Two, in the north (below)

  This highest-latitude spirit colony city, like many early military strongholds, was built on a small hill by the sea. The massive and solid central castle sits atop the mountain, with dark cannons pointing at anyone who dares to challenge it, showcasing its military might. Residential houses, shops, and workshops are distributed in a stepped manner around the central castle, layer upon layer from the slope all the way down to the harbor edge, surrounded by a circle of low stone walls. From afar on the sea surface, North Pole Port is simply a small hill covered with buildings.

  Due to the cold climate, the World Tree and many flowers that the Elves love are really unable to be planted here. However, this does not prevent the Elves from painting the Central Fortress with paint, depicting all sorts of flowers, grasses, and trees. This makes it difficult for outsiders to associate it with a military fortress, but rather easy to think of a kindergarten full of scribbles.

  Now, Colonel Gilbert stands on top of this decorated castle that looks like a kindergarten, looking down.

  The wind was strong at high altitudes, so he had to wrap himself up like a rabbit with thick scarves and gloves, shivering in the cold wind while observing the surroundings with binoculars. On the flagpole behind him, a huge green leaf flag was waving in the wind, blown by the strong sea breeze, proclaiming the elves' ownership of this place.

  Although it was almost noon, there were still no signs of people on the streets. The city originally had a population of only over 20,000, and after experiencing a civil war several months ago, the number of residents decreased by nearly half, with many houses still bearing traces of fire. The harsh cold, military coup, and food shortages drained the vitality of the city, while the frozen waterways also forced the once-thriving fur trade to be suspended, leaving residents with no business to do but to retreat into their own homes - although the elves implemented a comprehensive rationing system. However, in this kind of remote area far from the core of governance, various theoretically illegal trading activities were still thriving, and it was also the main source of income for colonial officials. Due to the inability to control everything, even the all-powerful Church of Xerath could only turn a blind eye.

  In the quiet city, the only slightly bustling place was the central castle on the top of the mountain, where hundreds of soldiers stationed inside added a bit of vitality to it. Gilbert could clearly hear the sound of military training and gunfire from the shooting range, which seemed a bit noisy compared to the surrounding silence.

  The hill where the castle is located is not high in elevation, but compared to the surrounding beaches and plains, it can already be said that it stands out from the crowd. Looking east from here, there is a boundless blue sea, with icebergs floating in the distance. The shadow of boats floats in the harbor at your feet. To the south of the hill, there is a vast plain as far as the eye can see, with a small frozen river running from west to east across the entire plain, brushing against the southern edge of the North Pole Port and flowing into the sea, providing the city with clean water sources while also forming a defensive barrier.

  Due to the vast land and sparse population, most of the plains have not been cultivated, maintaining their original forest and grassland landscape. Various rare wild animals inhabit here, and their fur is the only commodity that can be traded in the North Pole Port, attracting a large number of merchants to purchase every year.

  In the western and northern parts of the Arctic port. Two high mountain ranges that stretch straight into the sky intersect with each other, blocking the cold air currents from the South Pole, creating a relatively warm small environment here. Even in the coldest winter, the seawater in the bay does not freeze, but for four to five months every year. The layered sea ice outside the bay will still completely block the navigation channel, and even the polar icebreaker equipped with a bow and armor plate can only reluctantly shrink into the port. Passing the boring and dark winter aimlessly.

  However, as we enter March now, the ice and snow have begun to melt, daylight is gradually getting longer, and warm spring will soon return. Although flowers and grasses have not yet emerged from the mud, the time for the port to resume navigation has finally arrived.

  In the spyglass, Gilbert could see a icebreaker with iron ramming beak sailing eastward with full sails. The resident mages on board wearing blue navigator uniforms were casting druidic animal control spells to observe the floating ice situation around the route through the eyes of seagulls. There was still much floating ice but they no longer connected each other, and there were no icebergs blocking the route in sight. The sea surface had become wider and could accommodate the fleet's passage, and the spring of North Pole Port had finally arrived!

  "The thaw is over, navigation can resume!"

  The icebreaker's signalman shouted, raising the signal rod, and a red light immediately flew into the sky. A moment later, the lighthouse of this northernmost port on the continent, the coldest city in the Kingdom of Elves, finally lit up. The silent city suddenly burst out with cheers, the big bells in the church, lighthouse and barracks were struck at the same time, and some people even fired shots into the sky, expressing their joy in all sorts of intense ways.

  The route from the Arctic Port to Yongju Island and the Ferrin continent has finally been restored. Although due to the war, this vast sea area had long since ceased to have much merchant ship activity. However, at the very least, the military and civilians of the Arctic Port no longer had to worry about being trapped here.

  That's enough reason to celebrate.

