Chapter 51 The Nine Heavens Assembly: A Sudden Change

It's that person.

She stole their stones and ran away; she could turn stones into gold; she was both harsh and genuinely beautiful; Ying Huo.

The person who was watching me from the shadows.

The small sword pressed unceremoniously against the man's almost frail neck. Ying Huo lowered his eyelids, glanced at the sharp sword that was threatening his life, and let out a sneer. His waist was slightly bent, and the thin clothes in front of his chest rose and fell with the trembling, as if he had seen the biggest joke.

When he raised those cold, gray eyes again, Xia Zhu saw an absurdity in them.

She was stunned for a moment, and her grip on the sword hilt loosened slightly. If the opening was exposed for even a second, Ying Huo grabbed her wrist and pushed her hard, slamming Xia Zhu against the tree trunk. The short sword in his hand became a weapon to kill someone else.

Her back felt hot, as if the skin there had been chafed and scratched by the rough bark. Xia Zhu once again inappropriately imagined herself as a grizzly bear rubbing itself against a tree.

Then she heard Ying Huo say.

"Who are you?" The tone was cold, yet seemed to be filled with gritted teeth.

Grizzly bear, she thought, but what came out of her mouth was a question: "Do you know who I am?"

"Are you out of your mind? I'm the one asking you this!"

“But you’re doubting me, aren’t you?” Xia Zhu looked directly into his eyes. “Who is it that you think I am?”

"What?" His eyes suddenly flickered, and some long black hairs fell down his forehead. Xia Zhu glanced down without changing his expression, then pulled his knee in and forcefully rammed it into his stomach.

Ying Huo clearly hadn't expected Xia Zhu to have a backup plan. He groaned, clutching his stomach, and took a few steps back, his face turning deathly pale. He first glared fiercely at Xia Zhu, then immediately lowered his head.

Sure enough, Xia Zhu recalled her first impression of him: he was very weak and valued his life very much.

The two remained silent, and just as the eeriness in the atmosphere was about to reach its peak, Ying Huo turned and left, his back view hurried, almost like he was fleeing.

Xia Zhu gazed in the direction he left, a light, floating sensation rising from the soles of her feet, enveloping her heart and soaring towards the top of her head.

He must know something.

Another "different" person.

The gray moon still hung overhead, the smell of alcohol rising in her head, making her feel even more unsteady. Xia Zhu hummed a folk tune from her hometown as she walked towards the hotel, occasionally reaching out to scratch her back.

Feng Feng got up early, tidied himself up, and then pulled Xia Zhu out of bed. Today was the official opening day of the Nine Heavens Conference, and they both had to go to the venue to participate.

"Ah Zhu! Get up! If you're late, you won't get a good seat!" Feng Feng didn't know what was wrong with Xia Zhu, who was usually the first to get up, today. At this hour, she was still hiding her head under the covers, fast asleep.

"I had a dream..." Xia Zhu sat on the bed with vacant eyes, her back hunched and her head drooping.

"What kind of dream?" Feng Feng went around to the window and pulled back the curtains, indicating that the sun was already high in the sky.

“I dreamt of…” Sunlight filtered through the white sheets in the shape of a stained-glass window. Xia Zhu put her hand into the dappled sunlight and quickly felt warm. “I dreamt of two moons.”

"Huh? Two moons?" A face covered in cute freckles, like icing on a chocolate cake, suddenly loomed large in front of her. Feng Feng reached out a hand and gently placed it on her forehead. "Is it the psychological trauma caused by the dream last time?"

"No." Xia Zhu said firmly, tilting her head back and falling back into the messy blankets.

"Stop sleeping! Get up!"

They had arranged to meet Ji Wuchou last night to go to Sanjiu Peak together after a good night's sleep and breakfast. When Feng Feng dragged Xia Zhu downstairs, Ji Wuchou, with her slender and upright figure, was already sitting in the hall waiting.

The five of them quickly finished their meal and huffed and puffed as they climbed the mountain. The morning mist in the mountains was being melted away by the sunlight; spring was just around the corner after the New Year.

On the most important day, all activities on the other two peaks ceased, and all members of the Divine Blood Clan gathered in the Jianmu shell on the Three Nine Peaks.

In reality, Xia Zhu was still half asleep. She stood in the crowd like a stiff piece of wood, mechanically following Feng Feng into the arena. The cacophony of voices enveloped her ears like a thin film.

