Just then, Liu Qing distinctly felt the boy on his back begin to stir. The jolting run must have woken him. Liu Qing immediately set him down and called out encouragingly. The boy's eyelids twitched, then his eyes flew open. But he also shoved Liu Qing hard, sending him landing on his backside.
"I'll never hand Celebi over to you!" The boy did not seem fully awake yet, and he staggered as he stood.
"Hey, wake up! Snap out of it!" Naturally, Liu Qing was not going to get angry with a boy who now looked younger than he was. He got up, held the agitated boy by the shoulders, and shook him while calling out loudly.
After Liu Qing's shaking and shouting, the boy seemed to calm down. He looked at Liu Qing, then at his surroundings.
"What... happened?" Suddenly at a loss, the boy spoke in a daze.
"That's exactly what we wanted to ask you," Liu Qing replied, though he had already guessed that Celebi might have been responsible.
"What's going on?" Miku and her grandmother had climbed down the wooden ladder from the treehouse by then. Miku asked the question, while her grandmother, Towa, suddenly looked astonished and ran toward the boy.
"You're... yes, you're the boy from back then... thank goodness." As she spoke, Towa placed her hands on the boy's shoulders and hugged him, leaving him utterly bewildered.
"Grandmother, do you know him?" Miku asked.
"Didn't I tell you before? About the boy who disappeared in this forest forty years ago?" Miku's grandmother released him and answered.
"Could it be... this boy?" Miku looked utterly astonished.
"Yes, there's no doubt about it," Towa said, looking at the boy again.
"Oh, you're the lady who gave me bread back then?" The boy seemed to remember