Chapter 2745

"You... what did you say?!"

Lin Wan'er's understated sentence made Ye Chen feel as if his whole body had gone numb.

This was not an exaggerated description at all; he truly felt that he was slightly numb from his scalp to his toes!

Lin Wan'er said she was by the Heavenly Lake three hundred years ago, watching that Pu'er mother tree pass its tribulation. Didn't that mean she was already over three hundred years old?!

Deep in Ye Chen's heart, he couldn't believe Lin Wan'er's statement for a moment.

After all, even if a person really found the path to longevity, it was usually one step at a time.

One starts seeking the path in their twenties or thirties, but it is often only in their fifties, sixties, or even older that they might enter the path.

As one enters the path deeper, their lifespan becomes longer, but a cultivator over a hundred years old would at most retain the appearance of someone around sixty, like that count from the Anti-Qing Society.

If Lin Wan'er were really over three hundred years old, she should look at least sixty or seventy, or even eighty. How could she possibly retain the appearance of a seventeen or eighteen-year-old?

Even for himself, having entered the path in his twenties and not yet thirty, it would be absolutely impossible to return to the state of being seventeen or eighteen.

Seeing that Ye Chen seemed not to believe what she said, Lin Wan'er asked nervously, "Is the Young Master thinking that I am joking with him?"

Ye Chen nodded subconsciously, then shook his head and said, "I'm just a bit shocked..."

As he spoke, he asked curiously, "Why did you suddenly call me Young Master, and why did you suddenly refer to yourself as 'Nu Jia'?"

Lin Wan'er smiled, "In the past, girls generally addressed adult unmarried men as 'Young Master'. As for 'Nu Jia'... as a girl, if she hasn't married, she has always referred to herself as 'Nu Jia' in the past, and if she has married, she refers to herself as 'Qie Shen'. It's just that no one says that anymore, so before telling the Young Master these things, I naturally couldn't use it randomly. But since I have been honest and sincere with the Young Master today, I have nothing to hide, and this set of address is the most appropriate."

The words "honest and sincere" made Ye Chen suddenly think of Lin Wan'er's unclothed appearance just now.

For a moment, his expression was somewhat subtly awkward.

And Lin Wan'er also realized that Ye Chen might have misunderstood, and she felt shy and unable to bear it.

Thus, she hurriedly said to Ye Chen, "Young Master, please wait a moment, I will take something for you to see!"

Having said that, she got up and went downstairs, returning with a beautifully mounted scroll.

Lin Wan'er came to the other side of the bed, placed the scroll on the floor, and slowly unrolled it. A landscape painting about two and a half meters wide and six meters long slowly unfolded.

Ye Chen watched the painting intently, looking at the magnificent landscape slowly unfolding before him.

The towering and endless mountains, the Heavenly Lake hanging in the valley like a mirror—the scenery in the painting was natural and vivid, making Ye Chen deeply attracted in an instant.

Ye Chen had never thought that the artistic conception of a landscape painting could be so fascinating. The scenery in the painting was full of spirit, and every stroke seemed perfectly impeccable. The last time he saw such a shocking painting was the portrait of Meng Changsheng given to him by Old Mrs. Jiang.

And the painting skill of this work was even more superb than that one.

At this time, Lin Wan'er used her slender jade fingers to point to the towering and lush tree by the Heavenly Lake in the painting and said to Ye Chen, "Young Master, this is the Mother of Pu'er Tea I mentioned. This is what it looked like three hundred years ago."

After saying this, she moved her finger to a human silhouette under the tree and said, "This is me. For a period of time, I would sit under this tea tree every day to drink tea, watch the mountains, and watch the water."

Ye Chen subconsciously asked Lin Wan'er, "Did you paint this?"

Lin Wan'er nodded, "Yes, Young Master. This painting was done by me a few days ago, specifically for you."

Ye Chen couldn't help but be horrified. He didn't expect Lin Wan'er to have such superb painting skills. His father-in-law was just complaining about the Calligraphy and Painting Association organizing an exhibition and struggling to find good works. If this painting were taken there, I'm afraid all the landscape painters in the country would be blown away!

At this moment, Lin Wan'er suddenly used her other hand to grab Ye Chen's right hand wearing the ring and interlaced her fingers with his. Then, she said to Ye Chen with a face full of expectation, "Young Master, I dare to take you to see what it looked like three hundred years ago with your own eyes!"

Having said that, the ring, which had been motionless, suddenly seemed to understand Lin Wan'er's words and released a bit of Qi directly into their brains.

The next moment, Ye Chen felt his vision blur. Immediately after, it was as if he were being led by the hand by Lin Wan'er, quickly passing through an invisible door. Then, a cool breeze rushed toward his face, and the scene before him instantly came to life.

At this moment, he was standing in the endless mountains of Diannan. The sky was incomparably clear and blue, the mountains were refreshingly green, and the rolling white clouds were close at hand, seemingly within reach. By the Heavenly Lake, besides the exceptionally lush Pu'er mother tree, there were countless flowers of all kinds, and the water of the Heavenly Lake reflected the blue sky, white clouds, and green mountains. The whole scene was beautiful beyond words.

Afterward, Ye Chen looked closely. Under the Pu'er mother tree, a beautiful young girl wearing a cyan-colored, narrow-sleeved long shirt with a horse-face skirt was sitting at a small square table drinking tea. That girl was Lin Wan'er.

Not far away, many tea farmers were picking tea leaves on the relatively low tea trees. Before they carried their baskets full of tea leaves down the mountain, they would come to the Pu'er mother tree, bow slightly to the mother tree, and then respectfully say "Hello, Miss" to Lin Wan'er.

Lin Wan'er recognized every one of them. Whenever someone came up to greet her, she would smile and ask how their harvest was today.

The tea farmers would also walk up, take out a handful of fresh tea leaves from their baskets, and hand them to her for her to taste.

Lin Wan'er would gently pinch a pinch of tea leaves with her fingers, sniff them under her nose, and then pinch a leaf to chew carefully in her mouth, before telling them the grade of the tea leaves and how to kill the green, air-dry, wind-dry, steam-press, and store this batch of tea leaves better.

Every tea farmer, after receiving her guidance, would thank her gratefully before saying goodbye and leaving.

This scene made Ye Chen feel for the first time the perfect harmony between the ancients and nature.

And just as he was immersed in it, everything around him suddenly changed from the bright daytime to a night covered in dark clouds.

The storm kept hitting the Pu'er mother tree, and it used its own strength to face the attack of the storm without flinching.

The wind grew stronger and stronger, so strong that many of the mother tree's branches and leaves broke off, and the trunk swayed violently due to the wind.

Just as the mother tree's trunk was desperately resisting the wind, a bolt of heavenly lightning fell from the sky, crashing onto the mother tree and instantly igniting a fire on it.

The wind and rain did not stop, and the flames burned even more vigorously in the wind and rain.

About an incense stick's time later, the entire mother tree turned into a piece of charcoal, completely losing signs of life.

And the wind and rain seemed to have made an agreement, stopping in an instant.

The dark clouds in the sky dispersed, and a full moon appeared over the Heavenly Lake, illuminating the earth with a cold light.

Under the moonlight, a young girl wearing a basket, a coir raincoat, and a bamboo hat walked step by step to the mother tree.

This girl was Lin Wan'er.

She took off the bamboo hat that was blocking the rain, picked up a piece of the tree trunk that had been charred by the lightning from the ground, held it, and bowed to the mother tree three times.

After this, she did not go down the mountain but put the lightning-struck tree trunk into her basket and walked into the mountains without looking back...