Volume 5 – A Distance Within Reach, Chapter 33: Each Other’s Sunshine
As expected, Zhang Zixing’s voice kept echoing in quick succession.
“A respectful welcome to the eldest young miss of the Marquis of Citysun.”
“Greetings to the fifth young miss of the Marquis of Order Foundation.”
One airship after another landed in quick succession. Qianye had quietly retreated to the edge of the airship port and was continuously distancing himself from this troublesome area.
He secretly counted and found that there were two adopted daughters of dukes, ten lineal daughters of marquis, and three lineal daughters of counts. And this was excluding the main family ladies within the enormous groups of followers. This group of noble ladies had come for Wei Potian and was precisely this so-called “trouble” the Wei clan heir had been mincing words about.
At this time, Qianye suddenly thought of something. It seemed Blackflow City would be extremely “safe” in the period to follow.
A total of fifteen prominent noble ladies had arrived along with their guard units, each comprised of well over a hundred warriors. Blackflow City had gained a powerful thousand-man squad in the blink of an eye! There wasn’t much cooperation to speak of among them, but their levels were high and their equipment, excellent. They, alone, could easily defeat an imperial regular army corps of the same size.
Besides, the expeditionary higher-ups were undoubtedly aware of the fact that a group of noble ladies and an imperial fleet had come over to Blackflow City. They certainly wouldn’t choose such a time to act even if they had certain plans in mind.
Qianye was thus afforded with another buffer period. Meanwhile, his control over the reorganized Dark Flame and Blackflow City would only increase over time.
From this perspective, the problem Wei Potian had invited over wasn’t all that bad.
But the sudden influx of so many people made Blackflow City’s poverty even more obvious. There weren’t enough jeeps in the city to carry everyone not even if they ran back and forth several times. In the end, only the noble ladies and their female companions were offered a comfortable ride, while their followers and guards along with Zhang Zixing’s subordinates had to share the troop carrier trucks on the bumpy ride into the city.
Qianye hadn’t gotten the chance to speak with Wei Potian in private since the moment Nangong Ling alighted from the airship. Presently, he had been surrounded by ten-odd noble ladies—how could he have the time for Qianye amidst the constant buzz of feminine chatter. Meanwhile, Qianye had no intention to help him break this siege at all. He absolutely wouldn’t court trouble for himself by approaching these noble ladies.
Qianye called for Song Hu, Duan Hao, and the others immediately upon arriving back at the division headquarters. Together, they began to recruit the rich and powerful gentry of Blackflow City to accommodate these heaven’s proud daughters. It was just that the standards of the Blackflow City upper-class were a ways off from that of imperial nobility. Although the local gentry were delighted to ingratiate themselves to these noble ladies, the process wasn’t exactly a smooth sail.
Settling thousands of people in was a complicated business, and these aristocratic fellows were exceptionally demanding. Additionally, the nobles of the upper continent were inherently disdainful of the civilians of the abandoned land, their language and behavior a constant display of their arrogant sense of superiority.
Arranging for accommodations alone took up the entire afternoon. To speak nothing of the other Dark Flame members, even Qianye himself heard words like “as expected of a rural area”, “why isn’t this place cleaner?” and “can you bear the crime if our young miss gets sick?” multiple times.
The actual noble ladies were all mild-mannered and refined. They absolutely weren’t lacking in manners, at least in front of Wei Potian.
But those followers were much more difficult to deal with. Their attitudes were usually much more arrogant than the noble ladies, and it almost seemed as if their eyes were growing atop their heads. Perhaps one could discern the noble ladies’ true manners from their respective maids.
Fortunately, there weren’t any problems with the imperial army corps led by Zhang Zixing. They quickly settled themselves in after the seventh division emptied half a barracks for them. Even the accompanying champions who had to share a room in twos or threes didn’t raise any special demands.
It was already night time by the time all these uninvited guests of astonishing identities had been arranged for.
Only then did Qianye find an opportunity to grab Wei Potian and drag him into the dark. He lifted the man by the collar and said angrily, “What the hell is going on?!”
Qianye could be considered slender and thin among his peers. Wei Potian was taller than him by almost half a head, and his build was stouter than the former by a significant margin. But now, he had been lifted up by this relatively delicate Qianye with no ability to retaliate.
Wei Potian let out some awkward laughter—it seemed there was no way to fool Qianye. “I’ll speak, I’ll speak! Qianye, can you please let me down first?”
