"..."
Mo Caihuan wore a delicate slender sword at her waist and carried a basket filled with all kinds of ingredients. She walked briskly along the country lane.
The bamboo groves on either side swayed gently in the breeze, caressing her long hair. Bathed in the bright morning sunlight, she looked especially charming in her fitted martial outfit. She had the grace of a noble young lady and the spirited air of a heroine, yet also the lively sweetness and docility of a girl from a modest household. She was no longer the sorrowful, downcast young woman she had once been.
By now, she, her immortal master Annie—whom she had met on the road and won with a plate of pastries—and Flame Immortal, who was said to hail from Cuiping Mountain, had been living in the countryside, a few miles outside the capital of the Xu Kingdom, Xu Jing, for more than a month.
She needed money to practice cultivation, so she had sold the bottle of spiritual medicine that her big brother Han had given her through certain channels, earning quite a bit of silver. Afterward, the three of them had bought an unused country estate belonging to a wealthy merchant, nestled against the hills and beside the water at the end of the bamboo grove outside the city. They had settled into the elegant little courtyard, with its flowers, bamboo, water, and gardens, named "Clear Skies After Snow."
But only she and her master lived there, and her master often slept until well past noon. She also liked to wander around and never did any housework. So the chores—sweeping, shopping, cooking, and all the other little tasks—naturally fell entirely to Mo Caihuan.
She didn't mind.
After all, Mo Caihuan knew that a teacher was like a parent. Her