The sleeping old man slowly opened his eyes while a sliver of haggardness and great exhaustion appeared on his face. As he woke up, his mind jerked. He could not help but trigger the descent of the Celestial Energy to become a Soul Refining stage cultivator, but the descent was immediately suppressed by the soft sounds of a veena.
"I thank the island mistress for saving my life. This old man is unable to repay the mistress's aid" The old man looked towards Lailah Alden dully. His voice was extremely weak as Michael could barely hear the words coming out of the old man's mouth. In his exhaustion and pain, he even failed to notice the baby dragon in Laila's hands.
"No problem. I'm helping you because I feel nothing but pity for you" Lailah Alden spoke indifferently before turning to Michael, "Make the best use of the time you have to ask what you need to ask. This melody will only temporarily suppress him, but it can't last very long."
The soft sound of the melody was heard by Michael and made him feel extremely calm. He hesitated slightly before pulling out a pendant made of orange stone from his space ring and showed it to the old man,
"Do you recognize this?"
When the old man saw the pendant in Michael's hand, his expression changed greatly. He called out, "This... this is...this is... no- how could... this be?"
Michael became slightly excited, but his excitement was suppressed by the veena music. He stared fixedly at the old man before speaking "Perhaps you recognize this jade pendant?" Michael took out another pendant, unlike the previous pendant, the pendant he just took out had a glowing to it.
He received this pendent from Claire after he became the Core disciple of the sect. There were various different types of pendants, and all the people, from disciples to the teachers, Elders, and guards, had one. Michael's pendant was the pendant given to a Core Disciple.
The old man carried a mixed expression as a sliver of nostalgia appeared in his eyes. He recognized the origins of the pendant with a single glance, especially the morning sun's orange and the aged cracks on the pendant. He would never forget it, as it was created by no one but himself, decades ago.
"Where..where...did..you get this..pendant?" The old man asked. His expression was extremely complicated, a mess of emotions emerged in his eyes.
Right now, Michael had essentially confirmed his suspicions, he knew this man was Claire's grandfather, the previous leader of the Sunrise sect. "It was sect leader Claire who gave it to me"
A gleam of light immediately flashed across the old man's eyes. He took a closer look at Michael before saying, "Are you a disciple of the Sunrise sect of Bredia?" The old man's voice trembled gently and carried a little excitement. Currently, even the song of fairies melody could no longer suppress his emotions.
"Yes, I'm the Core disciple of the sect" Michael also became excited.
"System, can you be able to lift the curse after you come out of the safe mode?"
[yes]
Hearing the system's answer, Michael's excitement skyrocketed despite the fact that he still didn't cure the baby dragon.
The old man accepted the jade pendant from Michael's hand to examine it closely. He murmured to himself, "Claire, my little bear!" The old man displayed emotions of reminiscence, and two trails of murky tears slowly flowed down his face.
"Sect Leader Christopher," Michael said respectfully.
"Sect Leader Christopher!" The old man murmured before smiling at himself, "it's been countless years since someone addressed me like that" the old man weakly smiled, behind his smile, Michael saw an immense pain.
Great shock appeared in both Johana and Nerita's eyes as they witnessed this, both still playing the veena. The young man who appeared out of nowhere was actually a disciple of the old man's sect. The sudden change of events greatly stunned the two of them.
Christopher wiped off the ears with great difficulty, "How...how is Claire? Just how is the sect after so much time?" Christopher asked.
"Sect leader Claire is doing just fine but I can tell you that she's missing you every single day and don't worry about the sect, everything's perfectly fine" Michael lied because he did not want to reveal the sorry state of the sect and depress the old man even further.
"That little girl has become a sect leader" Christopher revealed a smile of relief on his sallow face. He continued, "So many years have passed, is Elder Sandra still alive?"
"You have nothing to worry about, Sect Leader, everyone is just fine," Michael reassured the old man again, he wouldn't forgive himself if he let the old man die of a heart attack before he could recruit Christopher as his subordinate.
"Youngman, I don't think I would last long enough to see my little girl" Christopher scurried the ground beside him to fish out a jade box,
"Please, give this to her, she deserves this"
Michael did not accept the jade box but asked him in concern, "Sect Leader, what happened to you? How did you get cursed by an Elven great mage?"
Michael seemed to touch on the source of Christopher's pain. It caused his eyes to become dull, while deep sorrow appeared on his face. Only after a while did he begin speaking, "if I don't tell you now, Claire may not know what happened to her family forever" Christopher let out a long sigh. The color of reminiscence appeared in his eyes as he murmured,
"Claire is not a pure-blooded human, she was born to my son and an elven general, Elasha of the house Elacan" the old man's words shook Michael's heart, he never thought Claire was a half-elf.
"Marrying a human was a forbidden act in elven lands but because the love they had for each other made Elasha elope with my son," Christopher said with an immense regret behind his voice.
"I helped them settle in Bredia, we were a happy family, young man" tears rolled out of the old man's eyes, his mouth curved upwards thinking about the happiest memories.
"The day Claire born was the happiest days of our life, we had everything until" the old man paused, a glimmer of anger rose within his eyes,
"Until the Elven mage found us during one of our family outings. Elasha fought with the mage, giving us the time to escape but the elven mage was too powerful, he captured her and cursed me and my son before teleporting to the elven lands. Claire was too little at that time to remember what happened to her mother. For Claire, her mother passed away. My son and I tried our best to fight the curse and rescue Elasha but my son died fighting the curse, it should have been me" Michael could see the pain and anger in the old man's eyes, even he himself felt a sliver of anger at those elves. They could have simply banished Elasha, letting her live her own life but instead of doing that, they destroyed a happy little family.
"I never thought your family and the elves have a history, what they did to all of you is horrible," Michael said, feeling sorry for them. Then he turned his gaze towards Lailah,
"Lady Alden, you said I may be able to help him, tell me what do I need to save them both" Only now the old man looked closer at Lailah to see the greyish baby dragon, his eyes instantly widened in shock
Standing to one side, she watched the scene with no emotions on her face. After a slight pause, she said, "Yes, I know a way to help him and heal this dragon but it will not be an easy thing, in fact, there's a strong possibility that you will die if you chose to help them"
When Michael and Christopher heard what she had said, both of their eyes glowed immediately while the light of hope began to shine in their hearts. Michael asked hurriedly,
"Lady Alden, if there's something I can do to help them both, I will do it in a heartbeat" He did not back off from saving the baby dragon just because of her words, this was the time for him to take a risk. If anything goes wrong, he could always buy a teleportation scroll and escape, he was grateful to the system for at least letting him buy a teleportation scroll regardless of its current state.
[The system urges the host to take this risk] just as he was thinking about the risk, he heard the system's voice in his head, it almost sounded like a plea. He frowned but since he already decided to take this risk, he did not ask any question to the system.
Lailah said slowly, "There is something called Demon Dragon heart in The Treacherous Ocean. It's condensed soul energy left behind by an ancient demon dragon. Although it won't break the seal, if you can find the heart, you can temporarily suppress the curse in his soul and cure the death kiss. He can then live at least for another two hundred or three hundred years of his life without suffering"
"Treacherous ocean huh," He said with a deep voice. Shortly afterward, the light in his eyes glowed bright and brighter. For Michael two hundred years were more than enough to lift this curse because he did not plan to let the system continue being on the safe mode. If he could bring the system back online and get the price of lifting the curse, he would eventually earn enough points to save the old man.