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In the autumn of the thirty-first year of Chengping, Yi Huawei returned from his travels.

Yu Rong Mountain Villa.

Yi Huawei stood by the window, gazing at the familiar bamboo grove outside. A hundred years ago, he planted these bamboos himself, and now they had grown into a dense bamboo forest. The wind blew, and the bamboo rustled, as if telling a story.

In one year, he traveled all over the empire.

He went to the northernmost part of the Gobi Desert, a place that used to be a harsh and cold land, but now several cities have been built there. Chinese immigrants there farm, herd livestock, and mine, and their lives are thriving.

He went to Suyab, the westernmost city, which he had personally planned. Now it is the largest metropolis in the Western Regions, with a population of over one million, a bustling commercial hub, and towering skyscrapers.

He went to the vassal state of Sindhu and met his second son, Yi Juncheng. Juncheng was now all white-haired, surrounded by his children and grandchildren, governing that vast land. The father and son drank all night and talked a lot.

He visited the Nanyang Protectorate and saw the plantations, mines, and ports scattered throughout the archipelago. The footprints of the Chinese had covered every inhabited island.

He went to Dengzhou Port, the place where he had seen off the Li family years ago. Today, Dengzhou is the world's largest port, with hundreds of giant ships entering and leaving every day, and goods from all over the world piled up like mountains.

He went to many places he had never been before and met many people he had never met before.

Everywhere was a scene of prosperity, bustling crowds. People wore smiles and their eyes shone with hope. They believed that tomorrow would be better.

A year later, he returned.

The villa remains, the bamboo forest remains, but those who have been with him for over a hundred years are all gone.

Yi Huawei stood there for a long time, until the sun set and the moon rose.

Then, he made a decision.

...............

In the autumn of the thirty-first year of the Chengping era, at the port of Qingdao on the coast of the East China Sea.

September 15th, a night of full moon.

Qingdao Port remained bustling, with the whistles of steamships sounding incessantly. The docks were brightly lit, and dockworkers were loading cargo through the night. A passenger ship bound for Southeast Asia was sounding its horn to urge the last batch of passengers to board. A young mother hurried past, carrying her child, whose cries were loud.

No one noticed that a person dressed in a moon-white robe was standing on the reef at the easternmost end of the harbor.

Yi Huawei gazed at the distant sea.

On the sea, a bright moon slowly rises from where the sea and sky meet, casting a vast expanse of silver light. The moonlight spreads across the sea, like a silver road leading to the endless distance.

Yi Huawei leaped lightly from the reef into the sea, stepping on the waves as lightly as a feather.

The seawater parted automatically at his feet, then closed behind him. Moonlight bathed him, gilding his silhouette with a silvery glow. His moon-white robe fluttered gently in the sea breeze, his long, black hair danced in the wind, and his young face appeared even more handsome and ethereal in the moonlight.

Yi Huawei took a step, one step at a time, towards the depths of the sea.

With each step he took, a wave surged up beneath his feet, supporting his body. The waves glistened in the moonlight, like blooming lotus flowers, one after another, forming a silver flower path behind him.

The wind whispered in his ear, and the waves murmured beneath his feet.

He was like a dragon, treading on moonlight and waves, heading further and further towards the distant east.

On the dock, a worker who was unloading goods happened to look up and see this scene.

He rubbed his eyes, thinking he was seeing things.

But that pale figure continued to walk on the sea, farther and farther away, until it finally disappeared where the moonlight met the sea and the sky.

The goods in the porter's hands fell to the ground with a thud.

“Holy...Holy Emperor…”

He knelt down with a thud and kowtowed three times towards the sea.

The people on the dock were alarmed and rushed over, looking in the direction where he was kowtowing.

But there was nothing left on the sea.

A few days later, the Empire Times published a brief news item on its front page:

"In the autumn of the thirty-first year of Chengping, the Holy Ancestor sailed eastward on the waves and disappeared without a trace. It is speculated that he went to Nan Yinzhou. The Retired Emperor's cultivation is profound and there is no chance of anything going wrong. I hope that his subjects will not worry."

The news shocked the entire nation.

But amidst the shock, people also felt it was perfectly natural. He was the retired emperor, a legend who had lived for 180 years. Nothing he did was surprising.

In Luoyang, some knelt and burned incense, praying for the Holy Ancestor Emperor's safe journey. Others gazed at the starry sky, imagining the white figure under the moon crossing the sea. Still others silently shed tears, feeling that the figure who had protected the empire for 150 years was finally leaving.

But everyone knows that the Emperor Emeritus will not truly leave. His name is engraved on monuments in every city, his portrait hangs in the halls of every family, and his story is written in every textbook.

He will always be there.

...............

Zhenhai City, on the east coast of Nanyinzhou.

At dawn, the sun rises from the sea, bathing the entire city in a golden glow.

