A Wanderer Returns Home

Just as Zhao Chengle grew increasingly anxious and uneasy, the atmosphere inside the room was not as sorrowful as he had imagined.

Zhao Sheng sat by the bed, holding his wife Wang Yuqi's hand, gently recounting every little moment from the seventy years since their marriage.

Wang Yuqi was gaunt as a stick, her face covered in terrifying age spots.

She had already fallen unconscious and could not hear a word her husband said.

Yet Zhao Sheng seemed to feel not the slightest sorrow, continuing his unhurried narration.

No one knew how much time had passed when Wang Yuqi's hand suddenly twitched slightly. Her eyelids quivered a few times before she slowly opened her eyes, mottled with white spots.

There was no light in her gaze. Her eyes were unfocused and bewildered, tinged with panic.

But upon feeling her husband's shriveled old hand, Wang Yuqi immediately relaxed, an relieved smile appearing on her face.

"Zhi Qin-ge, I finally died before you. How wonderful!" she murmured weakly, so softly that she was almost inaudible.

"Yes. From now on, I'll be the only one left to live in loneliness. Mm, I know you're terribly afraid of being alone," Zhao Sheng said tenderly near her ear.

"Zhi Qin-ge, you've always understood me best. Do you remember how we first met?"

Zhao Sheng reached out to tuck in the corners of her blanket and chuckled softly. "How could I not? I used perfume to lure you and Yu Yan over. To catch your attention, I even deliberately played High Mountain Flowing Water on the zither."

"Cough, cough. I knew your intentions were impure. Back then, I was young and ignorant, so you tricked me so easily."

"Do you regret it?"

"No regrets! Never any regrets!"

After saying that, Wang Yuqi's face suddenly turned unnaturally rosy, and her voice became clear again.

Zhao Sheng's heart tightened, and he involuntarily gripped his wife's hand tightly.

He knew this was a final burst of life before death.

Wang Yuqi suddenly turned her face toward Zhao Sheng, looking at him with intense longing as she pleaded, "Zhi Qin-ge, I want to hear you recite once more the poem you gave me as our pledge of love."

At that moment, tears suddenly welled up in Zhao Sheng's eyes. His voice trembled slightly as he softly recited, "Delicate clouds weave wonders, shooting stars convey grief; across the distant Milky Way, they secretly cross. When Golden Wind Jade Dew meet but once, it surpasses countless meetings in the mortal world..."

After Zhao Sheng finished reciting their love poem, Wang Yuqi seemed to have fulfilled her final wish. Her face swiftly turned ashen, her breathing nearly stopped, and only the last thread of consciousness remained. "Zhi Qin-ge, I suddenly miss home. I miss my grandfather and grandmother, my father and mother, and Sister Yuyan. I want... want to go ba—"

Before she could utter the word "home," her right hand suddenly went limp and released her husband's hand. From then on, her breathing stopped forever.

Seeing his lifelong companion leave this world, tears instantly blurred Zhao Sheng's eyes.

At that moment, tears streamed down his aged face.

When Zhao Sheng walked out of the room in dejection, waves of crying soon rose throughout Zhao Estate.

A month later, watched off by his son Zhao Chengle, his grandson Zhao Xuanhan, and the others, Zhao Sheng carried his wife's urn onto a carriage.

Then, driven by a coachman in the Innate realm, the carriage slowly set off toward Ganzhou of the Liang Kingdom, more than four thousand li away.

Winter passed and spring arrived. In the bright third month of spring, every peach tree in Nanyang City suddenly burst into bloom overnight.

The fragrance of flowers drifted through the air, while fallen petals danced in profusion.

On the very day that Nanyang's people celebrated the Peach Blossom Festival, a battered, ramshackle carriage stopped before an old estate.

The moment Zhao Sheng stepped down from the carriage, seven or eight men carrying sabres and swords suddenly surrounded him, shouting as they drove him away. "No matter where you came from, get lost! The Zhao Family isn't receiving outside guests today!"

