Oh no! My grandmother made me shoulder the responsibility for eight households!

Chapter 575 Two Years of Seclusion, Exhausted Foundation

Lin Chen's last period of seclusion lasted a full ten years.

Lin Chen walked out of the Hehuan Palace, wearing a moon-white robe, the same one he wore when he went in, as clean as if he had just changed into it yesterday.

Her hair was tied up, her complexion was normal, and she showed no signs of being haggard or tired.

But his eyes were different.

I used to be lazy, and I'm still lazy, but there's something more beneath that laziness.

Something very deep and heavy, like an ancient well with no bottom, carrying a sense of indifferent loneliness and deathly stillness.

Lin Chen stood on the steps in front of the Hehuan Hall, looking up at the sky.

The sky was blue, the clouds were white, the sun was shining brightly, and the wind was gentle.

Everything is the same as before, yet it seems like nothing is different.

Yan Ruyu sat on the steps drinking tea as always, her white dress as white as snow and her white hair as white as frost.

She held a teacup, watching thousands of disciples practice swordsmanship in the distant square.

Sensing the movement behind her, she paused, holding her teacup, then put it down, stood up, turned around, and looked at Lin Chen.

She didn't rush over, didn't cry, and didn't laugh. She just looked at Lin Chen and sized him up from head to toe.

"Why did it take so long this time?"

Lin Chen walked down the steps, stopped in front of Yan Ruyu, paused for a moment, and said:

"I've hit a bottleneck."

Yan Ruyu raised an eyebrow: "Bottleneck? Haven't you been cultivating quite smoothly all along?"

"I've reached the ninth level of the Great Dao, but there's a hurdle between the ninth and tenth levels." Lin Chen sighed.

"I've been trying to cross that hurdle for almost fifty years, but I still haven't gotten over it."

Yan Ruyu's expression froze slightly!

The ninth level, just one step away from perfection.

She opened her mouth, as if to say something, but then swallowed it back, finally only saying softly:

"Cultivation requires a balance between work and rest; perhaps you can break through a bottleneck at any moment."

He handed the teacup to Lin Chen, saying, "Try it, this year's new tea."

Lin Chen took the teacup and took a sip. The tea was very hot, making him wince slightly. He then put the cup down.

"It still tastes the same."

"You remember it quite clearly." Yan Ruyu looked at him with a smile.

"It's only been ten years." Lin Chen smiled calmly, but a hint of regret flashed in his eyes.

At this moment, Mei Jiu Niang rushed out of the sea of ​​flowers, buried her face in Lin Chen's chest, and said in a muffled voice:

"You're finally out!"

"Do you know how long you've been in there this time? A full ten years! Ten years!"

Mei Jiu Niang raised her head, her eyes slightly red, biting her lip as she stared intently at Lin Chen.

Lin Chen looked down at Mei Jiu Niang. Time had not left any marks on her face; instead, it had added a touch of kindness to it.

She was still the same charming Jiu Niang, but after having a daughter, she had toned down her allure by 99%.

"Sorry to keep you waiting!" Lin Chen reached out and ruffled Mei Jiu Niang's hair.

Mei Jiu Niang's tears finally fell, streaming down her cheeks, but she didn't wipe them away.

"Ten years! When you went in, our daughter was just a child, and now she's a young woman!"

Lin Chen's eyes glazed over for a moment, as he thought of his daughter with Mei Jiu Niang...

"Lin Nianlang! You forgot?" Mei Jiuniang punched Lin Chen in the chest, not hard, but loud.

"You promised her you'd be out soon before you went into seclusion, but this time you've been in seclusion for ten years, even missing her coming-of-age ceremony. She's furious with you!"

Lin Chen fell silent. He had missed not just one child's coming-of-age ceremony, but all children.

He spent a hundred years in the Time and Space Palace, advancing from the mid-stage of the Half-Step Great Emperor to the peak of the Half-Step Great Emperor, and his comprehension of the Great Dao advanced from the sixth level to the ninth level.

It may seem like only one step is needed, but this one step is more difficult than the previous nine steps combined.

Time flowed past him like water, and in his world, he hardly felt the passage of time.

But in the outside world, everything is changing.

Lin Chen reached out and wiped away Mei Jiu Niang's tears:

"I'm sorry, I probably won't be going into seclusion for a long time after this trip. I'll make it up to you two properly."

