Hearing the witch's final remark, Zheng Qing's heart skipped slightly. The suggestion made earlier by the old wizards of Lishan Mountain on the Performance Stage echoed in his ears again, and he instinctively tugged at his sleeve.
"Um, speaking of those talismans..."
The young wizard mumbled, probing vaguely, "I heard that getting high scores on the Performance Stage earns you some Invitation Letters? Do you know anything about that?"
"Just heard?" Jiang Yu glanced at him with a half-smile.
Zheng Qing looked around guiltily, coughed heavily, and honestly pulled a thick stack of Invitation Letters from his sleeve.
"Quite the haul."
The witch took the Invitation Letters and flipped through them briefly, the corners of her lips curling upward. "Let's see. The O'Brien Family, the Black Family, the Hongnong Yang Family, the Shaoxing Zhou Family... Huh, even the Tianmen Zhang Clan sent you one. Zhang Jixin treats you like a brother, yet you're planning to become his little uncle-in-law?"
She shot the young wizard a sidelong glare.
Zheng Qing shook his head so hard it resembled a rattledrum.
The witch did not continue flipping through the specific contents of the Invitation Letters. With a light rub of her fingers, a ball of True Fire ignited at her fingertips, reducing them all to a cloud of ash. "...The greatest concern of Wizarding Families is the lack of successors. That's why, at hunting meets like Shanglin Garden, every family extends an olive branch to 'fresh blood' they are interested in... It doesn't necessarily mean they want you to breed."
Hearing Jiang Yu casually utter those scandalous words, Zheng Qing was startled. He failed to swallow a mouthful of saliva and nearly choked to death.
The witch turned a blind eye.
"...But whether it's as an adviser, a retainer, a patron, or something