The autumn wind was desolate and chilly, turning the dew to frost as the grass and trees shook their leaves to the ground.
「Qingyang Town, the Wan Family's rear courtyard.」
Dressed in white, Ning Xuan sat in his wheelchair. He set aside the stone he had been caressing for a long time and caught a falling yellow leaf in his open palm, his eyes filled with gloom.
"Brother Ning Xuan…"
A girl with a beaming smile popped out from the doorway, her voice as crisp and pleasant as an oriole's song.
A gleam of light flashed through Ning Xuan's eyes, hinting at a smile.
"Quick, I've just finished brewing the Spiritual Medicine!" Wan Yue'er approached briskly, eagerly extending the steaming bowl of medicinal soup toward Ning Xuan before she had even arrived.
Ning Xuan's heart trembled. He leaned forward to take the soup, saying with concern, "Be careful, don't trip."
"I'm fine. Brother Ning Xuan, drink up! It's been six years, and you're just a hair's breadth away. After you drink this bowl of Spiritual Medicine, the Bloodline that was stripped from you will definitely regenerate!"
"Mm!" Ning Xuan nodded vigorously and drained the bowl in one gulp.
He was once the young master of the Ning Family of Wuling City, blessed with extraordinary talent and an unparalleled Bloodline. However, at the age of twelve, his cousin Ning Yang's family committed an unspeakable atrocity. They cruelly stripped him of his True Blood, reducing his Nine Nether Divine Body to a useless vessel.
Just as they were about to kill him to tie up loose ends, his closest relatives, who had been deliberately sent away, returned in the nick of time. Ning Yang's family had been plotting this day for a long time. Even though his grandfather's martial arts cultivation bordered on the Profound Mystery, he too was forced into a desperate situation.
At that critical moment, Ning Xuan's parents spent the entire family fortune to entrust him to the family of a loyal servant. They then rushed back to face the enemy without a second thought.
It's been six years. Why haven't they come for me? Could it be...
Although Grandpa Wan had assured him multiple times that they were unharmed, Ning Xuan couldn't help but feel uneasy whenever he thought about it.
"Brother Ning Xuan, how is it?" Wan Yue'er's anxious voice interrupted Ning Xuan's reverie.
"You silly girl, you're even more anxious than I am. Let me check," Ning Xuan chuckled, his face full of adoration.
Betrayed by his own kin, Ning Xuan's heart had once turned as cold as ice. But Wan Yue'er had taken care of him for six whole years. As his knowledge of the medical arts grew, he came to understand the immense value of the herbs in the daily bowl of Spiritual Medicine. The wealth he had brought from his family was a mere pittance in comparison.
The Wan family's kindness to him was as weighty as a mountain.
Ning Xuan had long sworn that if his Divine Body could regenerate, he would repay their family's kindness tenfold, even a hundredfold.
Sinking his consciousness deep within himself, Ning Xuan was overcome with ecstasy.
"My True Blood has re-formed! Yue'er, my Divine Body has regenerated!"
As he spoke, he pressed his hands on the arms of the wheelchair and shakily stood up.
"Just as dead plants can flourish again, just as a chrysalis becomes a butterfly... the Divine Body truly can be reborn!" Wan Yue'er was also visibly emotional.
Then, her eyes glinted strangely as she reached a hand toward Ning Xuan's Dantian. "Brother Ning Xuan, let me feel it."
Unsuspecting, Ning Xuan even took her pale, slender hand and guided it to rest upon his Dantian.
"Yue'er, with my Divine Body regenerated, I'll surely be stronger than ever before. Once I've achieved success, I will definitely repay—"
The ecstatic smile on Ning Xuan's face abruptly froze. He looked down to see a hand drenched in blood pulling out from his body.
"Brother Ning Xuan, there's no need to wait. You can repay me right now."
Wan Yue'er took a step back, her smile as radiant as a blooming flower as she looked down condescendingly at Ning Xuan, who had collapsed back into his wheelchair.
She opened her blood-soaked hand, revealing a mass of True Blood shimmering with a purple light, pulsing and swirling in her palm. A terrifying aura emanated from the True Blood, threatening to overwhelm everything.
"As expected of the Nine Nether Divine Body. Its True Blood is this formidable the moment it regenerates! With this, I shall surpass Ning Yang and become the sole Heavenly Maiden of this continent!" Wan Yue'er was uncontrollably excited.
"Why?! Why would you do this?!" Ning Xuan roared, his eyes blood-red.
He clenched the arms of his chair so tightly that his veins bulged. Blood gushed from his wound, staining his white clothes a deep crimson.
Six years ago, betrayed by his loved ones, his heart had turned to ice. But over six long years, that ice had been thawed. He had come to see the Wan Family as his own, and Wan Yue'er as his own dear sister.
