Chapter 1001: Winter in a Foreign Land

Snow swirled through the air.

The first snowfall of the season in the southern region had arrived late, but it came in a relentless, sweeping torrent. Flakes drifted endlessly from the leaden-gray sky, painting a vast, misty expanse overhead—an indistinct canvas that seemed to mirror the uncertain futures of two nations, tangled and obscured, impossible to navigate.

The academy’s pond was sealed beneath a thick sheet of ice, and around it, the nearby nursery beds were buried under a foot of snow. A biting wind blew in from the direction of the clock tower, shaking loose the snow piled atop the surrounding buildings, scattering it like curtains of white across the corridors and open courtyards. In this wintry scene, hardly a student or teacher could be seen venturing outdoors.

The Imperial Academy was now on its winter break. Except for the cadets at the Officer’s Academy, who still had a few days before their leave, nearly all the students had already departed.

A small, slender figure clad in the academy’s black uniform hurried along the first-floor dormitory corridor. Her pale gray hair fell loosely down her back. Outside, the howling wind slipped through the windows, echoing faintly within the building. Occasionally, she glanced up at the world beyond the crystal glass, but all she could see was the ceaseless snow and the increasingly desolate academy grounds.

This winter… it was truly cold.

She barely paused in the corridor, quickly passing through a door into the deeper dormitory area. Here, the silence was broken by faint voices drifting from several rooms, punctuated now and then by brief notes from a bagpipe or a dulcimer. These sounds eased the tension in her face slightly. She stepped forward just as a nearby door opened, and a young woman with neat short hair poked her head out.

“Dana?” The short-haired girl’s voice held a note of surprise. “I was wondering where you’d gone… Where did you leave the dorm?”

“I went to the library…” Dana’s voice was low as she showed the few books she’d just borrowed. “Mr. Miles lent them to me.”

“The library… that figures,” the short-haired girl said, hands on her hips with a hint of scolding. “Look at your shoulders—did you really walk through all that snow? Have you forgotten you’re a mage?”

“There was a stretch where the snow wasn’t too heavy. I took down my shield to feel the flakes, then forgot to put it back up,” Dana admitted, a little embarrassed. “But it’s okay, I don’t think I got too wet.”

“Come inside and warm up,” the girl sighed. “If you catch a cold now, it could be a real mess—especially with everything going on.”

Dana nodded and followed her roommate inside. The dorm room was surprisingly spacious, with two adjoining rooms, all kept neat and tidy. A magically powered heating system hummed silently, maintaining a comfortable warmth.

Dana set the borrowed books on the desk and glanced around curiously. “Is Marianne not here?”

“She went upstairs to check the ‘patrol points’… She and the second son of the Weber family always seem so tense, like the Cecilian forces might storm this dorm any minute,” the short-haired girl said with a sigh. “I’m worried too, but honestly, if the Cecilians really came charging in… do you think we, a bunch of Typhon students, could turn a few dorm rooms into a fortress?”

“I don’t think it’ll come to that,” Dana whispered. “The teachers said the Emperor personally ordered that foreign students be kept safe during the war… We won’t be dragged into this conflict.”

“That’s what they say, but who’s really staying out of it?” the girl snorted. “Marianne spends her days on the rooftop counting soldiers patrolling the walls and gates around the Academy of Arcane Technology. Maybe those soldiers are here to protect us… but they’re not just here for that.”

Dana opened her mouth, as if to reply, but the words caught in her throat.

She knew Karli was right. When a sudden war breaks out, no one can truly remain untouched—not even a group of seemingly harmless students.

The winter break had come to the Cecilian Imperial Academy, but all the plans the students had made for the holiday had quietly fallen apart.

In this isolated dormitory building lived only Typhon students stranded by the war. As the rest of the Academy’s faculty and students left, this small dorm became an island in a vast sea. Dana and her compatriots were marooned here, uncertain of what the future held. Though each was a chosen scion of their family, a promising youth of Typhon, and even trusted by the Augustus family, in the end… most were still young people who had yet to face real storms.

The true heirs who could shoulder heavy burdens were never sent abroad to study—they stayed home managing family estates and preparing for greater responsibilities.

Another gust of icy wind swept between the buildings, its rising howl slipping through the double-glass windows and into Dana and Karli’s ears. The sound resembled the distant growl of some wild beast. Dana instinctively glanced toward a nearby window, where thick snowflakes danced against the dim morning light.

In this foreign winter, even the falling snow seemed to form tangible walls and cages. To step beyond this storm and into the outside world required courage as if crossing an abyss.

The Academy’s administrators had not forbidden the Typhon students from moving about freely. In principle, aside from strict restrictions on crossing the border back to Typhon, students who had come here through proper channels and committed no offenses faced no special limitations or harassment. The Emperor had signed orders to treat students well, and the government had publicly declared a policy of “keeping legitimate students out of the war.” In theory, Dana could even carry out her original holiday plans—like visiting the historic Mill Hill and inner harbor of Tansan City…

But all that was theory. In reality, not a single Typhon student had left. Whether out of caution or distrust of the Cecilians, Dana and her compatriots chose to stay within the Academy, within the dormitory. The sprawling campus—with its corridors, walls, courtyards, and buildings—had become their refuge this winter, their entire world.

