A Crumbling Sect with a Nascent Soul Expert

What’s it like to be gone for six thousand years?

Ye Yu’an: Thanks for asking. The sect is gone, the disciples have run off, the storehouse is empty, and the creditors are at the door.

My only remaining disciple is a little girl in patched clothes who looks at me like I’m a god.

I told her I wasn’t a god, just a penniless nobody who owed 1.3 million.

She wouldn’t listen and insisted on following me to pay off the debt.

And so began our three-year journey to repay it.

We ran street stalls and got chased off by city inspectors; opened a shop and got squeezed by the competition; ran promotions and got cursed out by our rivals.

Kind strangers passing by asked what our relationship was.

I said we were master and disciple. She said no, we were family.

Later, the debt was paid off, the sect was rebuilt, and she grew up.

Someone asked her who she was most grateful to.

She thought for a moment and said, “Our founding patriarch.” Then she thought again and said, “No, that crooked-necked tree.”

Because without that tree, the founding patriarch would have gotten lost on the day he came back.

This is an irreverent story about rebuilding a sect.

The serious part is paying off the debt; the irreverent part is everyday life.

But serious or not, it all comes down to one thing: a bankrupt sect is nothing to fear, as long as its people stick together.