Chapter 3 - A long, long time ago
Chapter 3: A long, long time ago
In the evening, the mountains were shrouded in mist. When Chu Xianning returned to the courtyard, the evening sky was still ablaze with the glow of the setting sun and wisps of cooking smoke curled up in the air. She paused for a moment, then walked into the kitchen, where she saw Jiang Huai, wearing a homemade apron and seriously cooking a pot of tomato beef brisket.
“Master has returned? The meal will be ready soon.”
Jiang Huai turned and smiled at her.
Chu Xianning, dressed in a white gown, simply stood there, and the evening glow fell on the hem of her dress, making her look like a budding white flower, serene and aloof. No matter how many times Jiang Huai glanced back, he would be momentarily stunned.
Chu Xianning had gone to seek Granny Jiuyou for advice. Granny Jiuyou gave her a displeased look and told her that she only needed to see Jiang Huai once to ensure his head was fine. Perhaps it was just the shock of his cultivation being destroyed that caused some hysteria. He would be better after a short while once he accepted reality. Granny Jiuyou even took the rare step of advising Chu Xianning to spend more time with her disciple, lest he couldn’t cope with such a downfall and sought to end his own life.
But seeing Jiang Huai now, with a smile on his lips, where was the slightest sign of someone seeking to end his own life?
The tomatoes were grown by Jiang Huai in his own spiritual field, and he had somehow procured the seeds from some secret realm. The beef was bought from the sect market, where the sect raised spiritual cattle that fed on spiritual grass and drank from spiritual springs, making the meat delicious and nourishing.
Cultivators could naturally go without food for days, but the Tianxuan Sect advocated that natural desires were part of being human and did not promote cutting off emotions and desires. Thus, many cultivators still retained the habit of occasionally indulging their taste buds.
But most did so only occasionally.
Jiang Huai had volunteered to stand by the stove and cook for his master since he was ten, even coming up with a bunch of strange seasonings. Initially, Chu Xianning disdained this, merely reminding him not to neglect his cultivation. She hadn’t had much desire for food for many years, but this fellow seemed to have a more terrifying talent for cooking than for sword practice. After Chu Xianning tasted his cooking for the first time, her usually cold expression melted away.
After that, Jiang Huai would prepare two delicious dishes for Chu Xianning every day, using everything that could fly in the sky, run on the ground, or swim in the water. He picked everything edible in the sect and brought back wild game from secret realms to stew. Not to mention, he grew countless fruits and vegetables in his spiritual field and even made small desserts for his master. It was really… too much!