"Does he have to meddle with everyone who doesn't like the pipa?"
"Can he really keep up with all that?"
The old man shook his head.
Meddling in everything under heaven, and now even in whether people liked the pipa...
Did that young man like the pipa so much?
Or was he just too bored?
For a moment, the old man didn't know whether to laugh or get angry.
"It would be hard not to meddle when it came across you."
Xiao Xiao smiled.
The old man: ...
Well, put that way... it did make some sense.
The old man stared at the young man in front of him.
The other man had been polite the whole time.
And persistent, too.
He could feel how determined he was.
The other man genuinely wanted an answer from him.
The old man sighed deeply to himself.
"I hate the pipa..."
The old man's voice trailed off.
He had never told anyone about this.
After all these years, he'd thought he'd forgotten...
He'd thought he'd come to terms with it...
But these past few days had taught him...
No.
He hadn't forgotten.
And he hadn't truly come to terms with it, either.
"Good grief, why am I telling you all this..."
The old man paced around irritably.
"Can't you just tell your friend you didn't find anything out?"
"Come to think of it, if he wants to know why I hate the pipa, why doesn't he come ask me himself?"
"When he found out I hated the pipa, why didn't he ask me why?"
Instead, he had to send someone over to ask afterward?
"It wanted to ask you itself, too..."
Xiao Xiao smiled, looking a little helpless.
But the old man couldn't see the Pipa ghost.