The Master and Qingqing

Before long, Four Eyes lay resting in a chair, Healing Talismans plastered all over him.

Lin Yu sat speechlessly to one side, stripped clean of his talismans.

Jia Le was busy bustling about, putting the corpses in order. He gave Lin Yu, who had warned him earlier, a friendly nod.

He didn't dare ask questions now. All he knew was that Lin Yu called his master martial uncle and was his junior brother.

One might think Four Eyes was strict.

But Lin Yu felt that Four Eyes truly treated Jia Le as his own personal disciple.

In the Daoist trade, going hungry was the least of your worries if you didn't have some skill. You might even lose your life one day.

Naturally, Four Eyes didn't want to see the day when a white-haired man had to bury a black-haired one.

After all, Jia Le's talent was only average, and he spent all day in this little mountain ravine, with no experience of the wider world.

Four Eyes hoped that by being strict now, Jia Le would make something of himself in the future.

In truth, Four Eyes sometimes wondered whether he was being too strict, afraid that Jia Le would be hurt.

But whenever he went out transporting corpses and saw people about Jia Le's age lying dead in the streets, he suppressed the reluctance in his heart.

A good disciple came from the rod. Only by learning his corpse-transporting craft would Jia Le have a skill to earn a living with when he went out into the world.

As for his God-Invoking Technique, Four Eyes didn't hold out hope for Jia Le, given his talent.

Four Eyes knew better than to bite off more than one could chew. Not everyone was Lin Yu.

If not for Lin Yu, perhaps he would only have brought it out and passed it to Jia Le when he was dying, so the inheritance wouldn't die out.

Unfortunately, Jia Le didn't understand Four Eyes's painstaking intentions. Otherwise, he surely would have shouted, "Master, your love is heavier than a mountain! I can't bear it!"

"Master~ I'm all done." After all his hard work, Jia Le came over and knelt before Four Eyes, looking aggrieved.

"Hmm? Good, Jia Le is such a good boy. Master loves you the most, doesn't he?"

Four Eyes reached up and lifted the talismans covering his eyes. Opening his sleepy eyes, he reached out and pinched Jia Le's cheeks.

Lin Yu's talismans really did feel wonderful. He was so comfortable now that he was nearly asleep.

"Come with me. Hah~ Xiao Yu, you come too." Yawning, Four Eyes led Lin Yu and Jia Le away.

After washing up, they came before the portrait of their ancestral master.

"Pay your respects to the ancestral master." Four Eyes set an incense burner on the offering table.

Then he respectfully formed a hand seal and paid his respects.

Lin Yu and Jia Le also knelt behind Four Eyes, solemnly following his movements as they worshipped.

Unfortunately, Four Eyes hadn't stayed solemn for long before he started fooling around again.

He grabbed at the incense smoke rising from the burner and stuffed it into his mouth, then grabbed another handful and pressed it onto the top of his head.

Lin Yu looked at Jia Le in puzzlement. What kind of worship was that?

Jia Le waved a hand, signaling Lin Yu not to speak.

"All right."

Once everything was done, Four Eyes stood up and drew the curtains.

"Martial uncle, what were you doing just now?"

As Lin Yu spoke, he mimicked Four Eyes's movements.

"Pfft~" Jia Le finally couldn't hold it in and burst out laughing.

"Ow!"

Four Eyes slapped Jia Le on the head and began to explain. "What do you know? That's called receiving the ancestral master's gifts to the fullest. Absorbing more helps with cultivating the God-Invoking Technique."

"Oh~" Isn't that just groveling? He makes it sound so grand.

On the surface, Lin Yu looked as though he'd learned something, but inwardly he was speechless. Who worshipped like that?

"Then I'll go make you breakfast, Master." Seeing that everything was fine, Jia Le ran excitedly to the kitchen.

"Being so kind for no reason? Making me breakfast?!" Four Eyes looked as though he'd seen a ghost.