Qianye let out a cold snort and released his hand, whereupon, like a huge rock, Wei Potian fell to the floor with a loud bang.
Wei Potian glanced at Qianye fearfully while rubbing his somewhat painful neck. He couldn’t help but exclaim, “Even the arachne viscounts I’ve battled before aren’t as strong as you are. Are you still a human or not?”
“I’ve told you before that I’m not,” Qianye was starting to get impatient, “now speak! Stop rambling about other things!”
Wei Potian sensed a rather familiar killing intent and immediately shrunk his neck while letting out a dry cough. “Hehe… that… wasn’t my birthday just a while ago?”
This so-called “just a while ago” was six months prior—it was Wei Potian’s important twentieth birthday. At first, Qianye had intended to visit the Far East Province after the matters regarding Dark Flame had settled down, but plans fell through when war erupted on Evernight Continent.
“So, what of it?
It turned out that half of the upper continent defensive regions had battled against the dark races in the period preceding the war on Evernight. The Broken-Winged Angels where Wei Potian had been at the time was also called into battle. Under the circumstances, his birthday banquet was canceled and, that very same day, Wei Potian was gravely injured after single-handedly holding back two dark race viscounts on the battlefield.
Wei Potian’s face flushed red as he said sheepishly, “Erm, while I was recuperating, my family suddenly told me that it was time for me to start a family since my birthday has passed.”
Qianye stared fixedly at Wei Potian and observed him from every angle. The Wei Potian who usually acted like a local ruffian was actually wearing such a bashful expression.
Qianye suddenly became spirited and said with a laugh, “That’s not wrong. What then?”
Wei Potian’s face turned even redder and was now like a well-cooked lobster. “Naturally, all types of matchmakers began to appear at the doors! As it turned out, my family had already spread news of my marriage arrangements.”
Qianye found Wei Potian’s reaction quite odd. Wasn’t this normal?
Marriage was one of the most important events for the aristocracy and signified an alliance with other powers. Wei Potian had long since been designated as the heir and had revealed outstanding talents. His future was extremely promising and was the perfect marriage partner. Daughters of dukes and marquis all flocked to him the moment this news was released.
But Wei Potian was usually natural and unrestrained in his social interactions. Why was he being so sheepish? He was even more bashful than a noble lady pretending to be pure and innocent.
Qianye suddenly thought of a possibility and said abruptly, “So, you’re still inexperienced.”
Wei Potian’s face immediately swelled up with a purple-red color and said angrily while stomping about, “You’re the inexperienced one! This daddy has been peeping at bathing ladies since I was ten and playing with twosomes since I was fourteen. Although I don’t have as many women as that perverted sex-glutton Song Zining, I’ve been with no less than a hundred and eighty!”
Qianye laughed loudly but refused to believe him. Aristocratic descendants would have maids in their room after coming of age, allowing them to understand the ways of the world. However, very few would overindulge in the female charms. The period before the age of twenty was the most suitable time to cultivate origin power and lay down a solid foundation. The greater the aristocratic family, the more rigorously they would discipline their core descendants.
Only hedonistic sons with no initiative would revel in dance and wine each day. That was why Song Zining’s style had always been criticized. He was considered an odd character among his aristocratic peers for having such a large group of concubines at such a young age.
Song Zining’s love of female charms and his pursuit of miscellaneous knowledge was seen as self-abandonment. People felt he had no future even if he had great talents. That was also why no one had paid any special attention to what he had been doing outside before the Song clan decennial examination.
Under the gaze of Qianye’s bright eyes, Wei Potian’s momentum grew weaker and weaker until he finally said in disappointment, “Sigh, it’s useless. Let it be, there’s no problem in telling a brother. Laugh if you want to! That Nangong Ling dropped in as soon as I started to recover from my injuries, claiming that she was traveling and happened to be passing through Far East Province. She was merely the first, then an entire group of them followed.”
Even Qianye had realized that Nangong Ling’s so-called traveling was just an excuse and her real reason was to call upon Wei Potian. But it was also quite common to let two young people meet each other before marriage. Although the essence of a marital connection was for the benefit of the two families, the feelings of the people involved were also important. But there was something not quite right about meeting an entire group at the same time.
“How did that happen? It’s quite different from the normal style of the nobility.”
