present.
In fact, they should have won four championships, except in the first year, when Juanuo led the Blago Monastery float, using only biscuits to outshine Catherine’s Dinars.
"The old man has been at odds with biscuits all his life, never got tired of them all these years."
Stuffing a biscuit from the box into her mouth, nibbling for a moment, Catherine suddenly took off her glasses, using her pinky to rub the corner of her eye.
When she couldn’t sleep before, she would go find Teacher Juanuo.
No matter how late it was, Teacher Juanuo would get up, give her small biscuits to eat, and tell her stories.
Sometimes fairy tales, but more often some stories she could only understand now.
Stories based on real events.
Catherine couldn’t help but lightly tap the biscuit box: "To tell such dark things to such a small child, what were you thinking at the time?"
Yet, at the time, those stories, almost terrifying, could lull Catherine to sleep.
The biscuits with a brown sugar taste slowly melted in her mouth, she gently caressed the biscuit box.
Even though Catherine was already a thirty-year-old woman not yet married, she still maintained the habit of eating small biscuits whenever she faced insomnia.
"Teacher, I miss you."
Just as Catherine closed her eyes, immersed in past memories, she caught a strange smell at the tip of her nose.
Is something burning?
"Boom——"
The next second, a violent flash rose behind Catherine.
Although she didn’t turn around, her eyes involuntarily widened, a terrifying thought rising in her heart.
A huge sound, wrapped in hot wind, blew her sleeves forward, grass blades and wood chips shot out from overhead and all around.
Four guards stepped forward in unison, using their bodies to block the remnants of the explosion.
Yet Catherine pushed away the guards blocking her, placing her arm in front of her face to shield against the hot wind, staring blankly in that direction.
In the direction of the Red Dragon’s Breath warehouse inside the city, clusters of fireballs exploded one after another, flames spraying out like fountains.
Building after building caught fire, people screaming as they ran out of their houses.
Screams and barking followed, the entire city illuminated by flames, as if it were daylight.
Following the destruction of Catherine’s efforts outside the city by the flames, even Rapids City inside was plunged into a sea of fire.
It took a full five seconds before Catherine, in a pitch she had never used before, screamed: "Red Dragon’s Breath, it’s Red Dragon’s Breath!"
Hardly had Catherine’s scream subsided when a nightmare-like horn sound was heard.
The reason it was described as such was because the horn sound was coming from outside the city.
Under the bright moonlight and firelight, over a thousand infantry and knights pushed siege towers and carried tall ladders, rushing towards the city wall.
On the tower of the city wall, bright lights arose one after another, with the warning horn sound of the enemy attack almost drowned out by the violent explosion sound.
In the shouting of infantry captains, Catherine felt as if she had fallen into an ice cave, unable to utter a single word.