Morning light pierced through the thin mist of Peach Blossom Valley. Ye Fan put away his Inner World, and the Jiuxiao Huanpei at his waist gave off a soft, pleasant chime. Lin Zhaoyue's sword still rested quietly on the stone table where he had sat last night, its scabbard adorned with a few fallen peach blossom petals as if someone had quietly decorated it.
"The elders must be getting impatient." Lin Zhaoyue gently straightened her moon-white sword robe, the jade hairpin in her hair flashing with tiny flecks of silver in the morning breeze. Though her eyelids were lowered, the tips of her ears were even brighter than the peach blossoms.
As the doors of the council hall were pushed open, Elder Chén's booming voice greeted them head-on. "Little Ye! You're finally here—Lǐ Jiànfēng has gone through every single spy case from the past decade. Look at this—" He stopped mid-sentence, staring at Lin Zhaoyue's slightly bruised-looking eyelids, his beard twitching involuntarily. "Zhaoyue, didn't you sleep last night?"
Chapter 169