’Don’t provoke him! He’s as strong as Ignatius.’
Misha’s face palled at the mention of the accursed bastard as his gurgles echoed before he continued.
’He wants to help us find our parents or get to the village. Shake your head when I make those annoying noises.’
Misha nodded as his face darkened.
He didn’t know the man’s intentions. After all, it seemed off to him that he found them in the middle of the valley.
Meanwhile, Misha shook her head, her blond hair fluttering like shiny silk under the sun, to answer the man.
"Your parents aren’t around? Do you want me to take you to the village, then?"
The man frowned as Misha shook her head again. "Didn’t you lose yourselves in the mountains? Were you trying to escape something, perhaps?"
Misha shook her head for the third time, yet her eyes trembled, and her fists clenched as the man ignored her to turn towards Adam.
Eyes blazing in confusion and interest, he sized the baby up and down before the sudden sound of the baby’s growling stomach broke his concentration.
"I can take you to my house for now. It’s not big, but we can discuss your situation around a warm meal and see how I can help you." His lips curled into a bright smile. "It’s the first time I see a baby this intelligent. You’re the one answering me, right?"
Adam’s eyes enlarged, and his hair stood on end. A shiver ran down his spine at the man’s sharpness and how ridiculous yet accurate his assumption was.
’Who would think a baby can understand you after three sentences? Is it because he’s a cultivator? Wait! He can feel our life force! That’s why he came!’
The realisation struck him like a hammer as Misha looked at him worriedly.
She didn’t know what to do. Worst, her instinct screamed at her to proceed with the utmost caution. That’s why she didn’t speak after Adam’s warning. Yet, worry gnawed at her heart. Would they face an unsurmountable disaster after she had longed to explore the world and see Adam for two years?
However, too absorbed in his thoughts, Adam didn’t answer her concerns.
’He moved to meet us when I appeared on the mountains and saw Misha’s hatching and subsequent killing of the wolves.’ His small hand moved towards the man as his eyes burned a furious blue. ’Why are you interested in us?’
Meanwhile, the man’s face brightened as he noticed the intelligence in the baby’s eye.
"I don’t know if you understand everything I say, but let this old man introduce himself. My name is Lin Zhongguo. I’m a hermit who lives in the mountains." He pointed towards the peak and continued. "I felt your life force and thought someone came to find trouble with me since I’m in somewhat of a bad relationship with everyone."
He exploded into boisterous laughter, his hand moving to grab the baby as Misha’s fists trembled, ready to pierce through the wind to strike fiercely at the slightest abrupt movement.
But he ignored her and continued.
"It’s a boring and not really hidden story. You’ll eventually learn about it, so let’s skip it. Instead, I’m wondering how a baby and a two-year-old girl exude so much energy..." His face hardened, complex emotion distorting his features. "And why do you feel familiar?"
His hands trembled as he picked Adam up, feeling his soft skin and the incredible weight accompanying him. But he had guessed as much after seeing the girl struggle to lift him. Instead, his heart drummed in his ears, and his pupils trembled as he sent a wisp of life force, weak enough to be undetectable, into Adam’s meridians.
And when he felt the baby’s dan tian engulf the energy like a bottomless abyss, his eyes watered, and warm tears rolled down his quivering lips.
"Did you reincarnate after over a century of absence, or are you his inheritor? It doesn’t matter! I’ll raise you until you give me the answer. I want to know what happened to my grandson and where he disappeared!"
How could he not recognise it? The dan tian he spent decades and liquidated all his assets to create, the dan tian he merged into his dashing grandson. Lin Yao’s dan tian!
Yet, it seemed more powerful than before, and the realisation ignited the old, unachieved dream he had pursued in the past: the dream to create the unique and ultimate heaven affinity.
As his tears dropped onto Adam’s body, the latter gasped in shock.
’Luna didn’t send me to a random location! She planned for me to meet with him. Humph. At least she has a conscience.’
Honestly? He hated her for turning him into a baby and banishing him from the magic world. Still, her arrangement simplified his start in the cultivation world.
’I think we can trust him. Let’s follow him.’
Misha’s whitened knuckles relaxed, yet her muscles didn’t entirely, and she still eyed Lin Zhongguo suspiciously.
However, the man’s lips curled into a contagious smile as he grabbed and placed her on his shoulders, the movement so swift and delicate that she didn’t even notice what had happened. The realisation only came when she felt her feet dangling down his chest.
"Calm down, little one. If I had nefarious intentions, I would have already acted."
With a reassuring pat on Misha’s head, Lin Zhongguo walked through the slope, then climbed the mountain until they saw a small habitation.
Cradled in his arms, Adam observed the setting, noticing a wooden house built alongside the mountain’s edge.
Despite its moderate size, he nodded at the intricate letters carved on the walls and the two wooden dragons roaring fiercely by the door.
On the side, he saw a kitchen lining the courtyard, a table and a chair. The smell of soup boiling on the crackling fire and carried to his nose by the hot steam made his stomach grumble in desire. But he ignored his hunger and turned his head, noticing Misha’s wolf-like expression as he focused on the small garden.
Honestly? He really felt in a cultivator’s home with the rare herbs permeating the air with a fresh medicinal scent and the bronze cauldron towering above a cold fireplace.