Should I Pay It Back?

"Big Brother really isn't going back?" Nicole toyed with the latest Arcane Folding Experiment Table Xi Ye had bought for her and asked hopefully.

"I won't be going back..." Xi Ye shook his head. "There are too many things to deal with at the base."

"Oh, then your little brother must be very disappointed..." Nicole said regretfully.

"Huh? I have a little brother?" Xi Ye looked toward his father, who was standing off to the side doing nothing.

"What kind of expression is that?" His father immediately looked displeased. "You were out there risking your life, so our family naturally needed a son. Daughters will get married someday. What, were you expecting them to support us in our old age?"

"Th-Then how many children did you have, exactly?" Xi Ye stammered.

"Not that many..." Nicole said with an adorable smile. "Besides our little brother, there's only our older sister Sansa!"

Great... There was one more.

"You really aren't going back?" his father asked as well.

Xi Ye hesitated briefly before shaking his head. "Father, looking like this, I'd only embarrass you if I went back. I'd rather wait until I've achieved something before I return."

"Haha!" His father waved dismissively and laughed. "It's fine. Your father has been embarrassing himself every day for the past twenty thousand years anyway, especially during the ten thousand years after you secretly ran away."

Xi Ye: "..."

Faced with his father's mockery, Xi Ye felt no anger at all. His father had always been the kind of person who loved making cutting remarks, and Xi Ye knew that he cared about him.

The Federation was enormous. Xi Ye didn't believe it was a coincidence that he had run into his father, who had happened to come pick Nicole up from her exam just after Xi Ye returned.

Had his father been keeping track of him every moment of these past ten thousand years?

"I can't go back, so could you take two gifts to them for me?" Xi Ye smiled at Nicole. "What do your younger brother and sister like?"

"Little Chen Ye likes summoning-related things. Big Brother, buy him a Little Devil, or an even more advanced demon grimoire would work too."

Him? So his little brother was called Chen Ye?

Xi Ye felt a slight warmth in his heart and nodded. "Why buy him a Little Devil? I'll buy him a Succubus."

Nicole: "Big Brother, Little Brother is still growing. Isn't that a little inappropriate?"

Xi Ye: "..."

This little girl knew quite a lot...

"What about your sister?" Xi Ye changed the subject.

"My sister..." Nicole's expression turned rather unpleasant. "You should give up on trying to win her over. She won't accept your gift."

"Why?" Xi Ye asked curiously.

"Like everyone else in the family, she's been deceived by Raine. My sister has always wanted to marry Raine!"

"What!!" Xi Ye could no longer sit still. He looked toward his father with an expression that clearly asked what was going on.

His father shrugged indifferently. "What's the big deal? Your cousin is so popular right now, the complete opposite of a down-and-out young man like you. Isn't it perfectly normal for the younger siblings to like him?"

"Even so, isn't he a little too popular?" Xi Ye said with a dark expression.

In the Federation, marriage between close relatives wasn't forbidden in many families. On the contrary, many families even encouraged it to preserve the purity of their bloodlines.

But Xi Ye couldn't accept it—especially where that brat Raine was concerned. Having grown up alongside him, Xi Ye naturally knew what kind of person his cousin was.

He might usually look like a carefree, hearty big brother, but in truth, he was a thoroughly despicable person with a deep and calculating mind, exactly like his father!

Seeing Xi Ye's expression, his father sighed softly. "Sansa inherited your mother's beauty, and she's loved Hymn of Sacrifice since she was little. As you know, elves have always dominated the field of sacrifice. Your old man was deeply in debt back then, so I couldn't openly find her a suitable source of refined genes in that field. But that brat Raine actually found her genes from a Starlight Elf with an extremely high purity. Do you think she could possibly resist his advances?"

"Starlight Elf?" Xi Ye's pupils constricted slightly. Among the many elven branches, Starlight Elves were the most orthodox lineage of sacrifices. With their prideful personalities, they would never leak their refined genes, even if their entire family were destroyed.

Then where had those genes come from?

"That fellow Raine... got them from the battlefield, didn't he?" Xi Ye asked grimly.

His father lowered his head and fell silent, clearly acknowledging it.

Seeing this, Xi Ye's expression grew even darker. It made sense. Where else could that fellow have found refined Starlight Elf genes if not on the battlefield?

What was wrong with that girl? How could she accept such a trap? From the way his father had spoken, she had even been grateful for it?

Normally, when a family disciple died on the battlefield, their genes were unlikely to be leaked, because the genes had to be refined personally before they could be extracted. The only exception was if they were captured alive and coerced!

Xi Ye could figure out what had happened without even thinking. Raine must have captured a Starlight Elf on the battlefield, taken her prisoner, and forcibly compelled her to refine her genes.

Given the pride of the elves, she must have suffered inhuman torment before yielding. In the end, the elf surely hadn't met a good fate either. If her family found out about this, it would become a blood feud of honor and disgrace!

The situation on the battlefield was unpredictable, and everyone fought for their own masters. Families could understand that. Even if members of the same family encountered each other on the battlefield, they couldn't disgrace their family's honor by deliberately holding back. But dying in battle was one thing. Capturing a family member alive and humiliating them was another!

His foolish little sister still thought she'd obtained something wonderful? Once she was admitted to the Sacrifice Academy and people learned where the genes came from, she would surely face the Starlight Elf family's relentless revenge!

"Father, why did you let her be manipulated like this?" Xi Ye asked reproachfully for the first time.

"I told her, but she didn't believe me. She insisted we were just being malicious..." His father sighed helplessly. "That's girls for you. To defend the prince charming in their hearts, they turn their own parents into villains..."

Xi Ye sighed. "Father, could you be a little more serious?"

"More serious?" His father stroked his chin, then suddenly said with great solemnity, "Fine. I'll put it seriously."

The atmosphere changed so abruptly that Xi Ye and Nicole, who was sitting nearby, both flinched. To be honest, they rarely saw his father act serious.

"Sansa was already an adult when she accepted the genes. Before she came of age, we bore the responsibilities we were supposed to bear and gave her the education she was supposed to receive. Yet she still chose a path contrary to ours. That was no longer something we could control. After all, adults have to take responsibility for their own choices!"

After a pause, his father continued, "Take you, for example. Back then, we paid such a great price to cultivate you into a Celestial God, yet you ran off on an interstellar journey without a word. You didn't even discuss it with us. Did I force my way after you and drag you back?"

Xi Ye: "..."

Seeing Xi Ye fall silent, his father slowly rose and walked toward the door. His voice was low and solemn. "Even if you had died out there, I wouldn't have regretted my decision not to bring you back. Because this was the path you chose yourself!!"

There was no need to be... this serious, was there?

Xi Ye lowered his head and took the scolding, not daring to argue in the slightest. In truth, he couldn't think of any grounds to argue either. When he had decided to travel the stars on a shoestring, there had indeed been an element of rebellion and spite. A moment of anger had become a lifetime's fate. To be honest, he had regretted his ten thousand years of drifting through space countless times.

Seeing his father reach the doorway, Xi Ye finally couldn't help calling out, "Dad..."

When he heard Xi Ye address him without saying "Father," his father paused slightly.

"I'm sorry..."

"Hmph!" His father's body trembled, but he still snorted coldly. "Spare me that. Since you didn't die out there, you owe me back every cent I spent on you, with interest!"

"Eh? I... I have to pay it back?"