Once Wang Xiaoliang understood where Zhao Xiuqin and Wei Zijin stood, he stopped pressing the matter. He took Wei Zijin to brush their teeth and wash their faces, shared a passionate kiss with her, then went to the study.
The study was just as it had been before he left for university: a desk, a bookcase, and a single bed. As he lay on the bed, a sense of security he had not felt in a long time enveloped him.
But he tossed and turned, unable to fall asleep.
He sat up and pulled the carefully paper-wrapped Book of Fate from the side of the suitcase at the foot of the bed.
He had made a point of bringing it before setting off. But in the crowded airport departure lounge, with eyes everywhere, or aboard the plane, he had never felt at ease enough to take it out even once.
In noisy surroundings, he found he did not want to take it out at all.
Only now that he was home, back on his own turf, did that feeling disappear.
He unwrapped the paper, revealing the timeworn cover, and followed the bookmark to the latest page.
[Twenty-Four Arts of Fate Changing: To savor the true flavor of conversation, one must meet the other as an equal. This holds even among one's closest kin. Should either cling to distinctions of rank, their exchange will be nothing but hollow formalities and conventional pleasantries.]
Wang Xiaoliang read it word by word, silently putting it into everyday terms.
To get something truly valuable and meaningful out of a conversation, you have to treat the other person as an equal.
The same applies even to the people closest to you.
*If either person refuses to let go of the hierarchy between elder and