The sharp, silver moonlight sliced through the weeping willow branches, casting long, fractured shadows across the courtyard of the Cloud-Mist Pavilion.
The mahogany swinging chair creaked softly as Tony Clark leaned his head back, idly swirling the crystalline spiritual wine in his glass. He didn't stand up, nor did he alter his lazy, unbothered posture as the High Patriarch of the Tian Family and the six cosmic judges stood before him like an enforcement armada trying to look like a diplomatic embassy.
Beside the Patriarch, Princess Selene Tian stood in her pristine white spider-silk gown, her violet galaxy eyes locked onto Tony's face with a deep, silent wave of total fascination. The gold-attribute royal scroll bearing the absolute ancestral seal of a Direct Son-in-Law Marriage Alliance rested in the Patriarch's hands, its cosmic runes humming faintly in the cold midnight air.
