Chapter 1: The Mandarin Duck Sachet

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In autumn, tufts of white clouds drifted in from all directions, looking like paired mandarin ducks frolicking in a pond; yet from afar, they seemed on the verge of dissipating, as if the sky might soon return to its boundless clarity.

Liuyue City, Bai Residence, main hall.

“Bai Ling, your talent is spent. You are no longer worthy of my daughter Jiu’er!”

“Our family is here today for one reason: to dissolve the engagement.”

“Jiu’er has reached the peak of the Spirit Origin Realm. While cultivating at the Empire’s Celestial Pavilion, she was recommended by a figure of the Imperial Court and accepted into the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace, whose legacy spans millennia. Her future is limitless. If you have any sense, you’ll stay far away from my daughter from now on…”

The middle-aged woman, garbed in luxurious robes, drew out a red marriage contract and tossed it before the young man seated opposite her, then casually waved away the dust that rose from the gesture.

She arched her brows, her speech slow and unhurried, words deliberate and measured.

At her words, silence fell over the entire hall.

Bai Ling’s heart was a maelstrom of confusion. He slowly closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then opened them again, his gaze complicated as he looked at the girl before him—his fiancée, Ji Jiu’er.

Behind the noblewoman stood a fifteen-year-old girl, delicate and graceful in appearance, tall and slender. Her beautiful eyes were lowered, her hands cupping a teacup, her expression unreadable and somber.

“Bai Ling, I… I’m sorry…”

Bai Ling’s mind wandered back to earlier days. Ji Jiu’er used to call him ‘Brother Ling’ before anyone and everyone. But now, she called him by his name.

“Silence!”

“Jiu’er, you are now a disciple of the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace. There is no need to apologize to a useless boy from the countryside like him. Know your place.”

“Your mother is only thinking of your best interests!”

“Your father’s a blockhead, too timid to speak—so I’ll be the villain today.”

The noblewoman turned, cutting off her daughter’s words, then looked back at Bai Ling. “That engagement three years ago was nothing but drunken talk on my husband’s part—how could you take it seriously? Today, this marriage is over! It must be annulled!”

Suddenly, a thunderous crash resounded.

Bang!

A fist slammed onto the table.

The once unyielding stone table was instantly covered in a web of cracks.

It was the man at the noblewoman’s side—her husband, Ji Kun, and Ji Jiu’er’s father.

His face was flushed with embarrassment and anger as he berated his wife:

“Enough! Hold your tongue!”

“Hmph!”

Lady Ji snorted coldly and turned her head aside.

“Brother Zhentian, in these past ten years, without your guidance, I, Ji Kun, would never have broken through to the legendary Earth Origin Realm.”

“The Bai family’s kindness is etched in the hearts of my entire clan!”

“This toast—I drink to you!”

Ji Kun raised a large bowl before him, downed the fiery liquor in one gulp. His face turned crimson; the wine dribbled from his lips, trailing down his neck to soak his ornate robes. He paid it no mind.

Bai Zhentian kept his eyes closed and said nothing. Bai Ling’s expression grew glacial.

Ji Kun drew a deep breath, refilled three bowls of the strong liquor, and spoke of days gone by:

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“In the beginning, I was but a wandering cultivator, stuck at the tenth level of the Initial Origin Realm for twenty years.”

“Only with Brother Zhentian’s selfless instruction did I break my shackles, ascending overnight to the Spirit Origin Realm. The imperial court took notice, granted me resources, and sent me to the Empire’s Celestial Pavilion, where three years of seclusion saw me break through to the Earth Origin Realm and become City Lord.”

“All of this, I owe to Brother Zhentian… This drink is for you!”

Ji Kun drained all three bowls at once.

He felt as if the tight cord binding his heart had snapped, and the words pent up inside him poured forth, carried by the burning liquor.

Still, Bai Zhentian kept his eyes closed.

“Now, though our two families cannot become in-laws,”

“So long as you remain in Liuyue City, I swear to protect you and your nephew—no one will dare trouble you!”

“Here are a hundred thousand white spirit crystals. I beg Brother Zhentian’s forgiveness—help me just this once more!”

With a turn of his left hand, Ji Kun conjured a spatial ring from thin air and placed it on the table.

His gaze was fixed on the middle-aged man across from him, willing him to accept the ring.

