Chapter 096: Cousin's Husband

A month later, at Mistfold Mountain.

Mistfold Mountain was the secluded dwelling of the ancient immortal lord of the sect, the Immortal Venerable of a Thousand Shadows, Yuchi You.

Eighty years ago, Zhuge Yang had found Yuchi You and cajoled him with every kind of sweet talk into coming down the mountain to take on disciples. He spoke of “restoring former glory,” of “leaving a name that would endure through the ages,” of “the only blade capable of reviving the sect resting in your hands,” and of how “if you continue to live in seclusion, it will be the sect’s greatest loss.”

Yuchi You naturally knew exactly what Zhuge Yang was after, but he simply could not withstand the man’s relentless pleading. Zhuge Yang even went so far as to threaten him, then settled himself on Mistfold Mountain and spent every morning chanting scriptures in his ear.

Was that not worse than a rogue’s cruelty?

With no other choice, Yuchi You finally agreed to go down the mountain and take on a disciple, only then sending off that so-called old ancestor of the sect.

But Yuchi You also played a small trick of his own. Though he had agreed to take a disciple, he had never clearly said when he would do so, nor how many he would take.

And so, with regard to the matter of discipleship, Yuchi You intended to deal with it as casually as possible.

More than seventy years later, one day while strolling down the mountain, Yuchi You happened to see a girl of about thirteen sitting on the ground and bawling her eyes out. She was clutching a small bundle in her hands, crying with such heartbreaking misery that even Yuchi You could not help but feel a little sorry for her. So he went forward to ask what had happened.

Only then did he learn that because her cultivation had ranked dead last in the end-of-month assessment, she had been thrown out of the sect, Azure Abode Gate.

Seeing her so pitiful, and remembering that he had promised Zhuge Yang he would take a new disciple, Yuchi You simply took her in on the spot.

Though her talent was mediocre—so mediocre that in a small sect like Azure Abode Gate she could still rank at the bottom of the cultivation standings, which only showed how poor her comprehension was—if Zhuge Yang knew Yuchi You chose his disciple so carelessly, he would probably be furious enough to drop dead.

But Yuchi You had always done things in accordance with his own whims.

The girl’s name was Feng Churan, and from that day on Yuchi You brought her back to Mistfold Mountain. Naturally, he also assumed the responsibilities of a master and taught her diligently for seven years.

At last, Yuchi You used seven years to prove that Feng Churan truly was not made for the path of cultivation.

Even with a master as capable as Yuchi You, and with his carefully refined pills and elixirs to support her, after seven years Feng Churan had only barely reached the second level of the Profound Access Realm.

One had to know that among all the disciples Yuchi You had ever taken, even the one with the worst talent would, after seven years under his tutelage, at least have reached the Spirit Void Realm.

Besides being dull of talent, Feng Churan had two great flaws: she was a terrible crybaby, and she lacked confidence to a truly serious degree.

She always felt that her cultivation was worthless and that she brought shame to the sect, and she would burst into tears at the slightest thing.

Though that much was also true,

Yuchi You still felt that at the very least, she needed to regain confidence in herself, so he often encouraged her and told her flattering lies about how she was actually already wonderful.

This year, Feng Churan had also turned twenty. Her progress in cultivation had begun to stall, likely because she had already touched the edge of a bottleneck in advance. Yuchi You felt it would be best to send her down the mountain for two or three years of training, to let her cut down a few bandits and highway robbers and recover a bit of self-assurance.

Moreover, at her age, a second-level Profound Access Realm cultivation was already quite outstanding among her peers. Of course, that was not because her talent was especially good; it was only because the mental art Yuchi You had taught her was of high quality, and the pills he refined were excellent.

If Feng Churan had been placed in an ordinary sect to cultivate, by now she would probably have been only at the second or third level of the Bone Tempering Realm.

Fortunately, Yuchi You had planned ahead. From the very beginning, he had never told Feng Churan his true name, only that he was called the Pure Elder.

Of course, that was a name he had made up on the spot. In this way, even if Feng Churan made all sorts of embarrassing blunders during her travels, they would not implicate him.

After all, Feng Churan herself did not even know that she was the disciple of Yuchi You, the Immortal Venerable of a Thousand Shadows, a man whose name had once resounded throughout the world three thousand years ago.

Just before Feng Churan was to go down the mountain, Yuchi You gifted her a Greenwood Sword.

Then he ordered her to stand upon it, and the sword carried her flying southward all the way, gradually leaving Mistfold Mountain behind.

Yuchi You only hoped the place where her training began would be as far from Mistfold Mountain as possible, so that no one would ever link her to that mountain.

Thus, the Greenwood Sword carried Feng Churan toward the Kingdom of Li...

...

At this moment, in Yan City of the Kingdom of Li,

Song Ye was counting the days on his fingers. There were only three days left until his marriage to Qin Xuanxi.

He had heard that yesterday, Grand Princess Li Xiuling and her entourage had arrived in Yan City ahead of time. She had come on behalf of the court to offer congratulations to the Prince Xiang’s Residence.

But because the residence was busy preparing for the wedding, and the prince himself was also slightly unwell, they did not receive Li Xiuling inside the estate.

So Li Xiuling and the others were arranged to stay in another mansion.

Li Xiuling also knew that these days the people of the Prince Xiang’s Residence were extremely busy, and she did not wish to disturb them. She could only wait until the day of the wedding to meet the prince and personally offer her congratulations.

After all, there were only a few days left before the wedding at Prince Xiang’s Residence.

Yesterday, several old matrons from the residence had also come to Song Ye and given him a lesson in appearance and bearing, along with many of the household rules of the residence. They had even told him quite a lot about the rules of the imperial palace.

After all, once he became the prince’s son-in-law, he would count as part of the royal family of the Kingdom of Li, and in the future he might even be summoned to the palace to pay his respects to the emperor.

Of course, only Song Ye himself knew that he could not even make it to Changle Ward next door, let alone travel to the capital city of Luocheng and enter the palace to attend an audience.

Feeling truly restless in the courtyard, and perhaps a little nervous with the wedding date approaching, he thought of his first marriage, whether in his former world or in this game-like world. Nervousness was only natural.

So he decided to go to the East Market for some fresh air. In the next instant, he left the courtyard at astonishing speed, so fast it was as if he had used a flash-step technique. The two Purple Jade Guards at the gate did not even notice that he was no longer inside.

Once he reached the East Market, Song Ye’s old habits immediately kicked in.

“Auntie Wang, your two huge vegetable baskets are blocking the road again. What, did you think I was gone and decided to rebel?”

“Uncle Zhang, you really ought to clean up your stall. You should pay more attention to hygiene!”

Suddenly, a tall figure appeared in front of Song Ye.

“Song Ye, do you still remember me?”

Song Ye turned his head and saw Li Xiuling smiling at him.

This time, Li Xiuling was not wearing armor. Instead, she was dressed in a white robe and wore a futou cap, clad entirely as a man, yet she still gave off a spirited and heroic air.

“Princess Yi’an, we drank together once. How could I forget?” Song Ye said with a slight smile.

“Yes, we did indeed drink here before. How unpredictable life is. I never imagined that when we met again this time, you and I would almost become family.” Li Xiuling said with a faint smile.

Li Xiuling could never have imagined that the honest, down-to-earth village boy she had met in Autumn Whisper Village a year and a half ago would now be about to become a son-in-law of the nobility.

In other words, from now on, she would have to call him her cousin-in-law.