136. Rising Suns And Sinking Moons
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In the following year, Bailong paid a visit to Sky Palace.
This was normal. He drank and played music with Tianlong and Fei Yun, the three went on a hunt together, and even spent a few days in the Mortal Realm.
But upon their return, Bailong finally met Feng Yuexia, who was officially moving in to be with Tianlong.
And this was the first crack in the Feng family's over twelve thousand year lie...
Because Bailong was the first unrelated dragon Feng Yuexia was meeting.
It could be said that the Sky Emperor and Tianlong were sentimental, so they never noticed anything...
But Bailong was a complete stranger, and he instantly knew something was off.
First of all, Feng Yuexia was said to be the so-called Golden Phoenix.
Dragons were innately drawn to Phoenix aura regardless of whether they were mates or not.
So why didn't Bailong feel the slightest tug towards Feng Yuexia's aura...?
Tianlong was in love with Feng Yuexia, which was enough to convince everyone else that it was a fated dragon-phoenix match.
But Bailong was convinced that Tianlong's attraction had nothing to do with Feng Yuexia being a phoenix.
Tianlong and Feng Yuexia had met and played several times as children.
Then Feng Yuexia had remained his fiance even after it became apparent that he might remain a weakling for life.
Feng Yuexia was beautiful, highly praised, and talented, where Tianlong was not, so he had been grateful for her loyalty.
When considering all these, Tianlong was reasonably in love.
Bailong admired that! In his opinion, no nonsensical match between species should determine one's feelings!
But that didn't mean there was nothing wrong......
As a second point, Phoenixes were also said to be startlingly beautiful and held immense power.
Bailong could certainly admit that Feng Yuexia was indeed beautiful and quite powerful for her age, but Zhurong Fen could easily match her in appearance, not to talk of Yan Liwei whose face might make the stars jealous of her brilliance!
When it came to power, Zhurong Fen also outmatched Feng Yuexia, and in addition, Bailong found Feng Yuexia's core strengths did not feel like her own...
A bit like some of the mortals who endlessly swallowed power pills to grow their strengths, instead of striving for it, and he remembered the hordes of cultivation resources the Feng family had embezzled through the years...
...and he could even sense traces of the missing millennia-old peach within her!
Still, Bailong could have concluded that phoenixes were nothing special, and left it there.
But then he recalled the stories surrounding the birth of Yan Liwei and Feng Yuexia...
And of course he recalled the first time he met Yan Liwei and felt her own aura.
Now if one mentioned the term 'drawn to', then Bailong would certainly think of Liwei's aura first, and even his brother, another dragon, had felt that oddly compelling aura around her.
To confirm his suspicion, Bailong dared to invite his father and brother to Sky Palace, using the Sky Emperor's birthday as a premise, and as expected, both found nothing spectacular about Feng Yuexia...
But when Bailong took Yan Liwei with him to the East Sea Palace, his father and brother instantly called out her immense beauty and compelling aura!
In fact, Yin Shuilong privately told Bailong, "You're lucky I can read you like a book... If not I might have been tempted to go after your little entertainer for myself!"
"Ahaha! Elder brother, please don't make me nervous!"
But all this was enough to convince Bailong...
'Hmph. Weiwei is the real Phoenix!'
Unwilling to let his future wife suffer further injustice, Bailong took his findings to the Sky Emperor and tentatively brought it up, afraid the sky emperor might dismiss it to favour Feng Yuexia.
To his surprise however, the Sky Emperor did not like Feng Yuexia at all, and it had nothing to do with recent events.
"Are we fools?" He asked Bailong, streaks of sunlight making his neat red hair appear to burn. "A few friends and I were present at Feng Yuexia's birth... but my circle are considered somewhat 'young' by immortal standards.
"We're not as old as a few who are over a Millennia old, and these elderly ones use it to ride over our heads. This includes Grand Immortal Jin who is practically ancient." He sighed.
"That day, Grand Immortal Jin swayed everyone, convincing them all that a phoenix had been born, but though my friends and I do not have many memories of the previous War deity, we at least met her a few times!
"We have mild recollections of what a phoenix's aura should feel like, so we were suspicious at Feng Yuexia's birth.
Still, the older ones insisted, and we ourselves were not entirely sure...
Even the Night deity could find no evidence in the stars!
So we decided to keep the peace and give it a few years.
"However, it has only become more and more obvious through the years! My pet Yiguang (white light tiger) is closer to being a dragon than that child is to being a phoenix!"
Zhurong Haotian had felt betrayed, and this was why he favoured the Yan family and had secretly pressured them for thousands of years to open up a central audit, giving him an excuse to pull the Feng family down from the Bird throne!
Still, he could only implore Bailong. "I know you love this Yan Liwei. I myself bear guilt towards her and the Yan family. But I must beg you... Don't bring this up unless Yan Liwei herself seeks justice... I hate the Feng family, but I'd admit they're clever.
