Wan Jiayuan set his handbag aside and sat down, "Abbot, I even brought my mother’s photo with me today. Would you like to take another look?"
There was a sense of urgency in his voice as he got straight to the point without beating around the bush.
"There’s no need for that," Jiangli turned to Xia Xin, "Go get the bowl of water I prepared."
Xia Xin was taken aback, "A bowl of water?"
Jiangli frowned, "It’s in the courtyard, by the well."
Xia Xin murmured to himself, wondering when his ancestor had prepared it.
But he didn’t dare to question it and when he went out to look, sure enough, there was a bowl by the well in the courtyard.
However, it seemed that the bowl didn’t contain just water, but alcohol instead.
Curious, Xia Xin took the bowl and returned to the side hall, "Ancestor, I’ve brought it."
He gingerly placed the bowl on the table.
Wan Jiayuan caught a whiff of alcohol, "Abbot, is this alcohol? What are you going to do with it?"
"Mr. Wan need not concern himself," Jiangli didn’t elaborate to Wan Jiayuan, and instead took out an incense stick from a drawer and lit it with a striker.
Seeing Jiangli still using a striker, Wan Jiayuan was a bit surprised.
Jiangli placed the lit end of the incense into the bowl of water.
Then, he took out a talisman paper, turned to Wan Jiayuan and said, "Please stretch out your hand."
Wan Jiayuan cooperatively extended his left hand, "What do I need to do?"
Jiangli took out a needle, "Just keep your hand for now."
Wan Jiayuan was confused, only to see Jiangli prick his own fingertip with the needle.
Before he could react, he felt a sharp pain in his fingertip.
A droplet of blood immediately welled up.
Jiangli dipped the talisman paper into the drop of blood and dropped it into the bowl.
The talisman paper instantly dissolved in the water, disappearing as if it had never been there.
Wan Jiayuan was inwardly puzzled.
He then heard Jiangli instruct, "Now, close your eyes, mutter your mother’s name, and ask her where she is now, if you could see her once more?"
At this, Wan Jiayuan trembled.
He looked up at Jiangli as if he had a thousand words he wanted to say.
But Jiangli preempted him, "First do as I said."
Wan Jiayuan, subconsciously not daring to go against Jiangli’s command, reflexively closed his eyes and muttered his mother’s name, Jia Fang, asking where she was now.
While saying these things, he couldn’t avoid recalling the scene of his mother’s disappearance.
At the time, he was only about ten years old. The day before, his mother had been fine, sending him to school as usual, but when he returned, she was gone.
His father and grandmother said that Jia Fang had always been flirtatious with a man outside the village and must have run off with him.
The entire village knew about this, and soon word spread that Jia Fang had run off with a man, abandoning her husband and child.
To this day, Wan Jiayuan still didn’t understand and was confused.
Thinking about it now, he felt a surge of emotion and subconsciously blamed his mother for abandoning him.
Jiangli glanced at Wan Jiayuan, who was looking a mix of sad and angry, then whispered to Xia Xin beside him, "Go to the censer in front of the ancestor’s statue, and get another stick of incense."
Xia Xin acknowledged with a ’yes,’ hurried out, bowed three times in front of the ancestral statue before taking an unfinished stick of incense, and ran back to the side hall.
Jiangli took the incense Xia Xin handed over, touched it with his fingertips, silently recited an incantation, then gently tapped it a few times.
Incense ash fell into the bowl of water and started to ripple throughout it.
Gradually, the incense ash formed an image.