Jing Jiu brought Liu S sui into the residence and came to the courtyard where a crabapple tree should have stood.
Little Lotus was sweeping up broken porcelain. At the sight of the two of them, she gave a soft cry of delighted surprise, then came to her senses and hurriedly knelt to pay her respects.
Liu S sui walked over and knelt beside her, bowing respectfully.
"Does this count as getting married?" Jing Jiu asked.
Liu S sui thought, If you want to see it that way, young master, that works too.
The courtyard gate shifted slightly, and Jing Li hurried over. He dropped to his knees with a smack, his shoulders trembling faintly, unable to make a sound as he wept.
Jing Jiu looked at this man with graying temples and unmistakable signs of age, and sighed inwardly.
In this life, his name was Jing Jiu.
He regarded the Jing Residence, not far from the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, as home.
When he had told Gu Qing to take him home before falling asleep, this was the place he meant.
He truly regarded Jing Li as his nephew. He had tasked Lord White Ghost, the Green Mountain Guardian, with introducing him to cultivation, and Gu Qing had personally taught him swordsmanship. No matter how ordinary Jing Li's talent was, his cultivation should not still have been so low, nor should he have grown so old at little more than a hundred.
This could mean only one thing: Jing Li had not put his heart into cultivation. Naturally, that was because his heart had long been as good as dead.
Jing Jiu said nothing. He looked at him quietly for a moment, then went to the study.
"The Jing Household's Old Master passed away many years ago.