Xyrin Empire-Chapter 1367: Just Like Raising Birds

Since waking up, Anses had never ventured beyond the heavily guarded high walls of the military district. Of course, this was an arrangement Sandora made out of security concerns, but generally, people don’t like having their freedom restricted—Xyrin Apostles might be able to stand still for millennia due to a single command, but the Ancestors obviously couldn’t live like them. Sandora, perhaps a bit overzealous due to her concern, somewhat overlooked this point. Moreover, with recent busy affairs, a bunch of Ancestors was practically under house arrest, being kept like this for so long by us...

The scenery outside the military district is completely different from inside the high walls. The latter is a strict and rigid military base where Imperial Soldiers, with little regard for personal life, certainly didn’t bother to set up any entertainment facilities. But outside, civilians from various races brought the best and most distinctive things from their worlds. In their effort to showcase their world’s unique culture, they created a never-ending, dazzling exposition. The farther you go from the military district, the more prosperous it becomes: it’s almost the opposite of a typical city. I bet you’ve never seen a city center that’s rarely visited, with the bustling area only starting beyond the second ring road. Fortunately, Shadow City has a convenient teleportation system, or else this would absolutely qualify as a case of distorted development...

"Oh, so outside is such a bustling place." The Ancestor named "Lu," probably due to her youth, appeared more lively than the others. Initially confused, she quickly realized that the world outside was much friendlier than the heavily guarded military base filled with warning devices. Soon, she switched to a purely sightseeing mode. Influenced by her, the others gradually relaxed. We walked through the first commercial street, passing by countless dazzling stores. Residents from different worlds had set up an innumerable number of shops and entertainment venues here. This special commercial street is less a marketplace for ordinary citizens to meet daily needs and more a semi-official, semi-civilian "exhibition." All the stores here boast "exotic features," with a blacksmith shop selling traditional swords next to a starship dealership supporting credit card transactions. Above the Night Elf’s magic pharmacy is an interstellar travel group registration point. We even saw a magical driving school offering lessons from four-wheeled carriages to four-engine interstellar private yachts. The head of the driving school was a Dark Elf girl from a Middle Ages magic plane. She went to Imperial College to advance her studies as a Shadow Magic specialty student and later graduated with sixteen starship driving licenses, being a top student. The reason I know so much about her is because I’m somewhat a titular director of the school, and students who can graduate in such a cross-disciplinary top-notch manner can’t go unnoticed—I’d give you a heads-up about Bingdisi, a top student like that. Sister Bing’s graduation as a Light Goddess made her famous throughout the Divine Realm.

Finally, we arrived at a very special place, a place that claims you can buy or accomplish anything as long as you have money: the peculiar Feiyali Void Consortium founded by the bizarre Queen Feiyali.

Speaking of which, I hadn’t seen the magically-charactered Queen Feiyali for some time. It looks like her consortium is functioning normally now. But it’s just that, at this initial stage of development, the so-called Void Consortium was nothing but an empty shell with a grand name because I saw her personally handing out promotional materials in front of the consortium headquarters, fully embodying the tough struggle of starting a business.

The Ancestors were inexplicably attracted by the promotional materials handed out by this Void Peddler. I took a distant look and understood why: Philis was promoting civilian spaceships, something that piqued the Ancestors’ interest.

"Forgive us, we’ve spent most of our lives on starships. Navigation, engines, spaceship structures, these things are pretty much all we had in our lives." Anses, the old captain, appeared somewhat composed, not joining in the hullabaloo but standing quietly by my side.

Philis hadn’t noticed me yet; she was entirely immersed in her business. Realizing that Lu and her group of Ancestors were merely spaceship enthusiasts and not potential customers, she tended to them briefly before busying herself again, allowing the Ancestors to leisurely study the information on the automated display board. She grabbed a low-level ghost passing by, passionately promoting her excellent source goods. It was only when I and Anses approached that she saw us.

