"Elders, Dad, Mom!"
Li Xingchen and Fan Feixuan stepped ashore. The young man, having returned from his years at sea, wasted no time in helping his wife before the gathered elders. As he paid his respects, Li Xingchen's eyes grew moist.
He hadn't been home for many years, and to return now with his heavily pregnant wife and find all his clan members waiting to welcome him was overwhelming.
The family nodded toward Li Xingchen in acknowledgement.
Back in the Ancestor Space, Li Dalong had been furious about Li Xingchen's reckless escapades. But now that the junior had returned with his wife, it wouldn't be right to lose his temper.
He could only resolve to wait until they were back in the Ancestral Hall, where he would deal with him privately with a rattan cane.
The clansmen led the couple aboard the family's spirit ark. For the time being, Li Xingchen was still a member of the family's youngest generation. The elders all came forward to offer a few words of greeting to Fan Feixuan, a young woman whose eyes were filled with apprehension and nervousness.
Their greetings mostly came in the form of gifts, and in no time at all, Fan Feixuan's ten fingers were adorned with storage rings.
At that moment, Li Chang'an's wife, Liu Xiaofang, was holding her daughter-in-law's hand, her heart filled with joy.
Liu Xiaofang had also followed them from the small fishing village in the North Sea to join the clan.
As a fisherman's daughter, her aptitude was as ordinary as could be, but the Li family, after all, possessed both status and resources. Furthermore, with Li Yaoqing's medicines to purify her body and refine her marrow, she had managed to reach the Golden Core stage.
When the young lady Xiaofang first arrived at the clan, she was, after all, not accustomed to the life of a cultivation family.
She was always very low-key, and for the first ten years, she would even compete with the maids and servants for chores. Even now, she hadn't lost the habit of personally serving tea to the elders.
Kind and amiable elders can always put a person at ease, and Fan Feixuan no longer felt the apprehension she had upon first meeting these unfamiliar relatives.
Now... she was just plain terrified.
Clutching her large belly, Fan Feixuan looked helplessly at the rings on her hands.
The elders had given her many first-meeting gifts. The rings on her ten fingers were, without exception, all spirit artifacts. The space within each could hold an entire courtyard, and they possessed other functions as well.
On the island where she had grown up, these rings alone would have been enough to unleash a bloodbath.
"Mother."
Fan Feixuan bit her lower lip. Having accepted her new life, she had already begun to call Liu Xiaofang 'Mother.' She looked toward the elders conversing outside the spirit ark.
"I can't accept these. They're far too valuable. I…"
"Just take them," Liu Xiaofang said with a satisfied smile. "There's no sense in refusing gifts from your elders. Our family may not be some wealthy and noble household, but now that our wonderful daughter-in-law has joined us, we certainly can't treat you poorly."
Seeing her daughter-in-law's flustered expression only made Liu Xiaofang more pleased. She remembered being just the same when she first joined the Li family all those years ago.
Outside the cabin.
A look of joy flashed through the eyes of the Li family members. With their cultivation levels, they had already inspected the child in Fan Feixuan's belly and knew that he was perfectly healthy.
"Dad, Elders," Li Xingchen began, "while I was away, the battle in Eternal Sun Prefecture and Duravia Trade Prefecture…"
With his Nascent Soul cultivation, how could Li Xingchen fail to notice that something was wrong with his elders?
He could sense that his cousin, Li Xinghuo, was struggling just to suppress his injuries long enough to welcome him.
Many of the elders were pale, and even his Grand-Aunt Kuanghua nearly stumbled when she pressed her ear to Xuanxuan's belly, trying to hear the baby's movements.
Upon arriving in Eternal Sun Prefecture, a Nascent Soul cultivator could perceive the state of the world around them.
The path their spirit ark had taken was the most tranquil one. Yet, he could sense that great battles were raging all around, and dark undercurrents were surging everywhere.
"The battle is over."
Li Xinghuo sat on the deck, leaning against the side of the ark. He smiled, deliberately downplaying the recent events.
"Brother, the major powers of Eternal Sun Prefecture are all fighting amongst themselves now, so we no longer need to get involved. As for the Duravia Trade Prefecture, Prince Qian has already fallen into our hands."
"What?" Li Xingchen was stunned.
He had returned on this journey not only to bring his unborn child home but also because he was well aware of the clan's recent crisis.
He had come prepared to fight for his family, but by the time he arrived, there was nothing left for him to do.
For a moment, his expression was complicated as he glanced down at his wife's belly.
"Xingchen, after you've brought Xuan'er home, you will come with us to Azure Cloud tomorrow," Li Chang'an said, his eyes downcast as he gazed out at the turbulent sky.
"Yes, Father."
Li Xingchen nodded quickly. His clansmen had always been this way; the more casually they spoke of something, the more extraordinary it was likely to be.
The expressions of the other Li family members were also complex. After only a few short days in the Duravia Trade Prefecture, who knew how many others, like them, had managed to return home in peace. But not everyone had been so fortunate.
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