Li Qing’s smile faded. Her lips pushed out into a small pout, but she obeyed Wu Lingtian and began eating. The disciples nearby assumed that this was Wu Lingtian’s way of politely telling another family’s child to stop talking, but to their surprise, Wu Lingtian’s mellow voice sounded again.

“Yesterday, I was with Third Pillar,” Wu Lingtian said.

Li Qing perked up again. “What were you and Shishu doing?”

Wu Lingtian looked at Li Qing, who was at most eleven years old, and felt that he most likely should not inform the child about her shishu’s day drinking habits. “He was showing me around WuYe City.”

“Oh,” Li Qing nodded. “Ren-shishu says that Tian-shishu knows the city very well.”

Wu Lingtian ignored the suggestive tone in her voice. “Hm.”

“Tian-shishu likes going out at night the most,” Li Qing continued.

“Oh?”

“Mm-hm! He comes back extremely late. We’re all usually asleep when he returns,” Li Qing said. “This one time, I heard Shizun tell him not to stay out too late.”

“Oh.”

“Then Shishu said, ‘well maybe you should give me more work’ but for some reason Shizun just laughed at him,” Li Qing nibbled at her chopsticks.

“Don’t nibble,” Wu Lingtian said.

Li Qing immediately moved her chopsticks from her teeth and began eating normally again. “I think Shishu is just bored. But I also don’t understand why Shizun doesn’t want him to go out that much.”

Wu Lingtian unconsciously let out a sigh of relief. At least these adults still had enough propriety to not tell the children where they wandered off to in their free time.

“Sect Leader is most likely worried that Third Pillar is returning too late. It gets dangerous at night.”

Li Qing’s eyes widened. “It does?”

Wu Lingtian nodded. “There are bad people in the world. Remember to be careful when you begin to travel.”

Li Qing nodded seriously with an enlightened look in her eyes. She turned back to her food and fell into a quiet daze. Wu Lingtian reached out and carefully wiped away pieces of rice from Li Qing’s mouth before finishing his own food. Instead of leaving, he stayed and waited patiently until Li Qing was finished before standing up with her.

“Lord Immortal, are you planning on doing anything today?” Li Qing asked curiously.

Wu Lingtian paused a moment before shaking his head. “I have no plans.”

Since becoming a guest in Screeching Sparrow Sect, he experienced what it truly meant to be a waste of space. He had been in a coma for several days and, after waking up, he continued to do nothing but sleep and eat. He had thought about discussing what he should do with Fan Yi the past two days, but Fan Yi didn’t seem too interested in discussing such a thing with Wu Lingtian. Whenever Wu Lingtian hinted at it, Fan Yi would look at him blankly and say that there was nothing for him to do, rendering Wu Lingtian speechless. Wu Lingtian was well-known in the cultivation world for being everywhere at once. Even little children who were just weaned of milk knew just how busy Lord Immortal Yu Lan was. Yet, here he was now, wandering about a sect that he didn’t even belong to with absolutely nothing to do.

“Would you like to watch the disciples train?” Li Qing asked sweetly.

Any disciple nearby who heard this sentence immediately whipped their heads over to glare at Li Qing. Who are you asking?! Why in the world would this silly little girl want Lord Yu Lan watching them? Moreover, she didn’t even participate in this training! They began to bow their heads and collectively willed for Wu Lingtian to reject the offer.

However, Wu Lingtian wasn’t a god. No matter how much they pray to him, he still will not receive their prayers. Seeing Li Qing’s expectant gaze, Wu Lingtian nodded his head and allowed himself to be pulled away by Li Qing’s excitement.

That was why, when Fan Yi arrived at the training grounds, he was met with a crowd of anxious looking teenagers who tottered from foot to foot. The normally rambunctious disciples were dead silent in the large open field. Their heads were bowed. Some of them fiddled with the tassels at the ends of their swords, others stood around and gazed blankly up at the sky, as if waiting for a vision to come to them. The only person who looked relatively relaxed was Wu Lingtian, who sat at a bench overlooking everyone.

