bookrandom Chapter 97 Ji Canghai's Short Story
Chapter 97 Ji Canghai's Short Story
Meanwhile, in Lieyan City, Yanzhou.
The Ji family's residence is located here.
The reason why the Ji family can become one of the five great families is naturally because the Ji family has been passed down for thousands of years.
In particular, more than a hundred years ago, the Wuji Empire was beset by internal and external troubles. Emperor Yanwu went to Jukuzhou to save the country. With the help of Tianhai, he obtained the Immortal Mask and successfully restored the Wuji Empire. Moreover, he used the power of the Immortal Mask to destroy the grassland coalition.
As for why Emperor Yanwu had the name Yanwu in his title, it is already quite clear.
His vassal state was Yanzhou, and his relationship with the Ji family was self-evident.
This is why the Ji family patriarch was able to reach the peak of the Grandmaster realm.
Naturally, they received many benefits.
However, the Ji family patriarch was nearing the end of his lifespan, so his days were numbered, and his combat power was basically reduced to a mere tremor.
The next generation of grandmasters was killed by Liu Lian's father in the Cloud Sword Tournament of the Five Great Families a few years ago.
The other grandmasters were all of average skill.
Therefore, after Ji Canghai's father, Ji Shuo, was defeated and seriously injured by Ji Yingying's Black Impermanence.
Ji Canghai bid farewell to his beloved girl, Cui Sanniang, and returned home.
. . . .
Ji Canghai, a genius of the Ji family in Yanzhou.
Although he wasn't considered a legitimate son, he was certainly a favorite of the Ji family.
Among his peers in the Ji family, he was the first to awaken the Fire Spirit True Qi.
Liu Lian's father, Ji Shuo, possessed high cultivation and considerable combat power, while his mother was the second young lady of the Liu family in Runzhou and Liu Lian's aunt.
From a young age, he was lively, energetic, and unruly—a typical spoiled brat.
When he was seven years old, he secretly went out to play during the ancestral worship ceremony and even set off fireworks in public, almost burning down a garden.
So, after being arrested, he was severely beaten by his father and made to kneel in the ancestral hall to reflect on his actions.
But at night, Ji Canghai got hungry, and the ever-daring man began to steal food from the offerings.
The clan elders, who came to inspect the area, discovered this and not only removed the offerings but also severely whipped him under the pretext of ancestral family rules.
Already resentful from the beating, Ji Canghai, unable to sleep late at night, took advantage of the elders' sleep to start smashing and burning things, creating a scene in the ancestral hall, seemingly to vent his resentment towards these worldly rules.
The intense flames and the sounds of smashing attracted many high-ranking members of the Ji family.
In their fury, they were prepared to punish Ji Canghai according to family rules, or even expel him from the Ji family.
Unexpectedly, Ji Canghai's vandalism inadvertently opened a secret room in the Ji family ancestral hall.
The Flame Pearl, a family heirloom that had been dull for a hundred years, now shone brightly in his hands.
The clan elder was about to step forward, seize him, and then administer the family punishment.
The Ji family patriarch exclaimed in surprise, "Wait! He actually awakened the Flame Pearl!!" (Actually, I used gold nuggets to awaken it; it has nothing to do with him.)
Ji Canghai also realized that the situation was very good, and he immediately activated it, actually transforming into his true form of the Fire Virtue.
The entire Ji family was overjoyed. Thus, Ji Canghai, who had disregarded his ancestors and was about to be expelled from the Ji family, became the sole heir of the Ji family and even the designated candidate for the next head of the family.
The Fire Virtue Body is a rare constitution that appears only once every few hundred years.
It may sound like nothing special, but you have to understand that a genius who appears once in a century is enough to solidify the family's glory for over a hundred years.
Moreover, this Fire Virtue Body is the physique of the Ji family ancestor from a thousand years ago. Back then, he advanced to the Martial Saint realm with the Fire Virtue Body and even fought against a master of the Hidden Clan, perishing together with him.
Such ability is clearly extraordinary.
In the following thousand years, it happened once or twice more, and each time it brought glory to the family for hundreds of years.
