Seeing Su Wen's plan.
Jiang Menghan gave her reply as well:
"Unfortunately, I'm not a transcendent. I can't go to the Samoa Islands with you."
"Don't worry."
Su Wen replied in his usual relaxed, calm tone:
"Just treat it as an all-expenses-paid trip. The scenery along the First Island Chain is quite beautiful."
He was very clear about the path ahead of him.
At present, the advancement source substance he definitely needed was the Storm Eagle Feather.
The other required material was still unclear.
So he naturally chose this place.
Fortunately, the destination was the Bosinian waters—the Samoa Islands.
If it had not belonged to the Pacific islands,
but had instead been within America or England, Su Wen would probably have found it difficult to qualify for the expedition.
Three days later.
At Jiang Xiuyuan's recommendation, he arrived at the old bookstore on Yulin West Street.
Old Man Lin had an excellent memory. The moment he saw Su Wen, he recognized him:
"You're that young man who once did community service here?"
"That's right. I hadn't become a transcendent at the time, so I didn't know your identity."
Although Su Wen had seen the old man's hidden identity with his appraisal skill from the very beginning,
he still had to keep up appearances.
But then,
Lin Yunwen's words left him utterly speechless:
"What do you think of my granddaughter?"
???
That topic had jumped way too far.
Old Man Lin's granddaughter.
Su Wen remembered meeting her only once.
She was indeed a rich young woman, but he had been carrying the budding seed of a future sixth-tier Life Forbidden Zone at the time. He had been practically giddy with joy, so how could he have had the time to think about such irrelevant things?
But he definitely could not answer that bluntly.
He said calmly:
"Old Mr. Lin, she was willing to pour me a glass of water back then, so at the very least, she seems like a good person.
But if you want me to say more than that,
I'm sorry.
I can't make rash judgments about someone based on a single meeting. That would be too shallow."
Hearing this,
Lin Yunwen naturally understood that Su Wen's polite words carried a certain distance.
So he smiled and casually moved past the matter:
"Then how much do you know about transcendents?"
"Transcendents were born from the deviation of Cosmic Background Radiation during the Origin Era and the activation of Dark Matter. Professor Gu Liunian mentioned this at the beginning of his book, Introduction to Spiritual Energy."
"Correct. Before Origin Year 5, aside from the secret records held by the Great Library, the Clock Tower, the Freemasons, and the Dragon Descendant Research Association,
most people knew absolutely nothing about such knowledge."
Old Man Lin was gentle in manner.
He waved, signaling Su Wen to sit down.
Then he continued,
"But in Qian Deng Ancient Town of Yunzhou, because of the fall of the meteorite—the Hai Xu Civilization—China made a tremendous breakthrough in its understanding of transcendent knowledge.
This also led to three major transcendent destinations:
1. Explorable fragments of worlds, known in ancient times as Blessed Lands and Grotto Heavens.
Now, they are defined as Knowledge Relics or Secret Treasure Relics.
2. Spatial layers accompanied by increasingly severe rationality contamination as exploration deepens—the Abyss Border.
3. Finally, places unimaginably far away, beyond even the distant reaches we cannot touch when gazing at the Milky Way in the dead of night.
Through the conversion of Dark Matter spatial energy,
an Einstein-Rosen bridge can be opened to another starfield or a certain planet. These places are called the Other Shore."
Su Wen silently committed this information to memory.
At the same time,
the system notification sounded as expected:
Transcendent knowledge recorded: Relic Transcendent knowledge recorded: Abyss Border Transcendent knowledge recorded: Other Shore
Lin Yunwen continued:
"For example, the 'Border' connected to Yunzhou City is the third entrance to the Perpetual Glacier.
According to Night Watch records, the earliest Perpetual Glacier border appeared in Siberia.
The Perpetual Glacier and the Lost Sea are both borders.
The Tree Realm connected through a natural Einstein-Rosen bridge in Congo, Africa, is the Other Shore.
And Storm Cliff in the Samoa Islands of the Polynesian region of the Pacific Ocean, where you are about to go,
is a relic.
It is also the transcendent foothold with the lowest danger level.
As for the golden species Monarch Domain studied by those people in the Dragon Descendant Research Association,
and the Deep Abyss, which cultists can only communicate with through sacrifices, normal people would never want to go to those places. Unless someone has a hole in their head, there is probably no point in knowing much about them."
After Lin Yunwen's description,
Su Wen seemed to glimpse a world far broader than this azure planet.
With a humble attitude, he asked:
"Then if I enter a relic, is there anything I need to prepare?"
"Bring a camera? Try to photograph as many breathtaking sights as you've never seen in your life."
Old Man Lin cracked a joke.
Then he continued.
"As long as you don't provoke the Storm Eagles or stand at the edge of the cliff looking into the distance when the tides come in,
simply picking up the feathers they have shed should not pose much of a problem."
Su Wen nodded.
But he did not leave.
After all, Lin Yunwen had invited him to finish this cup of tea.
As a visitor,
such respect for an elder was necessary.
During their hour of idle conversation,
Su Wen praised how Lin Yunwen's old bookstore had sold him middle-school tutoring books at such a "low price," helping him complete his schoolwork so efficiently.
At the same time,
in order to receive a higher rating within the Night Watch organization,
he also added a touch of artistic embellishment as he described how, with his parents away on business for years, he had stayed up late every night and eventually gained admission to his dream university.
Though in truth, ninety-nine percent of his late nights had been spent playing video games.
Still, Su Wen felt he could not overlook that one percent of his youthful days spent staying up to finish homework.
After all,
compared to the youthful days depicted in books and films,
Chinese students' lives mostly lacked those unforgettable stories beyond exams and studying.
Even so,
there would probably still be people who, on some chance day, remembered their past.
Then, ten years later, or perhaps twenty years later,
they would tell their sons or daughters about their high school and university experiences.
Su Wen thought he would probably do the same.
Of course.
After an hour of conversation,
it was time for him to leave:
"Old Mr. Lin, until we meet again."
"You should still call me Old Man Lin, brat. I actually remembered you the last time I saw you."
Lin Yunwen said, feigning anger,
"You were the one who soaked and wrinkled the pages of my treasured tea book five years ago."
But Su Wen merely smiled leisurely:
"I didn't expect you to remember. Actually, afterward, I specifically took that book home, dried it properly, and put it back where it belonged."
"Yes. Otherwise, why would I have told you so much? Go without worry, kid.
Remember this: the fifth line of the third section of the Night Watch code.
It is an oath written in Hebrew and engraved upon a bronze stele: 'The night shall fade, but dawn shall endure.'"
Su Wen nodded.
From this moment onward,
his opinion of Old Man Lin had changed.
And at the same time, he had truly gained the Night Watch's recognition.
Accompanied by the fading sound of the old bicycle's wheels,
fallen autumn leaves carpeted the tree-lined road.
They dyed everything with a golden hue.
Old Man Lin leaned back in his recliner and dialed a number on his phone, taking a sip of steaming green tea.
Only then did he say with a smiling squint:
"Xiaoqing, do you know who Grandpa was just talking to?"
Before you continue