At dinner, Zhu Bajie made a pot of soup.
He used greens picked from the garden and mushrooms Sha Wujing had gathered in the mountains.
The soup was light, but Goten had two bowls.
It had been a long time since he'd enjoyed such a quiet meal—without a fight, pursuers, or the crushing urgency of life and death.
Zhu Bajie held his bowl and squatted on the doorstep, taking a sip of soup with a satisfied sigh. "If every day were like this, who the hell would want to be Marshal Tianpeng?"
Sha Wujing sat in the corner, sipping his soup without a word.
But there was a rare look on his face—not calm, but at ease.
Zhi Zun Bao sat at the table, pushing the greens around in his bowl with his chopsticks, with little appetite.
It wasn't that the soup tasted bad. He just couldn't stop thinking about what had happened.
He had shattered the Immortal-Trapping Array.
He'd shattered the Immortal-Trapping Array, reinforced by the Jade Emperor, with a bamboo pole. It wasn't luck or an accident—his body remembered something his mind didn't.
"Hey..." Zhi Zun Bao put down his chopsticks. "Goten, who do you think I really am?"
The air around the table fell quiet for a moment.
Goten put down his bowl and thought seriously before answering. "Only you can decide who you are."
"That's bullshit..."
"It's not." Goten spoke earnestly. "My dad once told me that it doesn't matter who other people say you are. What matters is who you believe you are. If you think you're a bandit chief, then be a bandit chief. If you think you're Son Goku, then go be him. No one says you can only choose one."
Zhi Zun Bao fell silent.
He picked up his bowl and drained the soup in a few big gulps, then set it down on the table with a crisp clack. "Tomorrow, when you learn Immortal Art... can I come watch?"
Goten smiled.
It was the first time Zhi Zun Bao had wanted to get closer to what he was doing—not because he had no choice, but because he wanted to. "Of course."
Leaning against the doorframe, Zhu Bajie watched them and narrowed his eyes.
He'd lived for so many years and seen countless partings and reunions, but he'd never seen a group quite like this: a boy from another world, a fairy hunted by the Heavenly Court, a bandit chief whose origins were unknown, a pig demon banished to the mortal realm, and a silent river demon. Somehow, together, they felt like a family.
He drained his bowl and smacked his lips. He had to admit, these were the most human days he'd had since being cast down to the mortal realm.
That night, Goten sat alone beneath the Old Locust Tree.
Moonlight streamed through the leaves, casting dappled shadows across the ground.
He closed his eyes and pressed a hand against the trunk, continuing to practice what he'd learned during the day.
But there was something he couldn't stop thinking about: what kind of Immortal Art was the move Patriarch Bodhi had promised to teach him tomorrow?
He opened his eyes—and saw someone standing opposite him.
Patriarch Bodhi.
Goten hadn't sensed him coming at all.
Even though his perception was several times stronger than when he'd first arrived, he still hadn't caught the slightest trace of Patriarch Bodhi's approach.
"Can't sleep?"
Goten nodded honestly. "I was wondering what I'd learn tomorrow."
Patriarch Bodhi came over and sat beside him—a gesture that took Goten slightly by surprise.
He'd thought Patriarch Bodhi only sat in pavilions or caves, not on the bare earth. "Want a preview?"
Goten's eyes lit up. "I can?"
A hint of a smile appeared at the corner of Patriarch Bodhi's mouth.
He raised a finger and gently tapped the air ten feet in front of them. A ripple appeared, as if a stone had been dropped into still water.
The ripples spread outward, and then a door appeared: a door made of golden light, floating in midair.
"W-what is that?"
"A Portal." Patriarch Bodhi spoke as casually as if he were commenting on the weather. "Use your Origin Energy to mark a coordinate in space, and you can open a door to that location from anywhere. Sun Wukong's Somersault Cloud can travel a hundred and eight thousand li in one flip. This is slower, but it can carry other people with you."
Goten stared at the golden door, his heart speeding up.
It was even more incredible than Instant Transmission in the Dragon Ball World. Instant Transmission required him to sense the other person's ki, but this didn't.
Once he'd marked a coordinate, he could open the door whenever and wherever he wanted.
He reached out to touch the door. The moment his fingertips brushed the golden light, a warm force pulled him inside.
The next second, he found himself standing in the pavilion atop the mountain.
He turned around and watched the door fade away behind him.
"Whoa..."
Patriarch Bodhi had somehow appeared in the pavilion too. He hadn't taken the door—he'd simply walked over. "This move is called the 'Star Gate.'"
"Star Gate..." Goten repeated the name, his eyes alight. "How long will it take me to learn it?"
"I told you—once you've built a solid foundation, you'll learn it naturally." Patriarch Bodhi looked at him. "Do you think your foundation is solid?"
Before dawn the next day, Goten was already up.
When he went to the Old Locust Tree from the day before, he saw that Zhi Zun Bao was already there.
Zhi Zun Bao sat on the ground, leaning against the trunk. He looked as if he'd been waiting for a while.
He held a new bamboo pole in his hands—the sixth—but wasn't practicing. He was just sitting there, gazing at the distant horizon and waiting for dawn.
Goten sat down beside him.
Neither of them spoke. They watched the sky slowly brighten, changing from deep blue to gray-blue, from gray-blue to pale gray, until the first golden ray pierced the clouds.
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