Phoenix's Requiem

After leaving Madam An’s residence, Yun Ruoyan headed to her grandmother’s quarters to play cards with her. As she left, Xiao Lan walked her out.

“Xiao Lan, I really like the designs you had someone send over yesterday,” Yun Ruoyan said softly as they walked alongside each other.

The Yun matriarch had already lain down to rest. Xiao Lan glanced back before replying equally softly, “I’m glad you like them, Miss Ruoyan. It’s really nothing impressive.”

“Xiao Lan, don’t belittle yourself! You’re the best at handicraft among all the servants!” Yun Ruoyan praised earnestly.

Xiao Lan was an old maid who had been serving the Yun matriarch for quite some time, and was one of the highest on the servant hierarchy. More unusually, however, unlike Xiangcao and Hong Yu, Xiao Lan didn’t misuse her authority. She was generous and kindly, intelligent and skilled at all aspects of being a maid. The Yun matriarch thought very highly of her.

It was a pity that Yun Ruoyan hadn’t had much opportunity to interact with her in her past life.

“Xi Lan likes handicraft as well, but it’s unfortunate that she doesn’t have anyone to learn from. Xiao Lan, if you’re free, I’d love it if you could come over to my quarters and interact more with her.”

Actually, Xiao Lan quite liked Xi Lan’s personality and had taught her quite a bit in her spare time. When she heard Yun Ruoyan mention this, however, her expression turned a bit awkward. “Miss, I’m sorry, but I can’t really leave the old madam’s side. However, in the afternoon, she tends to take long naps. If it’s fine with you, Xi Lan can find me then.”

“In that case, Xiao Lan, I’ll thank you on Xi Lan’s behalf!” Yun Ruoyan grabbed Xi Lan’s hand happily, excited to see that she was wearing the jade bracelet she had given her.

This jade bracelet was one of the better pieces of jewelry that Lin Yuemei had left Yun Ruoyan. When Yun Ruoyan had asked Peony, she was somewhat unwilling to hand it over, saying that Yun Ruoyan really wouldn’t have much to remember her mother by if she kept giving her jewelry away.

Yun Ruoyan nodded her head seriously, but she felt that it was far better to have them being used and well cared for rather than being stuck inside a jewelry box.

Her feelings for her mother wouldn’t dissipate just because she didn’t have any mementos of her. Instead, she would bury these feelings deep within her heart, sealed shut until the day her mother’s poisoner was found!

As Yun Ruoyan turned to leave, Xiao Lan called her back. “Miss Ruoyan…”

Yun Ruoyan turned back, a faint smile on her face.

Xiao Lan took one step forward and murmured, “There’s news from your brother.”

Yun Ruoyan’s eyes lit up and her smile deepened as she tried to hide the excitement coming from her heart.

“Xiao Lan, my brother…” Yun Ruoyan grabbed Xiao Lan’s hands, so excited that she couldn’t continue.

“The barracks sent back news saying that he’s been granted leave, but it’s not clear if he’ll be able to make it back on time.”

In others’ eyes, it had only been three years since Yun Ruoyan last saw Yun Moxiao, but to Yun Ruoyan, it had been far longer than three years. In her past life, the last fond memory she had of Yun Moxiao was during her wedding to Pei Ziao, and her last glance at him was at his funeral. From then on, the siblings were never to see each other again. But now that Yun Ruoyan could see her doting brother well and hale once more, how could she not be excited?

“Thank you, Xiao Lan,” Yun Ruoyan repeated. After she left her grandmother’s residence, she immediately headed to the Lin family in order to tell her grandfather the good news. Lin Zainan was naturally very happy: he’d only interacted with his grandson as a baby. During those days, Lin Zainan was very busy with Lin family affairs, and had been traversing the entire continent. He hadn’t had many opportunities to interact with Yun Moxiao, and by the time he was finally free, Yun Moxiao was already stationed at the army barracks.

“Wonderful!”

Lin Zainan stroked his beard happily before sighing once more. “I hope Xiao’er will be able to stay home a few more days this time. When he last came back three years ago, I was absent once again, so all I remember of him is how he looked as a baby…”

“Grandfather, I remember his face, I remember!” Lin Qingxue happily called out. “When Cousin came by three years ago, he brought me a lot of tasty treats!”

Lin Qingchen chuckled. “I bet you only remember those treats and not Cousin’s face.”

“Definitely not!” Lin Qingxue refuted, “He’s very tall, even taller than Grandfather. When he’s not smiling, he looks somewhat stern, but he looks really cute when he does smile.”

“Wow!” Lin Qingchen pretended to be amazed. “You actually do remember him!”

Three years ago, Lin Qingchen wasn’t even ten years old. That she could remember so many details was clear evidence that she had a strong impression of this cousin of hers.

Lin Qingchen also remembered Yun Moxiao, a tall youth with a sunny disposition.

“Grandfather, Cousin and Ruoyan look very similar. If Ruoyan were to dress up as a man, she would look like a miniaturized version of Cousin…”

“Like Ruoyan?” Lin Zainan couldn’t help but furrow his brows. “It’s not good for men to look too pretty.”