They passed through the tree hole and entered the interior of the Jianmu tree. The layout of the venue was basically the same as yesterday, except that six middle-aged women were already sitting in the eight solemn chairs, leaving two empty seats.

"Over here! Over here!!" Feng Feng, who was originally walking in front, had disappeared at some point. Now he was standing in front of the row of seats closest to Wu Jitianmen, waving to Xia Zhu and Ji Wuchou. His roar echoed through the layers of people and into the empty tree hole.

Everyone looked at them, and Ji Wuchou blushed and quickly lowered her head.

"Coming, coming." Xia Zhu stood on tiptoe and waved to Feng Feng. "Good spot, let's go quickly." She turned her head and whispered to Ji Wuchou.

The five people sat down one after another, and the meeting was almost over, with two chairs still empty.

"That's the position of the head of the Miao Man Group. They almost never participate in the Nine Heavens Conference." Feng Feng and Xia Zhu whispered to each other.

"Is that Auntie sitting on the far right?" Although she was far away, she could barely recognize that one of the six people looked very much like Feng Ye.

"It's just my mom's shadow. She doesn't like participating in these kinds of activities either. She just sits there like a cardboard cutout, smiles, and goes through the motions. So I don't participate in the Divine Strategy quantity selection either. It's pointless." Too few, pointless, Feng Feng thought to himself. Why bother going up when there's no suspense in the outcome? It would only give his enemies another reason to laugh at him.

The room gradually quieted down, and Xia Zhu spotted many familiar faces, including Jiang Yuran and Jiang Xiaqing, who were sitting diagonally opposite them, talking quietly. Meanwhile, a striking white-haired youth in the distance nodded slightly in their direction. Aside from the heads of the various families, the attendees were all young men; there seemed to be no older, unidentified officials among them.

"So many people." Xia Zhu couldn't help but exclaim. It was like a school's flag-raising ceremony on Monday. She had originally thought that the unknown officials were a small group.

“Yes, even though there are only eight families, they can continue for decades or centuries, with generations of descendants going on endlessly.” Feng Feng shook his head.

After it became completely quiet, it was almost noon, and sunlight streamed into the hall through the high windows to its maximum extent.

The woman, who was about the same age as Feng Ye and had a serious expression, stood up from her chair, took a few steps forward, and stood in front of everyone.

She wore a light-colored casual outfit, a top and trousers, simple and neat. She didn't dress up for the grand occasion, but her aura was still powerful. She slightly raised her head and glanced out the high window, her cold, emotionless eyes sweeping over the younger generation.

Xia Zhu noticed that Fu Yu didn't seem to be in her right eye; both eyes were the normal color.

"Do you know what the Ji family does in the mortal world?" Feng Feng whispered mysteriously in Xia Zhu's ear, his eyes gleaming with gossip. Xia Zhu glanced to her right at Ji Wuchou, who was sitting upright and serious, looking completely oblivious to what was going on around her.

"What do you do?" she asked cooperatively.

“Ji Chaoshan…” Feng Feng pointed to the woman on the stage, “I heard she’s a super amazing lawyer… She requires her people to enter human society to learn knowledge and to have their own professions. I admire her for that…” After saying that, he straightened up and sat back down in his original position.

Xia Zhu nodded, and Ji Chaoshan, as the current head of the Puyang Ji family, stepped forward to announce the official start of the meeting.

She didn't use any microphone-like equipment, yet her voice traveled clearly to the ears of everyone present.

"No need for further pleasantries, this year's Nine Heavens Conference will officially begin now."

"Now, please have the representatives of each family come forward in an orderly manner. Wu Jitianmen will use the Natural Aspect Stone to exchange for the Divine Strategy. The Divine Strategy obtained will be placed on the scales in front of the head of your family."

"The Ji family of Puyang, headed by Ji Chaoshan, in the name of Emperor Zhuanxu, hereby ensures absolute fairness and impartiality."

After she finished speaking, she raised her hand and waved it, and a platform slightly taller than a candlestick rose up in front of each of the six chairs, which was probably the scales she mentioned.

Ji Chaoshan returned to her seat. A commotion began to rise from the crowd as five people entered from various directions. Among them were Jiang Yuran and Ji Luochi, whom they recognized.