Therefore, the Ji family patriarch was naturally overjoyed to see the birth of the Fire Virtue Body in his lifetime.
Moreover, Ji Canghai was able to activate the Flame Pearl at the age of seven; such talent is terrifying.
Of course, other clan elders also questioned this, believing that Ji Canghai had only activated the ability by chance due to triggering certain conditions.
So they summoned a large number of Ji family members to come and test them.
As Ji Canghai watched them fail one by one, his ego naturally swelled even more.
As a result, his peers became jealous and disliked him, and wanted to beat him up when the adults weren't around.
Ji Canghai got beaten up quite a bit back then, but he was still the most stubborn.
"Wait till I grow up, I'll teach you a lesson you won't forget!"
As a result, he was beaten even worse.
Of course, this was also a test given to him by the family's higher-ups.
However, it was precisely this kind of test that made Ji Canghai not have much goodwill towards the Ji family.
After the age of nine, Ji Canghai's cultivation level soared to the Martial Master level.
Two years of being beaten spurred Ji Canghai to work harder in secret.
He understood the principle that "the nail that sticks out gets hammered down."
But he was not afraid, and he never bowed his head.
Even if he gets beaten, he won't be afraid of them, because he knows that sooner or later, these big kids will become his defeated opponents.
When the time comes, I will repay all the humiliation I have suffered!
Then, Ji Canghai began to fight back.
Within a year, Ji Canghai truly became the king of the kids among his peers.
This also delighted the Ji family's top management.
What does it mean to be a nine-year-old martial arts master?
Ji Canghai now received even stronger support from the Ji family, with the best pills, equipment, cultivation techniques, and martial arts skills he received.
That year, his mother became pregnant.
Ji Canghai appears to be bold and cheerful, but he is actually very lonely.
So after his mother became pregnant, he longed for the birth of his younger brother or sister.
Because he felt that in the Ji family, only his mother cared about him the most.
If you have a younger sister or brother, then you should treat them as well as your mother treated you.
When Ji Canghai was ten years old, he broke through to the Great Martial Master realm, and Ji Yingying was born at the same time.
But her birth brought her mother a difficult childbirth and her death.
Faced with the difficult choice of saving the mother or the child, Ji's mother insisted on saving the child.
Ji Canghai did not resent Ji Yingying for causing his mother's death.
Upon seeing his younger sister born, he became incredibly attentive to her, as if he wanted to pour the same love he had for his mother into his sister.
Aside from training and fighting, he spends his days taking care of his younger sister.
He loved to hold her, calling out, "Little Ying'er... Little Ying'er... Grow up quickly, and brother will take you to eat something delicious..."
Ji Canghai even learned carving for her, and he often carved toys for his younger sister Yingying to play with.
When Ji Yingying was eleven years old, she turned one month old.
The Ji family patriarch invited the Taoist priest Tongxuanzi to name Ji Yingying.
Therefore, Yingying is just her nickname; she doesn't have a real name.
If she had a proper name, perhaps she should be called Ji Cangyue or Ji Ninglei, names containing the water radical.
Master Tongxuanzi said that Ji Canghai was the hope of the Ji family, while Ji Yingying was the jinx of the Ji family.
The Ji family patriarch and others believed it.
Because Ji Canghai is indeed the hope of the Ji family.
Tongxuanzi was indeed a highly accomplished Taoist master.
His peak Grandmaster cultivation, youthful appearance, and inexhaustible elixirs all made the Ji family have unwavering faith in him.
Therefore, immediately after Tong Xuanzi left, the Ji family demanded that Ji Yingying be killed.
They vanquished the jinx and saved the Ji family's hope.
Forced into a corner, Ji Canghai's father stabbed one-year-old Yingying in the left chest with a dagger in front of everyone.
Only then did the Ji family's senior members leave, satisfied.
Subsequently, Ji's father gave the faked-death Ji Yingying to Ji's mother's maid, Lady Wang, so that she could take her mistress's daughter and run away to protect Yingying as she grew up.
Wang took Ji Yingying to Zhongzhou and found a farm to live on.
But she was actually a member of the Liu family, though she was from a collateral branch.
She was a maid, just like any other woman from the Liu family of Runzhou!