Even though he didn’t understand much about the upper-rank aristocracy, he knew that they paid particular attention to their reputation. Even if the Wei clan’s position was quite outstanding, they were nothing more than a regional marquis. Selecting from such a lineup was unheard of even for the concubine selection of an imperial family member.
Wei Potian’s expression was so bitter that he might be able to wring water out of it.
This matter was quite complicated, yet it was also simple—many dukes and marquis favored Wei Potian, and this made it difficult for the Wei clan to pick. It was unknown what had been going through the Marquis of Bowang’s mind when he actually announced that he would allow it as long as the two youngsters fell in love.
Unexpectedly, these nobles had no objection whatsoever regarding Marquis Wei’s unconventional decision! One could clearly see, from the fact that all the noble ladies had begun to “travel” and “coincidentally pass through Far East Province”, that they had tacitly agreed to the Marquis’ methods.
Three more daughters of feudal lords joined the entourage on the way. Their status was far below that of the nobility and their chances of being selected as the next Wei clan mistress weren’t that high. But those who felt that their daughters were qualified decided to have them jump into the fray since the marquis himself had announced that the marriage would be allowed as long as the youngsters were in love.
“Then, you ran over to my place?” Qianye had asked this question without any change in expression, but Wei Potian could almost hear the killing intent within.
He paused for a moment and then said sheepishly, “We haven’t met for a long time, right? So I dropped in to see how you were doing.”
Qianye shot a glance at Wei Potian and said indifferently, “You were wounded, so they came to visit you. This is a common thing even among friends. Why are you so flustered?”
“Common? How can this be common?” Wei Potian was suddenly furious and embarrassed. “You have no idea what I had gone through these days!”
It turned out that these noble ladies arrived at the Wei clan in succession and took turns to visit Wei Potian’s sickroom. Later on, they couldn’t allocate the time in a fair manner so they split into several groups and stayed with him in shifts.
Wei Potian was badly wounded at the time and couldn’t even get down from the bed. As such, he was “taken care of” by the noble ladies in various ways. But these ladies had belonged to rich families since childhood—how many of them had ever done any chores? It was quite easy to imagine the quality of care he received—there was no limit to this potential horror.
As it happened, Wei Potian could hardly even turn in bed at the time and thus he was faced with a fair bit of suffering. What made the Wei clan heir most dissatisfied was that, during this process, he had been in close contact with the ladies as well as their maids. He eventually lost count of how many times he had been taken advantage of.
Recalling those nightmarish days, Wei Potian finally couldn’t resist cursing out loud. “F*ck! It was like picking ladies at a brothel where you grab her chest to see if it’s big enough and her behind to see if it’s curvy enough! But goddammit this time, I became the one being poked and picked. It’s like the whole room was full of brothel patrons and I’m the only lady!”
At first, Qiane listened attentively without a change in expression. However, it eventually became impossible for him to hold back and he broke into a howling laughter.
“Qianye!!!” Wei Potian ground his teeth.
Qianye’s laughter grew so intense that he couldn’t even stand straight.
Wei Potian pounced over in anger, grabbed the front of Qianye’s shirt and roared, “Are we still brothers?”
“Yes, of course, we are, haha, haha!”
“Then stop laughing!” Wei Potian shouted.
“Fine, fine, fine… I’ll stop laughing.” Qianye struggled free from Wei Potian’s bear-like grasp with a single move and dashed out several meters with great agility.
He didn’t even wait for Wei Potian to come back to his senses before he started howling in laughter once again.
Wei Potian suddenly felt helpless after seeing Qianye laughing in such an exaggerated manner. “Qianye, you! What kind of brother are you?!” His fury had reached an extreme. He suddenly charged toward Qianye and the two tumbled to the floor.
Even then, Qianye was still laughing uncontrollably. Wei Potian sighed helplessly while covering up his face. “I did not want this to happen! It won’t be this bad if only my face was half as thick as Song Seven’s.”
It was at this time that the night suddenly quieted down. Even Qianye’s laughter was broken off for a single moment.
Suddenly, a fallen leaf floated past Wei Potian’s eyes.
Wei Potian had an instinctive hatred of fallen leaves. He grabbed at it, crushed it into fine powder, and cursed, “What kind of damned tree is shedding leaves in this season?!”
It was at this time that a gentle voice rang out, “What’s the joyous occasion? And how is my insignificant self related to it?”