  "The route is finally thawed!" Gilbert let out a long sigh of relief as he saw the lighthouse light up, and put away

  He walked into the house. Although it was already early spring, the cold wind on top of the castle made his bones tremble constantly, as he wasn't very tolerant of the cold.

  Especially since it's coming from the poles, the coldest winds in the world.

  He has been blowing through fifteen winters of cold wind here.

  He never wanted to experience another harsh winter in Arctic Port again.

  Although he is now the highest official in this city.

  Last year's series of battles was like a fantasy, the Northern Port's Elf Army won and lost. His old superior, Idriel, led this almost all-pure-blooded elf and half-elf strong army, annihilating several times their own number of Narsil Empire's New Continent Legion, once invading the glorious city in the south, but ultimately being beaten back to flee in disarray. They defeated one after another Narsil Empire's armies, captured one after another cities, killed tens of thousands of humans, dwarves and dark elves, the results were brilliant, yet still unable to gain a thorough victory.

  Defeat and massacre did not intimidate the Narsil people, who were considered weak. On the contrary, more and more people took up arms and went to battle. The new Narsil colony was not a tropical rainforest on the Mazka continent, nor were its people savage men with feathers on their bodies and stone clubs in their hands. Their firearms and artillery were several times better than those of the elves. The ubiquitous anti-magic zones also greatly offset their disadvantage in magic. The elven army was beaten everywhere on the unfamiliar grasslands, although the untrained Narsil people paid at least ten times the price in battle. However, there were only 10,000 elven soldiers on this continent, while there were 15 million Narsil people.

  This is a desperate ratio.

  The Elven Army was demoralized in despair of not seeing victory, and the epidemic that spread became the last straw to disintegrate the army. After several chaotic battles, Idriel was captured by the enemy, seemingly taken into a prisoner-of-war camp. Of the over 10,000 naval and land forces that marched south, less than 3,000 survived to return to Northport. Hundreds of warships were burned down to less than half. Gilbert led hundreds of remaining soldiers to fight until the last moment, but was powerless to change the outcome, the only consolation being that he managed to escape.

  But returning to the North Pole Port did not mean the end of the battle, as the Seventh Fleet of the Nazarre Empire occasionally drove their dozens of broken ships to harass, and the surviving troops also opened a terrible internal struggle for leadership. The scarcity of food further intensified the intensity of the struggle - due to the impact of war on farming, the remaining grain was not enough to survive the winter, and most of the losers would starve to death. Both sides built barricades on the streets of North Pole Port, using cannons and attack magic, completely reaching the level of civil war.

  Gilbert managed to get the support of the Navy and drove his opponents out of the city. However, by this time, half of the 20,000 citizens had died, and much of the grain had been burned. Fortunately, he took advantage of the last period before the port was frozen to contact several smuggling ships and smuggled in a batch of wheat and corn from the southern colony of New Zealand at a very low price. If not for this batch of things, North Port would have become a ghost town long ago.

  Even so, the Arctic port was still extremely precarious this winter. Fortunately, enough people died in the internal conflict. There were fewer mouths to eat. Gilbert barely managed to hold on by ice fishing, hunting bears in the mountains, and looting nearby colonial villages. However, many soldiers or civilians still died from malnutrition or scurvy, and those who managed to survive until now were mostly young and strong adults with good physical fitness. Moreover, the stored grain was almost exhausted, and it would not last until the next harvest season. He had to come up with a solution in the shortest possible time.

  But compared to those who escaped to the Stone Fortress, the North Harbor side was already quite lucky. They took away most of the land army soldiers, priests and magicians, but didn't have time to move many grains, it's said that they've already reached the point of killing people to eat meat. What Gilbert fears most now is not the Natsurier military, but those cannibal maniacs who will come back to North Harbor. Most of their own people are either starving or sick, and really can't cope with these guys who have gone mad from eating human flesh.

  "Alas, may the great Xerxes above bless his people and let me get in touch with those black-hearted smugglers as soon as possible. Otherwise, we'll have to retreat on board." Gilbert walked into the office, rummaged through the account books, carefully checked the remaining inventory, and after repeated calculations, he finally came to a most depressing conclusion.

  It's already too late to seek help from the mainland, even if it were possible to send the fastest flying clipper ships, it would take at least two months for a round trip. Adding to this the delays and losses along the way, by the time the transport fleet arrives, he will probably have been torn to pieces by the starving soldiers and civilians. It's better to withdraw early, at least he should still be able to get some rations...

  Due to the port being frozen and news not getting through, plus the Arctic port having no ultra-long-range communication equipment, Gilbert still doesn't know about the attack launched by Sofia Liria, nor does he understand the earth-shaking changes that have taken place thousands of miles away on Yongju Island. What's more, he is even more unaware that two massive fleets have set sail from across the ocean and are heading towards this port that he intends to abandon.