Once the young man in disarray had gone, the three peak masters exchanged a look, and their figures slowly faded away where they stood.

Ye Lan stood with her hands at her sides, watching the blue smoke curl up from the altar. She was silent a long while, thinking who knew what.

A moment later she turned around. The look on her fair face had finally returned to normal, no longer so cold, though a trace of weariness still lingered around her eyes.

“Sorry you had to see that.” Ye Lan tried to squeeze out a smile. The corners of her mouth moved, but wouldn't lift.

At Crane Mountain, Founding Patriarch Ye's name alone had been enough to overawe every hero there. Back inside her own sect's gates, she was in this sorry state; even her own master's statue had been swapped out.

She could almost picture how disappointed Shen Yi must be.

“Every family has its own troubles.”

Shen Yi had no intention of passing judgment on it. He offered just that one line of comfort and turned his eyes to the little courtyard.

There were six rooms in all, most of them empty now. It looked less like a branch of an immortal sect than a country household, and he could just make out how happy a home it had once been.

“The Fifth Peak is called the Alchemy Peak. But when things went wrong back then and I took over as peak master, I still knew nothing whatsoever about alchemy.”

Ye Lan looked over at the rooms too. A little nostalgia showed in her eyes, and a self-mockery so faint it could hardly be seen. “So that what the Fifth Peak left behind wouldn't go to waste, Martial Uncle Muyang picked out many of his disciples who studied alchemy on the side and sent them over to the Fifth Peak.”

“I was in no state to deal with any of it then. Later I left Shenxu Mountain altogether to travel the Divine Land, and little by little… it became what you see now.”

With that, Ye Lan…