Chapter 2968 — Recognizing Kin

"There's no rush. This is only the first step. Even if the meridians and the dantian are restored, I still have no Qi-Gathering Pills on hand—and one pill alone seems insufficient. It has to be taken twice in succession." Wei Zhao said, "Of course, if an antidote could be found, so much the better. It would spare us the Qi-Gathering Pills entirely—you wouldn't even need to heal me."

"There should be no antidote for this," Qing Bo said with a shake of his head. "Back when I was on the upper plane, I heard of this poison too, but never of any antidote. Generally, anyone struck by it is finished unless a Qi-Gathering Pill is used to break through the barrier—yet using a Qi-Gathering Pill leaves you finished all the same, stalled at a single rank with no hope of advancing. Unless the sect is powerful enough to possess an inexhaustible supply of Qi-Gathering Pills. But I'm afraid that apart from the Mystic Pill Sect, no sect could refine so many!"

"Just as I thought—there is none." Wei Zhao sighed. "It seems I must return to the Western Star Mountain Village after all. At least until I've found two Qi-Gathering Pills, I can't stay here. Today's trouble with the Dark Night Palace was smoothed over by the Mystic Pill Sect's people, but there's no guarantee the Dark Night Palace won't concoct some other pretext for revenge tomorrow."

"What! The Dark Night Palace's people came?" Gu Pengzhan's expression turned fiercely agitated at Wei Zhao's words. He stared at Wei Zhao and asked urgently.

"Uncle Chu knows of the Dark Night Palace?" Wei Zhao was slightly taken aback, somewhat puzzled. "Today the Dark Night Palace did indeed come making trouble!"

Gu Pengzhan was startled by Wei Zhao's reply. "They... came making trouble? Over what?"

"Over nothing, really—just making trouble for trouble's sake." With that, Wei Zhao recounted to Gu Pengzhan the reason the Dark Night Palace had come.

"They... came here only for that third-grade pill?" Gu Pengzhan seemed to relax. "They didn't demand anything else?"

"No. Should they have demanded something else?" Wei Zhao asked, rather puzzled.

"Nothing... nothing..." Gu Pengzhan shook his head somewhat absently, as if something had occurred to him, yet he hesitated to speak.

"Uncle Chu, is there some problem with this Dark Night Palace?" Wei Zhao sensed that Gu Pengzhan seemed to be hiding something.

"No... it's nothing." Gu Pengzhan waved his hand. "Let's not speak of it. Xiao Yi, when do you plan to go back?"

"Now that it's settled, the sooner the better—to avoid complications." Wei Zhao said.

"Very well, then tomorrow. Pack your things, and Qing Bo and I will see you off." Gu Pengzhan nodded.

"Seeing us off won't be necessary—we'll go on our own. Better to keep such matters low-key." Wei Zhao said, "When I said the sooner the better, I didn't mean tomorrow. Right now there are likely many eyes watching this area. Even if I leave, they can intercept us on the road. So I intend to wait—at least for the time being, the Dark Night Palace won't dare make trouble, and the other hostile factions will have to weigh their own strength, lest they provoke the hidden Yu family and the Mystic Pill Sect."

Gu Pengzhan nodded. "All right, then it's your decision..."

"Jingyi, sad as this moment is, I still have something happy to tell you." Wei Zhao turned and looked at Sun Jingyan.

"Ah... what is it?" Sun Jingyan had been brooding over some embarrassing thoughts, head lowered and face flushed, and started at the sudden sound of Wei Zhao addressing her. "You... what do you want to say?"

"Your parents, in fact, are not dead." Wei Zhao had no idea what she was thinking, and found her expression a little odd, though he gave it no further thought.

"What? My parents aren't dead?" Sun Jingyan's eyes flew wide open, and all those earlier tender thoughts were instantly cast to the back of her mind. Suddenly something occurred to her, and she turned to look at Sun Luoying in shock!

"That's right. You've probably already guessed—Qing Bo and Granny Sun are in fact your birth parents!" Wei Zhao nodded.

Sun Jingyan's eyes reddened at once. She did not doubt Wei Zhao's words; for him to tell her so surely, he must have verified it from many angles—and Sun Luoying's looks were proof enough in themselves.

It was only that Sun Jingyan had never imagined that Qing Bo and Granny Sun could be her parents!

"Jingyi, Xiao Yi speaks the truth. Luoyue and I are your parents!" Qing Bo watched Sun Jingyan nervously yet expectantly, and said slowly, "In fact, ever since you returned from the Ulonghot Mountains and Wei Zhao brought out that energy stone, I knew. It was only that your mother and I have formidable enemies, and I feared implicating you, so I never acknowledged you. But who would have thought that even without acknowledging you, trouble came calling a while back and nearly harmed you and Wei Zhao. Thankfully, it's all past now..."

"Is this real? I'm not dreaming, am I?" To Sun Jingyan, the day's events felt dreamlike—Wei Zhao wounded, and she had found her birth parents.

"Jingyi, Qing Bo really is your father!" Gu Mengyao had long since learned this from Wei Zhao and Qing Bo.

Sun Jingyan understood then—no wonder Gu Mengyao's attitude toward her had changed from before, grown so much warmer. It was because she was Qing Bo's daughter!

Sun Jingyan's guess was right; that was exactly how Gu Mengyao saw it. Qing Bo treated her almost like his own daughter, and had saved her many times. Now that Qing Bo had found his daughter—a daughter who, though she seemed to have some tangled feelings with Wei Zhao—Gu Mengyao had still gladly accepted her, simply because she was Qing Bo's daughter, no different from her own elder sister.

Just as Little Shu always treated her—never as an outsider, never competing with her over anything.

"Dad... Mom..." These words, buried deep in Sun Jingyan's heart for so many years, now spoken aloud—she had thought they would be heavy, but they were incomparably light!

"Jingyi!" Sun Luoying was the first to shed tears; Qing Bo, the sturdier of the two, simply kept smiling at Sun Jingyan.

"Mom..." Sun Jingyan pressed her lips together, took a step forward, and threw herself into Sun Luoying's embrace.

Though everyone found it a little amusing that a grown woman like Sun Jingyan would do such a thing, they could well understand her feelings.

Watching Sun Jingyan's happiness, Gu Mengyao was moved by the scene. If one day she were to see her own mother, would she be like Sun Jingyan too? Most likely she would! (To be continued)