Chapter 98: Shock

Kian didn’t even feel the sand.

The morning slipped into a rhythm of broken soil, scattered seed, and the shrill squawk of spirit hens discovering their new coop.

Mia took charge of the animal yard, her long hair tied back with a strip of cloth. Jiao Yin cut open feed sacks that outweighed her, and used it to feed the chickens. Her breathing was steady now that her Qi no longer leaked so much.

Feimei stood at the edge of the cleared plot, arms folded, her Blood Demon Eyes tracking the work like a hawk.

"Mia, the coop door faces the wind. Turn it south or the birds will freeze in the night."

Mia obeyed without question.

Her mother saw what she couldn’t and that helped make the farm bulletproof from stupid mistakes.

Jia and Kian planted their competing frost grass beds side by side, each pretending the other didn’t exist. But to any observant viewer, it was clear that Kian’s plant was just a copy of what Jia herself was doing.

Feimei passed behind them and clicked her tongue. "Both of you are wrong. The cold should run beneath the roots, not above them. Dig a shallow trench line and layer in the river pebbles from the shore."

"I told her it was like that!" Kian said disdainfully. "I am just doing it wrong once to see."

Kian and Jia shared a glance, then set to digging before either could say something petty.

Hours bled by until the sun hung low and orange, and the island no longer looked like a wild ridge—it looked like a farm.

Kian set the last wooden post into the chicken coop corner and looped the wire around it twice.

He pulled the line taut until it hummed, then twisted the end into a tight knot.

The spirit hens clucked from their roost, tilting their heads as he gave the fence a final shake.

The moment the wire held, a chime rang through his skull.

[Ding!]

[Your farm’s basic foundations are complete.]

[Farm Level Up!]

[Unnamed Island Farm — Level 2]

[Daily Qi Sparks Generated: 100 per day]

Kian froze with his hand still on the post.

The warmth started in his feet and rose through his calves, his thighs, and settled into his lower dantian like a sip of hot soup. Ten sparks a day had become a hundred, and he hadn’t had to spill a single drop of blood for it.

Good, good, good.

Passive income was always the best.

Feimei looked over from the hut and smiled, a big pot in her hand. She had just come back from the city, having cooked something for everyone.

"The land just accepted you. I felt the pulse."

"Really?"

"I think so."

Kian wiped his hands on his robe and called out, "Girls, stop working. For today, this is enough. Now let’s eat something! i am happy cause my farm just leveled up."

Mia stood first, dusting soil from her knees. "Ranked up? Already?"

"Already," Kian said. "And it gives me a hundred Qi Sparks every day now."

"Wow, that’s so nice." Mia blinked in wonder. "And the farm can become even better than this."

That quieted even Jia. She dropped her spade, wiped sweat from her temple, and stared at him with open shock.

"A hundred a day? For doing nothing?"

Kian grinned. "For building a farm with my wives, that’s not exactly doing nothing. Now come here and look at what we made."

They gathered around him as the sunset bled orange and gold across the dark soil.

They looked at the view and were amazed.

A warm wind rolled off the black sand and bent the frost grass sprouts before they had even broken ground. The coop stood straight, the herb beds lay in neat rows, and the fencing cut a clean line across the land.

"We really did all this in one day," Xiao Cui said softly. "It’s... kind of pretty."

"It’s indeed pretty," Kian said. "And it’s only level two. I wonder how it would look at level ten."

He draped an arm over Mia’s shoulder and squeezed her into a hug. "By the time we’re done, this island will feed us better than any sect."

"That’s great," Mia said.

The pot hit the floor with a heavy clunk, steam rising in a fragrant cloud.

They all settled around it in the fading light, dirt-streaked and tired, bowls clattering as Feimei ladled out thick stew.

Kian dropped onto a flat stone, and Mia leaned against his side without a word.

They all ate without any words.

He was halfway through his second bowl when he noticed Feimei hadn’t eaten.

Her chopsticks rested across her bowl, one hand curled under her chin, red eyes fixed somewhere past the fire.

