"Not bad. At least the boy didn't let me down—he's no mud that won't hold up on a wall." Lin Dongfang's tone carried a note of relief, as though he had been bracing for the worst.

"Hey, hey—you're my grandfather, after all. Is there any need to think so little of me?" Wei Zhao was caught between laughing and crying. Then he asked, "By the way, you said just now that my whole family is fighting the Center. What about you, old man? Are you and the Center sworn enemies too?"

"Me? My sworn brother—your master—is locked in a death struggle with the Center. My daughter and my son-in-law are locked in a death struggle with the Center. Anyone who has even a shred of friendship with me is locked in a death struggle with the Center. What do you suppose my relationship with the Center is?" Lin Dongfang pursed his lips.

"So you were dragged onto a pirate ship, were you?" Wei Zhao teased.

"Not exactly. I was already on board—there was no dragging about it." Lin Dongfang laughed heartily.

"Then that settles it. Why don't you tell me more about my parents, old man? I've been waiting all this time!" Wei Zhao urged him once more, unable to contain himself.

"If you really want to know these things, then wait until you meet them and ask them yourself. What's the point of asking me?" Lin Dongfang seized the chance to play coy.

"..." Wei Zhao was speechless for a moment, but then he caught on, and both startled and delighted, he said, "I can still see them? They're not dead?"

"What kind of talk is that? My daughter and son-in-law are perfectly well. Is this how a son behaves—cursing them before you've even laid eyes on them?" Lin Dongfang could not help but shoot him a glare.

"No, no, I was just too excited, that's why I spoke without thinking." Wei Zhao shook his head again and again. In his imagination, since his parents had entrusted him to Lin Dongfang, his grandfather, it must have been because some misfortune had befallen them—otherwise, what parent in the world would casually hand their child over to someone else, even if that someone was the child's grandfather? And now, learning that both his parents were still alive, Wei Zhao's heart was filled with a mixture of astonishment, joy, and complexity.

Seeing the complicated expression on Wei Zhao's face, Lin Dongfang sought to comfort him. "Don't think too much about it. They had their own deep reasons for leaving you with me—after all, this place of mine is one of the few rare patches of pure land left in the world, untouched by the strife outside."

"Mm." Wei Zhao nodded. He was a broad-minded person by nature; a matter like this might have driven an ordinary man to obsess and gnaw at himself, but he would not overthink it. Just as Lin Dongfang said, since his parents had made such arrangements, they must have had reasons they could not help, and when they met again in the future, all would naturally become clear.

"All right, if there's anything else you want to ask, ask it now while you can. I'm telling you up front—no waiting once the time's up." Lin Dongfang hurried him along. He had already caught the smell of Aunt Qing's cooking from afar, and compared to rambling on about these matters with Wei Zhao, eating was plainly more important to him.

"Fine. Let me ask something off-topic. I've asked these questions plenty of times before, and you never would say a word. What made you suddenly tell me so much today?" Wei Zhao could not help but wonder.

"The sun must have risen in the west," Lin Dongfang said offhandedly, without the least sincerity.

"Uh..." Wei Zhao was speechless again, and he said with a bitter smile, "I asked so seriously and sincerely—even if you're just humoring me, could you at least be a little sincere about it? This is downright disrespectful!"

"All right. Since you've asked so earnestly, I'll graciously humor you with a bit more sincerity. I didn't tell you these things before because your level wasn't high enough, boy—say a hundred things and it'd still be wasted breath. But now, well, it's still useless, but at least it can point you in the direction you should be striving toward, so you don't just mark time and grow smug with yourself. That good enough for you?" Lin Dongfang said, glancing at him sidelong.

"Still completely insincere, but at least it sounds more like human speech." Wei Zhao chuckled. "Actually, even without all that, I would never mark time. Because I don't cultivate just for myself—I cultivate for the people around me. For their sake, I could never stop moving forward."

That was the truth. Take what he had done on Cloud Terrace Island: returning to the mundane world to heal his bevy of beauties had been his greatest driving force, and it was precisely for that reason that he had never dared slacken for a moment. In a mere three years he had shot all the way from the early Foundation Establishment stage to the early Mystic Ascension stage—a miracle that, quite apart from outsiders finding it hard to understand, seemed unbelievable even to him when he looked back on it.

"Not bad. So you do have some sense of responsibility after all," Lin Dongfang said—a rare word of praise.

"Oh, right—there's one more thing I've been wanting to ask." Wei Zhao suddenly produced the jade pendant he wore close to his body and asked, "What's the story with this jade pendant of mine? You must know, don't you?"

Although the pendant had come to him by chance encounter in the cave dwelling, once he had gradually discovered its wondrous properties, he knew its origins could not be simple. And from Lin Dongfang's subsequent behavior, it was plain that the old man was definitely in the know—and very likely, this wondrous jade pendant had everything to do with the old man.

At that, Lin Dongfang was silent for a moment, as though recalling the past, and then he slowly began: "Back then, your master and I, and your father too, roamed together through the valleys of Miao Territory. There we came to know a very formidable doctor of science and technology. His name was Sun Jichuan."

"Wait! Sun Jichuan?!" A flash went through Wei Zhao's mind, and he leaped up in shock. "Isn't Sun Jichuan Jingjing's master? He was actually a friend of yours?"

"Not only that—he was one of the mad scientists under your grandfather's command. Back then he came to Earth precisely to protect your father. In a sense, it was even a pair of his wondrous spectacles that made your master what he is—that was the starting point from which your master rose from the ordinary to the extraordinary." Here Lin Dongfang could not help but grow a little wistful.

He thought back to those years—his own days had been as full of legend and color as Wei Zhao's. The name of the Twin Vajra Fiends had once struck terror into the hearts of all who heard it, and now here he was, tucked away in West Star Mountain Village, living out his old age. The thought drew a sigh from him.

"Then what does he have to do with the jade pendant?" Wei Zhao was utterly bewildered by all this.

"The connection is simple. He made it." Lin Dongfang's words were shocking.

"Huh? He made it? This thing can actually be made by human hands?" Wei Zhao was absolutely dumbstruck. The longer he had it, the more he discovered the marvels of his jade pendant—to call it a thing that steals the craftsmanship of heaven and earth was no exaggeration at all. He had always assumed it must be some exotic treasure of the natural world, and never imagined that Sun Jichuan had created it. What level of technology would that take?! (To be continued.)