"How are you still alive?" She asked. "And why are you young?"
After thinking for a moment, Zhou Fan wasn't sure how to answer her. He was considering making up a lie, but he had no idea what would sound believable. Just as he was about to try to tell her the truth, an idea came to Zhou Fan's mind.
"Have you heard of god?" He asked.
"Of course. I'm even a devout believer. What does that have to do with anything?" She said.
"Well, when I was about to die not long after the war, he descended upon me and saved my life. He said that I was destined to be his apostle and took me in. Ever since then, I have been following him around and he even made me not age!" Zhou Fan said exaggeratingly.
When Fui Rong heard him, she let out a gasp. For a moment, she didn't believe it, but she soon realized that there was no other explanation. How else could he have lived so long without aging?
"What does he look like?" She asked with visible excitement on her face.
"He doesn't look too much like a human. Instead, he seems like a human-shaped ball of light." He answered.
Zhou Fan had already formulated a story in his head and made sure that there were no loopholes. After she got an answer, Fui Rong didn't stop. Instead, she continued to ask question after question, only momentarily stopping to take a sip of her tea which arrived not too long ago.
30 minutes passed before she stopped asking questions. At some point, she had took out a notepad and a pencil to take notes.
When she finally ran out of questions, she stood up, gave Zhou Fan a hug and a thank you, and ran out saying she had somewhere to be. It wasn't much of a run considering she needed a cane, but it was still surprisingly fast.
Watching her leave, Zhou Fan let out a sigh and stood up. It was likely that this would be the last time he met Fui Rong. As he looked at her with the Dao earlier, he could tell that her lifespan was coming to an end. She likely wouldn't last another year.
Zhou Fan walked down the stairs and nodded at the guard in passing before he went back to the cave.
Meanwhile, Fui Rong had gathered a big group of people in her yard. Her yard was big, yet it was nearly filled to the brim. One could only estimate that 1000 people had showed up after she released a world shaking piece of news.
She had met with God's apostle!
Only an hour after she had released it, thousands of people were in her yard, eagerly waiting.
When Fui Rong saw that the yard had filled up, she started to speak.
"Just a few hours ago, I met with the apostle of God at Lou's pavilion." She started. "We first met up because he was someone I knew from 60 years ago, yet he hadn't aged a day. When we started to talk, he revealed that he was an apostle of God and generously told me about him. I have gathered everyone here to share what I was told."
As the people listened to her, excitement was visible on their faces. Although they would be skeptical if someone else said such a thing, Fui Rong had a great reputation for helping those in need and being truthful.
"He told me that while God has the form of a human, he is made up of light. He also said that God blesses those that are kind and gives bad luck to those that are bad."
As Fui Rong continued her speech, more and more people arrived, and by the time she was done, more than ten thousand people had gathered. Many people wrote down what they heard and information started to spread.
Before long, the entire world knew of the events at Lou's pavilion.
---------------
In the cave, Zhou Fan floated down to his house, only to not sense anyone nearby. Instead, people were gathered at one of the far sides of the cave. Curious, Zhou Fan flew over. When he did, he saw many elves and the rulers of the various races gathered around the casket.
When he saw such a sight, Zhou Fan felt his heart drop. He sped up and instantly appeared in front of the group.
As he looked at them, he could see many of the elves crying, while the rulers stood there with sadness visible in their eyes.
Zhou Fan didn't even have to ask who died when he saw the drawing beside the casket. The recognizable face of Yipeng was perfectly drawn on the piece of paper.
A single tear fell out of Zhou Fan's eyes.
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A couple days later, the mourning was concluded. As Zhou Fan sat in his room, he couldn't help but feel a large amount of sadness.
Yipeng was the closest thing he had to a friend. He regretted not being there in his last moments.
However, he recently learned that Yipeng lived a fulfilling life. While Zhou Fan was gone for 60 years, he gained a wife and even had a few children. Each of them was there at the funeral, and the oldest was already 40 years old.
Zhou Fan wasn't sure how to feel while looking at them. A lifetime had passed him by and he seemed to be the only one who didn't feel it. Old friends were either dead or old, and Zhou Fan was still the same as he was 60 years, besides much stronger and wiser.
He quickly got out of the stupor, however. Countless lifetimes would pass by, and Zhou Fan couldn't feel sad every time.
Finally back to normal, Zhou Fan started to think of what he needed to do before he went back into seclusion. First, he needed to study his current realm. Ever since he broke through, he hadn't paid it a bit of attention and forgot to see if he gained any new abilities.