Mystique Soul: A Cultivator's Flame
Chapter 102

Chapter 102: Chapter 102

Feng Jiao Xue walked up her grandfather’s mountain. Despite regaining his status as the Patriarch of the clan, he still opted to stay in the back mountains of the clan.

She can atually slightly understand the reason why and empathise with him.

It was kinda hard to leave her mountain behind. It wasn’t fancy, nor was it on a livable state when she arrived.

The overgrown weeds, patch up ceilings, disgusting food....

Feng Jiao Xue can still vividly remember that goo that was fed on her. Sticky as a slime, even trash looked better than that "food’.

She looks up at the sky seeing the ’flying turtle’ she saw for the first time when she went out.

The air was clean and fresh, the heavy scent of nature in the air. Sunlight peeing through the canopy of branches and leaves and the distant murmurs of the wind. A breeze caresing her skin, cool and soft, as if a cares from mother nature.

’Does this place even believe in mother nature?’ She muses.

She remembers the fear, uncertainty and anxiety that overwhelmed her when she first woke up in this world. How her heart palpitated as if threatening to jump out of her chest yet so heavy as if chained. The way her blood runs cold and how her breath felt like it was stolen, grasping for air in a space void of oxygen.

Now...

Feng Jiao Xue sighed as she continued walking forward. Her steps light, her Qi freely running through her veins, meridians and core. Her magic engulfing her soul.

She has come far from the assassin she was.

A light smile graced her lips.

She has come far from the person she had been.

Sometimes, she wonders. Was it enough? The price she paid, the... person she lost, for this place?

Her breath fogged her face as she sighed, moving away from that thought.

This place isn’t perfect.

Countless danger awaits her in the horizon. She is not foolish enough to forget that.

But now... she knows, when she grow weary, when she grew tired, this journey... isn’t all that she have.

Feng Jiao Xue could already see the glimpse of her grandfather’s abode. The wooden building stand ing humble yet deserving of awe.

The small smile that grazed her lips settled even more, the frost in her eyes melting like snow.

Feng Zhenhai was leisurely sipping tea on his own as if the troubles outside of the Feng wall has nothing to do with him.

"Grandfather" Feng Jiao Xue respectfuly bowed before raising a brow. "Is it really the right time for tea?" She asked exasperatedly as there is no doubt, even if the reconing has past, the turmoil has yet to settle.

"Ah, little snow, come here, come here" Feng zhenhai immediately waved her over. "What brought you here?" He asked suspiciously as this little grandaughter of his barely comes to him unless there is trouble unlike those little punks that is still clamoring around for their mother. As if their little schemes around the clan won’t be known by him.

Feng Zhenhai’s expression turned colder as he thought of his second son’s unit of a family. before he waved them off his mind. Truthfully, this grandfather and grandaughter pair are more alike than they realize.

Feng Jiao Xue was not that emotionally inept to not see his changing mood.

"Grandpa, it’s not actally because I’m in trouble but there is something" Feng Jiao Xue poured him some tea to ease him up.

He looked at his grandaughter appraisingly before sighing. "Where are you going?" He asked with a resigned sigh startling Feng Jiao Xue.

Feng Zhen Hai smiled at her knowingly. "I might not have been able to raise you, little snow but don’t forget, I raised your father. he had that same determined look you did when he asked for my persission to go on a cultivation journey"

"Your not opposed?" Feng Jiao Xue asked as she had expected... something else.

"Do I have the right to?" Feng Zhenhai asked instead, his eyes burdened with guilt.

"Grandpa..." Feng Jiao Xue wanted to rebute but Feng Zhenhai shaked his head.

"I failed your father, and in turn, I failed you." He reached for his cup, fingers idly tracing the porcelain rim. "What right do I have to demand you stay when I was not here to guide you? When I was not the one who raised you?"

She frowned at the unfamiliar weight in his tone. he had always been this cheery old man to her.

"Little snow, during this brief period that I saw you, I knew that one day, you would chose to leave this empire and follow your own path. You may be my precious grandaughter but you also have my respect as a cultivator." Feng Zhenhai spoke as he set his cup down, meeting her gaze with a rare, quiet solemnity.

Feng Jiao Xue stared at him, momentarily at a loss for words.

Respect.

She had braced herself for guilt, for the weight of familial obligation, for the disappointment that so often came when a member of a prestigious clan chose to step away from its affairs.

Yet, here her grandfather sat—offering not judgment, but understanding.

For a moment, she didn’t know what to do with it.

"You remind me of your father," Feng Zhenhai continued. His voice was distant, as if recalling something from long ago. "He, too, had that unshakable resolve. The same fire in his eyes. He did not chase power. No, his aspirations lay beyond mere clan politics. He sought something greater, though I fear I never truly understood what it was. I thought it was youth being hot-blooded."

Feng Jiao Xue remained silent, allowing him to speak.

"When he left, I did not stop him the last time. I could have, perhaps. I had the power to forbid him from stepping beyond the walls of our clan, but..." Feng Zhenhai sighed. "A cage, no matter how gilded, is still a cage."

His words settled over her like the mountain mist, cool, lingering, impossible to ignore.

For the first time, she saw the quiet burdens that weighed on his shoulders.

"...Do you regret it?" she asked softly. "Not stopping him when you had the chance."

Feng Zhenhai was quiet for a long moment. Perhaps lost in thought, mulling it over before replying to her in a solemn tone.

"Do I regret it?" He asked again, more like asking himself. Then, he let out a weary chuckle. "Regret? Perhaps. But not in the way you think."

She waited, letting him gather his thoughts.

"I regret that I did not understand him sooner," he admitted. "That I did not try harder to see the world through his eyes. That when he left, I simply let him go without telling him..."

His fingers tightened slightly around his cup.

"...that I was proud of him."

Feng Jiao Xue’s breath hitched.

"When he left you as a babe in my hand, merely a few months old. I was furios, I was mad. I said things I regret ever telling him."

She had never heard him speak this way before.

Not as the former Patriarch. Not as the unshakable pillar of the Feng Clan.

But as a father who had lost his son.

Feng Zhenhai exhaled, his expression softening. "But I will not make the same mistake twice."

His gaze locked onto hers, steady and unwavering.

"I see you, little snow. I see your determination, your strength, and your will. And though I may not have had the chance to raise you, I will not stand in the way of your path."

Silence stretched between them, thick with unspoken emotions.

Then, softly, hesitantly, Feng Jiao Xue spoke.

"...I will come back."

Feng Zhenhai’s eyes flickered, but he did not respond immediately.

She clenched her fists. "I don’t know how long I’ll be gone, but..." She hesitated, exhaling slowly. "This place is not a cage to me. I will return."

Feng Zhenhai smiled faintly. "Then I will hold you to that promise."

For the first time in a long while, Feng Jiao Xue felt something warm settle in her chest.

This journey, this academy, was a step forward. A path she needed to take.

But no matter how far she went, she now knew...

She had a place to return to.

As Feng Jiao Xue and Feng zhenhai sat in slence, feng Jiao Xue asked the old man the question that has always been at the back of her mind.

"What happened that day, grandfather? What happened to my parents?" Feng Jiao Xue wanted to personally hear the answer.

"I don’t know" Feng Zhenhai wearily replied. "All I know, is that your mother was taken by her family. As to where, your father didn’t have the time to tell me. All I knew, was that he went to rescue her... but neither managed to return."

Feng Jiao Xue frowned at that. "Then, who are mother’s family?" She asked, confuse.

"Nobody knows. She made us believe that she was an orphan but I now your mother. She must have lied for a good reason. But, Xiao Xue, don’t go chasing ghosts" He warned gravely.

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