That's fine, but following her mother, she naturally lived a life of luxury in the Ji family.
Even though she's been kicked out, she still has money for the time being, which she thinks is alright, and she's living happily.
But as time went on, without any income, she naturally grew to dislike Ji Yingying more and more.
So she found a man to marry, but this man she was in love with was no good either.
Since the two had no money, they decided to sell Ji Yingying for two taels of silver and were too lazy to support her anymore.
. . .
Meanwhile, Ji Canghai went out to play, and when he returned home, he found that Yingying was missing.
He searched everywhere but couldn't find it; he was going crazy.
Later, he forcibly arrested several servants and interrogated them, only to learn that his father had personally stabbed Yingying to death and then abandoned her.
He believed that his father had died because of his mother's difficult childbirth, and that his grief and hatred towards Yingying had led him to commit the murder.
When he went to question them, not only did Ji's father and others say that, but they also said that Yingying was a jinx to the Ji family and that they couldn't let her ruin the hope of the Ji family. They said it was for his own good.
Ji Canghai gave a bitter laugh. He had lost his beloved mother and his dearest sister. He looked at his father and a group of Ji family members staring at him, the hope of the Ji family.
He nodded, agreeing with everyone's opinion, and went back to continue his cultivation.
Two days later, he fled the Ji family and began to wander the martial arts world alone.
An eleven-year-old child has experienced far too much in the world.
Along the way, he changed his name and left Yanzhou, traveling to Zhongzhou, Leizhou, Yuzhou and Yuanzhou.
During this period, the Ji family asked many martial arts practitioners to secretly protect and support him, and also dispatched grandmasters to secretly guard him.
Even so, Ji Canghai still experienced numerous life-or-death crises.
His cultivation level rose accordingly.
At the age of twenty-two, he was a mid-stage Grandmaster.
While traveling in Yuanzhou, he suddenly encountered a trap set by Zheng Tu, the leader of the Zheng gang.
Takeda Nobutada and Kurumi, who frequented the Wuji Empire, were unfamiliar with its rules. They killed a few thugs and were then taken advantage of by Zheng Tu, who demanded that Takeda Nobutada fight in a ring to repay the debt, or he would take the matter to the authorities.
Reluctantly, Takeda Nobutada agreed.
Even without using the wind sickle, Takeda Nobutada, at the age of twenty-seven, was still a master.
Many skilled fighters stepped forward to challenge him, but all were defeated by Takeda.
Even some grandmasters were no match for Takeda.
Left with no other option, the Huang family asked Ji Canghai for help.
Ji Canghai said he was willing to fight, but not in your ring, and wouldn't give you the opportunity to gamble.
He brought Kurumi Takeda to the bamboo forest, where he borrowed the treasured sword Tianxu from the Huang family and engaged in a battle with Takeda.
Takeda was evenly matched with him, but his katana was cut off, and he had no choice but to admit defeat.
The two became friends after a fight, and Ji Canghai also helped Wu Tian resolve the so-called government threat that Zheng Tu had allegedly posed.
Sensing that the Wuji Empire was too complex and unpredictable, Takeda Kurumi, realizing she couldn't handle it, immediately fled back to Nichirin.
Ji Canghai was arrested by Cui Sanniang, who witnessed the two fighting.
Third Sister came specifically to win over the scions of the five great families, hoping to find some talented individuals for the Crown Prince and also to gain some allies.
She had heard of Ji Canghai's reputation, so she was already very interested in him.
Yanzhou is a territory that the Crown Prince must have, so Ji Canghai is crucial.
Lured by the beauty trap and the stunning scenery of the Misty Sea, Ji Canghai was hooked and followed Cui Sanniang directly to the Misty Sea.
Then, the two began an ambiguous relationship.
Two years later, Ji Canghai was twenty-four years old.
He received a letter from the Ji family; his father was dying.
He didn't want to leave, but he had to go back and check on things.
After saying goodbye to San Niang, he returned home.
At this moment, Ji Shuo lay paralyzed on the bed, and only then did he tell Ji Canghai the secret from thirteen years ago.
(I'll update later; there are still 3,000 words left.)