The sage was determined to die.

"That's not wrong, he is indeed sick."

Xu Tangyi said in surprise, "I didn't expect that you, at such a young age, would have some knowledge of pathology. In your opinion, what kind of illness does your senior brother have?"

Ji Bai thought to himself, "That was close," but on the surface he was very serious: "I think it should be called mental illness. Although there is no physical bleeding, the wound in the heart is bleeding, and there is no cure. This kind of pain is not easy to bear."

"That makes sense." Xu Tangyi nodded and sighed, "Let's go, I'll take you to see your other senior brothers and sisters."

The senior sister in front of me was unusually quiet.

She didn't look much older than Ji Bai; she was emaciated, her face as pale as paper, sitting quietly beside a pile of stones, her eyes unfocused and lifeless, like a breathing corpse.

They didn't react at all when they saw the two of them coming.

Ji Bai couldn't help but think of a book about mental illness he had once read. In the book, there was a mental patient who saw himself as a stone, which was somewhat similar to the senior sister in front of him.

"Was Senior Sister's literary talent also taken away?" Ji Bai speculated, thinking about Senior Brother's current state.

Xu Tangyi shook his head, took out a bottle of nutritional pills from his pocket, poured out two pills and stuffed them into her hand. After a while, she slowly put them in her mouth and swallowed them.

Ji Bai recognized the bottle. He had been worried about the poor food in prison and wanted to buy some nutritional pills as meal replacements, but naturally, he didn't end up buying them.

Because a bottle costs five hundred taels of silver, which is far too expensive for him to afford.

"Your senior sister can't eat normal meals."

Xu Tangyi handed the bottle of nutritional pills to Ji Bai and said, "These past few days I've been studying the Holy Path all night, so I don't have much time to take care of your senior brothers and sisters. Just give her two nutritional pills every day, and she'll take them herself."

Ji Bai looked at his senior sister, who was almost one with the stone, and hesitated before saying, "Senior sister, she..."

Xu Tangyi sighed again.

"Your senior sister was a true genius back then; even powerful immortal sects almost took her as their disciple."

"Unfortunately, she was assassinated in the Mountain of Books and trapped in the illusion of the Mountain of Books, where she killed her family and friends countless times with her own hands."

"After she finally survived, she could no longer distinguish between reality and illusion."

Ji Bai swallowed hard: "Is this how Senior Sister got sick?"

"Of course not."

Xu Tangyi's eyes suddenly sharpened, and he said coldly, "Of course, the person behind the scenes won't let her off so easily. After your senior sister came out of the Book Mountain, she was in a daze for a while, and she finally got through it."

"They plotted to kill her entire family and made her believe that she had gone mad and killed them."

Ji Bai remained silent.

"Just for Senior Sister's literary talent?"

"All for your senior sister's second-grade literary talent." Xu Tangyi sighed. "Your senior sister is the kind of person who would rather die than live in dishonor. She didn't let those people succeed and personally destroyed her own second-grade literary talent."

"She has looked like this ever since."

.

Xu Tangyi didn't let Ji Bai take care of too many people. All he was entrusted with was to accompany his senior brother in acting every day and then feed his senior sister a meal.

Taoranju was much larger than Ji Bai had imagined. Ji Bai had consciously observed that there were at least ten patients like his senior brothers and sisters living there.

If nothing unexpected happens, these will be ten promising young talents whose futures have been ruined.

"Teacher, you are so different from how you are in class," Ji Bai couldn't help but exclaim.

Xu Tangyi blushed. This wasn't the first time he'd found caregivers for these apprentices. Thinking of Ji Bai's upcoming praise, he was about to wave goodbye when the other man spoke:

"You taught us to get used to killing in the mountain of books so that we could save our lives. Yet you took in so many poor senior brothers and sisters."

Ji Baijun's face flushed slightly. He turned his head away and coughed twice to cover it up, saying embarrassedly, "You must be very rich, sir? Could you lend me some money first? I'll pay you back after I leave the mountain of books."

Xu Tangyi, who was just about to receive the friend card, thought to himself: "..."

In the end, this loan trip ended with Ji Bai borrowing three hundred taels of silver.

This made Ji Bai sigh, "One must be ambitious to succeed; being a high-ranking official makes all the difference."

Xu Tangyi was used to being alone and didn't like being served by servants. Fortunately, Taoran Residence had plenty of empty rooms, so he found an empty room for Ji Bai to stay in. At that very moment, the scorching midday sun was shining directly on him.

Ji Bai twitched his ears and squinted at a spot not far away. There was a wide open space where a very familiar-looking boy in red was playing Cuju (ancient Chinese football), and a chubby little boy was squatting next to him playing with ants.

"Teacher, which of my senior brothers is this?" Ji Bai looked at the person more and more familiar.

"Oh, this one is here to work, just like you."

Xu Tangyi yawned and said, "The one squatting over there is your senior brother."

Ji Bai nodded thoughtfully.

As a high-ranking scholar, Ji Bai naturally wouldn't be idle. After Xu Tangyi left, Ji Bai didn't rush back to his room to rest, nor did he disturb his senior sister who was a stone and his senior brother who was a scholar.

He sat under the tree and watched the boys play football for a while. Seeing that the boys were not paying attention to him, he noticed that the boys were talking to the chubby boy who was counting ants. Ji Bai had amazing hearing and heard everything clearly.

"I went to Zhenlong Restaurant for drinks yesterday, you must be envious. Did I spend any money? Of course not."

"Hahaha, I've run into a sucker. He's a fun guy, I'll bring him to meet you sometime. Don't take it seriously, I'm just teasing you."

"Hey, Fatty, you used to be royalty, now you're so fat you can't even kick a ball."

The chubby boy rolled his eyes at him, turned his back, and ignored him.

Ji Bai got up and walked over. The boy kicked the ball but missed, and the round ball rolled towards Ji Bai's feet.

Ji Bai picked up the ball, squinted at the opponent, and laughed, "Brother, you played quite well. You've got some of the national team's style."

"Oh, not at all, I'm still far from that level."

The boy in red blushed slightly at the praise, but his narrowed eyes widened abruptly the moment he saw Ji Bai's smiling face. His mouth gaped open, wide enough to fit an egg, and he instinctively asked, "What are you doing here?"

"It's only been a day, but I never expected this—"

Remembering that he hadn't asked the other person's name, Ji Bai changed his question: "I didn't expect that not only have you changed your clothes and gotten shorter, but you've even changed your face."

"Who's gotten shorter? I haven't gotten shorter at all!"

The boy turned to pull the chubby boy away, but the latter plopped down on the ground, his large frame emphasizing his weight. His eyes darted around, sizing up the two of them, before he suddenly blurted out, "Xie Bi'an, you've been disguising yourself to scam people again, haven't you? Why didn't you even tell him your name? Did you swindle him out of money?"