Chapter 3570: A Different Kind of Romance

The news of Master Kongyin's passing quickly spread throughout Japan.

For this long-lived Buddhist master, the Japanese people had always respected and cherished him deeply, so upon hearing the news, countless people went to Kyoto's Kinkaku-ji Temple to pay their respects, and television stations also broadcast rolling reports on his life.

When Lin Wanan boarded the plane, preparing to take off and return to Huaxia, her phone was still receiving updates about Kongyin.

Lin Wanan, feeling dejected, boarded the plane to return to Jin Ling.

On the plane, Sun Zhidong came to the front cabin and saw Lin Wanan leaning by the window, dazed and vacant.

He carefully walked up and respectfully asked: "Young Lady, are you alright?"

Lin Wanan came to her senses and forced a smile: "I'm quite well, though it's you who's had it rough, following me all the way to Japan."

Sun Zhidong quickly bowed and said: "Being able to attend by your side, saddle and horse at the ready, is my honor, Zhidong. During the years you were not in Huaxia, I often chatted with several brothers and sisters I grew up with about you. Though we all have achievements in different countries and fields, when we talk, what we actually envy most is Old Zhang, for only he has been able to stay by your side all these years."

Lin Wanan sighed: "It's just that he's suffered, having accompanied me for so many years, yet I myself have not even had a child."

Sun Zhidong softly sighed: "Actually, for us who have no ancestral lineage to speak of, there is indeed no need to continue the bloodline."

Having said that, he suddenly thought of this brief trip to Japan and asked her: "Young Lady, was Master Kongyin also one of the orphans you raised?"

"Yes." Lin Wanan nodded, sighing: "Back then in Japan, I adopted many orphans from Kyoto City. Over time, I gained a small reputation there, and so many people began leaving newborns they did not want or could not afford to raise at my doorstep. Zhengping was one of them."

Speaking of this, Lin Wanan couldn't help but feel emotional: "That time was truly long ago, and those children from back then have long since passed away one after another. Zhengping was the last to depart. Now that he's gone, all those children I raised in Japan are no longer with us."

Sun Zhidong asked her: "Young Lady, was Master Kongyin the one you loved most among those children back then?"

Lin Wanan shook her head: "It's not that I loved him the most, just that his life was the most bitter."

Having said that, she recalled the past and said: "Zhengping's mother gave birth to him at seventeen, during the coldest time in Kyoto. After giving birth, she left him outside my manor's gate and then jumped into the Moat River to drown herself. Given the weather at the time, a newborn Zhengping likely wouldn't have survived more than half an hour, but fortunately he cried loudly in his swaddling clothes, which other children heard and told me about, so I took him in."

Sun Zhidong asked in surprise: "Then why did his mother commit suicide?"

Lin Wanan said: "Zhengping's mother left a letter on him. According to the letter, his father was a son-in-law who married into the Ito family of Kyoto at the time, and his mother was a maid in the Ito household. His father was daily oppressed by his wife, so he secretly became involved with his mother. Later, when Zhengping's mother became pregnant, his father feared exposure and sent her away to another residence to live and await childbirth. But in the end, the matter was discovered by other servants, and the Ito family wanted to eradicate the roots, planning to kill both him and his mother."

Sun Zhidong was somewhat puzzled: "If the son-in-law strayed, why didn't the Ito family punish him, but instead direct murderous intent toward a maid?"

Lin Wanan said: "The Ito family had their concerns. They took in a son-in-law because the Ito family head at the time had only one daughter, and they needed a son-in-law to continue the Ito bloodline. Zhengping's father and the Ito family's daughter already had a son, named Ito Keiji. The Ito family head knew of this, feared that after his death, Zhengping's father would use his son Ito Keiji to bring his outside son into the Ito family, so he wanted to eradicate the roots."

"Ito Keiji..." Sun Zhidong murmured: "That name sounds somewhat familiar."

Lin Wanan explained: "Ito Keiji is none other than the founder of the current largest Ito family in Japan. It was he who, through his own efforts, elevated the Ito family from a small wealthy household in Kyoto to a massive financial conglomerate spanning all of Japan. Zhengping is his half-brother, sharing the same father."

Sun Zhidong suddenly recalled something and exclaimed: "Master Ye seems to have a good relationship with the Ito family."

"Yes." Lin Wanan nodded, saying with a hint of sorrow: "If Zhengping had accepted that Rejuvenation Pill, he might have had a chance to meet Ito Yuhong in the future. Ito Keiji is the great-great-grandfather of Ito Yuhong."

The plane returned to Jin Ling at night. After landing, Lin Wanan immediately shut herself in the mountain-top villa of Zijin Mountain Villa, alone and silently grieving.

This encounter with Kongyin, and experiencing the farewell, made her realize something: she had always taken in some children back then, raised them, prepared them to face the world, and then disappeared from their lives. She had thought it was being forgotten in the rivers and lakes, but she hadn't expected that these children's feelings for her could actually endure over a hundred years without fading.

Kongyin is like this, and the other children who are still alive—likely some of them are the same.

And the Lin Wanan of back then, for safety and to cut ties, rarely initiated contact with them again, but in her heart, these people are all her children, and how could she not miss them?

So, in the villa, under the tree of the Mother of Plain Tea, she made a silent vow: if in the future Wu Feiyan is no longer a threat, she will definitely go to see those children who are still alive, if there is still time.

Because among them, the youngest is probably already seventy years old.

……

Three days later, Master Kongyin's funeral was held in Kyoto, Japan. What was moving was that the one presiding over this funeral was a young Buddhist master from Huaxia, also Kongyin's forgotten-year friend, Master Jingqing.

Master Kongyin's body was cremated at the Kyoto funeral home. All of Japan awaited that after his cremation, he might leave behind relics, but unfortunately, Master Kongyin turned into a wisp of blue smoke and departed, leaving behind only a container of ashes.

Following Master Kongyin's last wishes, his ashes were not left at Kinkaku-ji Temple; the temple merely enshrined his spirit tablet, while his ashes were secretly buried by his chief senior disciple in a cemetery in the suburbs of Kyoto.

This cemetery has already existed for over a hundred years and is one of the earliest large-scale public cemeteries in Kyoto. The number of people buried here has long reached tens of thousands.

This public cemetery had already run out of new burial plots for sale several years ago, but some people had early on purchased empty plots that remain unused to this day.

Among them is an empty burial plot that Master Kongyin had purchased years in advance.

After Master Kongyin's burial, his tombstone was erected before the grave, but unlike most people's, his tombstone bears only the six large characters "Zhengping Saito's Grave," plus a date of death inscription at the base.

Because no birth date was left, actually few people know how many years the owner of this grave lived, and no one knows that this grave is actually Master Kongyin's final resting place.

Beside the grave of Zhengping Saito, a few scattered tombstones of the Saito surname still stand: Saito Keiko, Saito Tozan, Saito Han, Saito Rei, Saito Ryo, and so on and so forth.

The years of death for these people span a wide range, with the earliest even dating back to 1926.

Those who don't know might still think that a certain Saito family buried all their deceased relatives here, but some elderly people in Kyoto know that these Saitos are basically the orphans adopted by the renowned Miss Saito back then.

In their youth, they were all quite accomplished, with most of them having branched out and spread across all of Japan, and even the world, but without exception, before their deaths, they all demanded that their families bury them here.

The grave of Zhengping Saito is merely one among these Saito burial mounds, and aside from the tombstone being newer, there is nothing particularly special to be seen.

But for these orphans who grew up together from childhood, having no blood ties yet being as close as brothers and sisters, to be buried together after death—what is this if not another kind of romance?