Wu and Charles adventure: Ash, Frost, and Things That Should Not Remember

HELLO AND WELCOME TO HONOR CORNER!!!!

A Threshold Tale from the NDL

In the heart of a frozen battlefield, two renowned commanders found themselves facing an unexpected predicament. Once the stalwart leaders of the main march, Charles and Wu now stood as second-in-command, grappling with a situation that was all too familiar—trouble. With their blades glinting under the icy glare and wands at the ready, they prepared to confront the relentless Gnomee Bosses that had unleashed a reign of chaos upon the frosty realm of Frostborne.

The emergence of this new era of combat marked a significant turning point, as the Frostborne Goddess meticulously evaluated the strategies and tactics that the myriad servers would employ in their quest for supremacy. With the chilling winds of Frostborne sweeping across the land, the Legendary servers emerged, promising challenges unlike any before. These seasoned warriors would now contend with powerful foes: the formidable Gnomes, towering at level 60, and their equally daunting Gnome Bosses, formidable at level 20. Altars dotted the landscape, beckoning brave souls to vanquish the new cores hidden within gates and cities.

In her infinite wisdom, the Frozen Goddess sought to reclassify each server, tailoring the level of Frostborne challenges to ensure a fair fight based on each server's capabilities. As they climbed the ranks, they would earn the venerable honor of battling within the Legendary servers, gaining access to new opportunities for contract gold and the completion of the ever-important Battlepass. This Battlepass would yield tokens critical for enhancing altars and crafting materials, vital to nurturing the growth of their talents.

The talents themselves were nothing short of ambition embodied—a dazzling array of skills worthy of a lord, each one pivotal in advancing their server's might in the brutal thaw of Frostborne. Wu and Charles engaged in a deep conversation amidst whispers of strategy and the latest saga of the NDL.. This tale, thought to have reached its conclusion, lingered in the air, heavy with the promise of untold adventures. 

Yet, true to his nature, the steadfast Charles couldn't resist the temptation to tug at a loose thread of the narrative left merely flapping in the wind. And so, we find ourselves now, on the precipice of something far greater. The moral of this tale? If you lack the scissors to sever the thread, it's best not to pull at it!

The gnome boss collapsed without ceremony, its armour splitting along seams that had not existed until moments before.

Charles watched it slide across the ice and disappear into a shallow ravine, its defeat so complete it bordered on impolite. Around him, the troops paused in that peculiar stillness that followed Frostborne victories — a hesitation born not of fear, but of uncertainty. No one cheered for long anymore. Frostborne had taught them restraint.

Wu removed her helm and exhaled, the frost clinging to her breath before falling away.

"Level twenty," she said. "Legendary difficulty."

Charles glanced at the ruin. "I'd have expected more argument."

Wu's mouth curved faintly. "So would the gnome, I imagine."

That earned a brief, shared look — the sort of humour that had survived campaigns, winters, and far worse decisions. It was not laughter; it was recognition. They had both learned long ago that levity, used sparingly, was another kind of armour.

Behind them, altar teams advanced with practised efficiency. Walls had already been stripped of defenders. Garrisons dismantled. Only then had the city revealed its core — luminous, stubborn, and utterly indifferent to conventional force. Steel and fire had done nothing. Altars, deployed in sequence, had done everything.

Frostborne no longer rewarded courage.

It rewarded obedience to order.

Wu watched the altar hum into alignment, its resonance sinking into the ice like a remembered note. "This place doesn't resist anymore," she said quietly. "It complies."

Charles rested a gauntleted hand against the fractured gate. The stone beneath his palm was worn smoother than it should have been.

"Or it remembers," he replied.

Wu looked at him then. "You've seen this before."

Charles hesitated. That, for him, was an admission.

"Not Frostborne," he said. "But something shaped like it."

They moved away from the others, instinctively seeking the margins where second-in-command conversations lived — neither public nor secret, simply necessary. Frostborne stretched beyond the walls, vast and pale, its silence deepening rather than easing.

Charles accepted the slate offered by a runner and scanned the raw data. The numbers were clean to the point of discomfort.

Overwhelming survivability.

Shield saturation approaching total mitigation.

Healing curves that erased attrition.

Battles are reduced to sequence, timing, and compliance.

"This wasn't combat," Wu said, reading over his shoulder. "It was calibration."

Charles nodded. "Someone taught the land what to expect."

He moved aside and began to write, the field report forming with the economy of a man who knew which words endured scrutiny.

He did not file it.🧐

Instead, he reached into his satchel and withdrew a thinner sheet, its surface worn not by age alone, but by deliberate neglect. Wu recognised it immediately — not the text, but the treatment. This was something that had survived by being ignored.

She unfolded it carefully.

Fragment Recovered — Pre-NDL Record (Incomplete)

Wu lowered the fragment.

"This wasn't a myth," she said. "It was redaction."

Charles nodded. "And we built the Defence League on the assumption that forgetting was safety."

They stood in silence as the altar dimmed and the city finally surrendered itself to frost.

Wu broke it first. "You never told me how you knew."

Charles considered the horizon before answering.

"I was born between campaigns," he said. "My father commanded a holding that no longer exists. It fell the old way — steel, fire, certainty. When the land changed, he stayed the same. I learned early what happens when men mistake repetition for tradition."

Wu absorbed that without comment.

"And you?" Charles asked.

Wu's gaze remained on the ice. "I was raised inside systems. Supply routes. Records. The quiet machinery no one praises. When something breaks, I don't look for who — I look for why it was allowed to."

She turned to him. "That's why Himiko trusts us."

"And why doesn't tell us everything," Charles replied.

They both thought of Baldwin then — not as a traitor, but as a warning. A man who had recognised the shape of the land's memory and tried to master it rather than understand it. Chapter 10 had ended, but its consequences had not.

"This thread," Wu said softly, tapping the fragment. "It doesn't belong in the main record."

"No," Charles agreed. "It leads somewhere narrower. Darker."

Wu's expression sharpened. "A place we'll have to enter carefully."

They looked back toward the citadel, where Himiko held together a League built on restraint, silence, and impossible judgment calls.

"We should tell her," Wu said.

Charles exhaled. "Yes."

"But not yet," Wu added. "The timing would be catastrophic."

Charles smiled thinly. "When isn't it?"

They turned away from the battlefield together, carrying not a conspiracy, but something far more dangerous: continuity.

Behind them, Frostborne reclaimed the ground, patient as memory.

Preview — What Comes Next

This side thread does not resolve.

It narrows.

The next chapter will follow Charles and Wu as they quietly pursue the fragment's implications through gnome records, failed altar sites, and forgotten cycles buried beneath the NDL's own archives. What they uncover will not contradict Himiko's leadership, but it will complicate it.

And somewhere beyond Frostborne's veil, something that learned once before will begin to notice it is being remembered again.

Not with anger.

With interest.

HELPFUL INFINITY KINGDOM GAME LINKS

1.GLOBAL IK DOWNLOAD

2.KOREAN IK DOWNLOAD

3.HONG KONG & TAIWAN IK DOWNLOAD