She Is Not a Witch

Behind the Belis family’s mountain, Verdant Empire.

The ground between the mountains was covered with withered yellow and green-tinged leaves. The black soil was very soft, and one could hear the sound of dried leaves breaking when stepping on it. Occasionally, one could see a few ants crawling under the fallen leaves and on tree trunks, moving small granules of food—some were the corpses of other insects, some were pine nut fragments—crawling through various crevices.

The fence made of dead branches was slanted, with part of it loose, exposing rusty nails. It swayed slightly with the wind. The forest was very quiet, with only occasional long bird calls.

A young man with golden-brown hair approached. He was about sixteen years old, wearing a white shirt that allowed for easy movement and durable leather pants. On his shoulder, he carried a broadsword. Judging by the worn scabbard and polished counterweight ball, it must have been quite old.

He casually stepped over the simple fence, brushing off some debris and dust from his leather pants. After turning past a few large trees, a simple wooden frame appeared before him.

The wooden frame was just a thick log stuck in the ground with a branch nailed horizontally across its upper part. The overall height was about that of an adult. Judging by the marks on the edges of the wood, it must have been recently made.

He drew his broadsword, placing the scabbard under a tree, and began to practice swinging. The broadsword, tightly gripped with both hands, seemed a bit large for him—it would probably fit better in a few years.

Although he wasn’t swinging the sword quickly, it still cut through the air with a whistling sound. His form was proper, suggesting he had received professional instruction.

First, he practiced sword techniques for a while until his body warmed up. Then he put down the sword, stretched his legs and ligaments, and jogged a few laps around the forest before returning to where he had left the sword.

Judging by the light, it was around three or four in the afternoon. He went to a nearby mountain spring for a drink of water, then leaned against a tree to rest for a while.

At this moment, a short figure slowly walked out from the forest behind him. The pace wasn’t fast, but the footsteps were extremely light, almost inaudible.

This figure slowly approached the large tree where the young man was resting, gripping a short sword in its right hand, while the left hand flexed in the air. As it drew closer, the young man seemed unaware, still leaning against the tree trunk with his eyes closed, resting.

Seeing him completely off guard, the approaching figure felt a surge of excitement and prepared to make its move.

“Ha!”

In the quiet forest, the young man suddenly opened his eyes and shouted, startling the figure behind him. Its foot stepped on dried leaves, making a sound. Before it could react, the young man had already picked up his sword and turned to attack. The figure could only hastily defend with its short sword.

But how could the light and thin short sword compare to the heavy broadsword? After a simple two clashes, the short sword was knocked away, landing on nearby gravel. The hilt bounced slightly before coming to rest. The young man then pointed his broadsword at the figure, which was about the same height as him.

“Haha, I won this time, Rock,” the young man excitedly declared his victory.

“Tch.”

Looking at the broadsword pointed at him, Rock turned his head in displeasure.

“It’s just once, what’s there to be so happy about?”

“No, no, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten, Rock,” the young man waved his sword smugly and continued.

“We agreed that if I won, you’d become my attendant.”

“Oh, so you remember that? How come I didn’t see you become my attendant all those times you lost to me before?” Rock said, disgruntled.

“Well…” the young man was stunned for a moment before speaking.

“Because Uncle Wade is Father’s head guard, you shouldn’t…”

“I shouldn’t what? Why should I? I’m not going to be like my stupid dad. I don’t want to be some damned attendant,” Rock said, getting a bit agitated.

“Isn’t being the head guard quite good? It’s not very tiring usually, and you can come with me to feasts and parties to eat and drink for free,” the young man lowered his sword, looking a bit confused.

“So what if I go? Those noble young ladies won’t look at me anyway. They only want to marry those noble heirs with fiefs.”

“Besides, Isaiah, you’re only third in line. You won’t inherit the title either. Following you is a dead-end job.”

That stung. Hearing this, the young man also became a bit depressed.

The Verdant Empire was a society with strict class hierarchy, with a huge gap in rights between nobles and commoners. For example, many schools only admitted children of nobles. If a school admitted both noble and common children, noble families wouldn’t send their children there or allow them to study under those teachers.

This was because the nobles didn’t like seeing their children sitting in the same classroom as those “wild children” of unknown origins, believing it would corrupt them. The same applied to some high-end restaurants, libraries, and even shops.

If you were an ordinary person in Verdant, there were many places in the country you couldn’t access and many benefits you couldn’t enjoy.

Walking on the streets, nobles had special lanes. When carriages met at intersections, nobles had priority to go first, and so on. This inequality was evident throughout society. Even the empire’s laws explicitly stated that lives were not equal, and some people were meant to be more noble than others.

Logically, such a system should accumulate great contradictions and resentment between classes. However, the empire’s founders cleverly designed many channels for upward mobility. For instance, there was a very comprehensive military merit system. Fighting in wars could not only bring wealth and others’ respect, but accumulated military merits could also elevate one to the ranks of nobility.

The various benefits that came with noble status motivated batch after batch of people to take to the battlefield, fighting fiercely to earn military merits and change their fate. This greatly suppressed anti-war sentiment within the country in the early stages and improved the combat effectiveness of the army.

In addition to military merits, excellent craftsmen, priests, scholars, and high-sequence supernatural experts could also be granted noble status, separating them from the commoner class.

In this way, the nobility recruited the most elite and excellent group of people in the country through various channels. With no supernatural experts or masters among the commoners, they naturally couldn’t cause much trouble.

Moreover, most commoners accepted this concept. Nobles were nobles because they were indeed capable, diligent, and daring. Many common families would also educate their children to strive to become nobles in the future.

The privileges of nobility were also stratified. At the top was naturally the royal family and the four arch-duke families, followed by earls, viscounts, barons, and a large number of non-hereditary merit-based titles. At the same time, nobles also paid considerable taxes according to their rank and the number of registered family members, in exchange for their privileges. In a sense, the privileges of noble status were bought with money.

If insufficient taxes were paid, the title would be demoted until eventually becoming a commoner, which became a means of title recovery.

Relying on this unequal treatment while giving some hope, constantly motivating commoners and even minor nobles to keep climbing, the Verdant Empire maintained extremely high vitality. It constantly iterated and advanced through internal and external competition, eventually defeating the Oz Kingdom to become the strongest country on the continent.