"Ah, it’s His Majesty, the Emperor!" exclaimed the black-clad, pretty mature lady in surprise. The low-level ghost she had pulled along also began to flicker and bow. I couldn’t discern this ghost’s gender or appearance. Clearly, they were rather weak. As a ghost, the ghost likely didn’t possess much seniority and was probably here in Shadow City accompanying a superior or family, or perhaps just as a simple tourist.

"Oh, don’t be formal, don’t be formal. I’m just out having fun with people," I waved to Philis and couldn’t help but focus on that low-level ghost. Weak ghosts find it quite difficult to interact with physical matter; they involuntarily pass through everything they come into contact with, such as walls, tables, and ceilings. The weakest ghosts would need a medium of spiritual material just to pick up an apple. Ghosts of Anwina’s level are considered Undead Lords or even faux Death God level entities in undead society. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

So I was very curious about the purpose of Philis selling a vehicle to such a ghost: once the spaceship takes off, the ghost would remain on the launch pad behind, passing through the cockpit and hull...

"Think about it, although you have become the undead, the Empire never said undead can’t enjoy life, right? Since you want to walk under the sun and live peacefully with other living races, why not make your life a bit more stylish?" Philis seemed determined to showcase her promotional skills in front of me, earnestly persuading the somewhat bewildered ghost to purchase a private spaceship. "I suggest you choose this smaller intergalactic personal shuttle, its learning curve is very short, and it is one of the most popular private modes of transport in the Macro World right now. Imagine it, sitting in the spaceship, coursing freely through the endless cosmos..."

I finally couldn’t hold back and pointed at the low-level ghost, who had to exert great effort to even pick up the brochure: "Actually, they’re just vigorously synchronizing alongside the shuttle while maintaining an impressive posture as if sitting in a chair. If they fly a bit slower, they might just slip out from the back of the spaceship..."

... And then there was nothing else.

"Your Majesty, do you have a vendetta against me?" Philis asked seriously.

"I just can’t stand you deceiving consumers!" I declared righteously.

"I never lie when doing promotions, the customers decide to buy themselves," Philis raised an eyebrow, "Yesterday, I sold a sports car to a similar ghost."

"... Didn’t they come looking for trouble today? How is a low-level ghost supposed to sit in a moving car!"

"Nope," Philis said without any mental burden, "I also sold him two pamphlets, ’How to Fly at Car Speed as a Spiritual Being’ and ’How to Maintain a Sexy Pose Sitting in the Chair Holding the Steering Wheel While Flying’..."

Me: "..."

I practically dragged the group of ancestors away from this obviously dangerous place. My intuition told me that Philis, the Void Peddler, had already stepped onto the path of a mad swindler, and no matter how much money you had, it wouldn’t be enough around her.

"Who was that just now..." Anses could tell that I was quite familiar with Philis, but the latter was clearly not an Imperial Soldier, so he asked curiously.

"A swindler not worth paying attention to," I shrugged, "By the way, it was thanks to that swindler we found your crashed Ark, which allowed her to set up this Void Consortium here."

"Interesting, very interesting." Anses smiled faintly, his gaze lingering on the bizarre scene around us. To be honest, most things here were still incomprehensible to the ancestors: undecipherable texts, strange goods, unknowable cultures, and peculiar races. There were more things here they couldn’t understand than in military zones, but the ancestors clearly preferred the atmosphere here. Lu led the others in a circle and came back with a happy expression: "It’s much more lively than we expected. We thought you had turned the Empire into a dead place, now we are relieved..."

I found the statement somewhat odd but didn’t have time to think it through, so I just nodded with a smile: "This is where the Clans live, so naturally it’s livelier. Xyrin Apostles themselves aren’t much accustomed to this chaotic lifestyle: they prefer training all day in the barracks. The places where Clans and Imperial Soldiers are stationed are separated, also because their living habits can’t be integrated."

"Clans, huh," Anses’s expression subtly changed and then returned to normal, "Yes, you are fundamentally different from these mortals now, being called gods, it’s really hard for us old folks to understand."

"I keep telling you, don’t include me when you say ’old folks’!" Lu glared angrily at Anses. It seems that this technical director and the old Captain had a good relationship long ago and didn’t have such a strict superior-subordinate feeling.

