6 OLD MAN LAO (1/2)
Just as the sky was beginning to darken, Cheng Hao appeared atop a Teleportation Hexagram in a vast courtyard. The precinct was located in the large ring of land in between the Sixth and Seventh Walls: off in the distance were many small huts made of stone.
Looking around, Cheng Hao noticed an old man sitting on a chair just a few measures at the front.
The child stepped off of the now faded Teleportation Hexagram and towards this unknown elderly, whom had his arms crossed in front of his chest and his head dangling off to one side, as if he were sleeping. In front of the old man was a small desk, much like the Vacant Elder that Cheng Hao had met before when he was travelling together with Liu Biao. Unlike the Vacant Elder, this old man wore a set of simple and even somewhat worn out robes, which Cheng Hao recognized were neither a Sect Elder's nor a Disciple's robes.
Seeing how behind the sleeping old man was small carts full of black robes and from which hung hundreds, if not thousands, of keys, Cheng Hao came to the conclusion that this person was probably some sort of groundkeeper of the Sect.
Suddenly, almost as if he had sensed the other's gaze, the old man opened his eyes and raised his head to look back at the staring child. As the figure of the youth was registered in his golden-colored eyes, the elderly man raised an eyebrow in surprise at the boy's age. Immediately afterwards, the face full of wrinkles arranged into a thoughtful frown.
Seemingly not taking notice to the other side's concern, Cheng Hao had slowly approached the stall the man owned. Then, as soon as he had gotten close enough, he bowed: although the other had purposefully hid his cultivation from prying eyes through some sort of technique, the reborn Evil Saint had seen through it at a first glance; that seemingly insignificant, almost shoddy, old man… was actually a peak Reverend stage expert!
What about it? Well, to make a comparison...
Liu Biao's 'awesome' Advanced stage? Even if a dozen, no, a hundred of Liu Biao were to come charging forward, a single wave of a sleeve from this ordinary-looking old man would be able to blast them all away! After all, the Advanced was but the third Stage of cultivation, only above the initial Inferior Stage and the subsequent Basic Stage and below many others: even when counting the Mortal Realm alone, after the Advanced Stage would come the Superior Stage, followed by the Sung Stage, before finally coming to the very Peak of the Mortal Realm with the old man's Reverend Stage!
Although in higher planes of existence, Mortal Realm cultivators such as Liu Biao and this old man would be the trashiest amongst trash, in a lowly plane of existence such as the one Cheng Hao currently found himself in, the Reverend stage was most likely the very peak of existence! Therefore, befriending such a cultivator was bound to bring him benefits later on.
As for why such a powerful person acted as a mere groundkeeper... the child had no idea. Still he had no intentions of prying further. Instead, he chose to let his tongue, vocal chords and skills in the art of flattery do the work!
”Hello, Senior! This Junior is called Cheng Hao! Junior offers his respects to his Senior!” He smiled, his tone fawning, but not to the point it reached the extreme flattering he had shown towards the arrogant Liu Biao.
Listening to the child speak, the old man was baffled: very few people would be polite to him, since at the moment, his identity was that of a 'weak and poor old man', as could easily be discerned by the ragged robes he was wearing and by the absence of a cultivation base on him. Just based on those two facts alone, most would choose to treat him as nothing more than some kind of receptionist, urging him to hand over the sect robes in a rather rude manner. They would barely spare him an hurried nod, before hurrying away soon after.
Few, very few would ever show any more respect to him. The old man could only see two reasons why one would do that: firstly, it could simply be that their nature was that of a polite or well-educated person. The other would however be in order to flatter him so as to curry favor with him!
And a child so young, would his parents even have had enough time to impart him with such amount of politeness towards the older generation? Or, the much scarier part… could it be that his real strength had just got seen through by a cultivationless child? The old man had frowned exactly because he had reached this sort of conclusion, and having realized this, he knew that he absolutely had to check it! As such, he slightly lifted the seal on his cultivation; just enough for him to be able to send a strand of Reverend Will to examine the young boy.
Seeing the old man's actions, Cheng Hao laughed in his mind but kept his outward expression as still as a pond of clear water, devoid of the slightest ripple. He completely ignored the Strand: had he reacted to the Strand in any way, such as resisting or even acknowledging with the slight change in his heart rate, the old man would have definitely found out that Cheng Hao had actually seen through his real cultivation!
That would have meant mean that a child had actually been able to see through the ability of a Reverend stage cultivator! Had that got out, it would have brought countless problems to himself in the long run, together with an off-chance of offending that same cultivator…
A Strand of Will was a strand of spiritual energy imbued with one's consciousness. Being in the Reverend stage, only those on the same stage or above should be able to sense it. Of course, a few exceptions could be found everywhere, but for a child so small to be able to see through the power of a man having a cultivation of the Reverend stage... it was just unthinkable! For that reason, seeing no reaction from the boy in front of him after checking out once, the old man did not even bother trying it out again. Instead, he smiled kindly as he felt his heart warm.
Such a polite young boy...
Being fooled by Cheng Hao's methods, in his heart the old man had already begun thinking of Cheng Hao as an exemplary youth!
The child's expression suddenly shifted as he inquired, ”Is Elder alright? Why did Elder's expression suddenly turn dark? Did this Junior offend you in any way? If so this Junior will definitely try his hardest to amend!” Cheng Hao said that though 'clenched teeth', 'determined' to take responsibility for his 'wrongdoings';
The old man's heart warmed seeing such dedication and respect towards the older generation. He quickly stood up and walked to the boy's side, patting his shoulder, ”Worry not, child; you have done nothing wrong! It was just this old man suddenly remembered something unpleasant...”