Chapter 320 Xuan JiSince he was here, naturally, Ding Ning would not pa.s.s up the chance to get to know this place. Perhaps, the wall drawings would tell him where this was.
Ding Ning focused his gaze. The first wall drawing could not be simpler, which was a few human-shaped figures.
Just as he was feeling very disappointed, thinking that this wall drawing would not be able to tell him anything, all of his attention seemed to be caught by it. His sight blurred and as if he had been transported, he appeared in a wild world.
“Yu w.a.n.g, I am not questioning our ancestor’s theories. I just think that the human body is a bottomless treasure trove. Excavating the treasures in the human body is the best way to benefit the human race.”
“Humph! Chiyou, your thoughts are treasonous. Our Shennong’s people tried hundreds of plants to benefit the world yet you dare to question our ancestor’s theory?”
“I said I did not question it. Why can we not open up new ways of thinking by building on our ancestors’ theories?”
Two men wrapped in animal skins with feathers in their hair like American Indians argued ceaselessly and they paid no attention to Ding Ning who stood to the side. In the end, they separated unhappily.
But Ding Ning was shocked. The two people were Chiyou and the Yan Emperor. Did this terrifying place have something to do with Chiyou or the Yan Emperor?
Ever since he saw that ancient record at the mediation master’s, Ding Ning had paid particular attention to their information. Shennong’s people ruled the world for over two thousand years. Yu w.a.n.g was the name of the eighth Yan Emperor of Shennong. Thus, he had realized immediately that he had entered into the Chiyou period. The wall drawings were indeed magical.
In the events that followed, what happened in the wall drawing was very similar to what was recorded in history. The main direction of the story did not change much and the only differences were in the details.
The wall drawings clearly had more details than the historical record and it lifted the veil on a secret of that period.
Before the Great Ancient period, there was a Distant Past period and an even more ancient Great Ancient period.
During the Great Ancient period, G.o.d created the world and created tens of thousands of ignorant creatures that struggled for survival in nature.
Natural selection and survival of the fittest reigned supreme. The humans of that time existed in a very weak state and would be taken as slaves and even food of the most powerful demons. This caused the extinction of many tribes in the annals of history.
It was not until the Distant Past period that humans, dissatisfied with being slaves, discovered the ways of cultivation. This culminated in the birth of many martial artists of comparable strength who defeated the demons and became masters themselves.
But the human world could not endure the power of G.o.dlike battles and was almost destroyed. Naturally, the G.o.d who created the world could not just watch as the human world was destroyed, so he created a new law making those spirits and demons who were powerful enough to be a danger to the human world leave and enter a fairyland or demon land. They managed the human world on G.o.d’s behalf but could not directly interfere in human affairs.
By the Ancient period, there were no more spirits in the human world. But the people of that time were filled with respect and fear toward the spirits. The Xuan Nv tribe was the descendants of the battle G.o.ddess Jiutian Xuan Nv who managed the world on the spirit’s behalf and held an extraordinary position.
Chiyou was a genius and a mad scientist. Yes, in Ding Ning’s opinion, he was a mad scientist.
Not only was he a maker of immortality pills, creator of mystical tools, artist, Yin and Yang scholar, and politician, he was also the first inventor of criminal law. The bow, witchcraft, traps, bronze, pottery, tools used in rituals, palace rooms, and burial rites all came of his hand.
If this was all, Ding Ning would, at most, respect and worship him and would think he was a mad scientist.
The reason Ding Ning believed he was a madman was that he not only made his eighty-one brothers into invulnerable strange creatures, he also used the same methods and cultivated himself like a weapon. In the end, he turned himself into an immensely powerful G.o.d of war and soldiers.
When the wall murals got to the battle between Chiyou and the allied troops of the Yan Emperor, they abruptly stopped. They left Ding Ning feeling fascinated as well as with a sense of things being unfinished.
From this wall mural, Ding Ning could roughly guess where this place was. This was likely the old residence of the Jiuli tribe. However, he had no idea what it would appear beneath this deserted island.
After thousands of years, this mystery of the past was not something he could solve. His only wish right now was to quickly find an exit and take Luoxue and the mermaid away from here. This place was too strange.
As he continued along the pa.s.sageway, a bone-chilling coldness came through and Ding Ning shivered involuntarily.
When he stepped out of the pa.s.sageway, it was as if he was struck by lightning. A knife-like pain lanced through his heart and his eyes stared unblinkingly at a clear ice coffin inside an enormous cave in front of him. His entire body trembled violently as a ruthless atmosphere rose into the air.
The ice coffin was crystal clear and inside was a stunningly beautiful woman. Eight chains, like the ones locking up the mermaid, were pierced through her body and a bright handleless blade was stuck through her heart. She looked incredibly beautiful.
“Demon, who was it? Who killed you? Tell me, tell me…”
Ding Ning did not care at all about the bone-chilling coldness as he kneeled with bloodshot eyes in front of the ice coffin and looked at the beautiful woman within. He let out an animalistic roar.
Although he only had one night with the woman in front of him and it was also in unclear circ.u.mstances, she was, after all, his first. Her beautiful visage had long left a deep mark on his mind and he would never forget her.