Zhenhai City, a city built by the Li family over thirty years, is now the largest and most prosperous port in Nanyin Continent. Its city walls rise five zhang high, its gate towers are majestic, and breech-loading rifled cannons imported from the Empire (two generations outdated) are mounted on the walls. The port is filled with merchant ships from the Empire's mainland, and the docks are piled high with goods destined for the inland.

More than a century has passed, and the Li family's territory has expanded from its initial 500 li along the coast to 2,000 li inland. The number of cities they have built has increased from three to seventeen. The population they rule now exceeds three million.

To the north of the city lies a vast palace district. It was the residence of the Li royal family and the political center of the entire Southern Yin Continent. The style of the palaces differed greatly from that of the Central Plains, blending the styles of classical imperial architecture with those of local indigenous buildings. The white walls and golden tiles gleamed in the sunlight.

At this moment, on the highest pavilion in the palace, a white-haired old man leaned on the railing and gazed into the distance.

He was very old, so old that he needed two people to help him stand. His cloudy eyes were gazing at the sea, at the vast ocean he had crossed once and never returned to.

One hundred and twenty-six years ago, Li Shimin was fifty-one years old when he left his homeland, in the prime of his life. Now, he is one hundred and seventy-seven years old. Relying on the foundation of his internal strength cultivated in his early years and the various miraculous medicines discovered on this continent, he has managed to live to this day. But his brothers have long since passed away, his sons are now very old, and his grandsons, great-grandsons, and great-great-grandsons have already upheld the entire Li dynasty.

One hundred and twenty-six years.

The Li family has ruled this land for a full 126 years.

He transformed from an exile into the master of this continent. He turned that wild and untamed land into a new home for the Chinese people. He established order here using imperial methods; he established hierarchy here using imperial laws; and he continued civilization here using imperial writing.

But he never forgot how he came to be.

He never forgot the person who brought him here.

"Grandpa, you're looking at the sea again."

A young voice came from behind him. It was his great-grandson, a young man in his early twenties, and his favorite junior. The young man walked to his side, followed his gaze, but saw nothing.

"Grandpa, what are you waiting for?"

Li Shimin did not answer.

He didn't know what he was waiting for. Perhaps he was just waiting for an answer.

Why did we let them go back then? Why did we give them a chance? Why did we leave them a way out thousands of miles away?
These problems have troubled him for 126 years.

He still remembers that person's face clearly. That year, on the city wall of Luoyang, that phrase "The world is vast," and that departing figure, are like a brand, etched in the deepest part of his heart.

"Great-grandfather?"

The young man's call pulled him back from his reverie. Li Shimin was about to speak when suddenly his gaze froze.

A white dot appeared on the sea surface.

The white dot was getting closer and clearer.

is a person.

A man walked across the sea, step by step, from the direction of the rising sun. His steps were unhurried, his robes fluttered in the wind, and his face... remained the same as it had been years ago.

Li Shimin's body trembled violently. He gripped the railing tightly, almost unable to believe his eyes.

It has been 126 years.

One hundred and twenty-six years!
The man's face remained unchanged, as if the passage of time meant nothing to him. The figure drew closer and closer, finally stopping less than a hundred feet from the shore, standing on the waves.

Across 126 years, two gazes met from afar.

Li Shimin opened his mouth, and for the first time, tears welled up in his cloudy eyes.

On the sea, seemingly noticing Li Shimin's gaze, Yi Huawei quietly looked at the giant coastal city and the white-haired old man on the city wall.

It has been 126 years.

Li Erlang, you've gotten old.

And I am still the same as I was back then.

Yi Huawei smiled slightly, took a step forward, and the next moment, his body disappeared. When he reappeared, he was already on the shore.

.........

On the shore, the first to see this scene were several elderly people who were mending fishing nets.

They had lived here for generations, and in their youth they had gone out to sea to fish with their fathers, witnessing storms and mirages. But what they were seeing now was something they had never seen in their entire lives.

A person dressed in white walked along the waves, coming from the direction where the sun was rising.

At first, I thought it was a hallucination. I rubbed my eyes, but the figure was still there. As I got closer, I could see it clearly—a moon-white robe, long black hair, and a handsome face that seemed otherworldly. He trod on the waves as if walking on solid ground.

An old man's fishing net slipped from his hands, and he murmured, "An immortal...it's an immortal..."

The young man beside him reacted even faster, kneeling down with a thud, his voice trembling: "It's the Holy Ancestor! It's the Holy Ancestor Emperor! The Imperial Times said that the Holy Ancestor has sailed eastward across the waves and come to our Southern Yin Continent!"

This shout startled everyone on the dock.

The porters dropped their goods, the merchants abandoned their abacuses, the sailors stopped pulling their ropes, and even the patrolling city guards were stunned. Everyone turned to look at the sea, at the white figure that was getting closer and closer.

