The wedding was livestreamed by the sister, revealing his identity as a Taoist priest.

"Even a great fortune is a gift from others!"

Zhou Xiuqing's shout was hysterical.

Qi Hui slumped down in the guest seat.

"Xiuqing, are you really confused?"

Qi Hui's face turned deathly pale, and her voice was weak.

"Your Song family has been court musicians for three generations, serving as the imperial ensemble since the late Qing Dynasty. You have a profound background; how could it have been bestowed upon you by someone else?"

"Court musicians? Those tattered scores are just for fooling laymen like you."

Zhou Xiuqing gave a bitter smile; her full head of silver hair looked particularly desolate under the lamplight.

He stretched out his withered hand and gripped Song Yun's wrist tightly, with such force that Song Yun gasped.

"Yun girl, you've studied hard since you were little, won a national gold medal at sixteen, do you think you're a genius?"

Song Yun didn't dare to nod or shake her head.

The resume that he was usually so proud of seemed extremely thin under his grandmother's questioning at this moment.

"I'll tell you."

Zhou Xiuqing looked at her granddaughter, her gaze piercing through her, as if looking into the distant past.

Sixty years ago, I was fifteen years old.

"That December, I followed your great-grandfather to the foot of Zhongnan Mountain to escape famine."

The hall was very quiet.

Qi Hui swallowed.

Song Yun even softened her breathing.

Zhou Xiuqing's voice was dry and distant.

"The mountains were blocked by heavy snow, and the temperature was minus thirty degrees Celsius. Your great-grandfather and I were so hungry that we were on our last breath, and we huddled in a dilapidated cave waiting to die."

"Then, I heard the sound of a piano."

"The sound of a zither came from the deepest part of the wind and snow."

Zhou Xiuqing closed her eyes, and tears welled up in the corners of her eyes again.

"I climbed out of the cave, the snow was knee-deep, and right on the edge of the cliff, sat a blind woman."

"Wearing a faded gray-blue Taoist robe, with a charred wooden zither with half a corner missing across his lap."

"The wind was whipping up snow, and it was whistling like knives, but do you know what I saw?"

Zhou Xiuqing suddenly opened her eyes and stared intently at Qi Hui.

A chill ran down Qi Hui's spine.

"Look...what did you see?"

"Snowflakes, I can't touch her."

Zhou Xiuqing said, her voice trembling.

"Snowflakes flew everywhere, but when they reached within three feet of her, they were all pulverized by the invisible sound waves. She sat in the blizzard, without a single snowflake on her!"

Song Yun's pupils contracted sharply.

Sound waves shake the snow?

Isn't this the internal energy cultivation technique from martial arts novels?

How could such a thing possibly exist in the world!

"Your great-grandfather was targeted by a pack of wolves."

Zhou Xiuqing continued.

"A dozen or so starving wolves, their green eyes gleaming, surrounded us."

"The blind Taoist nun didn't even raise her head. She only said one sentence: 'Disturbing the peace and quiet.'"

Zhou Xiuqing's fingers made a plucking motion in mid-air.

With a "clang".

Just once!

"I watched as the three wolves at the front had their heads explode! Blood splattered on the snow, steaming, and the rest of the pack, tails between their legs, ran for their lives into the mountains."

The hall was deathly silent.

Qi Hui's hands trembled like a leaf.

"Xiu...Xiuqing...Is this some kind of supernatural tale? How could a wolf's head just appear when a person plucks a string on a zither..."

"You can't discuss ice with a summer insect!"

Zhou Xiuqing interrupted sharply.

"That's true sonic killing technique! That's the method of a cultivator!"

Zhou Xiuqing lowered her head, looking at her hands, which were covered in calluses from years of playing the zither.

"I knelt before her, kowtowing until my forehead was bloody and mangled, begging her to accept me as her disciple."

"She didn't accept it."

Zhou Xiuqing's eyes were filled with sorrow.

She said I had terrible aptitude and a cluttered mind, and was not worthy of entering the Heavenly Sound Pavilion.

"But I was so shameless that I knelt outside the cave for three days and three nights. Finally, when she saw that I was about to freeze to death, she sighed and allowed me to listen to her play the piano for half a month."

half a month.

