I am the Young Master - Chapter 124
——(POV third person, Li Huang, in front of his crush)——
Li Huang wasn’t sure that grand elder Su Zhi wanted to talk to him or not. Because of that he didn’t start talking to her when he saw her so that he won’t come off as rude. As they say, a junior shouldn’t talk to his senior before they start speaking to them.
Grand elder Su Zhi and Li Long came closer to Li Huang and other disciples slowly scattered and waited for a drama to happen. To many of them, it was logical for grand elder Su Zhi to be at odds with Li Huang as every participant knew that he told He Junli that he would make sure that she faces severe punishment. But to the ones who were more knowledgeable and knew about grand elder Su Zhi’s relation to Li Huang, it was more of a family meeting of sorts.
“How are you, Huang?” Grand elder Su Zhi asked with a smile and addressed Li Huang with his first name. This way she wanted to show him that he can forgo the formalities with her and also tell him that she doesn’t think he did anything wrong when he handled the situation that He Junli created in the trial.
Li Huang could understand what grand elder Su Zhi wanted to convey. He also used this chance to throw some cheesy lines at her.
“I was a little exhausted, but seeing the elder I already feel better.” Li Huang said and cupped his fists and bowed.
Grand elder Su Zhi raised a brow at this as she unfolded her fan. She had a small smile on her face behind it.
Li Long was staring daggers at Li Huang as even in his wildest of imaginations he would have never thought that Li Huang would act this way. Li Huang acted as he didn’t even notice grandpa Long’s existence, much less his piercing glare.
“Flattery will get you nowhere young man.” Grand elder Su Zhi said with a playful tone. She didn’t mind it but she couldn’t stop herself from teasing Li Huang a little.
Unfortunately, Li Huang wasn’t one to get flustered by just this much as his age would suggest.
“I was merely stating how I felt.” Li Huang said. He was walking on a thin line so he tried to tread carefully.
Grand elder Su Zhi was stunned for a second.
“Alright then, I believe you.” She said as she giggled a little. She had many suitors over the years and wasn’t a young girl with no social experience that would get beet red hearing this. She interpreted this as Li Huang being polite and friendly.
She turned to face Li Long who was still in a daze from Li Huang’s words and actions.
“He is certainly better than you when it comes to talking to women at his age, do you remember when you used to come to our White Moon sect?” Grand elder Su Zhi said and laughed softly as she remembered those years.
Li Long who was looking at Li Huang, lost all color in his face as he heard grand elder Su Zhi’s words. If Li Huang were to know about those memories, he wouldn’t have a face in front of his own grandson anymore so he tried to stop her from saying a thing about this.
“Ahaha, yes I was young and immature.” He said as he couldn’t just go and say ‘we should move on.’ and expect grand elder Su Zhi to do as he says.
Li Huang who saw this as a chance to stop his grandfather from beating him looked with curiosity toward grand elder Su Zhi.
“Oh, you don’t know about this Huang?” Grand elder Su Zhi said as she saw the curiosity in his eyes. Hearing this Li Long almost felt that his soul is leaving his body.
She thought this could be a good chance to improve her relationship with Li Huang so she wanted to continue but as this was a meeting in public it would be too careless to disclose such things so she came up with another idea.
“…How about you come to our White Moon sect. We can talk more and I can tell you more about these memories?” She said. She thought this could be a good chance to mend Li Huang and Shen Yan’s relationships a little.
“I will most certainly be there soon.” Li Huang said as he couldn’t let go of such a trump card against grandpa Long. Well, this being a meeting with grand elder Su Zhi also helped in his decisive decision making.
“Good.” Grand elder Su Zhi nodded as she was glad that Li Huang accepted her offer.
“I also wanted to thank you for helping my disciple.” She added after a second.
Li Huang didn’t know that grand elder Su Zhi had another disciple other than his grandmother and he didn’t think he helped such a person so he decided to ask her directly.
“Your disciple, elder?” He asked.
“You didn’t know? Yingmin is my disciple, she said that you helped her with his weapon Qi training.” She explained. She thought that Li Huang knew about who her master was.
It wasn’t hard for Li Huang to link Yingmin to Lang Yingmin who he called the outcast of the White Moon sect. Now he understood why she wasn’t afraid about how she was going to be received by her fellow disciples.
Thinking a bit more Li Huang knew that it must be Lang Yingmin who let grand elder Su Zhi know about what had really happened in the trial. Now it makes sense why she didn’t go for the leader position.
“Elder overpraises me, what could I offer that you have not offered at least a thousandfold better?” Li Huang said and there was not an ounce of flattery in his words. He didn’t think he with his meager experience in cultivation could say a word that someone at the level of grand elder Su Zhi doesn’t know a book’s worth of knowledge about it.
Grand elder Su Zhi too didn’t refute this because it was clear as day and doing so would only be an insult to Li Huang’s intelligence.
“*sigh* That child is too stubborn and if she doesn’t hit a wall she would try to solve any and all problems herself so it has also come as a surprise to me that she was willing to ask for pointers from somebody else.” Grand elder Su Zhi said as she shook her head. Lang Yingmin was really hard-working but she wanted to find her own path instead of walking on the same path as her predecessors. Su Zhi was sure that she wouldn’t ask Li Huang for help if he were using the same weapon as her as she couldn’t translate this knowledge to her weapon and add her tweaks this way.
Li Huang cupped his fists and accepted this gratitude from grand elder Su Zhi.
After some more small talks, grand elder Su Zhi said her farewells and left toward her sect’s tent. It was now only Li Huang and Li Long there.
~’Huang, don’t tell me that you are trying to court grand elder Su?’~ Li Long asked in a sound transmission as there are words that one shouldn’t say and this was one of them.
~’What if I am grandpa?’~ Li Huang asked with a smirk on his face as he was sure that grandpa Long would have to call him grandpa that way.
~’Well, I say good luck because your chance is almost nonexistent.’~ Li Long said as he too smirked at Li Huang’s naivety.
Li Huang who could feel that there was something that he didn’t know about grand elder Su Zhi asked Li Long directly.
~’Why is that?’~ Li Huang asked as he turned to face Li Long.
~’Well, it is like this…’~ Grandpa Long started to explain.
He said how grand elder Su Zhi was not only the brightest talent of her generation but the brightest in the hundreds of years. She had many suitors from a young age, many came after her for her beauty, many for her talent, many for her position, and many were simply lovestruck.
Needless to say, Su Zhi was focused on her training and didn’t want such things to stop her. When you can live for centuries if you train hard enough, it is not too late to decide about a partner at that time.
This logic was accepted by her suitors for a while but those young masters and top talents lost their patience slowly as the years passed and Su Zhi didn’t stop training and didn’t give them a chance.
Seeing this they came up with a good method to marry Su Zhi, political marriage. They used their sect/house as the bargainer with the White Moon sect to arrange a marriage between them and Su Zhi who had no family other than the sect. Seeing this the sect grand elders were under pressure to give a valid reason to the suitors.
So Su Zhi told them that she would fight every suitor and if they can beat her in a fight in the same cultivation, she would accept their marriage proposal. The suitors were ecstatic about this news and started getting into lines to challenge her.
What followed was a decade of duels where Su Zhi won every single one of them.