In the past, Jia Le would only start cooking at lunchtime, when Four Eyes was too hungry to bear it any longer.

Now he was being attentive for no reason. He was up to no good.

"Oh, right, Master, I forgot to tell you. The master next door is back." Jia Le gestured as he deliberately changed the subject.

"So he's back. What, am I supposed to go pay my respects to him?" He'd come back without even coming to see Four Eyes. If Jia Le hadn't mentioned it, he wouldn't even have known. Did the master still think of him as an old friend of many years?

The master certainly lived up to his name; he'd diverted Four Eyes's attention in an instant.

"Well, now you'll have to squeeze in with Jia Le." Four Eyes grinned with malicious delight.

"The master's coming over." Just then, Jia Le saw the master walking toward the door.

"Just tell him I'm not feeling well."

Seeing the master arrive the moment he was mentioned, Four Eyes immediately hid his smile. He didn't want to see him right now.

"Hey, junior brother, why did Master say you had to squeeze in with me?" Jia Le looked curiously at Lin Yu.

"Someone wasn't here, so a certain person thought about taking over his house. But his plan fell through before he could even carry it out," Lin Yu whispered in Jia Le's ear.

"No way! Who's so immoral, doing something so utterly heartless?" Jia Le looked ready to stand up for the household in question.

"Your master, of course." Holding back a laugh, Lin Yu told Jia Le who it was.

"Ah!" Jia Le instantly wilted.

Now he also knew whose house his master had intended to take over.

"Jia Le~" By then, the master had reached the door.

Hearing the call, Jia Le hurried out to greet him, while Lin Yu followed behind to take a look.

"Oh, Master, Qingqing, you're here." The moment Jia Le saw Qingqing, his face blossomed into a smile.

His eyes hadn't left her since she arrived.

"Who is this child?" The master spotted Lin Yu behind Jia Le and asked curiously.

"This is..." Jia Le realized that he didn't seem to know his junior brother's name yet.

"My name is Lin Yu. My master is Lin Jiu, and my martial uncle is Four Eyes. I've come to visit my martial uncle. Greetings, Master, Miss Qingqing." Lin Yu stepped forward of his own accord to spare Jia Le the embarrassment.

"Amitabha. This humble monk greets you." The master hadn't expected the eight-year-old child before him to understand such etiquette.

He could only say that Lin Jiu's outstanding disciple lived up to his reputation, unlike Four Eyes, who set a crooked example all day long.

The master and Qingqing looked Lin Yu over.

Lin Yu was also curiously sizing up the two of them.

The master was plainly dressed in a single gray Buddhist robe. He wasn't tall, and his head wasn't oddly smooth like those of the monks at Shaolin Temple; instead, short stubble had grown out.

He looked kindly overall, though his face had a slightly comical quality, much like Four Eyes's.

The young woman, meanwhile, had delicate features, wore red, and had two large braids. She was very lively.

She was the complete opposite of a refined young lady from a prominent family like Ren Tingting.

"Young benefactor, you are truly an impressive young man. I can see that, young as you are, you should already possess magical power." A trace of astonishment flashed through the master's eyes.

Although he couldn't tell how advanced Lin Yu's cultivation was,

he had genuinely sensed a trace of magical power. This child, who only came up to his thigh, had certainly already taken his first steps in cultivation.

For some reason, even experts like Uncle Nine couldn't see through Lin Yu's cultivation. To find out, they could only ask him themselves.

"Of course. Just look at whose disciple he is." Four Eyes pushed the door open and came out.

"Not yours, anyway."

The moment the master saw Four Eyes, he started sniping at him.

Those two really were a pair of bickering frenemies.

"You... Hmph. He's still one of us from Maoshan. Xiao Yu's talent is the best I've ever seen," Four Eyes boasted, his face full of pride.

When they had a genius among the younger generation, these elders had to bring him up to show off every day.