Song Yun was struck dumb.

"Grandma...you mean...?"

Song Yun's throat tightened, and her voice broke completely.

"Your Song family's ancestral zither skills, your masterful abilities..."

"It's all just the superficial stuff I learned by auditing classes and secretly observing over the past two weeks!"

Zhou Xiuqing burst into tears.

"She wouldn't even let me touch the zither! Half a month later, she left only the words, 'Mortals listen to the zither for pleasure, but celestial music uses the zither to decide life and death,' and went into the mountains, never to come out again."

Tears streamed down Zhou Xiuqing's face as she clutched her phone tightly to her chest.

"My greatest obsession in this life is to be able to properly kowtow to the Tianyin Pavilion and call it 'Founder'!"

"But I'm not qualified! I'm not even a registered outer disciple; I'm just a thief who eavesdropped for fifteen days!"

Qi Hui fell completely silent.

The pride of the master of traditional Chinese music in Beijing was shattered before this almost mythical secret.

Listening to the basics for half a month is enough to dominate the modern Chinese music scene for sixty years.

Just how terrifying must the true successor of the Heavenly Sound Pavilion be?

Zhou Xiuqing suddenly raised her phone and shoved it in front of Song Yun.

"Look at this video!"

Zhou Xiuqing's finger poked at Su Qingluan's red dress.

"That blind Taoist nun told me that in the Heavenly Sound Pavilion, those in gray-blue Taoist robes are outer disciples, while those in silver-threaded black robes are inner disciples."

"A crimson robe shimmering in the clouds..."

Zhou Xiuqing swallowed a mouthful of saliva mixed with blood.

"That's a robe that only the current sect leader and direct descendant can wear!"

"Her name is Su Qingluan, and she is a direct descendant of the Heavenly Sound Pavilion!"

Song Yun felt a surge of electricity rush from her tailbone to the top of her head.

"That...that Mr. Chen..."

Song Yun astutely grasped the core of the problem.

Su Qingluan, as the current head of Tianyin Pavilion, actually came down the mountain in person.

She disregarded worldly opinions and the lofty ideals of her sect.

Using the "Nine Heavens Phoenix Melody Zither," a treasured artifact unseen for eight hundred years, as a betrothal gift to another woman?!

"That's the scariest part."

Zhou Xiuqing's eyes flashed with extreme awe and fanaticism.

"A man who could make the direct descendants of the Heavenly Sound Pavilion willingly admit defeat, and even give away the pavilion's most prized possession..."

"Mr. Chen's status is beyond the sky!"

Zhou Xiuqing slammed her hand on the table and stood up abruptly.

Her movements were so agile that she didn't seem like a woman in her seventies at all.

"Where!"

Zhou Xiuqing stared at Song Yun with bloodshot eyes.

"Where is what?"

Song Yun didn't react.

"Where was this video filmed?! Where is that deity?!"

Song Yun hurriedly grabbed the phone, opened the trending topics page, and scrolled through it rapidly.

"Jiangcheng! It seems that the eldest daughter of Tianyin Pavilion is at the Shen family's residence!"

Song Yun called out.

Zhou Xiuqing pushed aside the mahogany table in front of her.

"Uncle Fu!"

Uncle Fu, who had been waiting outside the door panting heavily, immediately pushed the door open and rushed in.

He had heard the entire conversation inside, and now he was covered in cold sweat.

"Madam!"

"Contact the airport immediately! Get the Gulfstream at home ready!"

Zhou Xiuqing's voice was resolute and unwavering.

"Gather all the core members of the Song family, whether they're performing out of town or studying abroad. Get them all to Jiangcheng within twelve hours!"

Uncle Fu, stand at attention!

"Yes! What are you going to Jiangcheng for?"

Zhou Xiuqing grabbed the sandalwood cane beside her, her eyes burning with a century-old obsession and fire.

"Go and kowtow!"

"The successor of the Heavenly Sound Pavilion has appeared in this world. Even if it means death, I will still go to acknowledge this threshold of recognition of my ancestors!"

"Get the car ready! Let's go!"