He had never thought that the demon whose name he did not know, who helped him lose his virginity, would be tragically dead here. Forever separated from him by life and death. How could he not be pained?
Separated by life and death, yin and yang yet he did not even know who the enemy was and could not avenge her. He opened the coffin with a powerless and insurmountable rage. He put his hands on her face, her eyes were tightly closed but her face still seemed alive, and two b.l.o.o.d.y tears fell down. “I swear, no matter who killed you, if I find out, I will destroy him to avenge your spirit.”
“You are finally here!”
A beautiful woman’s voice suddenly rang out in Ding Ning’s mind. It made his hair stand on end and startled him into looking all around. In a sharp voice, he said, “Who are you? Come out, don’t sulk around!”
“Hey! You just said you would avenge me and now you say I’m sulking around. Your promises really mean nothing.”
The woman’s voice came from the coffin. Ding Ning lowered his head and looked. The demon had opened her eyes and was looking up at him unblinkingly. The brightness in her eyes looked nothing like a dead person.
“You… You’re not dead? That’s great; that’s great; you’re not dead; that’s great. I won’t let you leave me again.”
Ding Ning’s eyes were wet and his entire body trembled. The wild joy wiped his mind blank and he repeated himself like an idiot.
“I am not dead now but I will die very soon.”
The woman looked at him calmly without shock, horror, fear, or pain. It was as if she was talking about a very normal matter.
Ding Ning’s heart tightened. He looked at her nervously and shook his head desperately. “Demon, you won’t die. I will save you. Trust me, you will not die.”
“Demon?”
A trace of confusion flashed through the woman’s eyes then she suddenly smiled, as beautiful as a blooming flower. “Little kid, I am not a demon.”
“I don’t know what your name is.”
Ding Ning smiled with embarra.s.sment then suddenly realized what she said and angrily said, “Who is a little kid? No matter what, I am your man.”
Anger flashed across the woman’s pale face. “What nonsense are you sprouting, what my man?”
“Huh?”
Ding Ning scratched head. Thinking that she was shy, he coughed dryly and said, “Don’t talk for now. Let me check your body and see what your injuries are like.”
The woman’s long lashes suddenly flickered. “No need. I am content that I have waited for your arrival and can make clear my final wishes.”
Ding Ning was startled and said, in a panic, “No, you’ll be fine. I will cure you for sure. Trust me, my medical skills are very good.”
“It’s useless. Unless your skills are even better than Chiyou, otherwise, even G.o.d cannot save me.”
The woman spoke calmly. Her gaze landed on the stone man on his chest and a trace of sorrow flashed through her eyes.
Ding Ning’s body froze and his heart sank. Chiyou? He could admit that he could not compare to the man who cultivated himself like a weapon and was the G.o.d of soldiers.
“Alright, I won’t tease you anymore. Little guy, I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else. I am not a demon, my name is Xuan Ji, chief of the Xuan Nv tribe. I am a contemporary of your ancestor Chiyou. It’s not wrong for me to call you little kid, right?”
The woman’s voice was calm but Ding Ning’s face drained of color and shock rose in his heart. He looked at her in disbelief and said shakily, “You, you are the Jiutian Xuan Nv who killed Chiyou?”
After calming down, Ding Ning realized that something was not right. This woman calling herself Xuan Ji did not seem to be the demon, and she only looked very similar.
Xuan Ji had a red spot between her brows which the demon did not. Their voices were also not the same, the demon’s voice was more magnetic and was not so ethereal. Their auras were also different, although they both had a sense of being holy creatures untainted by the world, Xuan Ji seemed more inviolable and distant.
Earlier, he had been in a panic and mistook Xuan Ji for the demon mostly because they looked very similar. Looking at her now, he could see the differences. At least, ah, the demon’s chest was bigger than hers.
However, he had no time for such things and was stunned by Xuan Ji’s history. If what she said was true, had she not lived for five thousand years? How was that possible?
“I don’t have the ability to kill Chiyou!”
Guilt and self-mockery appeared in Xuan Ji’s face. “I should have died long ago. I only held on until now to wait for your arrival.”
“Waiting for me? Do you know who I am?” Ding Ning looked at her in disbelief.
Light swirled through Xuan Ji’s eyes and she signed quietly. “I don’t know who you are but I know you are Chiyou’s descendant. Your bloodline is very close to his.”
“You, you have the wrong person, right? I am not Chiyou’s descendant.”
Ding Ning was startled and silently raised his guard. He unconsciously took a few steps back to widen his distance to Xuan Ji. This was an old monster who had lived for thousands of years, and who knows what unfathomable tricks she had up her sleeve.
Xuan Ji seemed to see his thoughts. She stared at the stone man on Ding Ning’s chest and said something shocking. “I purposely released this stone man for him to recognize a master. How could I be wrong? If you were not of Chiyou’s bloodline how the stone man could recognize you as its master?”
“You… purposely released this stone man?”
Ding Ning abruptly remembered what was written in the history books. If he remembered correctly, the price the Yan and Yellow Emperors alliance paid for having Jiutian Xuan Nv take action was the stone man.
Now it seems that it was very likely that the stone man had fallen into Jiutian Xuan Nv’s hands. However, why would she release it? Also, what was this place? Why did she appear here again? And who injured her? What did she mean that she was waiting for him?