Insufficient balance

  One year after the signing of the peace treaty.

  Early in the morning, the newly risen sun emitted soft morning light, illuminating this land that had been baptized by war. Civilians were busy making a living, and a person wrapped in white robes walked slowly on the street, as if no one noticed his presence.

  The man in white robes would lightly sway his feet whenever he was about to bump into a commoner, then reappear behind the commoner and continue walking slowly. The commoner, however, seemed as if nothing had happened and continued on their way.

  Standing at the entrance of the Tianlong City Orphanage, the white-robed person's hands emerged from his chest, holding a baby who was still fast asleep and had no idea he was about to be abandoned.

  "The figure in white robes looked at the infant being tightly hugged and said involuntarily: 'Young master, our whereabouts have been discovered by them, we can't continue like this. Please be at ease, after I divert their attention, I will definitely come back to pick you up.'"

  The man in white put down the baby gently and disappeared into the morning.

  A middle-aged monk picked up an abandoned baby left at the gate.

  The master sighed again and said, "Alas, how many abandoned babies have there been?"

  Xiao Xiuren is the principal of this orphanage. Since the truce between the Tianlong Empire and the Heilong Empire, His Majesty has established public orphanages in many major cities of the Tianlong Empire.

  Your Majesty does this not to show his own benevolence, but to cultivate these orphans into the talents needed by the empire, and warriors absolutely loyal to the empire.

  After all, the "Battle of Black Sky" has consumed too much military strength, and a large amount of fresh "blood" must be replenished. Whether it is the lowest-level warrior or the upper-level Refiner and Beastmaster, they need to actively cultivate themselves.

  Your Imperial Majesty has also explicitly decreed after the war: within the empire, it is not necessary to be an imperial citizen. If for whatever reason parents are unable to raise their children, they can send these children to orphanages established by the empire, and the empire will take care of them. However, there are conditions. First, the child must not be older than five years old; second, the child's body has no disability or illness; third, the parents and children have no relationship with each other, they only belong to the empire.

  As soon as the decree was issued, the number of abandoned babies in orphanages throughout the empire increased. Although the parents also knew that this was equivalent to sending their children to the empire.

  However, if one really can't afford to raise their child, no parent wants to see their child starve to death. The battle is over, but recovery takes time, and in such a chaotic period, it's already a problem whether one can survive themselves. Rather than watching their child die before their eyes, it's better to let them leave and live on.

  It's better to live a life of shame than to die with honor, this is what ordinary people think in their hearts.

  The baby in Xiao Xiu's arms didn't look like a newborn, judging from his size and weight, he was at least a week old. The child was sleeping peacefully with his eyes closed.

  "Hoo... hoo... hoo..."

  The round little face looked particularly cute between inhaling and exhaling. The deep blue swaddle tightly wrapped around the baby's body, the material was very soft and not something ordinary poor people could have. Xiao Xi felt this point and then examined the baby's body, as expected, on the baby's right arm there was a "Zheng" character.

  In the Azure Dragon Continent, many generations of great aristocratic families have their own family names, but having a family name carved on one's body is not a power that ordinary aristocrats can possess. One's ancestors must have had glorious achievements in the continent to be able to do so.

  These families take pride in this, and as soon as a child is born, they carve the family name on their body to represent orthodoxy. But why are children now being abandoned at the gates of orphanages?

  Xiao Xi couldn't help but sigh and say, "Another once glorious family has fallen." It was not the first time Xiao Xi had seen children with a clan name on their body. In this era, it was most common to see the rise of new nobles and the fall of old ones.

  Xiao Xiu went through the generations of the Tianlong Empire's aristocracy and couldn't find anyone with the surname "Zheng".

  It can be seen that this child is not a person of the Tianlong Empire. It should be that the family was killed by the enemy family, and in order to let the family continue, the child was not discovered by the enemy family, so they had to send the child out of the empire to avoid suspicion.

  But now it has been sent to an orphanage, and it seems that the family is indeed in name only, perhaps already extinct.

  No matter what, the baby has arrived at the orphanage now. In order to avoid trouble for him in the future, some things must be kept secret. Xiao Xiu's left palm pressed on the child's right arm with the clan name and said: "Guanzong, fusion."

  Suddenly, a lizard-shaped green light appeared on Xiao Xiu's left arm and quickly wrapped around his palm.

  "Hide."

  As the sound faded away, the tribal name on the baby's right arm slowly disappeared and turned into a color similar to the surrounding skin, without any noticeable difference. The baby didn't feel disturbed at all and continued to sleep soundly.

  Xiao Xiu's movements seemed slow, but in reality everything was completed in an instant.

  After erasing the surname of the infant, Xiao Xiu couldn't help but smile bitterly as he thought: I was able to become the director of this imperial orphanage just by relying on my beast-taming skills. It seems that His Majesty saw through my hidden talent. However, this way, it's a good thing for both the empire and the child, and can reduce a lot of unnecessary trouble.

  Xiao Xiu's only soul beast is that green lizard from just now - Chameleon.

  Chameleons are the lowest level of magical creatures and don't have any powerful abilities, all they can do is change the color of objects to achieve concealment.

  However, this ability has a remarkable effect when used for reconnaissance on the battlefield or in other places. Xiao Xiu was originally a retired scout from the battlefield, and because of his special ability, he was assigned as the principal of the Imperial Capital Orphanage after his retirement.

  It seems that the Empire had known from the beginning that there would definitely be some "special individuals" among the children in this orphanage, and had prepared Xiao Xi for this purpose. Xiao Xi couldn't help but admire the person who thought of all this.

  What he didn't know was that the person who had deliberately arranged for him to become the head of this orphanage was none other than the current prime minister, Mr. Fan.

  Xiao Xiu looked at the child and thought: You originally had a surname, so I won't give you another one. Just like before, your surname is Zheng. There are many people on the mainland with the surname Zheng, no one will suspect you because of your surname. From today on, you'll be called Zheng Feng.

  I hope that you children of these declining aristocratic families will make achievements for the empire in the future, restore the glory of your ancestors, and perhaps at that time your family name can be revealed again.

  At this moment, Xiao Xiu did not think that the surname Zheng was a common surname on the Qinglong Continent, but it might be different on other continents.

  In the blink of an eye, four years have passed.

  The sun was shining brightly in the sky. In the mountains behind the Imperial City of Tianlong, if one were to look down from above, they could see two small shadows running through the forest.

  A little boy with silver short hair stumbled after a girl, shouting: "Sister... wait for me, waaahh... don't run so fast... waaahh... it hurts..." His voice was clearly trembling with tears.

  But the girl in front seemed to have not heard it, she didn't turn her head back, and continued running without stopping, covering her face with both hands, her expression filled with fear, as if being chased by some extremely ferocious beast, and would lose her life once she stopped.

  The girl should not be very old, probably between nine and ten years old. She has a head of brown long hair tied with a ponytail, which keeps shaking as she runs. Girls have always matured earlier than boys since ancient times, and this girl already looks like a beautiful young woman.

  A buzzing noise was coming from behind, the sound getting clearer and clearer, the girl ran even more desperately.

  Let's take a look back, only to see a large pile of bees following behind the little boy, from time to time there will be a bee and the little boy who come into "close contact", every time this happens the little boy always makes a "Woo... it hurts..." crying sound.

  Alas, kids these days are fearless, the two of them must have poked a beehive. Now they know fear and regret it.

  ．．．．．．