Settling in

Feng Xing settles into his new home efficiently. He obeyed Cai Qingyin's insistence to clean up and Cai Qingyin brings him a few things he needs to enrich his new home such as a small table and two stools. One for him and one for a potential guest, maybe?

She also gave him a wooden chest to store his clothing, incense pot with a pack of a hundred incense with pine aroma so the place and his clothes don't smell musky, and a candle stand complete with five candles to be used to brighten the place at night.

At first Feng Xing felt that he already got everything he needed with just a roof over his head and a place to sleep, it wasn't until Cai Qingyin gave all of these things that he realized he was too thoughtless.

When they're both done, the sun has gone way past overhead, entering the second half of the day. The rickety hut finally looks decent to be lived in and the initially empty and wide space became a little more narrow but cozier.

"Girls are really more organized. Thank you so much, senior sister. I couldn't even think about needing these things." Feng Xing sighs, touched. "If you need any help in the future, just tell me. Xing will help you out."

Cai Qingyin blushes and smiles. "You're welcome. We're the same age, it's fine if you just call me by my name."

"Are you sure?" Feng Xing asks. Frankly, he's also not used to call Cai Qingyin, a girl clearly younger than him, as 'senior sister'.

Cai Qingyin nods, her pigtails bounce with her. "Yes."

"Qingyin," Feng Xing remarks. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. I'll take you to look around." Cai Qingyin invites him and how could Feng Xing refuses? His intention is to look around too!

The pair exit Feng Xing's hut and he shut the door. He turns around and exhales. "Good view." His thatched hut faces the east towards where the sun rise and he could see a beautiful view just by opening the door. There's a shallow cliff ten steps away and there's a wooden fence stretched over to secure in case of accidence, but the shallow cliff opens up the view and enable him to even peer down to the far below.

"I'm glad you like it. If you're not a morning person, I can ask fourth senior brother to move you to another house." Cai Qingyin rubs her hands.

"This is already perfect." Feng Xing shakes his head. "Let's go, Qingyin. We're going to look around, aren't we?"

They both walk down the path leading to the main courtyard again and Cai Qingyin begins explaining the uses of each building. The bigger building with a lot of open windows is the kitchen, it's situated at two o'clock of the courtyard from the entrance. The biggest building is the storehouse, that's where Cai Qingyin and Feng Xing got extra table, stools, and chests. From Cai Qingyin's words, that's where everyone toss the things they don't want to keep in their own house and everybody is free to take it if needed.

Between the kitchen and storehouse, there's a big koi pond but there are only two kois in it.

"Eldest senior brother said it used to be an empty pond, but one day master wants to fill it with koi fish and make it a koi pond. She brought back a pair of fish so they could populate the pond with their descendants but..." Cai Qingyin stares blankly at the pond. "Maybe she brought back two male fish or two female fish... either way, they don't breed at all," she deadpans.

Even a master can make a mistake or two, Feng Xing thinks as his lips twitch.

Cai Qingyin straightens up and points at a path that goes deeper, secluded by rows of trees. "If you follow this path, you'll find a cave where master resides. She spends most of her time in her cave, but she usually will go out in the morning to sit in the courtyard." She then points at the chairs around the courtyard while explaining.

"Over there is where fifth sister lives, I don't know where she is right now. The cave over there is where second sister lives, the one below is where third brother lives. I'll take you to meet second sister first." Cai Qingyin grabs Feng Xing's hand and leads him to upward path towards the upper cave.

"What kind of person is the second sister?" Feng Xing asks.

"She doesn't like to talk or go out much but she always makes me clothes." Cai Qingyin skips her steps happily.

When they arrive at the mouth of the cave, Cai Qingyin asks for permission to enter and they both enter when they got a response.

The first thing Feng Xing notices when he enters is a mannequin and he almost punched it down on reflex. When he takes a second look around, he realizes there are so many clothes and rolls of fabrics scattered around.

The cave is not dark at all, much to Feng Xing's surprise, especially as this cave is facing west and should only get the sun during the sun set. When he looks around curiously, he finds out why it's not dark.

In the middle of the cave there's a natural spring with crystal-clear water. There seems to be a hole high above the ceiling of the cave that lets a smidge of sunlight to come in right above the natural spring. With the sunlight hitting it, the spring seems to glow, scattering fluorescent light everywhere.

 "Second senior sister! Master accepted a new disciple this morning. I bring him here to greet you," Cai Qingyin lets go of Feng Xing's hand and bounces around the natural spring.

Feng Xing raises his eyes to see the second sister Cai Qingyin calls. At the same time, second sister also gazes at him.

Feng Xing smiles harmlessly and cups his hand in greeting. "Second sister, Feng Xing greets you."

The second sister is also a beautiful woman. She's wearing a set of loose-fitting purple robe with delicate butterfly embroidered in golden thread, giving an illusion that the surrounding scattered clothes, fabrics, and threads around her cave is her cocoon and she's just waiting to break out of it. She's not lively like Cai Qingyin and not devastating like Master Xia. Her presence is like a delicate moonlight quietly glowing in the night.

