Chapter 84

The master and the servants rushed tothe front door to welcome the newly arrived.

Old man Ning had long been waiting fortheir arrival!

After a while, old man Ning had welcomedhis three good friends into his house. Everybody was happy from gettingtogether with their old friends again.

They all settled down in front of thetable in the study.

“All my brothers finally arrived!” oldman Ning felt very emotional!

Old man Lin raised his brows, “Old manNing, your message was so delayed. We’ve planned on making a trip out here whenwe heard that the mystical spring was in Willow. We received your message whenwe were just about to take off, so we left right away. Even then, it took usover half a month to get here!”

“He’s right, old man Ning. We almostthought you were never going to tell us when we finally got your letter, ha haha ha ha….”

Old man Ning was a little bitembarrassed by the teasing of his old friend, helplessly he said, “Old Quan,stop teasing me. Why would I try to hide this from you? We tried so hard in thefirst few days to establish contact with the Cheng’s, unfortunately, we endedup mucking things up and were snubbed by the Cheng’s. I’ve sent you the letterthe first opportunity I got, I guess it’s all my fault!”

“HAHAHA…” Old Du laughed out loud, “Oh,Ning lao di1, we are just messingwith you. Don’t take it so seriously. How long have we been friend, eh?”

“Exactly, we have traversed jianghu2 together back in the days andknown each other for over forty years. Our bond is stronger than this!”

“Yeah, our bond will last for life, Ningdi, don’t mind Quan di’s little joke!”

“HAHA, that’s wright, old man Ning willnever be so petty. We know him well by now!”

The old men chatted and laughed happilyin the study and Ko Yang standing to one side also smiled a little. With thembeing here, he believed those from School of Divine Condor will behave slightlybetter.\nAfter all, these were all elders fromthe nine top sect. Their being here, even if those from School of Divine Condorwere arrogant, they would have to refrain themselves some in front of them.

In front of his old friends, old manNing felt even more guilty. After all, he was being selfish at the beginningand didn’t notify them right away.

Now that they were teasing him friendlyabout it, he felt quiet embarrassed. Lucky this was not his first rodeo, he wasgood at hiding his feelings.

After the laughter died down, old Linregained his composure, he asked with a bit uncertainty, “Ning lao di, it seems kind of noisy in yourplace, are the folks from School of Divine Condor still here?”

“Yeah!” replied old man Ning with abitter smile, “They haven’t left yet. Looks like they will be staying here fora while longer.”

“Oh, why is that?” asked old Lin, baffled.

Old Quan frowned too, “There were quitea few of them. It’s a pretty hefty to provide them with room and board for aprolonged period of time!”

They knew that while old man Ning waswell off, his assets were like night and day when comparing with some of theother sects.

They started worry for him, but theyalso knew that they’d just hurt his ego if they offered to help him out. Sothey felt obligated to remind him.

“Don’t worry, all my good brothers. Ican afford to house them for a while long, that’s not the biggest problem, thereal problem was…”

“Was what?” asked old man Lin, seeinghow troubled old man Ning was.

“Old brother, let me tell you what havebeen going on lately!”

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Note:

1.      Means “old little brother”. “Old” because he was old in age. “Di” is younger brother, old Du still referred to him as younger brother because he was older Du was older than Ning. I chose to go with Chinese pronunciation here as “old younger brother” just sounds very awkward in English.

2.       

3.      literally translates as “Rivers and Lakes”, but figuratively refers to the “underground world of martial arts”. A section of society consisting of martial artists, gangsters, thieves, beggars, prostitutes, merchants, entertainers, and anyone else wanting to operate outside of mainstream society or in the grey area of the law. (Source: Wuxiaworld.com)

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