"If she wasn't neutral, she could make one side seem more reasonable than the other," Su Yao said hesitantly, continuing her thought only when she saw Wu Ling nod his head. "She could go further though. If she can use tea to calm, she could use it to agitate too, couldn't she?" So Yao said, her eyes going wide. "If she helped one person stay calm while the other became irritable or overcome by an emotion like remorse," she said, her voice growing quieter as she spoke.
"Your Aunt could pivot an entire negotiation," Su Yao realized. "And the people she's doing it to probably wouldn't even notice. They'd think they were just drinking tea."
"There's a problem with this kind of thing though," Wu Ling said before she could get to carried away with his aunt's fearsome powers. She was incredibly capable to be sure, but it wasn't quite as exaggerated as Su Yao thought. "Do you know what the problem is?"
"There has to be a limit on it somewhere. If Tea Masters were so powerful, I'd have heard much more about them," Su Yao said, trying to puzzle through the contradiction. "Does it have to do with how far a person has advanced their cultivation?"
"Exactly," Wu Ling said with a smile. "Mortals and first-stage cultivators are easy to read and easy to influence, but after that, it's very difficult to pick up much from a cultivator at a higher stage than you are."
"It's not that you can't perceive anything," he explained. "But it's much less detailed. Also, some cultivation methods can make it harder to read someone than normal. Sister Yao Meifeng's Requiem of Frozen Heart will make it hard for anyone to perceive the feelings she holds deep under a layer of ice, and even harder to influence them."
"So when will I get to see the world like this?" Su Yao asked, eagerness overpowering what little anxiety remained in her heart.
"It depends on you," Wu Ling answered cryptically. "You've only just received your cultivation manual. I know it seems like I came into this instantly but the truth is that I'd been reading my manual for a long time before Awakening."
"I also used the manual to go through a different sort of awakening than most people do," he added so she didn't get the wrong idea. "So while I've only just Awakened, I had time to study before that. You need to be diligent in your studies if you want to start making use of your abilities as a cultivator."
"You always say that," Su Yao pouted, sticking her tongue out at Wu Ling. "I promise, in three months, I'll surprise you with how far I've come! I only slacked off in school so much because I had to put so much effort into zither that I felt like I never had enough time to practice what I really loved. Now that I don't have to, and I have the sect to help me, just you watch. I'll catch up to you in no time!"
"You don't have to try to catch up to anyone," Wu Ling said with a laugh. This was the face he liked seeing on Su Yao the most. Bright, eager, painted in lush greens like spring's fresh sprouts, ready to blossom into a myriad of colors. Before, she'd only been this bright when talking about the handsome men she imagined herself becoming betrothed to and it had been the most intense when she set her sights on Fang Lin. Now, that bright green yearning for growth combined with flecks of golden ambition centered on herself rather than some external source.
"Junior Sister, this you, this feeling you have right now," Wu Ling said, capitalizing on the moment. "This is the you that you should show your parents when you tell them you've joined a sect. Show them how bright and eager you are for the things you'll learn and the opportunities you'll have. If they see that you're happy and that joining the sect has made you happy, that will do a great deal to put their minds at ease with your decision."
"You really think so?" Su Yao asked, her voice both hopeful and uncertain.
"I was afraid that my mother would forbid me from becoming an Artist because she'd suffered so much discrimination as a Sword Dancer," Wu Ling said gently, recalling the look on his mother's face when he finally told her about his plan to awaken as an Artist. "I was wrong. She always knew what my passion was. I pretended to follow my father's path because I thought it would make her happy, but when I finally told her, she said she was disappointed that I didn't tell her sooner. She was upset because she didn't have a chance to help me and because the secret pulled us apart when we could have been closer together."
"But now you're her disciple," Su Yao said, wondering how joining a sect where his mother was an Elder had changed their relationship. "So are you closer, or further apart?"
"Closer," Wu Ling said with a reassuring smile. "Much closer. While she takes her responsibilities to tutor me in sect matters seriously, it's less like I'm receiving lessons from a powerful Elder and more like… she gets to be my mother in a way I wasn't letting her before. I can bring problems to her that I would have hidden from her before and she has advice for me, or sometimes she just helps me talk it out and find the solution on my own"
"The point, though," Wu Ling said, returning the conversation to the direction he'd intended when he brought up his mother's reaction to learning about his choice. "The point is that she's happy seeing me following the path that I love. If I'd awakened as a Sword cultivator without loving it, but did it because I thought it's what she wanted for me, I think she'd have been even more hurt. Your parents want you to be happy and they want to see you living a good life. Show them that this decision lets you do that and I'm sure you'll have their support."