In This Life, I Only Want to Have Children

Knock, knock, knock! The door to the room was suddenly knocked on.

Immediately after, a childish, shrill voice came from outside the door. "Young Master, the Qi Nourishing Soup is ready. Shall I bring it in for you?"

That voice was extremely familiar and distinctive.

A frail figure swiftly surfaced in Zhao Sheng's mind.

Zhao Xiaobao.

His personal attendant boy. Zhao Xiaobao had followed him since he was eight, attending to his daily needs.

"Come in," Zhao Sheng replied calmly, following his memories.

Then he flipped off the bed. His feet landed without a sound, raising not a speck of dust, his body seeming incomparably light.

Zhao Sheng was surprised. He had not expected the effect of being light as a swallow to be so remarkable.

The door was pushed open, and Zhao Xiaobao entered with a blue-and-white porcelain bowl held in both hands.

After carefully placing the porcelain bowl on the table, Zhao Xiaobao quickly stepped before Zhao Sheng and asked respectfully, "Young Master, the medicine is ready. Do you have any other instructions?"

"Mm, nothing else. You can leave first."

After saying that, Zhao Sheng did not drink the medicine. Instead, he walked to the washstand mirror. Reflected in it was a youth six feet tall, with red lips, white teeth, a high nose, phoenix eyes, and a valiant bearing.

He was exceptionally handsome. That was good.

It should be enough to win over some young lady from a Cultivation Family.

That was right!

Zhao Sheng's goal in this life was to marry one, or even several, women from Cultivation Families.

He swore to have as many children as possible. He refused to believe that he would fail to produce descendants with spiritual roots in the end.

By now, he had completely absorbed Zhao Zhiqin's memories. In those memories, not a single descendant with spiritual roots had been born into the Zhao Family up to this day.

Since the descendants were so disappointing, the old ancestor could only take the field personally now.

Zhao Xiaobao did not leave.

After hesitating for a moment, he suddenly gritted his teeth and said, "Young Master, I just heard some bad news. They say Madam wants to reduce your food, clothing, and martial arts expenses. The Qi Nourishing Soup that was originally given once every three days is being changed to once every seven days."

Zhao Sheng raised his brows upon hearing that.

The Madam Zhao Xiaobao referred to was the lawful wife of the Zhao Family Head, First Madam. Not only did she control the Zhao Family Fortress's daily expenditures, but she also participated in managing the family businesses and oversaw the accounts.

Zhao Sheng turned and sat at the table, asking at the same time, "Does Madam have a reason?"

Zhao Xiaobao lowered his voice. "I heard the family businesses recently lost a large sum of silver. Using tight cash flow as an excuse, Madam took the initiative to reduce the expenses of every branch. Our Third Branch had its share cut by another twenty percent."

"Mm. Since the family is short of silver, temporarily cutting expenses is nothing much."

With that, Zhao Sheng picked up the porcelain bowl and tipped his head back, draining the medicinal soup in one gulp.

That bitter, fishy-sweet, familiar taste spread through his mouth once more, just as it had over a hundred years ago.

"Young Master, you don't know. The young masters and young ladies of the First Branch and Second Branch still receive a bowl of Qi Nourishing Soup every three days. It hasn't been changed to once every seven days," Zhao Xiaobao could not help muttering.

Mm?!

At that, Zhao Sheng's brow immediately furrowed.

Since ancient times, the scholar was poor while the martial artist was rich. Martial arts training consumed enormously. Not only did it require great amounts of meat, it also could not go without medicinal soups to nourish the body.

The cost of a single bowl of Qi Nourishing Soup was five taels of silver, and there were already more than twenty direct descendants of the Zhao Family's current generation training in martial arts. This expense alone cost the Zhao Family at least thirty thousand taels of silver every year.

Even with the Zhao Family's vast wealth, it could only barely keep afloat under such immense expenditures.

Therefore, he could endure reduced expenses. But unfair treatment was something he could not endure.

Thoughts whirled through Zhao Sheng's mind, and he quickly came up with an idea.

"Xiaobao, go out and ask around about how the young masters and young ladies of the other two branches have been doing lately. Come back and tell me once you find out."

Zhao Xiaobao nodded and acknowledged the order, then swiftly withdrew from the room.