After announcing the news, it was time for Yun Ruoyan’s pillmaking lessons once more. Lin Qingchen and Lin Qingxue had rushed to finish their homework in the morning, so they were permitted to stay and watch.

Yun Ruoyan stood in the middle of the room, her hands outstretched. Two flames appeared on her palms. This was the first time that Lin Qingxue and Lin Qingchen saw Yun Ruoyan condense spiritual fire, and they opened their eyes wide in amazement.

Lin Qingxue had no talent for pillmaking, and she had never been close to any sort of magical beasts since her childhood, so she likely didn’t have talent for beast taming either. As a result, Lin Zainan had always focused on standard blademaster and forgemaster training for her.

On the other hand, Lin Qingchen had some talent for pillmaking. Although it wasn’t a particularly outstanding talent, she was hardworking and diligent, and had developed a substantial body of knowledge with regards to both medicine and all sorts of magical beasts. As a result, Lin Zainan was confident that she would be able to make a name for herself with her talent. He was simply waiting for her to become a seventh-rank blademaster so he could start training her as a pillmaster in earnest.

Lin Qingxue was just there for the excitement, but Lin Qingchen was looking at her cousin very seriously. The two flames in Yun Ruoyan’s palms started to change, becoming as large as a fist before shrinking to a focused, needle-like flame.

“Not bad,” Lin Zainan commented. “You’re already able to change the size of these flames as will. How about changing the color and quality of your flames?”

As soon as Lin Zainan spoke, Yun Ruoyan’s spiritual fire went from red to orange, and then, after a little while, to yellow! This time, Lin Qingchen and Lin Qingxue weren’t the only two opening their eyes wide. Even Lin Zainan and Yun Ruoyan were doubting what they’d seen.

The spiritual fire eventually died out, and Yun Ruoyan checked her spiritual vortex. It had become pure-white, and there was no trace of any fire-attuned spiritual energy left.

“Ruoyan, how did you do that?” Lin Zainan walked over, his tone expressing his shock and surprise.

Yun Ruoyan blinked at Lin Zainan in a rather confused fashion.

“Grandfather,” she began, “I also don’t know how I was able to do that. In the morning, I didn’t have any fire-attuned spiritual energy in my body, but while you were training me just now, I found that some fire-attuned energy had appeared out of nowhere.”

Lin Zainan was stroking his beard absent-mindedly as he listened to her, but this last point made him narrow his eyes.

“These last few days, I’ve been fully focused on trying to absorb more spiritual energy and condensing it. I haven’t had the time to train my spiritual fire, so I don’t know how the quality suddenly went up another level and turned yellow!”

Yun Ruoyan and Lin Zainan were naturally suspicious of such miraculous gains: something that provided such rapid improvement was likely to incur equally massive drawbacks. How could excess spiritual energy have appeared out of nowhere? And how had her cultivation suddenly improved without training it? This was undoubtedly a very strange scenario!

“Isn’t it a good thing that Sister Ruoyan’s cultivation’s improving?” Lin Qingxue turned toward her sister. “Why are they looking so stern?”

Lin Qingchen’s face had also turned serious. “I heard Grandfather said that having your cultivation increase out of nowhere was a very rare situation that might arise from a block in your spiritual vortex.”

This block referred to an inability to expand one’s spiritual vortex further. In such a situation, there had been recorded cases of patients experiencing temporary boosts to their cultivation. Thus, experiencing such an unusual increase in cultivation wasn’t a good sign. But the probability of something like this happening was vanishingly small. Was it really the case that it had happened to Yun Ruoyan?

As Lin Zainan and Yun Ruoyan continued to think in silence, the Lin sisters couldn’t help but panic.

“Qiu, qiu,” Qiuqiu suddenly piped up. “Mistress, don’t worry, your spiritual vortex is fine.”

“It’s fine?” Yun Ruoyan relaxed after hearing Qiuqiu’s confirmation. “Do you know what’s going on, Qiuqiu?”

Qiuqiu very much wanted to tell Yun Ruoyan about the qilin beads, but it didn’t dare to reveal anything related to Li Mo to her. Otherwise, if he were to find out, she might suffer! It could only wait for Yun Ruoyan to discover the secrets of the beads on her own.

“I don’t know either, qiu. If it’s not related to your spiritual vortex, could it be because of some external source? Mistress, think carefully—have you encountered anything that might have increased your cultivation recently?” I might not be able to tell you outright, Mistress, but I can at least lead you down the right track! It’s not my problem if you guess it on your own!

“You’ve been with me all the time, so how could you not know if I’ve encountered some spiritual object?” Yun Ruoyan asked quizzically. As soon as she spoke, however, she suddenly thought of something. Could it be…?!

Yun Ruoyan immediately rolled up her sleeve and exposed her silver bracelet and the qilin beads. “Grandfather, can you see if there’s anything unusual about this string of beads?”