“At least supplies have been steady. No water or mana outages. The central cafeteria stays open during the break, and the shops in the main campus haven’t closed,” Karli said, her voice pulling Dana from her thoughts. The daughter of a viscount from Enchock County spoke with a trace of optimism. “Look on the bright side: this winter will be a memory none of us will forget. How many people get to be trapped in an enemy country’s academy during wartime? Endless snow, talks about the future, students setting up barricades in the hallways… Oh, and those books you borrowed from the library.”

Dana smiled faintly. “Setting up barricades in the hallways was a bit much… Marianne and the Weber heir really are from knightly families. I can’t believe they thought of that.”

“Maybe next spring they’ll have to pay the Academy head back for all the wood and iron—and face Mr. Magnum’s furious roar,” Karli shrugged. “I bet the headmaster and teachers already know what we’ve been up to in the dorm. Ruslan said last night he saw Mr. Magnum’s spirit drifting through the hallways, like he was inspecting the last dorm still occupied.”

At the thought of Mr. Magnum’s angry roar, Dana instinctively shrank her neck, but soon she laughed. Karli’s description brought a rare moment of ease to this cold, tense winter day. She laughed aloud, until suddenly a bagpipe’s notes drifted through the corridor and into the room, making both girls fall silent.

The halting, imperfect melody gradually grew clearer and more coherent, interspersed with faint singing. Dana focused intently on the tune coming from a few rooms away. After a few seconds, Karli whispered, “That’s a melody from Enchock County… Is the second son of the Yulea family playing?”

“Yulea…” Dana listened to the bagpipe’s song, memories stirring. “I heard his older brother died on the Paramel Heights…”

Karli didn’t answer, only nodded softly. She leaned against the desk, fingers tapping a slow rhythm on the surface, lips moving silently as if humming along with the faint bagpipe notes. Dana slowly lifted her gaze, looking through the dorm’s crystal window. Outside, the snow showed no sign of stopping, drifting down in thick curtains that seemed to swallow the world whole.

…

The wind howled beyond the window, the harsh weather clearly unsuitable for any outdoor activity. But for those who disliked venturing outside, perhaps this was for the best.

Merry Whitebloom, small and childlike, sat at her desk. She glanced once at the swirling snow outside, her pointed ears twitching, then bent her head again, her pen flying swiftly across the letter before her. A thick stack of completed pages lay nearby, but she still had much to write.

“…Mother, I actually miss Talrond a little… Winters there are cold too, but at least the wind isn’t this fierce, and the snow isn’t this heavy. Of course, the snow here is beautiful, and friends have invited me out to play when it lets up a bit, but I’m worried I might accidentally fall into a deep snowdrift… You can’t imagine how heavy this snowfall is…

“…Cecilia and Typhon are at war—you’ve probably been following the news, right? You don’t need to worry about me here; it’s safe, as if the border war hasn’t touched the heartland… Of course, there are some effects—the newspapers and broadcasts are full of war news every day, and many people talk about it…”

“The prices of food in the city have gone up just a little over the past couple of days, but they quickly dropped back down. According to my friend, fabric prices also rose slightly, but then the High Administrative Office called a meeting with the merchants, and after that, all prices stabilized again. You really don’t need to worry about how I’m living here. Honestly, I don’t want to rely on being the chieftain’s daughter for any special treatment… My friend is the daughter of the Navy Admiral, and she’s even planning to work a part-time job during the holidays.

“Ah, of course, I don’t have just one friend—I have several…”

Suddenly, the pen in Meri’s hand stopped moving. Her brow furrowed deeply, her delicate, childlike features scrunching up as if in thought. After a few seconds, she raised her finger and gently brushed across the paper, quietly erasing that last sentence that almost felt like a confession.

She set the pen down for a moment and stretched lazily. Her eyes casually drifted to a newspaper that had just arrived today, lying quietly on the table. The front page headline was printed in bold, sharp letters:

“Reinforcements Arrive Again—Valiant Imperial Soldiers Have Firmly Secured Winterwolf Fortress.”

“Unwavering Resolve, Always Ready to Face Higher-Level Wars and Wider Conflicts!”

The extensive war report included clear frontline photos, captured faithfully by the magical network terminals—scenes from the battlefield: war machines, soldiers lined up in formation, trenches scarred by artillery fire, trophies of war, and body bags…

Though all this was “peripheral information” with no security restrictions and open to the public, the images still showed ordinary people in the rear things they rarely saw or even imagined. For Meri, the very fact that such raw realities of war were being broadcast so quickly and widely was astonishing in itself.

What were those people who sent back these images called again? War… war correspondents?

In any case, they seemed like remarkable individuals.

Meri shook her head. She knew these newspapers weren’t just for the people of Cecil. Riding the pulse of commerce, the information they carried would spread at an unimaginable speed to faraway places—reaching the Mosswood, the Dwarven Kingdom, even the southern continent… The war erupting between Typhon and Cecil was likely to have an impact beyond anyone’s expectations.

Was this the outcome that Emperor Gawain Cecil had deliberately pushed for? Was he intentionally “showing” the entire civilized world this war?

Meri couldn’t help but feel curious.

(End of chapter)