He Ao had two purposes for conversing with Lockway just now.
One was to tease out intelligence, to confirm whether Lockway was indeed the mastermind behind Yiluo's incident years ago.
The second was to distract Lockway's attention to rescue the red-dressed little girl who had been aiding him and had deep connections with this church. He had just taken Lockway by surprise with a direct move, knocking away Lockway's scalpel and saving the little girl.
However, the little girl in red was still by Lockway's side. With the power and vigilance Lockway had shown, if He Ao's intentions had been too obvious, Lockway might have prioritized "killing" the little girl.
Therefore, He Ao first had to shift the topic to himself to divert Lockway's attention.
There was an information gap here: Lockway was unaware that He Ao had already made contact with the little girl in red earlier, which his words and behavior had revealed.
