Wait, How Did My Digital Girlfriend Become a Sword Immortal? Chapter 777: Making it up with all your might

Li Qingran halted in her tracks, spinning around with a bewildered look. "What's the issue?"

For an instant, her chest felt constricted.

Had her secret identity been exposed...

In appearance, she served as the rightful heir of the Flame Boar Family. Normally, awakening a sword as her Battle Soul made no sense. During the recent days, she had pored over numerous tales from the Canglan Continent. True enough, some Soul Masters had roused Battle Souls that deviated from their family's inherited bloodlines.

Yet, such cases typically fell into just three categories.

Illegitimate offspring, altered Battle Soul, or a Battle Soul tied closely to the lineage.

The initial case required little elaboration. If the child didn't stem from the true line, why would it carry the family bloodline? The latter case resembled the Flame Boar lineage producing a Suckling Pig Beast Battle Soul, something fairly ordinary.

The middle case, altered Battle Soul, proved exceedingly uncommon.

Still, these altered Battle Souls split into beneficial changes and harmful ones.

Certain altered Battle Souls ended up weaker than their standard versions.

Likewise, a commonplace Battle Soul might transform via alteration into a formidable force. That said, altered Battle Souls lacked the bloodline transmission quality. They couldn't found expansive Battle Soul lineage clans; instead, they functioned as elite fighters or key figures inside a given family.

Her present predicament didn't qualify as an altered Battle Soul, nor as one linked closely to the bloodline.

It resembled Yang Fei having betrayed the Flame Boar Family leader, Li Ji, with infidelity.

Yet Li Qingran understood Yang Fei hadn't committed any such act.

Her Battle Soul state right now stood out as irregular, and she dreaded anyone detecting the flaw.

Beyond the Canglan Mirror, Chen Huaian gripped with equal anxiety, barely breathing, fearing interference was imminent.

Why not simply allow his cherished apprentice to finish her awakening?

What prompted this abrupt summons...

The Soul Master lifted his gaze and declared, "Should I send two Soul Masters to accompany you home? If you require purchases, request them from the escorts. Later, they'll guide you to the Battle Soul Hall as well."

He had reviewed Li Qingran's records.

He understood that Li Qingran and her mother Yang Fei had faced expulsion from the Flame Boar Family.

No matter if Li Qingran truly was an illegitimate child, the Battle Soul Hall prioritized raw talent over domestic dramas. Suppose the Flame Boar Family stirred up issues over Li Qingran's Battle Soul and shattered his promising path?

Offering escorts upfront seemed wiser.

It would demonstrate to the Flame Boar Family the depth of their regard for Li Qingran.

Li Qingran: "..."

Ah, merely an escort detail.

In that case, no problem.

Her affinity for this realm grew a touch warmer.

Though her entry had brought a slew of harsh encounters at first, beyond those select few, the rest of the folks she met showed genuine kindness.

"I appreciate it greatly."

Li Qingran nearly performed a cupped-hand bow out of habit but recalled this realm lacked such customs. She swiftly tucked her hands behind her.

The Soul Master blinked at Li Qingran's odd motion for a second but brushed it aside.

Two Soul Masters clad in Battle Soul Hall uniforms accompanied Li Qingran.

They journeyed straight to the modest, rough dwelling where she and her mother lodged for now.

Upon spotting her daughter returning unharmed and learning of her successful awakening—complete with the fabled innate full Soul Power—Yang Fei welled up with tears. She drew Li Qingran into a fierce hug.

"Amazing! Amazing! Mother believed... Mother believed you had it in you!" she sobbed, running her fingers through Li Qingran's hair over and over, as though reluctant to stop.

But upon hearing that Li Qingran had summoned not the ancestral Flame Boar, but an unfamiliar longsword instead, Yang Fei's delight shifted instantly to astonishment laced with dread.

"A sword? How could that happen?" she whispered instinctively, her complexion draining as she clutched Li Qingran's hand with urgency. "Qingran, Mother... Mother swears on the heavens, I never betrayed the Li Family in any way!

You truly carry the Li Family bloodline!

This... what's really happening here?"

She feared her daughter might bear the label of "illegitimate daughter."

Even more, she worried this abrupt change could draw unwanted dangers.

Still, Li Qingran viewed it as trivial.

Having already departed the Flame Boar Family, did legitimacy even matter anymore?

Yang Fei had wed into the Flame Boar Family for years, though. Witnessing Li Qingran awaken her Battle Soul with innate full Battle Power, she couldn't shake a lingering dream of reclaiming status there. Regardless, Li Qingran refused to accompany Yang Fei back.

The pair of Soul Masters traded looks at these words.

Li Qingran wasn't an illegitimate daughter? That struck them as odd.

Suddenly, the elder Soul Master interjected. "Madam, please don't worry.

While Battle Soul alterations are scarce, they do occur.

May I inquire, prior to Miss Li's return to the family, where did she mostly reside?

Did anything out of the ordinary happen to her?"

At this, Li Qingran adopted a fitting expression of unease mixed with hazy memory.

She dipped her head a bit, her tone soft with a faint undercurrent of unease. "I... my early years are fuzzy in my mind.

I only faintly recall it was in a vast forest... No steady home. We wandered wherever we went. For meals, we'd gather wild berries or unearth edible tubers. For water, we'd sip from spring sources... By night, we'd rest in tree cavities at times, or simply... on the earth..."

So her daughter had endured such hardships during those wandering days?

Listening to Li Qingran's account and reflecting on the fragments of those wilderness years, Yang Fei brimmed with grief and remorse, yet also a delayed terror.

World Beasts roamed those untamed peaks freely. How extraordinarily fortunate had young Li Qingran been to evade their savage jaws?

Reuniting with her daughter now felt like divine favor.

Li Qingran hesitated, as if straining to remember, her words even quieter. "I think... there was an enormous... World Beast?

It showed no desire to hurt me. Occasionally, it offered portions of its kills...

I was small then and felt no fright. I just... stayed with it and its young for a while.

Eventually... one day, a group of mighty figures arrived, aiming to slay it...

It suffered severe wounds, concealed me and its offspring... I never encountered it again...

After that, I fled wildly, unsure how far, until a city appeared."

Every bit of this tale was fabricated, naturally.

Under pressure, she had no choice but to spin the yarn as best she could.

Nevertheless, as a seasoned Cultivator, she excelled at deception.

Delivering these lines, her cheeks stayed calm, her pulse steady, like she'd lived that very past.

However, Li Qingran had misjudged the savvy of these Soul Masters.

Though she aimed to avoid deceit, to them, her narrative brimmed with inconsistencies.

At once, a frown creased someone's brow.