We really hadn't expected this trip to keep us away for nearly two months. When we left, it had been Severe Winter, with heavy snow falling; by the time we returned, winter was practically over. According to the calendar, the season of blooming spring was about to arrive—though winter's chill still lingered, and supposedly the False Spring Cold in K City would be pretty severe this year. Lin Xue said so.
Then it had to be severe.
Staying home for too long got irritating, but working outside for too long made nowhere feel as comfortable as home. There were grand, magnificent halls outside, castles towering into the clouds, but none of them had the cozy atmosphere of home. At least in my opinion, my own twenty-something-square-meter bedroom was still the most comfortable place to sleep—over twenty square meters wasn't small.
And I figured everyone around me felt about the same. Birds of a feather flock together; none of our big family were the type to agonize over such trivial matters as food, clothing, housing, and transportation. Even Viska, a certified Goddess who had grown up in the Obsidian Palace, was perfectly happy to squeeze onto a sofa with Sandora and fight over the TV remote—though what they did after getting hold of it was entirely different. The first thing Suigintou did after returning home was solemnly place her big suitcase beneath the window, then stand on top of it and tell me seriously, "I'm not going out with you next time. Adult work is so boring!"
She had clearly gotten used to being categorized as a "child" alongside those little girls.
On the second day after returning home, Miss Lin contacted me through Spiritual Connection. The girl told me, aggrieved, some wonderfully satisfying news: after countless unexplained disappearances, nights spent