As far as Ai Qing knew, the friendship between the Yin Family and the Huai Family dated back eighty years.
Back then, Huai Shi's great-grandfather had been a rare Fourth-Tier Ascendant who amassed a vast fortune in the open frontier and retired after achieving success.
At the time, he had provided the Yin Family with considerable support and played no small role in helping the already declining Yin clan regain its footing.
But after Huai Shi's great-grandfather passed away, the Yin clan began rising once more, while the Huai Family never produced another Ascender and gradually declined.
In the end, when the Huai Family most desperately needed capital to stay afloat, the Yin Family chose to kick them while they were down, leaving the Huai Family utterly unable to recover.
Then Huai Shi's grandfather died, and Huai Shi's parents vanished without a trace along with a large sum of assets. That was the final straw that broke the camel's back.
The whole process had gone so smoothly that it could have filled eight hundred thousand words on Qidian. If there was nothing shady behind it, not even ghosts would believe it.
It was a feast prepared by all parties together. The Yin clan ate the meat, Qi Wen drank the soup, and in the end, Huai Shi was left behind as a fig leaf.
See? It was not that I had forgotten old ties. This was merely ordinary business competition. It was only that your descendants had been too disappointing.
For old times' sake, I even left you a scrap of food. How compassionate of me.
Now you could not say I had gone too far, could you?
They gained tangible benefits, preserved the Yin Family's dignity, and had an explanation for their deceased old friend. Three birds with one