Peace City.
On the not-so-tall city gate tower hung the sign for Peace City.
The open city gates saw few people coming and going.
As Xiao Yecao stepped into the city once more, she instinctively tightened her grip on Li Muyang’s hand.
Now, Xiao Yecao had grown into a full-fledged young woman.
Even dressed in plain clothes, her natural beauty was hard to conceal.
The most radiant and captivating features of a young girl were already fixed upon her face, impervious to the ravages of time.
Her bright eyes seemed to hold a nebula, dazzling and luminous.
Li Muyang had no idea what realm of cultivation Xiao Yecao had reached, and even the girl herself couldn’t really explain it.
The cultivation method she practiced had been so altered by her that it bore no resemblance to the conventional methods of the world.There was no Golden Core, no Primordial Spirit, no Purple Mansion.
Within her, there was only the misty aura of an immortal spirit.
On the surface, the girl seemed to merge with the world around her, posing no threat and lacking the imposing presence of gods or cultivation grandmasters.
But not long ago, Xiao Yecao had effortlessly slain a demigod, her display of power deeply moving Li Muyang.
Yet now, this little girl stood outside the gates of her hometown, nervously clutching Li Muyang’s hand.
“Brother…”
Xiao Yecao glanced nervously around and whispered, “Shall we not go in? It’s been so many years. Maybe my parents are no longer there…”
Li Muyang, however, looked at Xiao Yecao’s nervous and evasive gaze and smiled.
“We’ve come all this way, why not just take a casual stroll inside?”
He patted the girl’s hand reassuringly, saying, “As the old saying goes, since we’re here…”
Li Muyang laughed heartily, half-dragging the girl into the small city with its mottled city walls.
The suggestion to visit Peace City had been made casually by Li Muyang.
But after he proposed the idea, the girl’s shrinking and evasive reaction only strengthened Li Muyang’s resolve to bring her here.
The path of cultivation fears inner demons the most, and the girl had been saying her progress had stalled, hitting some sort of bottleneck.
Li Muyang guessed that she might be unable to let go of her childhood experiences.
Being abandoned by her mother at a young age must have left a deep shadow in the girl’s heart.
In order to unravel the knot in her heart, perhaps it was necessary to bring her back to her hometown, to revisit the old place, and to see her parents again.
Li Muyang laughed heartily, forcibly dragging the girl into the city gate.
Although Xiao Yecao could crush Li Muyang with a mere lift of her hand at this point, in his hands, the girl was as docile as a kitten.
However, after they entered the city, Li Muyang did not immediately take Xiao Yecao to find her parents.
He led her around the city, casually inquiring about interesting things, as if they were just ordinary tourists.
After wandering around for a while and listening to a storyteller’s tales in a teahouse, Li Muyang and Xiao Yecao checked into an inn in the city as night fell.
The next day, and the day after, Li Muyang did the same.
He simply took the girl around the city, not mentioning a visit to her parents.
…….
It was the girl who couldn’t hold back any longer.
She secretly learned the current whereabouts of her parents and stealthily slipped away in the breeze.
Her mother, who had sold her own daughter to a trafficker in a fit of anger for not bearing a son and thus losing favor at home, was now in her thirties.
The woman, who did not look old, dressed in tacky clothes and caked on makeup, laughed and jeered with the lady of the house at the husband’s newly taken concubine.
This lady of the house was the same woman who had always suppressed and bullied her in the past.
But now, the two women seemed like close sisters, mocking and ridiculing the young girl across from them.
The young girl, who had come from a brothel, was young but sharp-tongued and not one to back down.
Xiao Yecao stood quietly to the side, hidden in the wind, witnessing the scene before her, silently observing her mother, who had once been young and beautiful but now turned into a vulgar and sharp-tongued figure.
She watched for a long time, until the three women parted ways unhappily, and then she turned and left.
In the days that followed, Xiao Yecao often watched.
She watched her mother scold the servants, curry favor with the lady of the house, twist her still-pretty body to flatter her long-neglecting husband, secretly skim the servants’ wages, spread rumors to harm the newly taken concubine, and finally, in the dead of night, secretly meet with a young and strong servant in the firewood shed.
Under the moonlight, the girl listened quietly to the faint panting from the dark shed with a complex expression.
It wasn’t until Li Muyang’s voice sounded behind her that she suddenly snapped back to reality.
“…It’s not great to eavesdrop at the wall in the middle of the night, is it?”
The girl’s face instantly flushed to her ears, and she turned around as if electrified, looking at Li Muyang in front of her with panic and a bit of a stutter.
“B-Brother, when… when did you get here?”
Under the moonlight, the man in white robes spread his hands, his handsome face, now showing a hint of wrinkles, wore the familiar smile the girl knew well.
“I’ve always been here. You just never noticed.”
Li Muyang shrugged and said, “My little fairy is always so focused every time she comes that she doesn’t even notice a little tail following her.”
Li Muyang’s teasing words brought a blush to the girl’s face, which had just calmed down.
‘Brother… you follow me every time?’
The girl seemed to want to ask this, but in the end, she was too embarrassed to voice it out.
With her cultivation level, she shouldn’t have failed to notice Li Muyang tracking her.
She thought she was moving silently, but she didn’t realize that every time, Elder Brother had followed her…
Under the moonlight, the panting inside the dark firewood shed became more rapid, as if it was approaching the final moment.
Li Muyang glanced over there with a smile and said, “You’ve been watching for so many days. Aren’t you going to show yourself and meet her?”
The girl shook her head lightly: “There’s no need.”
“I thought I would miss her a lot and care about her. I thought… perhaps she had some difficulties back then.”
“But when I actually saw her, I realized everything was very simple.”
“There were no difficulties, and there is nothing to explain. She’s just that kind of person.”
“And I, her daughter, born of her, naturally am just as cold-blooded and heartless. Seeing her, I felt no longing. Instead, the more I looked at her, the more I detested her, even wishing I could kill her.”
Saying this, the girl glanced back at the dark firewood shed and said, “Let’s go, brother, this place is boring.”
“Staying any longer is a waste of time.”
The girl’s eyes were cold, her expression one of disgust.
Li Muyang reached out to her with a smile and said, “Whatever the fairy says.”
Under the moonlight, the two left hand in hand, without disturbing anyone, as if they had never been there.
Only the curious muttering of the girl echoed in the darkness, fading away.
“By the way… Brother, you seem to have no interest in that kind of thing, it’s so strange…”
The girl seemed puzzled.
In the darkness, the man’s helpless voice of defense could be heard.
“Who says? I’m very interested, okay?”
“But you never… even last time with that dragon maiden…”
“You still have the nerve to mention that! You got drunk and caused trouble, almost getting me caught by the Dragon King to be wed to his daughter. Dare to casually take the Dragon King’s daughter? She could swallow me in one bite… I don’t like fierce women…”
“Tsk… then what kind of woman do you like, brother?”
“The kind I like.”
“Ugh…That’s not saying anything! Brother, you’re already thirty, an old man, and still so picky… Only I am willing to stay by your side.”
“Heh…”
The laughter of the girl and the man disappeared into the night wind.
Inside the mansion under the moonlight, there was chaos.
But it had nothing to do with them anymore.
They were leaving Peace City to go to the next place, continuing their journey.
And Peace City was just a minor episode in their travels.
Not worth mentioning anymore.
The girl looked at the moonlight and whispered softly.
“…The only relative I have in this world is Elder Brother.”
She had come to understand that.
In this world, aside from Elder Brother, no one was her relative.
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