When Yi Huawei stepped onto the dock, a crowd of people had already knelt down around him.

No one dared to look up, no one dared to utter a sound.

An elderly man with white hair, who looked to be at least seventy or eighty years old, knelt at the front, his forehead touching the ground, his whole body trembling, his voice hoarse and excited:
"This humble subject...this humble subject kowtows to the Holy Ancestor Emperor! Long live the Holy Ancestor! Long live the Holy Ancestor!"

He was an elderly man of Chinese descent who had come to Nan Yinzhou with his grandfather from a young age. He often heard his grandfather talk about the empire and knew what kind of existence the Holy Ancestor Emperor was. He thought it was just a legend, a memory embellished by his ancestors. But now, when that legend stood vividly before him, he felt his legs go weak and was filled with nothing but primal awe.

"No need for such formalities!"

Yi Huawei did not linger, but merely glanced at the crowd kneeling on the ground, his gaze calm as still water.

The next second, his figure vanished from the spot, as if he had never been there.

…………

Guanhai Pavilion.

Li Shimin gripped the railing tightly, his chest heaving violently.

Disappeared.

The figure that came riding the waves vanished into thin air right before his eyes.

Is it a hallucination?

Was it because the wait of 126 years was too long that he developed a delusion?
His body swayed, almost unable to stand. His great-grandson quickly steadied him: "Grandpa, what's wrong? What did you see?"

Li Shimin did not answer. He simply stared intently at the empty sea, his murky eyes filled with disappointment, confusion, and a hint of something else...

"Find me?"

A voice rang out behind him without warning.

The voice was clear and peaceful, neither too loud nor too soft, yet it exploded in Li Shimin's ears like a thunderclap!

There was another person on the top platform of Guanhai Pavilion.

"Who goes there!"

"Protect the Ancestral Emperor!"

"Halt! Take another step forward and you will be killed on sight!"

Those were the exclamations of the guards, the clanging of weapons being drawn, and the sound of hurried footsteps.

Immediately afterwards, an invisible pressure descended silently, as if the sky were collapsing.

The guards rushed up the steps of the Guanhai Pavilion, but froze the moment they stepped through the door.

A sense of awe from the depths of their souls made them involuntarily stop in their tracks. The weapons in their hands clattered to the ground with a crisp, jarring sound.

No one dared to take another step forward.

No one dared to make a sound.

The young man beside Li Shimin froze, his body trembling slightly. He wanted to stand in front of his great-grandfather, but found he didn't even have the strength to raise his hand. His young face was full of shock and bewilderment.

Li Shimin slowly turned around, his gaze passing over the frozen imperial guards and the trembling great-grandson, landing on the moon-white figure in the center of the Guanhai Pavilion.

It has been 126 years.

That face remained completely unchanged. It was still the same as before: handsome and refined, with a hint of aloofness in his eyes, and a touch of worldly-wise indifference. He wore a moon-white robe, had long, jet-black hair, and exuded an aura as solid as a mountain, yet blended seamlessly with his surroundings.

He stood there, as if he had been there for a long time. Or as if he had just broken through the void and descended from another world.

Li Shimin's lips moved, but no sound came out.

His body was trembling violently, not from fear, but from an indescribable, extremely complex emotion—shock, disbelief, and a hint of grievance that even he himself was unwilling to admit… nostalgia.
It has been 126 years.

He thought he would never see this person again in his life.

He imagined this man in the deep palace of Luoyang, continuing to rule that vast empire, enjoying the worship of all nations. Meanwhile, he, thousands of miles away in the desolate wilderness, led his people from scratch, struggling to survive and build their empire. They were two parallel lines that would never intersect.

But now, this person is standing right in front of him.

Her appearance remains unchanged; time has not aged her.

And he, Li Shimin, once the spirited Prince of Qin, once an exile who persevered through despair, once a pioneer who started from scratch in the wilderness, is now an old man with white hair and a faltering gait.

Yi Huawei's gaze fell on Li Shimin and lingered for a moment.

A faint ripple flickered in those unfathomable eyes.

"Li Erlang".

His voice remained calm, yet carried a warmth different from usual. It was a natural closeness that one only feels when seeing an old friend.

"You're getting old."

Li Shimin was startled.

These three words evoked more emotions in him than any other words.

old.

Yes, I'm getting old. 177 years old, it would be strange if I weren't.

But what he heard wasn't mockery or contempt, but a kind of... seemingly timeless, quiet reminiscing. Like two old friends reuniting after a long separation, one saying, "You've gotten old," and the other replying, "You're still the same."

Li Shimin suddenly smiled.

The smile was tinged with bitterness, relief, and a hint of ease that even he hadn't expected.

He spoke slowly, his voice hoarse and aged:
"One hundred and twenty-six years. To be alive enough to see you is already a blessing. As for Your Majesty, after more than a hundred years, you haven't changed a bit." (End of Chapter)