Chapter 72: Never Underestimate the Transmission of a Dao Lineage

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Chapter 72: Never Underestimate the Transmission of a Dao Lineage

When someone knocked on Huo Jian’s dorm room door, Huo Jian was no longer as excited to open it as he had been the previous few times. After all, he had already rushed to the door full of anticipation several times, only to find that it was never his uncle or his master, but instead, “Classmate, would you like to subscribe to a magazine?” “Classmate, we’re conducting a survey about entrepreneurship and employment. Would you mind taking a look?” “I’m looking for XXX.” “I heard Master Chen is here.” And so on.

So when Chen Yuan and Yu Shenliu walked through the door, Huo Jian was extremely surprised. He shot to his feet and strode over to them. “Master! Uncle!”

There was already a group of boys in Huo Jian’s dorm waiting to get a look at Master Chen. Although none of them were rude enough to openly stare at Chen Yuan, they had all perked up their ears, keeping a close eye on what was happening over here. Their ears were practically standing straight up. Chen Yuan didn’t notice, but Yu Shenliu saw it all too clearly.

So Yu Shenliu said, “Xiao Jian, aren’t you going to introduce your classmates?” giving the boys a way to save face.

“Uh, Master, this is the guy I mentioned before.” Huo Jian pulled another boy over and introduced him to Chen Yuan and Yu Shenliu. “Lan Jingwei, my good friend.”

Chen Yuan was so used to terms like gay best friend from his old world that hearing the simple word friend suddenly felt a little strange. But in Huaxia, same-sex relationships were considered perfectly normal, so there was naturally no need for special slang like gay bestie or bro to describe close male friends.

He looked over the boy standing beside Huo Jian. The boy was tall and well-proportioned, with handsome, refined features. He was quite a good-looking guy, except that his glasses gave him a somewhat… sinister look.

Chen Yuan felt that without that word, he really wouldn’t know how else to describe the impression this young man gave him. Still, from just that quick look at his features, he would never have guessed that this boy named Lan Jingwei would actually go looking for talismans and the like to help him find a romantic partner. From the perspective of physiognomy alone, this boy shouldn’t have any trouble in matters of romance. And more practically speaking, with a handsome face like that, it wasn’t as though he should have fallen to the point of resorting to such methods.

“Hello, Uncle. Hello, Master Chen.” Lan Jingwei spoke in a calm, even voice. Hearing him speak only reinforced Chen Yuan’s impression that Lan Jingwei was an extremely composed person. So how had someone like him ended up going to the Metaphysics Club to get a talisman for love? It was simply impossible to understand.

Still, although Huo Jian called Yu Shenliu his uncle, Chen Yuan had no problem with that. It was simply a matter of seniority within the family. But seeing someone who looked to be around twenty call Yu Shenliu “Uncle” simply because his friend was Yu Shenliu’s nephew felt incredibly strange to Chen Yuan. It was as if he had only just realized that Yu Shenliu was actually someone of an uncle’s generation.

Come to think of it, Yu Shenliu was technically in his twenties, but he was already approaching thirty. Combined with his years in government and the experience he had accumulated, he did indeed give off the air of an elder. Chen Yuan himself, however, was also unusually mature for his age. With two people who were young in appearance but old at heart spending time together, their thoughts and topics of conversation happened to mesh perfectly.

Unlike Chen Yuan, who was pondering all of this, Yu Shenliu noticed something else about Lan Jingwei’s choice of address. He studied Lan Jingwei as the young man raised his eyes to meet his gaze, then glanced at the oblivious Huo Jian. Finally, he shrugged inwardly. Fine. Whatever happened between the youngsters was for them to sort out themselves. And judging from his current impression, Lan Jingwei’s personality was actually somewhat similar to his own. Perhaps he wasn’t the best match for Xiao Jian, but he shouldn’t be a bad one either.

In the end, Yu Shenliu decided not to interfere. Still, just to get closer to Huo Jian, the other party had gone to all this trouble and even gotten Chen Yuan to come over. He certainly had some nerve.

Once everyone in the dorm had been introduced, Chen Yuan sat down in the living room. The dormitories at Xishu Academy were laid out more like suites. Only then did he begin getting a clear picture of what had happened. Huo Jian had mentioned it before, but his explanation had been so vague that Chen Yuan hadn’t really understood the specifics.

“Uh, let Jingwei explain. He’s the one involved.” Huo Jian shifted awkwardly and scratched the side of his face before saying this. Truth be told, he hadn’t really figured out what was going on himself.

After entering Xishu Academy, he had made quite a few friends, and Lan Jingwei was one of them. Lan Jingwei had originally been his classmate. To be honest, though, their personalities were different, and they didn’t live together, so they weren’t actually all that close. Lan Jingwei always gave Huo Jian a feeling similar to that of an elder, yet he was also his own age, which made Huo Jian find the whole thing rather strange.

Lan Jingwei, however, seemed to consider himself quite close to Huo Jian, so somehow, before they knew it, everyone had come to regard them as good friends.

It had all started when quite a few couples began appearing among the academy’s new students. Lan Jingwei was, by any measure, a handsome guy with plenty going for him, yet he was still single. Huo Jian was different. He was only sixteen and still very much a kid, so it was perfectly normal for him not to think about such things. But Lan Jingwei was already twenty.

