Ninth In the World

The short, stout Qu Xiaoshu panted hard as he rushed towards Di Jiu. “The king is going to kill the Di Clan and dig your elder sister Di Di’s eyes out…” he told Di Jiu anxiously.

“What?” Di Jiu paused for a moment before he grabbed hold of Qu Xiaoshu’s shirt. His hands were trembling, and he was not even able to utter a complete sentence. The only question that came to his mind was why. Why?

Qu Xiaoshu managed to calm down. He stared at Di Jiu as he told him, “Do not ask how I know this. You must escape immediately. I know for a fact that there will be people coming for you in at most five minutes.”

“What is going on?” Di Jiu asked eventually. He was still unable to keep his voice even.

“The Medical Grand Master from the Empire that the king hired to cure Princess Mingzhu announced that only Sister Xiaodi’s eyes are compatible to be transplanted into Princess Mingzhu. The king dotes on Princess Mingzhu, so he wants Xiaodi…” Qu Xiaoshu, who had always adored Di Di, was not able to complete his sentence. Tears started flowing down his cheeks in rivers.

“Wu Bahu!” Di Jiu’s eyes were blood-red, his veins were visible on his forehead, and his whole body was shivering in anger.

All he wanted was to shred Wu Bahu, the king of the Ji Nation, to pieces.

“Uncle did not agree to the arrangement. He rushed to the Imperial Court and shouted abuse at the king. The king was so furious that he beheaded your father. Nobody pleaded on your father’s behalf. After he killed your father, the king placed an order to wipe out the entire Di Clan. People from the Di Clan are being arrested in Pearl City as we speak. If you had not come to Ji Bei Mountain to look for herbs, you would have already been…”

Although Qu Xiaoshu did not finish his words, Di Jiu fully understood what he meant. If he had not left Pearl City, he would have been killed by now. Qu Xiaoshu was the only person who knew that he had come to Ji Bei Mountain to dig for medicinal herbs. Qu Xiaoshu had no interest in medicine. Otherwise, they would have been digging for herbs together.

Di Jiu tried to calm down, but he was unable to. He was not even able to speak anymore. He had never heard of anything like this in his entire life. His biggest misfortune so far had been Zhen Man’s departure.

“Oh, Jiu. You must go quickly. They will find this location in no time!” Qu Xiaoshu shook Di Jiu.

“Where can I go?” Di Jiu muttered. When he came back to his senses, he realized that without the protection of his father, there was nowhere safe for him to go.

If Wu Bahu wanted to kill him, there was no place that he could escape to.

“Take your aircraft. There is still a glimmer of hope if you go. If you stay here, you will die.” Qu Xiaoshu pointed at the silver aircraft parked nearby.

Di Jiu was still shivering from head to toe. He did not escape in his aircraft as Qu Xiaoshu had suggested.

“Oh, Jiu! Didn’t you say that you did not want to stay under your father’s protection anymore? That was why you decided to study medicine. The Di Clan has been massacred. It is possible that you are the only remaining survivor. Don’t you want to take revenge? Zhen Man would not like a coward!” Qu Xiaoshu exclaimed, grabbing hold of Di Jiu’s arm.

“Revenge, revenge…” Di Jiu muttered to himself a few times. His eyes looked crazy.

A soft vibration could be felt through the ground. “They are coming, Di Jiu. You have to hurry up and leave!” Qu Xiaoshu said anxiously.

“I am leaving, Xiaoshu.” Di Jiu had finally calmed down. He hid the stone, turned around and rushed towards his aircraft.

He did not thank Qu Xiaoshu. He knew that it was not necessary. This matter could implicate Qu Xiaoshu and the entire Qu family as well. He would just have to remember the kindness Qu Xiaoshu had shown him in his heart.

He only hoped that no one knew that Qu Xiaoshu had tipped him off.

When he saw Di Jiu start the aircraft, Qu Xiaoshu relaxed slightly. Panicked, he watched the aircraft that Di Jiu was in fly towards the black rift in the sky instead of the far horizon, as he had expected.

It was in this moment that he noticed the strange rift in the sky.

When Di Jiu’s aircraft flew into the rift, the black rift disappeared without a trace.

…

When Di Jiu opened his eyes, he felt a cool feeling on his head. He unconsciously touched his forehead and felt something sticky on his hand. He took a look under the faint lighting and saw blood all over his hand.

Di Jiu immediately remembered everything. He had found out that the king had wiped out the entire Di Clan and flown his aircraft into the black rift in the sky.

Di Jiu’s eyes landed on the windscreen of the aircraft, which was completely dark. There was no information on the screen whatsoever. He struggled to crawl up and open the door of the aircraft.

The sound of birds chirping came from afar. When Di Jiu stepped out of the aircraft, there was silence all around him. This place looked like a canyon densely covered in thorns. Occasionally, some unknown animal species would run past him. Di Jiu realized that this had to be a place no one had ever visited before.

Di Jiu did not look for an exit. Instead, he looked up into the misty sky and clenched his fists tightly. As he tightened his fists, his nails cut into his palms.

It did not matter where he was now. If he went back to the Ji Nation again, he would destroy the Wu family. Even if he was not able to practise martial arts, he would still destroy them. He would find other means to do it.

He had most likely escaped from the Ji Nation for now. No matter where he was, entering the black rift that had appeared out of the blue had been the right decision. If he had not entered the rift, Wu Bahu would have killed him by now.

After a long period of time, Di Jiu slowly turned around. He wanted to look for a piece of cloth to dress the wound on his forehead. He had likely acquired it due to the violent vibration of the aircraft as it had flown into the rift.

Di Jiu looked in the mirror and tried to clean the blood stains left behind by the wound. He was shocked to see that, although there was a wound on his forehead, there was no blood flowing from it.

If this was not his blood, then where had the blood on his hands come from? When Di Jiu spread open his hands, he realized that the wound created by his own nails had stopped bleeding as well. Although it was still visible, it was recovering at a remarkable speed.

What was going on? Di Jiu felt his scalp tingling with numbness. That was really strange. He remembered hurting himself on the calf a few days ago, but when he rolled up his pants to take a look, the wound was visibly smaller.

Had his body acquired some kind of self-healing ability from that grayish stone?

As he thought about it, Di Jiu grasped the stone that he had put in his pocket. The stone seemed to have shrunk in size compared to when he had first obtained it.

Di Jiu stared at the grayish stone with the golden filament in the middle. Could his body have changed and developed self-healing abilities thanks to that stone?

Perhaps there had been no changes to his body and this was just the stone’s special ability. Di Jiu took a dagger out of the aircraft and placed the stone on the ground. He made a cut on his arm with the dagger, letting his blood flow out. About half a minute later, the wound on his arm did not heal automatically.

Di Jiu picked up the stone from the ground and grasped it tightly. He suddenly felt a cooling, flowing sensation curl over the wound on his arm.

When he wiped off the blood stain, Di Jiu saw that the wound was still visible, but the bleeding had stopped.

That stone had a special ability. As Di Jiu held on to it tightly, he thought that heaven had not abandoned him completely.