Her pair of melancholic eyes flicks at Feng Xing, scanning the boy subtly, the way she gazes at people makes people feels inexplicable pity, yet also cold. She lowers her eyes, her thick eyelashes hid the depth of her eyes and she focused back her sewing needles. "Xiao Yue'er," she gives her name indifferently.

"Second senior sister, Feng Xing will bother you in the future and will apologize to you in advance," Feng Xing says humbly.

"Not a bother," Xiao Yue'er responded.

Feng Xing feels a bit awkward hearing Xiao Yue'er's curt response but he doesn't think much about it. He guesses the second sister might be introverted by nature. "Thank you, second sister."

"Mm..."

As Xiao Yue'er is clearly busy with whatever she's working on, the two younger disciples quickly excuse themselves and walk out together.

"What sort of art second sister is learning?" Feng Xing asks as he walks down the slope with Cai Qingyin.

"Art, ah? She likes sewing things, knitting, embroidering, even weaving."

"Oh." Feng Xing mulls hard what does that mean, intrigued. He read a lot of webnovels with varied profession for the protagonists. Naturally, none was ever a tailor. What does a tailor made anyway? What's their place in cultivation world? They make clothes and there are defensive-type clothes in cultivation setting, but those are usually made by Artificer and the process to make it is never mentioned through sewing but through refining.

Then again, Feng Xing only ever read stories, who is to say those artificers didn't also make clothes by conventional mean? Words written are not usually that detailed.

Cai Qingyin takes him to the lower cave which has several charred marks outside of it. When Cai Qingyin was about to call out inside, a loud explosion came from the cave and Cai Qingyin grimaces.

Cai Qingyin slowly turns to Feng Xing, watching his expression awkwardly. "Uh, let's meet third brother another time." She grabs Feng Xing's hand and pulls him to another direction.

"Are we not going to go in and check?" Feng Xing asks curiously.

"No, it's normal. There will be explosions from his cave once in a while, he can take care of it himself," Cai Qingyin casually and Feng Xing nods when it's clear that Cai Qingyin doesn't take it seriously.

After exploring around and getting shown places by Cai Qingyin so he doesn't easily lose his way when navigating around the mountain, the sun has started to sink to the horizon in the west. The two has grown exhausted and also hungry from exploring around so they climb back up to the peak.

Cai Qingyin turns back and look down the hundreds flights of stairs, overseeing the scenery below. "I think fifth sister will not be home again today. You can only meet her another day."

"That's alright. We all live in the same peak, we'll meet one way or another in the future." Feng Xing does not feel all too urgent to meet everyone, in fact he's feeling quite relaxed about it. He has six seniors according to Master Xia and he already met three. That's already half the sect that he met and introduced himself to on his first day.

"Fifth sister is always impetuous and a free spirit, you can't predict when she will come home from her errand."

A new voice pulled the two of them from enjoying the scenery.

Feng Xing turns around and sees a new face, a man he hasn't met yet. The man is tall and his skin is lightly tanned, his dark hair also has a hint of brown only seen on people with sun-damaged hair. As the only man he'd seen so far is the fourth senior brother, Huang Junya, he couldn't help but compare the man in front of him with Huang Junya and they couldn't be any more different.

Huang Junya dressed like an elegant scholar in light blue Taoist robe, there was bookish air around him and even the way he stood felt measured. The man in front of Feng Xing is dressed in dusty dark brown working clothes, the sleeves are rolled up like farmers usually would wear their clothes.

The pair of eyes are the most eyecatching, they're brown at a first glance but Feng Xing's eyes are sharp and he captures a hint of red on his left iris. It is very subtle and Feng Xing wonders if it is the reddish light from the sunset that plays trick on him.

His train of thought is cut by Cai Qingyin's exclaim.

"Eldest brother!"

Feng Xing blinks out of his reverie and bows to greet the man. "Feng Xing greets eldest senior brother."

"Huh," the man smiles. "Senior brother? Did master take in a new disciple?"

"Yes!" Cai Qingyin nods rapidly. "She just did this morning. I didn't have the time to bring him to your farm today to introduce him to you. Sorry, eldest senior brother." She grins sheepishly.

"It's okay. Don't I meet him now?" The man smiles. "Seventh junior brother, I'm Xuanyuan Yu. We're all like family here so don't be too restrained."

"Then, I won't be," Feng Xing jokes.

"Hahaha, good. Here, a meeting gift."

Xuanyuan Yu hands Feng Xing a radish before Feng Xing could even think about it. "A... radish?"

"Hm." Xuanyuan Yu smiles even more kindly.

"Thank you, senior brother," Feng Xing holds the radish and bows again. What else could he say? The temperament of cultivation experts is usually weird and they're allowed to be weird. The weirder they are, the stronger they are usually. Accepting a radish is something simple, Feng Xing doesn't mind to follow along.

"You two must have not eaten yet," Xuanyuan Yu started.

"That's right, senior brother. How do you know that?" Cai Qingyin's eyes gleamed.

"I didn't leave any food in the kitchen today. How could you eat?" Xuanyuan Yu smiles brighter.

"Oh."

"Come on, I'll make vegetable soup for dinner."