Kyle had heard the word Winter Babies before. Naturally, it was a slur for the people of the Winterfire Kingdom.
This slur originated from the reports of spies.
Apparently, the Winterfire Kingdom didn't have something as devastating as Skysand, which was a danger to almost anything.
Instead, the Winterfire Kingdom had Winterfire.
Winterfire was a bit similar to Skysand, but there were a couple of differences.
Winterfire was an extremely cold fire. According to reports, anyone who touched the blue flame of Winterfire would turn into an ice statue.
However, compared to Skysand, Winterfire didn't ravage the landscape.
Instead, it only existed in big, mountainous caves.
It didn't leave these caves, and it didn't spread across the entire landscape.
It was basically just there.
Skysand Kingdom needed to spend a ton of money on different Ether Springs to keep the Skysand at bay, while the Winterfire Kingdom didn't need to do that.
Their lands were purer, in a way.
The Skysand Kingdom's climate and weather were managed by the different Ether Springs, which were placed by humans.
Meanwhile, the Winterfire Kingdom's climate and weather were very natural with minimal variety.
The people of the Skysand Kingdom were not a fan of that.
It felt almost unfair that they had to deal with the Skysand, while the Winterfire Kingdom could just relax.
'Bit of a weird slur,' Kyle thought. 'Sure, we got Skysand, but that's completely managed. Pretty sure almost nobody has ever had issues with Skysand since it follows its predetermined paths along the Ether Springs.'
The people of the Skysand Kingdom hated the people of the Winterfire Kingdom with a passion.
It was almost to an unrealistic and even funny degree.
According to some people, the people of the Winterfire Kingdom cried once a day about the war because they were so sad about the fighting and death.
Other people said that babies in the Winterfire Kingdom were being breastfed until they were six years old.
Apparently, there were also cuddle huddles. A cuddle huddle was when a bunch of sad people jumped into a pile to hug everyone in it.
The lies were ridiculous.
Yet, so many people believed them, and it was kind of obvious why.
'We are at war, and the only bits of information we get are from our spies and the government.'
'That happens when fuckers don't have internet.'
There were also some wars on Earth, but the amount of information online was crazy.
There were thousands of videos and interviews with affected people. There was so much information that it became almost impossible for any party to control all of it.
It was just a tide of information.
Ridiculous lies like the ones that were being spread here wouldn't work on Earth.
Due to the tide of information, the lies had to be much more believable and subtle.
Naturally, Kyle didn't believe half of the things he heard about the Winterfire Kingdom.
Sure, they probably had a different culture, but the stuff he was hearing was just crazy.
However, Kyle was smart enough not to contradict the lies.
'Who cares anyway?' Kyle asked. 'Our kingdoms are enemies, and we fight. We try to kill them, and they try to kill us.'
'Boohooo, the world is unjust. Oh no, there is an aggressor. This is unfair, noooo,' Kyle thought with a subtle roll of his eyes.
'War is war. Just fight, for fuck's sake.'
'I'm here to earn money. Don't have time to think about global politics.'
The group traveled to the western edge of the Grand Ocean, which was more than 1,000 kilometers away.
Luckily, even the slowest person in the group could run at 300 kph, which meant they only needed around four hours to get to the western edge.
At some point, Kyle saw the huge tower in Janus' Hold from a distance.
Janus' Hold was already pretty far to the west, but they continued even further.
A gigantic lake bordered Janus' Hold, and the group ran along its northern edge for a while.
This was the second biggest lake of the Skysand Kingdom, and it was nearly 400 kilometers wide.
When they reached the northwestern corner of the lake, they ran towards the north.
The area around the big lake and Janus' Hold had been the territory of a Four-Weapons Fighter Guild, the Naga Covenant.
As they continued north, they left the territory of the Naga Covenant.
From now on, there would be no more powerful Guilds on their way.
After another hour of travel, Kyle saw another lake to the left.
This was Lake Frontier, and it was the biggest lake in the Skysand Kingdom.
Lake Frontier bordered the western World Wall, which was the humongous wall that signified the end of the world.
'Still weird to think about this world being so fucking small and that it just ends despite being fucking round.'
'Like, this is a small planet. The horizon is way closer here than on Earth. Yet, there is also a fucking wall. I mean, is the western World Wall just the eastern side of the eastern World Wall?'
'Honestly, no idea. I want to ask Boss, but I can't really speak to myself in public.'
While Kyle was thinking about the weirdness of this world, the group continued traveling north.
Lake Frontier was almost 800 kilometers long but "only" 200 kilometers wide.
Despite being the biggest lake, Lake Frontier didn't have that many powerful sea beasts.
Because of that, mining Water Affinity Ore in the lake was quite easy.
Lake Frontier was the biggest source of Water Affinity Materials in the Skysand Kingdom.
Yet, for some reason, it didn't have some kind of metropole or huge trading hub.
There were just a bunch of cities along its coast.
After traveling for some more hours, the group left Lake Frontier behind.
"We're almost there," the Captain said.
Some minutes later, Kyle saw a mountain in the distance.
Yet, as they continued traveling, the mountain vanished as closer but smaller mountains blocked Kyle's vision.
At some point, Kyle only saw a bunch of mountains in front of him.
"We're here," the Captain said. "This is the World Peak."
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