The flicker of spiritual power between Jin Guangyao and the sword on the docks gutters out abruptly at Illarion's arrival. He looks up quickly, eyes disarmingly wide and curious, before averting his gaze. Jin Guangyao is a quick study, and a survivor, and so it has not taken him long to become inured to the sight of walking, talking, thinking beings who have clearly never been human. That does not mean he isn't fascinated by them--or immune to the fear of all the things about them that he does not yet understand, that could pose a threat to his safety.

"Yes, xiansheng," he answers, polite and courteous, and then calls the sword back into his grasp; it leaps to his fingers as though eager to answer his commands, and it would be unspeakably rude to leave such a tool on the dirty ground for longer than necessary. "If this humble one can summon the power to make the journey across the water." The self-deprecation doesn't ring with self-pity or bitterness; rather, like the honorific that precedes it, as a gesture of respect to a stranger whose social standing is likely higher than his own.