Mei Jiu Niang buried her face in Lin Chen's chest and mumbled, "You have to keep your word."

"You keep your word."

Lin Nianlang stood at a distance, watching Lin Chen from afar.

She wore a pale yellow dress, her hair was tied up in a bun, and her eyebrows and eyes were very similar to Mei Jiu Niang's. When she smiled, she had two identical dimples.

Ten years ago, her father hugged her and then went through that door.

For the past ten years, he has missed his father every day and longed for his return, but now he can't even utter those two words.

After Mei Jiu Niang finished crying, she wiped away her tears, turned around, and called out, "Nian Lang! Come here!"

Lin Nianlang took a deep breath, lifted her skirt, walked up to Lin Chen, and looked up at him.

It was still the same image in her mind from ten years ago. Lin Nianlang's nose suddenly stung with tears, and she opened her mouth to call out:

"Father!"

Lin Chen looked at the girl in front of him.

All those things that had been worn down by time in the Temple of Time and Space surged up at this moment, and his Adam's apple bobbed:

"Um."

Lin Nianlang's eyes instantly reddened, and he called out again, "Father!"

Lin Chen reached out and touched Lin Nianlang's head, his eyes also a little red:

"You've grown so much."

Lin Nianlang shed a tear with a "plop," then quickly lowered her head and pretended to look at the tip of her shoe.

Mei Jiu Niang watched from the side, tears welling up again, this time with a smile.

Lunch was served in the courtyard behind the main hall, on a small round table with a few side dishes and a pot of wine.

Lin Nianlang sat next to Lin Chen, slowly picking up food with her chopsticks, her movements steady. Occasionally, she would look up at Lin Chen and then look down again.

She ate slowly, but she ate every last grain of rice in her bowl.

Mei Jiu Niang sat on her other side and, seeing that her bowl was empty, refilled it for her.

"Eat more, it's rare for your father to come back."

"Mmm," Lin Nianlang replied softly.

Lin Chen held his wine glass, looking at Lin Nianlang, still unable to accept that his daughter was so grown up while he was still a child!

After letting his mind wander for a while, Lin Chen casually asked, "What realm have you reached in your cultivation?"

Lin Nianlang paused with his chopsticks, swallowed the rice in his mouth, and straightened his posture: "Peak of the Celestial Realm."

"Not bad." Lin Chen nodded. "I'll give you some pointers after we finish eating."

A twenty-year-old at the peak of the Celestial Realm might have been considered an unparalleled genius before Lin Chen.

But after Lin Chen appeared, no one dared to call themselves a genius, let alone Lin Chen's children.

Lin Nianlang's eyes lit up for a moment, then she quickly suppressed them and lowered her head to take a bite of rice.

"Um."

Lin Chen noticed that the base of her ears had turned red, and he knew what was going on.

After dinner, Lin Chen thoughtfully guided Lin Nianlang's cultivation for a while, and also gave her some resources and gifts, immediately restoring the relationship between the father and daughter to what it was ten years ago.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Lin Chen stayed in Hehuan Valley for seven days and seven nights.

Besides spending time with Yan Ruyu and Mei Jiu Niang on the first day, he also had girls from the Hehuan Sect taking turns to keep him company.

Seven days and seven nights later, Lin Chen walked out of the Hehuan Palace, feeling refreshed and relaxed, with every bone in his body feeling comfortable.

The long-awaited embrace and warmth completely awakened him from his century of solitude.

A hundred years of solitude in the Time-Space Palace had made Lin Chen somewhat forget the warmth of human life, making him feel like a monster who didn't partake in the ways of the world.

But after seven days and seven nights of hard work, that feeling of loneliness disappeared, and that sense of detachment vanished.

Lin Chen felt the warmth of the world again, felt the pulse of life again, and felt the taste of being alive again.

Yan Ruyu looked at Lin Chen with a smile.

"How are you feeling?"

Lin Chen smiled slightly: "It's alright."

"Any inspiration?"

Lin Chen thought for a moment: "No, but I feel much better."

"That's good!" Yan Ruyu smiled. "Now that you've settled in, go home. They're all waiting for you!"

"Okay, I'm off then!"

As Lin Chen spoke, he tore through the void and stepped inside.