She just stood there, watching quietly, her thoughts rising and falling with the waves, not even noticing the footsteps approaching from behind.
It wasn't until a rough yet warm hand gently patted her shoulder that Yunqin snapped back to reality.
Her body trembled slightly, but she didn't turn around. Her voice was hoarse from crying: "Uncle Tian, heading out to fish again?"
"Haha, I thought I'd mistaken you for someone else. I can't believe it's really you, little Yunqin." A familiar laugh came from behind her.
Uncle Tian, leaning on his fishing rod, walked smilingly to her side. His gray hair fluttered in the sea breeze, his face etched with the wrinkles of time and a gentle smile.
Yunqin slowly turned to face Uncle Tian. Just as she was about to greet him, he handed her the fishing rod. "Take it."
"What's this for..." Yunqin asked, confused, but she instinctively took the rod.
Noticing the lingering redness in her eyes and glancing at her slightly swollen eyelids, Uncle Tian didn't directly mention that she had been crying. Instead, he just smiled and shook his head. "Compared to how you are now, I much prefer the boisterous girl from before."
After saying that, he turned and walked toward the small fishing boat moored at the pier. "Come on, keep this old man company for some fishing at sea. Feel the sea breeze, and maybe you'll figure things out."
Yunqin watched Uncle Tian's retreating back and finally followed him in silence.
The fishing boat slowly pulled away from the pier. The two sat on the gunwale, sharing a tacit silence, with only the sound of waves lapping against the hull echoing in their ears.
Yunqin stared at the motionless float on the sea's surface, her doubts surging like a tide, nearly suffocating her.
"Uncle Tian, if... if you discovered that everything you've known so far was fake—the family you thought you had, the identity you thought was yours, the beliefs you held—all of it fake, should you accept your true self, or continue to play dumb?"
Yunqin couldn't help but ask, her voice so soft it seemed the sea breeze could carry it away.
Uncle Tian didn't answer immediately. He just stared intently at the float, his fingers gently stroking the handle of the fishing rod, his eyes filled with calm.
Time ticked by, second by second. On the sea, only the float bobbed quietly, and Yunqin's heart sank a little more with each passing moment.
She could no longer suppress her inner turmoil; the power of the ocean was unleashed.
Just then, Uncle Tian's eyes lit up, his voice tinged with surprise: "Here it comes!"
With swift movements, he lifted the fishing rod, his arm tensing slightly as the line pulled taut, and a plump fish was reeled in.
Uncle Tian held up the fish, watching it wriggle in his hand, and laughed like a child, his eyes narrowing into slits.
But after laughing for a while, he carefully unhooked the fish and gently released it back into the sea.
Watching the fish disappear into the water with a flick of its tail, Uncle Tian recast his line. Only after the float settled steadily on the sea's surface did he slowly speak: "When the false is taken as true, the true becomes false; when the true is taken as false, the false becomes true."
Seeing Yunqin still looking bewildered, her eyes filled with confusion.
Uncle Tian pointed to the float on the sea's surface and explained with a smile: "It's like this fishing. I forgot to bait the hook, yet I still caught a big fish."
"Would you say this is 'false'? But the fish did take the hook, and I truly felt the pull. Is it 'true'? But I didn't follow the usual rules; even I didn't expect to catch anything."
He turned to look at Yunqin, his eyes filled with gentleness: "So, what matters isn't the so-called illusion versus reality, nor how others see or define you, but what you truly think in your own heart."
"If you want to be the Yunqin who loves Rex Lapis figurines and learns to fish with me, Uncle Tian, then you are Yunqin! You live your life for yourself, not for others to see."
The sea breeze curled around the fine spray of the waves, gently lapping against the ship's side. Water droplets splashed onto the back of Yunqin's hand, but she didn't flinch as she had before.
Yunqin stared blankly at Uncle Tian, then at the float bobbing gently with the waves on the sea's surface. The fog in her mind had mostly cleared.
At some point, the "water" that had terrified her was no longer as frenzied. Instead, it seemed to possess a gentleness that resonated with her own heart.
"But..." Yunqin opened her mouth, her voice as soft as cotton fluff shredded by the sea breeze, her fingertips unconsciously tightening, "what if my 'true self' is something that makes others recoil?"
Her gaze fell to the sea, watching her reflection sway on the wave crests, just like her wavering heart at that moment.
She feared that if she reached out to grasp "reality," she would shatter even those warm memories.
Uncle Tian heard her but didn't answer immediately.
He slowly reached into his pocket, fumbled around for a moment, and pulled out a smooth, lustrous ore, holding it out to Yunqin.
"When you were little, you always used to sneak away with my jade stones, saying you wanted to string them into a bracelet for your Rex Lapis figurine. Remember?"
Yunqin took the stone, memories flooding her mind.
Back then, she was still young and didn't know Uncle Tian's true identity.
While playing at the docks, she saw the exquisite jade stones he carried and insisted on snatching them to make a bracelet.
But the string broke after she had threaded only two beads, scattering them all over the ground. She squatted there, on the verge of tears.
It was Uncle Tian who put down his fishing rod, smiled, and helped her pick them up one by one. He restrung them with a sturdy thread and even tied a small peace knot at the end.
"Our Yunqin's intentions are the purest. Rex Lapis will surely see them," Uncle Tian had told her back then.
"Back then, you didn't know I was Tianshu, nor did you know how valuable the jade was. You just thought it was pretty and wanted to give it to your beloved Rex Lapis." Uncle Tian's voice was gentle, mellowed by the passage of time.
"You see, liking Rex Lapis and wanting to put a bracelet on his figurine were things you truly wanted to do from the bottom of your heart. Now, you're afraid that these things you genuinely love will be taken away because of an 'identity'."
"But true feelings never depend on 'identity'. Just like this stone, it won't change its luster because of who you are, nor will it become something bad just because you've done some bad things."
Yunqin squeezed the jade stone, her fingertips pressing slightly harder.
She remembered how, on Mt. Aocang, she would carefully wipe the Rex Lapis Geo figurine every morning, not even sparing the dust on its base.
She remembered the first time she ate the delicious food Mr. Zhongli brought, so engrossed she didn't even notice she'd burned her tongue.
She remembered last year's Lantern Rite, when she released Xiao Lanterns with Hu Tao and the others, while Mr. Zhongli stood by, watching, the smile in his eyes brighter than the lanterns themselves...
Those memories were all real, a tangible warmth she held in her hands. How could they turn into false illusions just because of the words "descendant of the Overlord of the Vortex"?
Just then, the buoy floating on the sea bobbed.
Uncle Tian's eyes lit up like a child who had discovered treasure. "Another fish is on the hook! Want to try reeling it in this time?"
Yunqin froze for a moment, then instinctively took the fishing rod Uncle Tian handed her.