The sun was starting to fall below the horizon, the sky was painted yellow, the air ... the first open air I've felt this heavily on my face since coming to this world.
Yet I find, there was an absence, an absence of the euphoria I had always envisioned I would relish in when I finally completed my one year sentence.
As I strolled the family grounds with qinger by my side , as she pointed at and described the various sceneries , the zones and thier functions , structures, passing elders and children of both the main and side branches of the family.
We paid a visit to my mother's garden. Calling it a garden would be the understatement of the century , it was behind the sprawling cottages and courtyards of the west zone, containing hundreds of acres of different herbs and plants.
Servants in grey robes like that of qinger and my other two maids darted back and forth as they attended to the 'garden' .
There I saw her, my mother , the only other person I've come to care about this deeply aside from my previous life's parent.
She was sitting there in a simple chair in the middle of the fields, spotless torquois robes , long black hair that almost touched her waist, blue eyes scanning the field ahead of her as she dolled out instructions to the workers.
I have never seen my mother this focused or serious before , she looked liked a disney princess out in the fields as she scrunched up her little face now and again, but I can tell she loves what she does.
Then she noticed me and qinger in the distance, she turned head away, then turned at us again, not believing what she was seeing, I saw her grab a servant nearby and asked him something while pointing at us, I can guess she's probably asking if he sees us too, to which the guy nodded vigorously.
My mother sprang from her sit, she was fast, too fast infact, this wasn't the speed of a typical peak qi gathering realm cultivator, am guessing she subconsciously used a movement technique out of excitement at seeing me outside for the first time and it wasn't a low grade technique either, am guessing my mother has secrets of her own.
In just less than five seconds since our eyes connected, I was already up in the air, in my mother's embrace and being suffocated by what's been my meal since i came into this world.
My mother could not contain her happiness as she darted around the field with me still glued to her chest.
Seeing as I kept tapping her back and the tapping was getting slower, she looked down and realized what she had done.
I was finally released from her embrace, trying to breath in oxygen when she began planting kisses on every part of my face.
"mother!, please stop, we are outside , stop treating me like baby!. I shrugged her off as I exclaimed.
That only made things worse.
"Oh!!!, my baby is soooo cute!!!"
This continued for an extra thirty minutes, until qinger came to the rescue, suggesting to my mother that she takes me on another stroll to the biggest market place in houzi village.
Knowing what she was up to, I immediately supported the idea as well and my mother gave qinger way too much gold coins for a simple stroll around the marketplace.
I also came to learn that I had a personal courtyard with guards and maids of my own at the far end of the west zone, which solved a lot of my problems and made some complicated issues a little bit more straight forward.
And I can check it out but my mom insists I still stay with her till I at least turn ten years old and start cultivating for my safety, but I know she just doesn't want to stay without me, her only worry was I was too paranoid of the outside world and not wanting to step outside the room but now that there's no longer a need to worry, she wasn't going to part with her baby after just one year.
I countered with assurances that I would come be with her some times and she can come over anytime as well. She needed some persuading but after a full hour of back and forth, I succeeded.
The marketplace was a chaotic symphony of sounds and scents, voices rising and falling, haggling , laughing customers and vendors, pedestrians to and from places , humble and luxurious carriages being pulled by ordinary horses and spirit beasts alike.
I was enthralled with all I saw, jumping from place to place and trying several new things, I saw other kids as well in purple robes darting about but paid them no mind , I wanted to catch up on what I had been missing out on for a whole year.
I tried everything there was to try, bought a lot of useless trinkets and souvenirs, tried some of the local flavors, and by the time we were done touring the marketplace, it was already too dark out.
We started moving towards the family land but all of a sudden qinger stopped and told me there was something far more interesting that I could see at the back of the mountainside some distance away from the Li family household.
"really?! more interesting than all we've seen today ?! " I asked her
"Yes, young master, the most interesting by far" responder qinger
"Ok now , lead the way please!" I affirmed curiously and innocently .