Kian nudged her knee with his foot. "Hey. What’s going on in that head of yours?"

She blinked, then let her gaze travel slowly over Jia, Mia, Jiao Yin, Xiao Cui, and finally back to him.

The firelight caught the red of her eyes and made them gleam. "I was just thinking that we already have everything."

"Hm?"

"A family that could call each other sisters easily. A man who loves them all, takes care of them." She set her bowl aside. "A farm that grows stronger every single day. A way to move between this island and the city whenever we choose. The life ahead is good."

She looked deep in thought and her words clearly came out without any hidden meaning. They, her daughters and Kian’s entourage in general, currently had everything.

A lovely family that they could all call sisters, a man who loved them all and cared for them, a wealthy farm that was making them stronger everyday, a way to enter and leave the city whenever they wanted.

A good, happy life ahead of them, where Kian could turn all of them into mothers soon.

What else did they need?

Hadn’t they reached the prime of life?

She said: "We truly lack nothing. Further conflict with the outside world is something, thus, we should never do."

The girls went still, listening.

Feimei smiled, soft and almost sad. "Before long, Kian will make mothers of every one of you girls with how he is, and you will all have little ones walking around. Everything is how it should be."

Jia’s face scrunched as if her mother had just fed her a mouthful of cold stew.

"Mother, speak for yourself. I’m not letting him put a baby in me so soon just because you’re feeling sentimental by a fire." She pointed a chopstick at Kian without looking at him. "And you—stop smiling like you’ve already won something."

Mia hid a laugh behind her hand, then let it spill out anyway. "You say that now, but earlier you were shoving frost grass at him and blushing every time he smacked your butt."

She nudged her sister with an elbow. "A farm, a warm hut, and little ones running around? I wouldn’t mind it, honestly. Kian, give me a baby!"

Jiao Yin kept her eyes on her bowl, but her ears turned pink. "I think it sounds nice." She paused, then added, "Loud, though. There are already four of us and him."

Xiao Cui made a small, strangled noise and buried her face in her blanket. "Can we please not decide my future children while I’m still finding dirt in places I didn’t know I had? But yeah, I like babies."

Feimei laughed, full and warm, the red in her eyes softening. "I never said today. I said before long. There’s a difference between a wish and a curse."

Kian set down his bowl and leaned back on his hands, watching them all with the slow, satisfied ease of a man who had already marked every inch of them his.

"Why are you all debating what’s already decided? You’re mine, this farm is ours, and every one of you will carry my children when the time comes."

He counted them off on his fingers. "Jia first, though, because she protests the loudest. Then Mia, because she’ll beg for it. Jiao Yin right after. And Xiao Cui once she stops hiding in that blanket."

He grinned into the firelight.

Mia laughed. "I don’t mind being the first."

Jia sneered. "What about mom?"

Kian smiled even more.

Feimei covered her lips with the back of her hand, looking at Jia with some annoyance.

Kian said without hesitation: "And yes, Feimei too. Maybe even before the rest of you. She looks too hot for this poor me to resist these days. Maybe I’ll knock her up one of these nights."

Mia’s spoon clinked against her bowl. She stared at Kian, then at Feimei, then back at Kian like her mind had just tripped over a stone.

"You—how can you say that about Mom, Kian?" She shoved him angrily.

Jia laughed through her nose, low and knowing, while Feimei simply returned to her stew as though the fire had said it.

"As if they don’t do even worse things in private," Jia said. "Mia, you’re too naive. She does more with him than you do."

Mia blinked. "Do what?"

Jiao Yin’s gaze dropped to the fire. Xiao Cui pulled the blanket over her nose and stared hard at a pebble.

Neither said a word.

Jia only smiled, slow and teasing, then looked at Feimei across the pot. "Should I tell her, or will you?"

"Tell what?"

"How you move your mouth oh so gently across his erect~!"

"Shut!" Feimei’s hand covered her mouth in a panic.

Kian stared at the scene curiously.

Mia turned slowly and stared at him with wide open mouth.

He said: "Of course your mom belongs to me."

She was speechless as he gave her open mouth a kiss.