Huo Jian had asked Lan Jingwei about it once, only for Lan Jingwei’s expression to turn extremely grim. He poured out a whole list of complaints to Huo Jian, saying that his romantic luck was terrible and that he could never win over the people he liked. Huo Jian had been left completely bewildered. After that, he heard that Lan Jingwei had decided to resort to extraordinary measures to improve his romantic luck and was planning to go to the Metaphysics Club for a talisman.

Having spent so much time around Chen Yuan, Huo Jian immediately sensed that something was wrong. After trying everything he could think of, he had finally managed to talk Lan Jingwei out of it. For the past few days, he had practically stayed glued to Lan Jingwei’s side, afraid that he would go and do something “stupid.” It wasn’t until Chen Yuan arrived today that Huo Jian could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

At Huo Jian’s words, Lan Jingwei pushed up his glasses before finally explaining what had happened to him. His description was rather vague. He simply said that he felt his romantic luck was terrible, that the people he liked never seemed to realize how he felt about them, and so on. That was why he wanted to get a talisman and give it a try.

Quite a few of the people around them understood what Lan Jingwei was really getting at. Unfortunately, Chen Yuan and Huo Jian were not among them. The two of them took turns discussing the potential side effects of the talisman and trying to convince Lan Jingwei not to go through with it.

Fortunately, before these two clueless guys could go on for much longer, there was another knock on the dorm room door.

Someone immediately went to open it.

Unexpectedly, however, the visitors weren’t students who had come to see Master Chen. It was the president of the Metaphysics Club, accompanied by the vice president and several other club members.

“So you’re Master Chen?” He walked over to Chen Yuan in a few quick steps, then bowed deeply to him, his manner remarkably courteous and composed.

Chen Yuan naturally returned the courtesy. After all, you didn’t hit someone who came bearing a smile. “May I ask who you are?”

“I am merely Kong Quanlu, president of the Metaphysics Club,” Kong Quanlu replied, his choice of words exceedingly formal. In Huaxia, archaic honorifics and self-effacing forms of address were rarely used outside of formal occasions.

When Kong Quanlu raised his head, Chen Yuan scrutinized him using physiognomy, wary of the Metaphysics Club at Xishu Academy.

The president of the Metaphysics Club was exceptionally handsome, with an unusual quality around the corners of his eyes and brows. Chen Yuan could sense something familiar in him, the air of someone who also studied metaphysics and possessed abilities beyond those of ordinary people. At the same time, however, unlike the broad-minded and gentle disposition one would expect from someone who practiced metaphysics, Chen Yuan could see a murkiness in his eyes. Had he allowed himself to be blinded by the temptations of the mortal world? He clearly had exceptional talent and innate qualities, yet he had gone astray.

From this first meeting alone, Chen Yuan could basically confirm that, just as he had suspected, this Metaphysics Club was not following the proper path.

In wuxia novels, it was common to see unorthodox sects, like the Demon Sects, pushed aside by the orthodox schools, only for those supposedly evil practitioners to do good while the righteous ones committed every imaginable wrong. Characters would often scoff at the very idea of good and evil. But when it came to metaphysics, the so-called proper path was not defined that way. The proper path meant following the laws of Heaven, doing good and accumulating virtue, being tolerant and kindhearted, and valuing goodness and one’s moral character. Methods were secondary; one’s character came first.

Kong Quanlu’s talent was clearly apparent from his features, and yet a look into his eyes revealed shortcomings in his moral character. To Chen Yuan, that was a tremendous pity. In truth, finding a suitable successor was extremely difficult for any metaphysical school. Someone with both exceptional talent and fine character was a rare thing.

It was much like how Chen Yuan had Huo Jian call him Master, yet had never actually taught him anything. Huo Jian’s features showed no particularly outstanding talent for metaphysics. If it weren’t for Huo Jian’s excellent character and the fact that he had repeatedly demonstrated an unusually strong sixth sense, Chen Yuan would never have tacitly accepted him as his disciple. Now that Kong Quanlu was the president of the Metaphysics Club, those methods were presumably things he himself knew. Techniques like these were basically impossible to learn without a master. And if Kong Quanlu’s master had managed to find someone with such exceptional talent yet failed to cultivate his character, that was nothing short of a disastrous mistake.

Just as he did with Huo Jian, Chen Yuan had always placed the greatest emphasis on character. But in his eyes, Kong Quanlu had practically been ruined.

While Chen Yuan was sizing up Kong Quanlu, Kong Quanlu was studying Chen Yuan as well. Of course, he knew that Chen Yuan, Chen the Half-Immortal, had genuine ability. What he couldn’t understand was why, with Chen Yuan’s abilities, he charged only a thousand yuan each time. A master of Chen Yuan’s caliber, on par with his own master, should surely charge tens of thousands for a single consultation.

If you possessed such extraordinary abilities, you should naturally use them to secure enough profit for yourself. That was what Kong Quanlu had believed ever since he first became involved with metaphysics. He wasn’t like his master. His own skill wasn’t nearly as advanced, so all he could do was make a living at the academy and take whatever he could get. But he was always working to improve. One day, surely, he would be able to take his master’s place.

When he thought about where his own privileged life had come from, Kong Quanlu simply couldn’t understand why Chen Yuan charged so little and then donated most of it.

Even so, when facing someone with genuine ability, he still had to show the proper respect.

The matter of Lan Jingwei wanting to buy a talisman was troublesome, though. He would have to find a way to deal with it. The Metaphysics Club couldn’t afford to lose face. Otherwise, how would they make money in the future?

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