"We’ve seen enough here, take us somewhere else," Anses waved at Lu, glancing into the distance towards the World Tree, "I hear that’s the embassy of gods? I’m really curious, during our lifetime we didn’t know ’gods’ truly existed."

I looked at the empty-handed ancestors and finally became curious: touring the commercial street but not buying anything, have these ancestors just gotten used to frugality or are they truly disinterested in shopping? I remember they all had universal shopping cards for Shadow City.

"There’s nothing to buy," a sturdy but slightly squat middle-aged man smiled honestly. I knew this ancestor’s name was "Egron," "We were just looking around anyway. The base has all the daily essentials, right?"

I looked at several ancestors, and they were all smiling contentedly and indifferently. The atmosphere seemed quite good, so it seemed they weren’t really interested in the goods here. I waved my hand: "Alright, let’s go take a look at the temple district, though you might find the imagery of the gods a bit..."

Using the city’s public teleportation points, we quickly arrived at the temple district. The ancestors were dumbfounded as they looked at the towering cliff-like structure in front of them that no longer looked like a tree trunk.

"This is the World Tree, the control center of the Outer World. The Imperial Capital is located in the Inner World, and the miscellaneous matters of the Outer World are entrusted to a member of the Divine Race for management, so this temple is somewhat akin to the property management office," I explained, pointing to the giant tree once the ancestors came back to their senses. "Oh, and those are the gods over there, along with their little companions..."

Dingdang led a large group of Little Ones emitting green light out of the tree trunk, and I quickly introduced these Little Doudings to the ancestors. Sensing that their "master" was nearby, Dingdang immediately flew over, rubbed against my face twice disregarding everything else, and then nimbly burrowed into my shirt pocket to look for candy. Meanwhile, the Little Doudings who came with Dingdang noticed the ancestors standing in a daze nearby and started fluttering around them excitedly, chattering non-stop: "Mortals, oh! Look, mortals who came with the Emperor!" "Hello, are you here to worship at the temple? Are you friends of the Emperor?" "Perhaps they are Dingdang’s friends!" "Dingdang didn’t greet them, so they probably aren’t. Colin is so smart!"

A group of Little Ones flitted around the ancestors in this lively manner, seemingly sensing a similar energy emanating from the Life Goddess in the ancestors, which made them extraordinarily friendly toward these mortals they had just met. However, this excessive enthusiasm seemed to have startled the ancestors: they had certainly never seen creatures like this before.

"Wha—what are these?!" Lu finally snapped back to reality, but with the Little Ones fluttering all around, she didn’t dare move casually and could only stand there stiffly, exclaiming in surprise. I helplessly extracted Dingdang, who was rummaging through my pocket for candy; she had found a piece of milk candy and was busy trying to tear open the wrapper with her teeth. I pointed to the group of Little Ones and then to Dingdang, who was furiously ripping at the candy wrapper: "Like I said earlier, these are gods, just smaller in size, known as Life Goddesses."

The ancestors: "?"

"Moreover, their power was also used in your resurrection; these numerous Life Goddesses were gathered specifically for the resurrection experiment." Although they quickly turned it into a sightseeing opportunity—I refrained from saying this last part out loud.

Anses had some understanding of his resurrection, but this was the first time he heard about the details, and the other ancestors had only awakened a few days ago and knew very little. I looked at the cheerful Little Doudings around us and decided to take this opportunity to tell everyone the full story of what happened during the resurrection experiment, letting them have a positive impression of the gods is a good thing, too.

After an exchange, the ancestors finally gained a genuine understanding of the little Life Goddesses, and the Little Ones found out for the first time that the fragments they shed the other day were collected to resurrect these "big mortal friends." The relationship between the two sides suddenly became much closer, and soon I, the intermediary, was left aside, as the ancestors and the Little Doudings happily gathered together.

These palm-sized Dou Ding Goddesses were originally adorably silly, and it was beyond imagination to have such a high degree of affinity.

