Am I the old man who's always by my apprentices' side?

Chapter 124 Is there such a good thing?

Zhu Ye took a deep breath and opened his mouth with difficulty: "Brother Huang Wu, why don't you go to the Sword Forging Manor to learn martial arts?"

Upon hearing this, Huang Wu looked puzzled again: "Why should I learn it? There's no benefit to learning martial arts! What I lack is money. I can make a living as a carpenter right away, but learning martial arts would be a waste of money. Why should I learn it?"

"But if you learn martial arts and become a martial artist, you can run escort services or do other things in the future, earning more money. It's much easier than being a carpenter, right?"

"What's wrong with being a carpenter?" Huang Wu scratched his head and said, "You guys are really strange. Does learning martial arts guarantee you'll become skilled? My carpentry skills are already quite impressive, why would I want to learn martial arts?"

Zhu Ye felt like a scholar encountering a soldier, unable to explain himself at all. He was unusually exasperated: "If you don't want to learn martial arts anymore, then why are you learning immortality?"

"Mr. Zhu, this is cultivating immortality! Who doesn't want to become an immortal? That's what gods are!"

Huang Wu gestured with his hands, giving Zhu Ye a look as if she were an idiot, and Zhu Ye immediately felt as if she had been scolded.

"Hehehehe..."

Before anyone knew it, Zhang Chengdao had flown over and stood beside the three of them, smiling as he said, "Huang Wu is a magnanimous and straightforward person. It's normal that young friend Zhu, with his keen intellect, can't understand Huang Wu's thoughts."

As he spoke, he nodded to Huang Wu and asked, "You have an excellent character and are destined to be with my White Stone Immortal Sect. Would you be willing to become my disciple and my fifth personal disciple?"

Huang Wu was stunned for a moment, then he danced with joy, nodding repeatedly and counting on his fingers, saying, "I'm willing! I'm more than willing! I just don't know what the proper way to do this apprenticeship ceremony is? Do I need to buy some cured meat? Or do I need to get some wine?"

Zhang Chengdao replied, "No need for anything. Our sect doesn't have many rules. You can come with me first. After the Immortal Fate Assembly, Sect Leader Xu will explain the sect rules to the new disciples."

After saying that, he led Huang Wu toward a table in the distance. Huang Wu looked around excitedly, and his originally somewhat slovenly appearance became exceptionally radiant.

Zhu Ye watched Huang Wu's departing figure, feeling both jealous and confused.

The mountain breeze gently blew against the hem of his clothes, making him feel a bit chilly.

"Mr. Zhu, please come this way!"

Chang Ping'an's voice rang in Zhu Ye's ears, startling him awake.

Zhu Ye glanced one last time at Huang Wu, who had already rushed into an empty table, then looked away, sighed wistfully, and followed Chang Ping'an toward the tower they had been standing in.

"Immortal, wait, I should call you Master now!"

On the other side, Huang Wu chuckled somewhat awkwardly and said frankly, "You look more than ten years younger than me, it's really a bit embarrassing!"

After expressing his amazement, he asked, "Master, I've never studied martial arts for even a short time, and I know I'm not very smart. Why did you take me in as your student?"

Although Huang Wu speaks bluntly and doesn't know how to be tactful, he's not stupid. He could tell from Zhu Ye's reaction that someone like him could become a disciple of an immortal... something that Mr. Zhu couldn't understand!
If even someone as intelligent as Mr. Zhu couldn't understand it, then of course he couldn't figure it out either, so he simply asked directly.

Upon hearing this, Zhang Chengdao paused almost imperceptibly.

He actually disliked Huang Wu's big yellow teeth. He had the illusion that he could smell bad breath just by looking at them. He had even been thinking that he should crack down on the cleanliness of the sect's disciples in the future, so as to prevent fleas and lice from growing in the already backward ancient times.

But to be fair, aside from Huang Wu being a gold card holder, Zhang Chengdao genuinely found Huang Wu to be a very interesting person. When others were affected by the illusionary magic of the inner demons, they either suffered greatly or experienced intense emotions due to their desires. But when it came to Huang Wu, it was as if he had just lived an ordinary day!
It seems that no experience or hardship could defeat this somewhat disheveled middle-aged man, nor could it affect his strong inner self.

Murong Ruyan, who couldn't understand why her master had taken on this dirty-looking craftsman, really couldn't stand Huang Wu. She snorted sarcastically, "Hmph! No manners!"

Ye Shuyun, who was standing next to Murong Ruyan, quickly changed the subject and pulled Murong Ruyan aside to discuss, "Senior Sister, do you think our disciples' quarters are a bit small? Senior Sister's lightning magic is powerful, so why don't you help me level that grove of trees next door these next few days, so I can have it expanded..."

Huang Wu's ears twitched slightly, as if he hadn't heard anything. He still happily took his seat, but his eyes looked at Zhang Chengdao expectantly, making no attempt to hide his desire to gain Zhang Chengdao's approval.

"Many people... no, most people, live their whole lives in regret."

Zhang Chengdao also sat down and slowly began to speak: "When you are young, you will regret a piece of candy or a bite of meat; when you are middle-aged, you will regret your ordinariness; and when you are old, you will regret the choices you may have made that were wrong."

"The scholars who passed the provincial examination regretted that they could not write brilliantly in their examination rooms, and the generals who returned from the battlefield regretted that they could not strategize effectively on the battlefield."

Many people are always regretting, lamenting, and searching for "what ifs," and in the process they gradually get lost, or even live in the past forever.

“But I noticed that you don’t seem to feel any ‘regret’.”

Hearing Zhang Chengdao's words, the people sitting around him were all stunned.

Instead, Huang Wu grinned, revealing his signature big yellow teeth, and said, "No, I do have some regrets! If I had given up on living on our little plot of land earlier and taken my mother to the prefectural city to work as a carpenter, I might have been able to get her health back on track. If she had stayed a few years longer, she could have eaten more meat!"

But after saying that, he frowned in distress: "But my mother would never have let me sell the family's old ox and farmland when she was alive. Who knows, in the end, it might still be the same, and I'll only be able to drink a sip of meat soup before I die!"

Finally, Huang Wu surprisingly sighed, slapped his thigh, and said, "Sigh! That's what I mean! You can't predict anything, so why regret it every day? Right?"

Listening to Huang Wu's words, Zhang Chengdao felt as if his heart had become more open.

He nodded in agreement, saying, "It's inevitable for people to have flaws, but it's very difficult to be honest with oneself."

After saying that, Zhang Chengdao suddenly seemed a little dazed.

He seemed to understand what he had read in the book before, which was why after achieving the elixir, cultivation no longer considered physical attributes, aptitude, or spiritual roots, but only temperament and comprehension.

People tend to reconstruct past choices as "avoidable mistakes," but in reality, the decision at the time may have been the optimal solution given limited information. This hindsight bias amplifies the feeling of regret, causing many people to remain in a state of remorse, clinging to the idea of ​​"what if."

In a daze, the golden core within Zhang Chengdao's body seemed to solidify a bit, and he also felt a little hot.

This change brought Zhang Chengdao back to his senses, and he immediately opened his control panel.

Sure enough, it wasn't his imagination.

After the "Realm" section on the personal panel, the original "First Level of Core Formation" suddenly changed to "Second Level of Core Formation", and the time consumed for upgrading was also reset!

There is such a good thing! ?
(End of this chapter)