"Insolence!"

The coachman, Zhao Er, had learned everything he knew from Zhao Sheng and revered the old master as if he were a god.

Seeing this, he abruptly stepped forward and let out a furious roar. Innate True Qi mingled with the sound waves and erupted without warning.

The eardrums and inner ears of those seven or eight men were shattered on the spot, and they collapsed limply to the ground.

"Ah! Why can't I get up?!"

"Ah, I can't hear anything!"

They screamed endlessly. Their bodies had completely lost their balance, and no matter how they struggled, they could not rise.

At this moment, the expressions of the two middle-aged men in red guarding the entrance of Zhao Estate abruptly changed.

Unlike the lowlifes who merely drifted through the Jianghu, these men from the Blood Sabre Sect recognized at a glance the background of that seemingly ordinary coachman.

This man was actually a rare Innate Grandmaster of Ganzhou, an existence on the same level as the Blood Sabre Old Ancestor.

Realizing things were going badly, the two Blood Sabre Sect disciples turned to run into Zhao Estate.

But just then, a frail, white-haired old man with one arm suddenly appeared between them.

Immediately afterward, an aura as heavy as a mountain descended upon them. The two men were instantly completely suppressed, unable to move even a finger, like insects frozen in amber.

Fortunately, that terrifying aura came as swiftly as it vanished!

The two soon regained their freedom, yet neither dared move, much less report the news to the Blood Sabre Old Ancestor.

"What happened at Zhao Estate? And who are you people?" Zhao Sheng asked after withdrawing his Innate pressure.

The two men did not dare conceal anything and hurriedly explained, "We are both disciples of the Blood Sabre Sect. But we absolutely mean no harm. It's because the Blood Sabre Old Ancestor wishes to take the Third Young Master of Zhao Estate as his disciple that he personally came here. We are merely guarding the entrance to keep outsiders from disturbing him."

"Take a disciple?"

Zhao Sheng frowned, thinking, If he truly wanted to take a disciple, would he need to make such a spectacle of it?

At that moment, the coachman Zhao Er leaned close and said, "Old Master, judging by how they've drawn their blades, that Blood Sabre Old Ancestor is probably up to no good! Shall I send him on his way first?"

"No."

After saying that, Zhao Sheng stepped into the ancestral home he had not returned to for fifty years.

Meanwhile, the atmosphere in the Main Hall of Zhao Estate, where guests were received, was exceptionally heavy.

At the seat of honor sat a ruddy-faced old man with a magnificent beard cascading beneath his chin. Though he was past fifty, his hair was still black and his face bore not a single wrinkle. Clearly, he was well versed in the arts of preserving health.

On the grand chairs below him, four Zhao Family elders sat on the left, while only two people sat on the right.

At the uppermost seat sat a bald, owl-faced old man dressed in a long scarlet robe. He was extraordinarily tall, with a visage as fierce as a demon.

This was Chang Meng, the Blood Sabre Old Ancestor, whose name had shaken Ganzhou's Jianghu for half a century.

Seated below him was an old Daoist with the face of a child and the hair of a crane, holding a whisk.

Behind the two stood a row of Blood Sabre Sect disciples dressed in red. Their temples bulged high, making it clear at a glance that every one of them was a rare first-class expert in the Jianghu.

Apparently tired of waiting, the Blood Sabre Old Ancestor suddenly asked in a gloomy tone, "How has your Zhao Family considered the matter? When will you let this ancestor meet my precious disciple?"

After hearing this, the bearded old man smiled. "Ancestor Chang, it is the Zhao Family's good fortune that you are willing to take Jie'er as your disciple. Unfortunately, he went to visit his grandaunt two days ago and has yet to return. How about this: once he returns, I'll have Jie'er personally go to the Blood Sabre Sect to acknowledge you as his master. What do you think?"

"Bullshit!"