The silly and seductive Mira, the older sister with a scarred arm who once gave him a ray of sunshine, the doctors and nurses he met at the hospital, and some ordinary soldier on the battlefield... It was these people, because they were more like Henry, their sacrifice and dedication felt even purer to it.

So we saw him risk his life to dash back to the 101 Medical Station, facing the active choice of three hundred people. This was a proactive and clear decision.

Henry is someone who only wants to survive and go home. For someone like that, to expect him to always take the initiative to risk his life every time—it's just not logical.

I also don't want to directly portray that kind of noble and flawless mindset.

In short, I am gradually depicting the psychological journey and transformation of a character.

I mean no offense to anyone; after all, there have hardly been any related comments. I just want to say, if a subtle, gentle approach to character transformation is considered a crime in web novels, then I hope readers who support me can be a bit more patient and trusting.

—Respectfully, The Arsenal of the Mortal World

Volume One: The Known and the Unknown

Preface: It has always been this way—when the unknown shatters our understanding, it brings fear, but also courage.

Chapter 1: That Year at Fenglong'ao

Henry Clark's name was given by an old itinerant monk who guarded the dilapidated temple in the village back then.

When he grew up and asked about it, he was told that when he was born, the rice seedlings in the paddy fields had just started to turn yellow and green again, and the mountain stream flooded for several days.

So his name was chosen to ward off disaster. The old monk collected five dou of rice from every village along the river for this.

That was nineteen years ago.

That lonely old monk, who could always talk his way out of any mistake, made a living by fortune-telling, reading faces, picking dates, and choosing burial sites. He had already left for somewhere else a few years back.

Actually, according to the ancient rules in some rural areas, the name Henry Clark isn't really that good—it's a bit too grand.

But in Fenglong'ao, no one understood that.

Just like the people here didn't know that the name of their little mountain village was actually quite grand—very grand.

Fenglong'ao, a small mountain village that had never been prosperous for generations, but the harvests from the mountain fields were always decent, so no one ever really went cold or hungry.

As a member of yet another generation of mountain folk in this remote land, an ordinary farm boy, only two major things had happened in Henry Clark's nineteen uneventful years:

One was that he failed the college entrance exam this year.

The other was last year.

"Twice now..."

The old pear tree in the farmhouse yard was tall, with an abandoned magpie's nest in its branches. Sunlight filtered through the leaves, casting dappled shadows on the ground. Henry Clark sat under the tree, muttering unconsciously, and then even managed a small smile, though it inevitably looked a bit bleak.

He actually had some excuses he could use.

For example, his Chinese teacher used to be a mailman, and only switched to teaching after publishing a tiny poem in a newspaper. Now, every class was about reciting his later, never-published poems to the students.

His English teacher was already quite old, a former educated youth who couldn't leave the village because he had slept with a girl from a big family. His major was Russian, his Mandarin had a Tangshan accent, and when he spoke English, he mixed all three accents together, making it even harder to understand than any one of them alone.

But none of that really mattered. Failing the exam was failing the exam—there's no arguing with that.

"Then just try again. What do they say? Third time's the charm."

Hearing his muttering, his mother Jessica Bolton came around the corner of the wall and chimed in.

As she spoke, she set down the wooden basin she was using to wash clothes, picked up a wet garment, wrung it out, shook it a few times, and hung it on the bamboo pole.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, failing the college entrance exam wasn't all that surprising. It was common for ordinary people to take it two or three times. His mother was a straightforward person, not very educated, didn't know much, and wasn't too discouraged.

Try again?

Henry Clark's heart stirred. Deep down, he wanted to, but then he thought about his two severely weak subjects, and the light in his eyes dimmed again. He said, "Another year probably won't help... I really don't think I can do it."

He also kept some thoughts to himself—in fact, in terms of income, high school tuition wasn't cheap in those days. In recent years, the family had already gone into debt to support his schooling, and because they were short on labor, his parents worked harder than most of the neighbors. He didn't feel confident, and was already too ashamed to try again.

"...Is that so? Well, you see, Mom doesn't really understand either..."

His mother turned to look carefully at her son's expression, trying to gauge his thoughts. All along, Henry Clark had been a decisive child, and in recent years, he had even started making decisions for the family.

Since her boy said so, Jessica Bolton thought for a moment and said, "Well, it's up to you. If you don't want to study anymore, that's fine—we're still an educated family..."

She meant to comfort her child, not to pressure or force him.

But as she spoke, Jessica Bolton's expression suddenly brightened, her eyes lit up, and she continued, "Then how about just staying home, getting married, having kids, and living your life?!"