Only Dingdang didn’t join her little sisters; she was somewhat more conscientious, preferring to snuggle with me—clearly the result of daily care. Anses also didn’t join the excitement, although he was curious about the Little Ones; after all, he was an old Captain, with a lot more poise due to his age and experience. So, Dingdang, Anses, and I found a place to rest at the edge of Temple Square, chatting leisurely.

Of course, Bingdisi, now bound as a piece of equipment, was with us too, though this female hooligan had no interest in our conversation and just feigned death within me.

Everything in Temple Square was composed of "pure natural creations." The street lamps around the square were tall glowing branches, the houses were natural tree houses cultivated by the elven priests, and the long benches were roots of the World Tree emerging from the ground forming natural "benches." We sat on one such "bench," breathing deeply in the wondrous fragrance permeating through the temple district, with Dingdang happily lying on my shoulder, licking the milk candy, and Anses looking at his subordinates who were chatting with other Life Goddesses: "How long has it been since we had such a peaceful day..."

I knew he was reminded of the days of exile, where onboard the spaceship everyone was on tenterhooks, reporting large-scale casualties daily, always fearing the imminent catastrophic disaster approaching their Ark. Those days could not be compared to the peaceful and mundane present. Yet, even though Anses expressed this sentiment of relief, his face did not show much happiness, so I was a bit puzzled, "Are you not satisfied with the current situation?"

"No, I’m very satisfied," Anses replied softly, "... It’s just that I remembered those who couldn’t see this day..."

"Those who failed to resurrect... It couldn’t be helped..."

"No, not just them," Anses shook his head, "those from other Arks, those who stayed in the Hometown World and couldn’t escape, all those who died on the exile journey... Now, only a few of us are left."

"Well... it might be a bit reckless to say this," I struggled with my words, finally unable to hold back, "but you all seem to have a bit of a goal-less, lackadaisical vibe."

"That’s exactly what it is, no need for ’seems like,’" Anses smiled wryly, spreading his hands, "What goals can we have? What can we possibly do? Yesterday, I was trapped in the bathroom for a whole hour, and some of us can’t even open our own wardrobe—you tell me what we can do?! We’re a bunch of primitives resurrected from stone by you all; our children have now become gods, you know, gods—they are gods, whereas we are primates who might choke to death on our drinking water. What do you need an ancestor for? You just need to ask us a few questions, then lock us in a cage like birds and feed us well! What can we do? Can you use a bunch of primitives to do anything? You have so many Vassals, so many Servants; can we become your Vassals? At least give us something to do!"

As Anses spoke, he got more and more agitated, his voice unconsciously rising, but he soon forced himself to calm down once more, sighing deeply: "I’m sorry, I got worked up... It’s been a few rough days... I know it’s not your problem, it’s ours."

I finally began to understand where this awkward feeling that had been present for a while was originating from. As I led the ancestors on a tour of this city, they appeared all smiles, yet from start to finish, their gazes were merely observing, shrouded with a difficult-to-explain sense of dissonance—a dissonance stemming from "isolation."

They could not integrate into all of this.

Or more accurately: they could not integrate into the upper echelons of the Empire, while Sandora would not allow them to connect with the lower echelons of the Empire.

The military district is a heavily guarded Imperial City, essentially a cage that holds the ancestors. Outside the Imperial City lies a world they could barely accept, yet they were acutely aware that even this world outside the Imperial City was not theirs.

A remark by Anses in a moment of urgency revealed everything: Could we become your Vassals?

If they were Vassals, akin to those ordinary people within the Servant Army, they might feel more at ease. Among the Empire’s numerous vassals, even weaker Races have their place, yet, ironically, the ancestors could not even have such a place.

They are the ancestors, the forebears of the Empire from the Ancient Times, and the Xyrin Apostles would not allow their creators to touch or even integrate with the "lower species." They would rather place their ancestors at the pinnacle of the Imperial City tower, even if the ancestors dislike being in that position.

It’s like keeping birds. (To be continued. If you like this work, feel free to visit Qidian (qidian.com) to vote with recommendations and monthly tickets. Your support is my biggest motivation. Mobile users, please head to m.qidian.com to read.)