"Ning Xing!"

The girl turned around, realising who it was.

"Ah, Xiuying! Aren't you supposed to be meeting your family now?"

"Well..."

Xiuying handed her the box in her hand.

"I got Hai Huang to cook this up for you!"

"Hmm? Who's that?" Ning Xing asked.

"I guess everyone just calls him Mr Octopus. He's the octopus that cooks all the canteen food."

"Oh! Somehow it didn't even occur to me that he had a name..."

Xiuying laughed awkwardly.

"Sorry if this is a bit brief, but I'm heading off now! To meet my parents and siblings."

"Bye!"

As she saw Xiuying rush off, a small smile came over Ning Xing.

"Big sis!"

A group of three kids ran up to Xiuying as she got to her knees. She smiled.

Two were boys that looked nearly identical and one was a girl.

The boys were young and looked around 7, while the girl looked 10. While the boys were filled with boisterous energy and were practically jumping up and down, the girl was more reserved and shy.

"Big sis, we miss your cooking! Mom's food isn't even half as good as yours!" one of the boys said.

The girl pinched him, making him squeak.

Footsteps came from a distance

Having come to check on the commotion, a woman in a black dress walked into the living room. She had long black hair and a rather beautiful face. For a woman who was 32, she looked rather young.

"Oh, you're back, Xiuying!"

"Mom!"

"Hubby, Xiuying is back!" she turned back and shouted.

"Coming!"

A man soon rushed over. He had a rather rugged look to him, with rather piercing eyes. Right now though, they were quite gentle.

"You're home?" Xiuying sounded surprised.

"Ah, that old man told me you would be back to visit in around a week, so I ended up taking a few leave days."

"Oh, I-"

"Big sis! Play hide and seek with us!" one of the boys shouted, interrupting the conversation.

Xiuying looked awkwardly between her younger sibling and her parents.

"Go on." her father smiled. "We can talk after lunch."

As her parents excused themselves, Xiuying was left with only her siblings.

"Okay, sis! Close your eyes and count to 20!"

She sighed lightly and put her hands over her eyes.

After counting to twenty, she began looking around.

Hide and seek... In the past, it was fine, but now, she could sense them. She could either find them immediately or pretend she couldn't find them and search in places she knew they weren't in. That took all the fun out of it.

Well, not that they were the best at hiding in the first place, but still.

As she walked around and pretended to search, she slowly came to realise where all of them were hiding.

Nanying, one of her brothers... somehow managed to stuff himself into a drawer. Hiding in the smallest spaces as usual. All the clothes that were inside were haphazardly shoved under a blanket on a nearby bed though, so even without cheating, she could probably tell he was there.

She decided to 'find' him quickly before he started to get uncomfortable or suffocate.

"You found me so fast..." he grumbled.

"Don't hide in places like that next time! What if you get stuck inside and can't breathe?" she berated him.

Nanying stuck out his tongue at her and ran off.

Continuing her search, she realised her other brother, Nanyong had locked himself in the bathroom.

"Nanyong? Are you there?"

"No!" said a falsetto voice. "I, your father am using the toilet! Don't interrupt my poo time, Xiuying!"

Xiuying: ...

She used her qi to push the lock from the other side, opening the door. Inside, her brother was standing on the toilet.

"Ahhh! You're cheating!" Nanyong shouted.

"I've told you locking yourself in rooms is cheating before..." Xiuying shook her head.

Like his brother, the boy stuck his tongue out and ran off too.

And lastly, her sister, Huaying was just behind a curtain.

She grinned as Xiuying pull back the curtain.

"I'll go cook up something for everyone," Xiuying said.

"Yay! I'll go tell them." Huaying ran off too.

As Xiuying went down to the kitchen, her family followed her in.

"I've learnt some cooking arts from an elder at the sect, Hai Huang. Heheh, watch closely!"

She focused on a ring on her right hand. It was a silver ring with a piece of green jade stuck to it.

Immediately, a pan appeared in her hand.

"Whoa!" exclaimed her mother.

"This cultivation technology sure is handy." her dad mumbled. "I wonder how it works..."