Fan Yi clapped his hands together to get everyone’s attention. The disciples straightened at once and lined up—something that they rarely ever did before.

“Third Pillar is feeling a little ill today,” Fan Yi announced. “So, I will be taking his place.”

The normally discouraged looking disciples immediately perked up. Fan Yi was a far more lenient teacher than Tian Xiewen.

“Let’s start with a warmup,” Fan Yi walked to the front, passing by Wu Lingtian. He paused as the disciples all got into their places and looked towards Wu Lingtian. He lowered his voice. “What are you doing here?”

“Am I not allowed to be here?” Wu Lingtian asked.

“You are,” Fan Yi said. “But why are you here?”

Wu Lingtian couldn’t find it within himself to tell Fan Yi he was far too bored and that was why he decided to sit in on a lesson. Instead, he glanced about the disciples. “I wanted to see the energetic youth.”

Fan Yi stared at him blankly before scoffing, followed by a disbelieving laugh. “Oh. I see.”

Wu Lingtian avoided Fan Yi’s amused gaze and stared strictly forward. “Aside from your direct disciples, does everyone else learn the same technique?”

“Yes,” Fan Yi saved Wu Lingtian from his embarrassment and willingly changed the subject. “Our sect has our own secret technique that’s based around the long sword. Of course, it can be applied to any melee weapon, but the long sword is the most suitable for it. Every disciple, even those under Tian Xiewen, have to learn how to use a long sword.”

“I see,” Wu Lingtian murmured. “Do you use this technique?”

Fan Yi glanced at Wu Lingtian.

The two of them were quite familiar with each other’s fighting style. After exchanging blows more than a handful of times, Fan Yi deciphered that Wu Lingtian used a very chaotic variation of Lord Wan Li’s Thousand Sword technique, which created an illusion of a sporadic duplication of swords. The tecnique Fan Yi was more familiar with was much more fluid, causing each movement to blend into each other and creating a mirage that enemies would never get out of—yet Wu Lingtian’s fighting style was different in this aspect. While it was usually the opponent that needed to break the illusion, Wu Lingtian was the one who broke it for his opponent. To him, the illusion was a distraction—a way to break his opponent’s mind. With each blow that looked so soft an elegant, Wu Lingtian was able to render his enemy helpless beneath his feet in just a few sharp hits.

“This isn’t the technique I use,” Fan Yi said. “I do use it though since I created it. But I use a technique that this one was based off.”

Wu Lingtian’s eyes sparkled with interest. “What is it?”

Fan Yi smiled. “Secret.”

Fan Yi sat down beside Wu Lingtian. “Only family members can know.”

Wu Lingtian silently observed Fan Yi’s suggestive gaze for a moment before turning his head away. “Then I am not interested.”

Fan Yi had expected as much. He smiled understandingly and looked out into the hardworking disciples. He turned back to Wu Lintian. “How are you feeling?”

Perplexed as to why Fan Yi suddenly asked this, Wu Lingtian gave a suspicious gaze. “I am fine now. Thank you.”

“Then are you feeling well enough to fight?” Fan Yi asked.

Wu Lingtian understood Fan Yi’s meaning. “But can your disciples withstand our pressure?”

The pressure emitting from cultivators of their caliber would immediately crush disciples who had just barely formed their golden core.

“We can set up a barrier. They will watch from the outside,” Fan Yi suggested.

Wu Lingtian acquiesced after a moment. If the disciples were safe, he didn’t mind fighting.

Fan Yi stood and clapped his hands together. “Alright, we aren’t practicing today! Today, since we have a special guest, we will do something different. Lord Immortal Yu Lan and I will be fighting. Whoever is pushed out of the boundaries of the stage first loses. Once we’re finish, your job is to give us a report on what you observed. If you do well, then you won’t have practice again for the entire week. If the observations aren’t satisfactory then you will have to do five laps around the stadium.”