Thank you for giving me some hope. [That hope is what he clings to with all of his might and sanity. Without it, he feels like he has been torn to pieces and left to drift in the wind.]

My father has never accepted me. I am his bastard - one of many - and he left me to be raised in a brothel alongside my mother. He won't even give me his name. When I went to see him after her death, he blamed me for interrupting my brother's birthday celebration and kicked me down a long flight of stairs.

I could barely stand. Nie Mingjue took me under his wing then - he did not have to - and I have been loyal to him since. However if my father required something of me...

Something that would mean he would accept me...

I can see why I would be tempted.