"But how are you going to cook in that?" her mom pointed to the pan.

The pan was missing it's bottom, leaving a huge gaping hole. It looked more like a giant magnifying glass. A stripe of silver metal was wrapped around its side, encrusted with little blue gems.

"Hmmhmm."

As she sent a strand of qi in, all the little blue gems lit up, sending out streams of light. The streams of light formed a glowing surface, completing the pan.

Instantly, her parents understood. It was the pinnacle of non-stick pans!

"Shiny pan! Awesome!" shouted Nanying.

"It's very convenient! Stuff won't stick even if you don't use oil." Xiuying explained.

But to her parent's surprise, Xiuying continued to take out pans, until the number reached 6. She turned all of them on one by one.

"Do you need that many pans?" asked dad.

She focuses, creating balls of fire in the air. Invisible hands of qi grabbed each of the pans, lifting all of them up. The Eight Trigrams Cooking Art!

To the awe of her parents and siblings, Xiuying began to take out ingredients and began chopping them, then throwing them into the 6 floating pans. Despite cooking a different dish in each of them, Xiuying was able to cook each of them with incredible precision.

Just for the sake of cooking, she was the first of all the outer disciples to learn a spirit art!

Before long, the table was plated with delicious food they had ever seen. Another convenient thing about the pans was how the food would just fall neatly onto plates after turning the gems off.

Xiuying wiped the sweat off her face and smiled at the results of her hard work. She was very tired, almost using up all her qi and feeling just to show off, but the awe from her family was worth it!

The two boys began eating immediately.

"No! You should start eating at the same time as everyone!" Huaying complained.

"Well, it's a special occasion today! No need to hold back!" her mother smiled.

As Xiuying ate with her family, she was surprised by how good her food was. Maybe it was that thing where people said food was best when cooked with love?

After the meal, her mother spoke up.

"By the way, mind leaving us one of those pans? Since you have 6."

"Ah... I can't. I borrowed the pans and the ring from my master."

"That's too bad then. I wonder what your teacher is like... hmm..."

Xiuying decided not to break her mother's fantasy by telling her he was a giant octopus.

After some more chatter, she headed to her room.

On the walls, there were certificates stuck neatly. The table was covered in paper and stationery and there was a bookshelf stocked with textbooks. The only other things were a closet for her clothes and her comfy bed. With how focused she was on her studies, she didn't really have time for other hobbies.

She sighed. All those years studying as a scholar, all for nought now that she was cultivating. It wasn't very easy either, getting accepted to be a scholar as a girl. Her parents had to pull some strings.

Shaking her slight regrets aside, she took out an incense burner and placed it on the floor. It was sculpted to look like several cliffs, with a pool at the bottom. Right now, it wasn't particularly spectacular, but when it was lit, the smoke would flow and form a beautiful waterfall. Certain incense sticks would boost concentration and cultivation speed.

She took out some cushions from the ring, then a box of incense sticks, followed by a small jar of Qi pills.

For the past week, she had been working hard to earn jade. It was all for the sake of buying these for her family.

Maybe her parents were too old, but she didn't understand why the sect master didn't pick her siblings as disciples as well. She believed they were fairly good kids and would fit a virtuous sect.

Back when he came to the household, he got along with the kids pretty well too... She appreciated him accepting her into the sect, but she had always wanted to ask him why he didn't accept them. But in the end, she couldn't muster up the courage to.

Now that she was a cultivator, the thought of her family growing old, wrinkled and dying before her was terrifying. She would do everything to prevent that.

And as for friends... Well, maybe it was a good thing she didn't have any before joining the sect. In her academia, she often felt like she couldn't quite get along with any of the scholars there. They were just... too different... There were a few that did try to get along, but she got worried they were just hitting on her and ended up avoiding them.

It was all thanks to the sect master's encouraging words back then. Without his guidance, she wouldn't have had the courage to reach out to Mei Xiu, Liu Qiang, Yingyi and Wang Wei to befriend them.

There was a wistful smile on her face. She owed so much to the sect leader...

For the rest of the day, she taught her family the basics of cultivating and guided them as they did so.

From now on, her room would be the family's cultivation room.