Once he was alone, Zhao Sheng rose and walked to the bedside, reaching out to take down the Hundred Refinement Sword hanging at the head of the bed.

Shing! The longsword slid from its sheath, and a familiar sensation welled up in his hand, just like his sword from a hundred years ago, Floating Light.

In truth, this Hundred Refinement Sword had been forged entirely according to Floating Light's design. Its weight and length were exactly the same.

The true famous sword, Floating Light, was worn at the waist of the family head, Zhao Hexing, as a family token.

With a flick of his wrist, a six-petaled flower of sword light abruptly flashed into being.

As he unleashed the first stance of the Floating Light Swordplay, Six Petal Plum Blossom, a figure suddenly began darting, shifting, and weaving through the room. Strands of sword light appeared and vanished alongside the transformations of his moves.

Gradually, the sword light in the room grew denser and denser, until it finally gathered into a drifting, ever-changing ball of light that completely enveloped his entire body.

Half an hour later, Zhao Sheng's clothes were soaked through the back with sweat as he came to a stop.

He casually tossed the longsword in his hand. The next instant, the Hundred Refinement Sword miraculously slid back into its sheath.

Name: Zhao Zhiqin (Zhao Sheng) Lifespan: 15/120 Physique: Hundred-Year Physique (Mortal Grade), Light as a Swallow (Mortal Grade)

Talent: Dynamic Vision (Mortal Grade)

Skills: Floating Light Swordplay (Great Completion), Cloud Dragon Three Transformations (Great Completion), Azure Sea Tide Rising Art (Entry Level)

"Not bad. The feel is still there."

Looking at the data on the page, Zhao Sheng nodded in satisfaction.

Although he had been reincarnated, the experience he had accumulated over a lifetime of martial arts had not been forgotten.

After practicing only a few dozen times, he had cultivated both the Floating Light Swordplay and Cloud Dragon Three Transformations to the Great Completion realm.

Once his body matured in a few years and his Internal family true qi reached minor completion, he would be able to easily retrain several martial arts to the peak realm of his previous life.

The Nanyang Zhao Clan had two important locations. One was the ancestral residence in Nanyang City, while the other was the Zhao Estate built a hundred and fifty years ago.

The Zhao Estate lay thirty li outside Nanyang City, backed by mountains and facing water, with vast stretches of flat, cultivable fields before it.

The residence grounds alone covered nearly fifty mu. Together with the thick, sturdy stone walls surrounding it and the eight five-zhang arrow towers protruding from its four corners, it looked like a heavily defended fortress.

Thus, it was also known as the Zhao Family Fortress.

Halls and pavilions stood everywhere within the Zhao Family Fortress, and its population was dense. Yet nearly five mu of land had been left vacant in its southeastern corner.

The ground there was covered with thick yellow earth. Along the walls stood every sort of martial arts equipment, including sabers, spears, swords, axes, wooden stakes, and archery targets. This place was the Zhao Clan's training ground.

The next day, Zhao Sheng, dressed in fitted white martial clothes and carrying the Hundred Refinement Sword in one hand, walked leisurely into the training ground.

At that moment, shouts rose and fell throughout the training ground. Several direct young masters and young ladies of the Zhao Clan, their faces flushed, were diligently practicing swordsmanship.

Zhao Sheng smiled faintly at the sight.

He had arrived at just the right time! He walked up to a handsome young man of around twenty and said with a grin, "Third Brother, how about the two of us exchange a few moves?"

Third Brother was named Zhao Zhijing. He was twenty-one this year, a direct son of the family head Zhao Hexing, and ranked third among the Zhao Clan's Zhi generation.

His martial arts were the strongest among the people in the training ground, so he naturally became Zhao Sheng's target for establishing his authority.

Zhao Zhijing withdrew his sword stance and turned to see who it was. He immediately laughed, teasing, "So it's Xiao Jiu. What's this? Your skin's itching, and you want your Third Brother to loosen you up?"

Zhao Zhijing did not take Zhao Sheng seriously in the slightest.

Leaving aside the six-year gap between them, even in terms of cultivation, he was one of the first two members of the Zhao Clan's current generation to enter the Third-Rate Realm. Old Ninth, Zhao Zhiqin, had not even mastered the Floating Light Swordplay in ordinary times. How could he possibly be Zhao Zhijing's opponent?