Threads Chapter 402-Recovery 10
Ling Qi completed the adoption ceremony by extending her hand toward Ling Nuan. It was awkward doing so while sitting down, but she was tall enough that it still worked.
Ling Nuan took her hand and raised her head, turning to look out over the gathered household.
"Thank you, my clan head," she said roughly. She did not strictly need to continue holding Ling Qi's hand for any longer, but she did not let go. "I would like to show my appreciation."
Ling Qi nodded. They'd discussed this, just after the fittings were done.
Yu Nuan—no, Ling Nuan now—would perform a piece of her own up on the stage, a presentation and demonstration to the clan introducing who she was and what she was bringing. Ling Qi had considered asking the other girl to improvise a duet between them, but in the end, she had decided otherwise. They were establishing a new tradition here. Not every cultivator adopted into the Ling clan in the future would be a musician, after all, so this would be better.
"I would be pleased to see it, as would we all," Ling Qi said.
She gestured, and Mother closed the cabinet containing the ancestral tablets. As she stepped back, the roots enclosing it rumbled, curling to cradle it protectively as they withdrew the cabinet back down beneath the stage.
"Come,” Ling Qi continued. “Let us cede the stage to our new kin."
Mother, Hanyi, and herself descended the ramp from the stage. She felt Sixiang's presence retreat from her mind to the puppet body nestled in the dark of the garden. The ground shook as Zhengui emerged, trundling up to the far end of the family table where a trough piled high with fruits waited for him. She took a seat beside Mother, who quietly dismissed the older woman who had been tending to Biyu back to the household tables. Hanyi remained standing at her side, and an empty seat was reserved for Ling Nuan.