If the Cheng’s mystical spring had caught the public’s attention, then the face that there were three beast tamers at the Cheng’s were definitely like a bolt from the blue.
Rather, everybody was very familiar with Cheng Biyuan. After all, his life had been so full of drama, who could ever forget that? And now that news about him have spread, it was no surprised that everybody was shocked out of their seats.
Of course, the one who was shocked out of his seat was the master of the Cheng’s at Emperor City. The first thing he did after he recovered from the shock was to strike his favorite Cheng Bihua across his face so hard that he head turned the size of a pig’s head.
How the outsiders react had not much to do with villagers of Willow or the Cheng’s. They continue to live their lives as usual.
However, something was different in Willow today. The house of Patriarch Liu of Willow was filled with visitors. All of them villagers of Willow and all of them male.
The youngest one was Liu Danhuang, who was sitting in an inside corner.
Sitting at the host seat was Patriarch Liu, who, with his eyes half closed, hasn’t utter a word yet. There were many attendees but nobody was saying anything, the entire living room was so quiet all one could hear was breathing sounds.
After a long while, Patriarch Liu looked up and a light of intelligence shone from his eyes. Looking at the several dozens of villagers in front of him, he said, “I believe everybody more or less have an idea of what had happened at the Cheng’s. I trust that everyone has a pretty good idea the kind of people the Cheng’s are, so I am not going to elaborate on that. What I want do want to say is, with my title as Patriarch, I would like to invite Master Cheng to be the instructor of Willow, to give our young a shot at new lives. So that Willow villagers will not only be hunters for generations to come. I trust that every one here has first hand experiences of what the life of a hunter is like.
“Master Cheng is a big shot. He never would have been here, but god had delivered him to us. And we should make good use of this opportunity to afford our youths the opportunity to rise above and have careers of their own and bring pride to the village of Willow. What is everyone’s opinion?”
“……”
Everybody there looked at each other and nobody commented. Liu Danhuang, sitting in the corner, was nervous. He worried that the others would veto this idea. He would really like to be accepted as a disciple of Cheng Biyuan.
“Uncle Liu was right. I agree with this request. Life has been harsh in our village. We struggle all the time just to feed ourselves, let alone bringing pride of the family. If our youths can become Master Cheng’s disciples, it will offer them an alternative. Even if they can’t bring pride to the family, but if they will just be able to put food on table and keep a roof overhead, that will still be an improvement. I personally support this idea!”
Liu Sanzhen was the first to voice his opinion.
Liu Hanlin, sitting next to him, broke into a smile, “This is a great idea. If I wasn’t as old as I am, I’d want to become a martial art disciple too. I just worried that brother Cheng won’t accept me as his student!”
Hearing his opinion, everybody started breaking out into approving smiles. Everybody understood that this was a great idea logically. But it took them a while to wrap their mind around an idea so unfamiliar. But once someone else had already voice their opinion, the rest of them started to open up.
“Patriarch, we are all hunters. We know full well how difficult lives are as hunters. Now that we are offered this opportunity, we would be doing our youths a disfavor if we let it slip past. I support this suggestion as well!”