"They exploited A-Tian's weakness and Feng Yuexia in particular planted seeds when A-Tian was most vulnerable, making him eternally grateful for her favour. Now only a few of her tears are enough to tug his heartstrings." He shook his head and sighed.
"I've recently come to terms with the fact that A-Tian likely won't wed anyone else, so it might be best if the story remains buried."
Bailong bowed and gave his word to the Sky Emperor, but before he left, he said,
"My word only stands if the Feng family never tries to harm Liwei... If they rear their ugly heads in her path, then I'll have to wrong you and A-Tian...!"
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Another fifty years passed...
Amidst the rising suns and sinking moons, amidst the endless and beautiful cycles of seasons...
Amidst the sweet fast and slow flow of time, words eventually met feelings, sparks and soft glances eventually flared to a brilliant flame, and Bailong and Yan Liwei finally became a couple.
At first, everyone knew Yan Liwei as simply the weak Yan Princess who finally conquered Yin Xiaolong.
But Bailong had long succeeded in healing Liwei's core, making her phoenix aura burst forth, and after several years of guidance and training with him, she silently became one of the strongest immortals of their age group!
"A-Bai! Look what I can do!" Liwei cast a few hand seals and large lotuses of brilliant gold fire surrounded her.
But as Bailong watched in awe, the lotus-shaped flames began to take on different colours!
"Five!" As someone near obsessed with refining pills, Bailong had sought out as much knowledge as possible on flames, their different colours, properties, and how they each affected the ingredients within a furnace.
But even with his endless travels and vast knowledge, he had only succeeded in mastering the three most basic flames of red, blue, and green!
But here was his wife with flames of red, blue, green, purple, and yellow!
"Phoenixes are indeed scary!!" He exclaimed with a shudder.
Liwei was shocked. "Y- You knew?!" So far, she had not mentioned her true identity.
"Uhm." Bailong admitted. "I suspected after I met your cousin. There isn't a single remarkable thing about her! With the past rumours, it didn't take long to figure it out, and I took you to the East Sea palace to confirm my suspicions...
I didn't say anything because I wanted you to tell me on your own."
Liwei sighed. "I didn't hide it intentionally. At first I didn't say because I'm used to no one believing it. Then after you helped resolve the Yan family issue, I realized as long as my family is safe, I have no care for being the phoenix...
"And now? I'm happy with the strength to defend them from future troubles, and I'm content with living a quiet life with you!"
A flood of warmth filled Bailong and he pulled her into a hug, kissing the top of her head. "Are you really okay with never claiming your real identity?"
Liwei smirked, and then deadpanned, saying.
"Ah... My 'real identity' as the Golden Phoenix. So according to the past Emperor's edict, I'll become the Bird Clan Princess, and then marry the Crown Prince of Sky Realm, becoming the future empress."
Bailong nearly spat blood.
"Weiwei. You could simply say that you've made peace and won't go back... Must. You. Annoy. Me. To. Death?!!!" He asked, squeezing her tighter.
Liwei beamed up at him, then swiftly leaned up and planted a kiss on his lips...
She was indeed content to ignore her so-called identity and simply stay beside Bailong
However, her five-flame technique had triggered the heavens, affecting Immortal Ye's Fate mirrors.
He instantly asked the Sky Emperor through the mirrors.
"Why is our phoenix in the mortal realm?! Isn't she in Sky Palace?!"
To which the Sky Emperor tartly replied,
"The one who says she's the phoenix is certainly here."
Unfortunately, a few Fate disciples and servants heard this exchange, making them wonder in their circles, "Is Immortal Feng Yuexia not the real Phoenix?!"
To worsen the situation, Bailong officially proposed to the Yan family and this led to several visits within Sky Realm.
He took her to meet Old man Bao, who was being visited by two other dragons...
"Now that I see her, those past accusations don't seem so baseless!" One of the dragons said. "I was drawn to her aura at once!"
He took her to meet Immortal Kai Zhen, who was in the company of several other powerful immortals...
"Just look at her face...!"
"This countenance-! She outshines the Crown Princess consort by miles, and then some!"
"Is she really not the phoenix?!"
Theories surged left to right, flying between Sky Realm and Mortal Realm!
But of course, all this flew back to the now worried Feng family who ruled the Bird Clan, and before long, they acted again...
This time, they acted smarter, and with Feng Yuexia now in the Sky Palace, they burned the library records which mentioned the millennia old peach.
They also burned the Yan family ledgers, completely erasing any existence of the millennia-old peach from the Bird treasury.
Then they allied with the Magpie clan to falsify their own ledgers.
And once they had covered all known tracks, they accused Yan Liwei of stealing the Peach again.....
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