At last, Bai Zhentian opened his eyes, but still said nothing. He glanced only at his nephew, Bai Ling.

Bai Ling stood, untying an exquisitely embroidered sachet from his waist, its pattern showing mandarin ducks at play.

The sachet’s gentle fragrance, caught by the cold wind entering the hall, drifted over everyone present.

Once, a single whiff would have dispelled all his inner gloom; now, the scent left Bai Ling feeling stifled, suffocated.

He placed the sachet on the scarred and battered stone table and looked at Ji Jiu’er across from him.

“Is this your decision?”

“Is it?”

Ji Jiu’er instinctively avoided the young man’s gaze. After several seconds of hesitation, she forced a thin smile, her eyes still clouded with complex emotions. Yet she set down her empty teacup and spoke resolutely:

“Brother Ling, you’re a good person, but we’re not meant for each other…”

“I’ll always remember the happy days we shared in Liuyue City, roaming the hills and rivers, cultivating martial arts together. But…”

“The moment I set foot in the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace, what I saw, heard, and experienced… so many things were beyond anything this small city could offer.”

Ji Jiu’er took a deep breath and continued, “We are people of different worlds, Bai Ling. You must see reality for what it is.”

Reality!

A heavy silence weighed on the hall.

“Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace?”

“Do you know, if not for my uncle, would your father Ji Kun have become City Lord of Liuyue City? Would you have entered the Empire’s Celestial Pavilion, let alone gained the right to study at the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace?”

Bai Ling clenched his teeth, forcing out each word, his voice rising to a furious roar by the end.

Ji Jiu’er was startled, almost frightened.

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Lady Ji was incensed. She rose, pointing at Bai Ling with her middle finger.

“Look at yourself—just look at your manners!”

“I once thought you a well-behaved, sensible child. Now, you’re no better than a stray dog barking in the street!”

“What, you feel wronged?”

“Take a look in the mirror—at fifteen, even that idiot son of the Li family has reached the fifth level of the Initial Origin Realm, while the wastrel Xiao Wuhen is already at the tenth level.”

“My daughter is a tenth-level Spirit Origin expert, soaring to the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace, her future limitless. What right have you, a useless nobody, to compare with her?”

“You should take a good look at yourself—what status do you have, to be worthy of my daughter? Hmph… a toad lusting after a swan!”

Having torn away all pretense, Lady Ji spat these words out with a cold snort.

Crash!

Bai Ling suddenly grabbed the spatial ring from the table and hurled it at Lady Ji. With a dull thud, it struck her face, leaving a red, ring-shaped mark.

Smack!

Ji Kun’s face was crimson, his body trembling uncontrollably as he turned and slapped Lady Ji hard across the face.

The sound of the blow echoed through the room.

“Shut up and leave!” he barked, dragging away his furious, cursing wife.

Ji Jiu’er slowly rose and looked toward Bai Ling.

Yet in her mind, she could not help but recall her stern master’s warning: that her fate’s greatest tribulation, her karmic thread, originated in Liuyue City…

If the outcome was ill, then the cause must be severed early.

The engagement made three years before now seemed as impossible as the gulf between fairy and mortal.

After a moment’s thought, she said,

“Brother Ling, I’m sorry… You’ll find a good girl someday.”

When it’s time to let go, let go.

Ji Jiu’er abandoned her inner struggle, turned swiftly, and exited through the door.

In the courtyard, the clouds above gathered, the sunlight quietly retreating. A light breeze swept past, lifting her hair. She took a deep breath and extended a pale hand; coolness seeped into her palm. She murmured softly, “Let these memories drift away with the wind…”

She would return to that distant Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace.

From now on, the two would be as far apart as heaven and earth, never to meet again.

At that moment,

A cold, detached voice rang out from the courtyard—Bai Ling’s. His words, now eight times louder than before, thundered in everyone’s ears.

“Ji Jiu’er, don’t think that just because you found a mentor and entered the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace you can rule the world, peerless and invincible. There are many powers in this world far greater than the Sacred Yuan Immortal Palace, many more people with greater talent than you. You’re just a lucky speck of dust in the river of time, swept up by a favorable wind, nothing more!”

Ji Jiu’er faltered, pausing where she stood. She slowly closed her eyes, her chest heaving, her face devoid of expression.