145: Chapter 235 The Son with a Cleft Lip

This time, he looked even more slowly and for a longer duration. Sometimes he felt it with the pads of his fingers, sometimes he examined it closely with a magnifying glass, and he even picked up an extremely fine steel needle to lightly scratch an inconspicuous spot on the edge of the stone, observing the marks and powder. He was completely immersed in his own world, as if he had forgotten the three people standing behind him.

Yu Bo and the other two didn't dare disturb him; they simply stood quietly in the center of the main room, taking in this space filled with contradictions and stories, their hearts brimming with an indescribable sense of emotion. Who could have thought that the once-famous "Ghost Hand," Yang Yizhuo, would actually live in seclusion in such a simple mountain village wooden house, guarding these long-outdated yet still sharp tools for twenty years?

After an unknown amount of time, Yang Shuming finally put down the tools and the stone in his hands. He took off his reading glasses, rubbed his aching eyes, turned around, and looked at Yu Bo. Under the dim light, the wrinkles on his face appeared deeper, and the sharpness in his eyes seemed somewhat diluted by fatigue.

"This stone," he began slowly, his voice raspy from long periods of concentration, "is indeed quite interesting. But as for the risks, as I said just now, they are very high. The direction of the 'cotton' is uncertain, the boundary of the black and white dead colors is too hard, and the internal texture might be even more uneven than it looks. If I really take a knife to it, it will be a tough battle and a massive gamble. If I lose the bet, this stone will be completely ruined, and even the little bit of 'spirit' it has now won't remain."

Yu Bo's heart leapt into his throat, but he still nodded calmly. "I understand. Everything is up to your decision."

Yang Shuming stared at him for a few seconds before suddenly asking, "If—and I'm saying if—I agree to try, what payment do you intend to offer?"

Just as Yu Bo was pondering and reflecting, Yang Shuming gave the answer himself—or rather, a heavy answer that caught everyone off guard.

The old man looked around the main room, which was almost empty except for the carving tools, and shook his head to himself. "I'm nearly seventy. Being alone in these mountains, as long as I have a bite to eat and a roof over my head to shield me from the wind and rain, it's enough. Money has long since become meaningless to an old bag of bones like me. You can't bring it with you at birth, and you can't take it with you when you die."

He paused, casting his gaze out the window, past the courtyard wall toward the distant mountains where the twilight was deepening. His eyes became distant and hollow as if he had fallen into a far-off memory. The air in the room suddenly became heavy and stagnant due to the change in his tone.

"If I must say there's anything left in this life that I can't let go of..." The old man withdrew his gaze, his voice dropping low, carrying a bone-deep exhaustion and... remorse that had settled over many long years. "It's only my... child, whom I haven't seen in decades."

A child? Yu Bo, Yin Tianxue, and Tang Guo were all stunned. They had never imagined that this eccentric, solitary, and seemingly isolated legendary old man would have such a heavy past.

Yang Shuming didn't look at them, as if he were speaking to the void, or perhaps to someone in his memory. "That child was born... with a cleft lip. It was very severe, splitting from the lip to the base of the nose. Back then, I was young, arrogant, and poor. I felt it was shameful, and I was afraid I couldn't raise him, even more afraid... that he would be a burden later on. I... I wanted to abandon him and have another healthy one."

He spoke very slowly, each word seemingly gouged out with difficulty from the deepest part of his heart, carrying blood and rust. The old man's hands unconsciously gripped the edge of the workbench, his knuckles turning white.

"But his mother... she didn't agree. She protected him with all her might. We fought, we quarreled; there wasn't a single day of peace in the house. I thought she was being unreasonable, and she thought I... had no humanity." The old man's voice trembled slightly. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, his gaze was filled with a thick, inseparable sorrow and regret. "Later... she took the child, who wasn't even three years old yet, and left. She didn't leave a single word; she just vanished. I searched, but I couldn't find them. At that time, I didn't have much fame; I was just a poor carver with a foul temper and decent skills but was struggling. Those two, mother and son... I don't know where they went or how much they suffered."

A dead silence filled the room, broken only by the old man's heavy, suppressed breathing and the increasingly clear chirping of insects outside. Yin Tianxue instinctively covered her mouth, her eyes filled with shock and sympathy. Tang Guo was even more moved, tears welling in her eyes. As a mother herself (or soon-to-be mother), she could imagine how desperate and resolute that wife must have been when she left with her disabled young son all those years ago.

Yu Bo's heart felt as if it were being squeezed tightly by an invisible hand. He suddenly understood why Old Master Ren had said Yang Shuming had a "heart disease." This was more than just a heart disease; this was a demon and a regret that had entwined around him for most of his life, nearly devouring his soul! He also understood why his temperament was so eccentric and why he had sealed his tools and lived in seclusion—this was not just disappointment with the world, but a self-punishment and exile for his cold-blooded decision back then!

"In these decades," Yang Shuming's voice was so low it was almost inaudible, yet every word pierced the heart, "I have carved countless beautiful jades and tried to transform 'rot' into something precious. I've had fame; I've earned some money. But these things cannot fill that hole in my heart. The older I get, the more I miss the two of them. I wonder what the child looks like now, if he's doing well, and if that lip... was ever treated? I wonder if his mother... still hates me. Sometimes I dream of the child crying and asking me, 'Dad, why didn't you want me?'"

A turbid tear finally slid from the corner of the old man's dry eye, winding down his deep, knife-etched wrinkles and disappearing into his gray stubble. But his face remained expressionless, as if the tear did not belong to him.

He looked up at Yu Bo, who was already shaken to the core and unsure of how to react. In those eyes that had weathered many hardships, a final, almost humble spark of hope was burning:

"So, if you must ask for payment... I don't want a single cent of money. And I might not even succeed in carving the stone. But if you... if you have the ability, the connections, if you truly feel you owe me something, or if you just want to do a favor for an old man with one foot in the grave..."

He took a deep breath, as if using up all his strength to speak the words that had been suppressed in his heart for decades:

"Help me find them. My wife's name is Lin Xiuying. The child, if he still follows his mother's surname, should be named Lin... I don't know if he changed his name later. The child was born on the seventh day of the twelfth lunar month in the Year of Geng-Shen (1980), under the sign of the Monkey. If he's still alive, he should be forty-three this year. Behind his left ear, there's a small red mole. His mother... has a very shallow scar at the end of her right eyebrow, from accidentally being cut by a wood-chopping knife when she was young."

Having said all this, the old man seemed drained of all energy. He stumbled slightly, steadying himself by leaning against the workbench. He waved his hand, no longer looking at Yu Bo and the others, his voice utterly exhausted:

"Leave the stone. You all... stay for a simple meal as well. I'll go prepare something to eat."