And now, she had cruelly ripped his True Blood from him again.
This betrayal was far worse than the last.
"Why? My dear brother, you surely don't know about Ning Yang's achievements, do you?" she said mockingly. "He has already led his branch of the family to establish themselves in The Capital. In just a short time, the Ning Family has become a powerful force there, associating with royalty and nobility. What's more, Ning Yang himself was noticed by the Martial God Temple, one of the three great sects on the continent, and has become one of its True Disciples!"
"I, Wan Yue'er, have always believed my talent is second to none! Why should I be forced to languish in some forgotten corner? With this regenerated Divine Blood, I will enter Su Yue Zhuai!"
"Don't worry," she continued, already swallowing the True Blood. "Once I become a True Disciple of Su Yue Zhuai, I will defeat Ning Yang on the battlefield of prodigies and avenge you."
At this moment, her smile was radiant. She caressed Ning Xuan's cheek with her bloody hand and even had the audacity to press her blood-stained lips to his forehead in a soft kiss.
Ning Xuan let out a wild, miserable laugh as blood trickled from both his wound and his mouth. "After what Ning Yang did, I treated your family as my closest kin, cherishing you all so dearly. If you wanted my True Blood, you only had to ask, and I would have given it to you. Why did you have to use such a cruel method?!"
Wan Yue'er's body trembled slightly.
"Yue'er, don't be fooled by him. No one would be willing to make such a sacrifice," an indifferent voice said. Two men, one old and one middle-aged, appeared behind her.
"Grandfather. Father."
"Grandpa Wan... Wan Zhongshan, you... So you started preparing for this day six years ago! No wonder you came to me with ancient remedies and platitudes about dead trees returning to spring! My grandfather saved your life! Has your conscience been eaten by a dog?!"
The old man's few words made Ning Xuan understand everything in an instant.
"Conscience? You have the gall to speak to me of conscience?" Wan Zhongshan snorted, his voice thick with self-righteous justification. "My Wan Family raised you for six whole years and spent countless resources on you—an honor even Yue'er never received. Now we ask for a mere mass of True Blood in return, and you scream and shout. You're the one with no conscience!"
"'A mere mass of True Blood'! For this 'mere' thing, your family schemed for six entire years! Hahaha..." Ning Xuan laughed maniacally, tears of blood streaming down his face.
He laughed at his own naivety. Even his true family had disregarded the bonds of blood. How laughable that he had believed outsiders, that he had thought only of repaying them one day.
"Stop laughing!" Wan Yue'er barked, her beautiful smile twisting into a malevolent snarl. "Grandfather, since he cares so little for his Divine Body True Blood, let's do a thorough job and destroy his twelve meridians. That will prevent his Divine Body from ever regenerating again!"
Meridians were the channels for blood and vital energy. To destroy them meant that not even a god descending from the heavens could rebuild his Divine Body.
"Wan Yue'er, are you truly determined to eradicate me completely?!" Ning Xuan's face was ashen, but his eyes were a churning sea of red.
This vile woman's heart was so poisonous! She intended to extinguish his last glimmer of hope!
"Brother Ning Xuan, you must be joking. Why would I kill you?" Wan Yue'er's face once again bloomed into a smile, her eyes curving like crescent moons, filled with delight and anticipation. "I'll keep you alive so you can personally watch me defeat Ning Yang. When that time comes, the original Divine Body will have to look up as two new Divine Bodies battle, and then watch as I ascend to the absolute peak. The very thought is just so amusing."
Ning Xuan stared, his eyes feeling as if they would split from his head as tears of blood streamed down his face. "Bitch! You'll die a miserable death! I curse—"
"Silence!" Wan Zhongshan interrupted. Fearing that Ning Xuan would affect Wan Yue'er's Mental State, he pulled her away while commanding the silent, middle-aged man, "Qianhe, the rest is up to you. I'm taking Yue'er to assimilate the True Blood!"
Wan Qianhe was a man of few words, but his actions were swift and decisive. He struck like lightning, shattering all twelve of Ning Xuan's meridians. Then, he departed with an air of utter indifference.
In his eyes, Ning Xuan was no better than a stray dog.
PTHOO!
Biting down so hard he nearly shattered his teeth, Ning Xuan could no longer hold back and violently spat a mouthful of fresh blood.
The wheelchair tipped backward, sending Ning Xuan tumbling to the ground. In his dazed state, his hand once again found and clutched the stone he had been caressing earlier.
PS: A new book sets sail! It's old wine in a new bottle, my friends. Don't be fooled by the familiar opening—the protagonist won't be joining a sect, so it's not the same old cliche. I humbly ask you all to please stick with it! A lowly author pays his respects.