The exchange ceremony proceeded smoothly and quietly, the only sound the occasional whooshing sound of stones sliding into the well water and pipes. "It's really been a long time," Feng Feng leaned back, implying that they had quite a few innate astrological stones.

Ji Luochi was behind Jiang Yuran in line, and seeing her dawdling by Wu Jitianmen, she couldn't help but complain.

"Can you hurry up!" Ji Luochi said impatiently, arms crossed.

"Don't rush, Xiao Ji." Jiang Yuran stuffed all the Divine Strategy items she had exchanged into a small cloth bag. She tossed her hair, looked towards a certain spot below the stage, and then, in full view of everyone, raised her hand to make a peace sign, her smile incredibly bright, revealing a set of big white teeth.

The sound of a camera shutter suddenly rang out in the otherwise quiet venue. Jiang Xiaqing, sitting in the audience, put down her phone and gave Jiang Yuran a thumbs up.

"Take pictures, take pictures again! Don't you get tired of taking pictures of me every year?!"

Every year during the ceremony to exchange for Shence, Jiang Xiaqing would take a photo of Jiang Yuran.

"Would you like to take a picture with me too?" Jiang Yuran asked shamelessly, but Ji Luochi slapped her away.

"No way! Move aside! I'll definitely be ahead of you in line next year."

The sunlight moved slowly across the wooden floor. Xia Zhu nervously clutched the hem of her clothes, fearing that something similar to the accident she had encountered yesterday might happen. She was both nervous that an accident would happen and nervous that it wouldn't.

If it happened, it means there was something wrong with the matter itself, and the various families might trace it back to Xia Zhu, who also made the same mistake. But if it didn't happen, it's even more frightening; among all the officials involved, she's the only one who encountered a similar situation.

The exchange ceremony finally came to an end. The five unidentified officials placed the Divine Strategy into exquisite little cloth bags with special restrictions on the small tables in front of each family head.

Five cloth bags embroidered with different totems emitted different colors of light under the expectant gazes of the crowd. After a brief buzzing, the patriarch's chair belonging to the Huangdi Ji family lit up, and a cheer immediately rose from the crowd, probably concentrated in one direction. Xia Zhu looked up in that direction and saw her white head quietly sitting in it.

The girl sitting behind Xia Zhu slapped her thigh excitedly: "I knew it! Next year we have to show these people that the Nine Heavens Assembly should be held in a place like our Ji family's Xuanyuan Hill, not..." She looked up and glanced around the inside of the tree hole, "not in this shabby, withered shell!"

Ji Chaoshan stepped forward again, raised her hand to signal for silence, and then announced that the next Nine Heavens Tournament would be held at Xuanyuan Hill in Kongtong. Even with Ji Chaoshan in charge, a small commotion broke out again in the stands after the results were announced.

"Alright, next is..." The next segment was supposed to be an awards ceremony and a reflection meeting. Before Ji Chaoshan could speak, a disheveled-looking man suddenly rushed out from the audience. He stumbled to Ji Chaoshan's side and whispered something in her ear. Xia Zhu saw Ji Chaoshan's expression suddenly change and quickly turned to look at the other five family heads.

The situation changed suddenly, and before anyone could react, thunder roared down from above. The once bright and sunny sky suddenly darkened, as if the clock had been turned back ten hours, and darkness descended in an instant.

"What happened?"

The atmosphere became tense. No one understood why the sky had suddenly changed color, and the family heads even ended the meeting and began to discuss things with grim expressions on their faces.

Xia Zhu keenly smelled a fishy odor, a sign of an impending downpour. She had a bad feeling, as if something big was about to happen. Spring rain is usually gentle and doesn't come so fiercely. Unconsciously, she reached into her pocket, where she still kept Shen Ce, who had written "Hello" on it.

"Who was that man just now?" Although the incident was sudden, the well-trained officers, after a brief moment of confusion, discovered the key to the change in the situation.

A rustling sound of discussion came from around me, like a restless classroom.

Xia Zhu heard someone whisper beside her, "That man is a scholar from the Ji family."

The speaker was Ji Wuchou.

"Scholar?" Feng Feng heard it too. She lay on Xia Zhu's lap and peeked out to try to hear Ji Wuchou's words.

“That’s right, he is crippled and has no ability to generate ice and snow. In order to prove his worth and stay in the Ji family, he has devoted his efforts to…” She paused.

"The money was spent on translating the divine language of the Divine Strategy Research Institute."