Chapter 1: The Freeman of the Eighth District

“Clang!”

“Clang!”

The heavy sound of hammering rang out. Inside, the furnace fire was strong, and the rising heat made Romon’s dark face slightly flushed.

He was stripped to the waist, his bronze-colored, strong muscles and gruesome scars twitching rhythmically with the movement of the hammer.

The burning hot forged iron gradually deformed under his action, and the standard iron sword blank was taking shape.

Standing opposite was a boy of about ten years old, who used iron tongs to clamp the fiery red sword blank and throw it into a stone water trough.

The cold, clear water mixed with the red-hot sword blank, instantly releasing a large cloud of steam.

Romon grabbed a dirty towel from the shelf, hastily wiped the sweat from his face and body, and said to the young boy:

“Ace, your old man is going to the tavern on the east side of the street for a drink. When I get back, you’d better have the sword blank polished, or watch your backside.”

“I know, I know,” Ace replied, not even lifting his head. He skillfully clamped the sword blank and threw it onto the forging stone, which still had sparks on it.

“I don’t care if you go drinking, just don’t get drunk and start a fight like last time. Not only did my mother and I have to go to the City Hall Square to pay a fine, but you also got twenty lashes.”

“You little brat,” Romon’s dark face turned even redder, like an old cat whose fur had bristled.

“That time, someone else provoked it. Ulu insulted your grandfather’s grandfather, Citizen Narr.

Your ancestor followed the great city-state founder, Ronamos , escorted the people to escape the pursuit of Ice Demons , passed the Thirteen Trials, and came to the promised land of the Goddess of Elegance , establishing the prosperous and powerful Medimus City-State.

Romon took a hard breath and said loudly, “We are not an ordinary Freemen family, my son. You must remember that we are the descendants of a Citizen, and we have an honor that we must protect.”

“Yes, the honor of our ancestors must, of course, be maintained.

But the family’s wallet is also very thin. We need to control our anger and dedicate our energy to the effort of regaining our Citizenship, such as letting me go to school to read and write, instead of hammering this damned sword blank.”

Ace answered calmly.

He raised the iron hammer, which was about half his height, and repeatedly struck the sword blank with “clang, clang, clang,” gradually making its surface smooth.

Romon opened his dry mouth, wanting to say something but unable to speak.

Looking at his calm and busy son, he sighed, turned around, and walked out, mumbling, “I understand.”

Ace picked up the sword blank from the forging stone and walked to the grindstone.

The rhythmic “swoosh, swoosh” sound of grinding the sword began, and as Ace skillfully polished the sword blank, his mind returned to three years ago.

He was a university researcher from Earth who had reincarnated here. In his memory, when he first crossed over, he felt dizzy and was vaguely sucked into the mother’s womb.

It wasn’t until he was seven years old in this life that he awakened his fragmented memories from his previous life. He had forgotten a lot, but he also remembered a lot.

Skyscrapers, continuous traffic, computers, smartphones, and the endless forms of entertainment are all long gone and out of reach.

The fusion of two lifetimes of memories gave him a high fever. Fortunately, his mother in this life took meticulous care of him, and he slowly overcame the side effects brought by the memory fusion.

The child didn’t know much, but at least he could speak the common language of this place, had a complete family, and was a genuine local resident.

Over the past three years, Ace made a conscious effort to understand the world by listening to Romon brag , hearing his mother tell mythological stories, and never missing a performance by a bard. Finally, he grasped the world’s general situation.

This world seems to have Deities , who reside on the unseen and untouchable Kaya Mountain.

The city-state where he lives, Medimus City-State , is in the south of the Salia Peninsula , the promised land of the Goddess of Elegance.

The King of the city-state is the Son of the Goddess of Elegance, the city founder Ronamos.

“If there are Deities, there should be extraordinary existences.”

Ace thought so and was constantly watching the phenomena around him.

The Nobles of the city-state do indeed possess strength, speed, jumping ability, and reaction time far surpassing ordinary people, and even the city-state’s soldiers cannot compare to a noble child.

He heard that outside the city-state, in the deserted wilderness, many Monsters roam, possessing various supernatural powers.

Ace used the talent of a child who is good at asking “why” and asked many people how he could become like a Noble.

The answer he received was that Nobles are descendants of the Divine Blood, naturally far superior to ordinary people, and are the divinely ordained rulers of humanity, and mortals cannot become them.

In a world where supernatural beings are confirmed to exist, Ace was a little unwilling to be destined to be a mere mortal.

However, he maintained a good attitude. His current position was too low, and his exposure was too limited, so the information he obtained was also extremely restricted.

Only by entering the upper strata of the city-state can he obtain more information and have more opportunities.

Even without it, by capturing roaming Monsters or even extracting the blood of Nobles, he might be able to research their supernatural secrets.

Ace’s goal slowly became clear: to become part of the city-state’s upper strata, meaning a Citizen.

Medimus City-State is a young colonial city-state, founded less than a century ago, full of vitality, and with an active ambition for external expansion.

The city-state is surrounded by Barbarian tribes and roaming Monsters, and it is far from other civilized countries.

The nearest clusters of civilized nations are in the north of the Salia Peninsula, so this is a very martial and expansionist city-state.

Medimus City-State is the promised land of the Goddess of Elegance, Medea. Her direct descendant, the God-son Ronamos, rules here, sitting at the top of the city-state’s pyramid. Below him are Nobles , Citizens , Freemen , and Slaves.

As for how to become a Citizen, Ace heard his father repeat the conditions many times. A Freeman can become a Citizen under three conditions:

1. Literacy.
2. Having served in a low-level public office for more than three years.
3. Having achieved a merit equivalent to “ten kills.”

For all Citizens, if they fail to meet the above three conditions after three generations, the fourth generation automatically loses Citizenship.

This means that Ace’s family happened to decline in Romon’s generation , transitioning from a Citizen family to a Freeman family.

Romon is a good city-state man, stout and skilled in the art of sword and shield combat. He self-equipped his weapons and armor several times to serve as a heavy infantryman, beheading more than a dozen Barbarian warriors and slaying several Monsters.

His only flaw was his lack of intelligence. He couldn’t learn the characters , failed the examination until he was thirty-five, and eventually lost his Citizenship.

He consequently lost a series of Citizen privileges, including the right to the most favorable tax rate, the right to reduced criminal punishment, the right to an annuity, and the right to participate in the Citizen Assembly and the Council of Five Hundred.

He could no longer live in the First District , which had the best public security, and had to move to the Eighth District in the south of the city, making a living by forging iron for the city-state and its residents.

Romon struggled to inherit Citizenship in his youth. It was only after completely losing his Citizenship and nearly exhausting the wealth left by his ancestors that he considered marriage. He found a connection with Marina , a Freeman of the Eighth District and Ace’s mother, and settled down.

More than ten years have passed, and Romon is now over forty years old. He has slowly become a skilled blacksmith and has a stable little home in the Eighth District.

Being fond of drinking, he always spends the family’s savings, which is why he lacks the financial means to support Ace’s literacy education.