Pride

"They really cared about you."

Walking home beneath the night sky with her lover, Yi Qing was still marveling at everything she had just witnessed.

She had never seen believers who revered the gods so deeply.

She could not believe that children like these would ever entertain the thought of harming a god.

"I know."

He cared about everything here as well, which was why he had come despite the risk, even if only to see off the soldiers who had once served under him.

On the day Xin left, he had not even received the news.

This time, with Yun, he could not miss it again.

"But I only dared to go see those believers who were on the verge of death..."

With a sorrowful sigh, Xuan Sheng remained fixated on his own strength. Only then did he realize in astonishment that he no longer knew anything about the younger generation of the Xuan Tribe.

Everything had ended in the past, vanishing completely with the death of that old man...

"Mm."

Yi Qing nodded lightly and said nothing more.

Although she did not understand what kind of state of mind he had been in when he endured that disaster,

her lover now was unwilling even to approach the most ordinary of those believers...

The pain he had once suffered was plain to see.

"By the way, Yi Qing."

Unlike the woman whose eyes were filled with tenderness, Xuan Sheng, having recovered his senses, took out the unexpected gift he had obtained this time.

A brilliant Phoenix Feather that shimmered with a faint light lay in Xuan Sheng's hand.

"This is for you."

"This?"

The multicolored Phoenix Feather reminded Yi Qing of the crimson feather that had once allowed her to be reborn.

"Yes."

Seeing Yi Qing carefully put away