Welcome to the Ability Shop!

Chapter 93 This is the Celestial Realm
In fact, the boy woke up that very night.

After hearing from Lin Qing that the other party had opened her eyes, Chen Xuan handed over the task of serving customers to her and went up to the third-floor restaurant.

It wasn't that he was stingy and unwilling to open a second-floor room for the guest, but rather that the unconscious person couldn't sign a rental contract, so he couldn't get the room key to open the door.

Of course, sleeping on the floor on the third floor isn't too bad. The delegation stayed here for more than ten days and all praised how well they slept with the cotton blankets and quilts.

When Chen Xuan entered the room, he found that the boy had already sat up.

His gaze remained fixed on the girl beside him, his eyes showing a hint of confusion, but mostly tender concern.

Hearing footsteps, he turned around. Upon seeing Chen Xuan, he immediately placed his hands on his forehead, knelt down, and respectfully kowtowed.

"You must be my sister's savior. I will never forget your great kindness..."

Despite being quite young, he speaks with remarkable eloquence.

This shows that the boy was definitely not as destitute as he appeared; he must have been well-educated and quite adept at etiquette, things that are usually only understood by children from wealthy families.

"Don't move," Chen Xuan said.

The boy paused slightly, but did not immediately look up.

He walked over, bent down and pressed down on the tape that was about to come off the other person's hand, "Don't pull the IV needle out, it still needs to be used for a few more days."

The boy stared at the transparent tube in his hand without saying a word.

Chen Xuan guessed that he probably didn't know what it was, but when he saw a tube connected to his body, his first reaction was not to panic and try to pull it out. His composure was quite surprising.

"You can move now, you don't need to lie down to talk," Chen Xuan said. "What's your name? How old are you?"

"A-Jiu is eleven years old this year." The boy resumed his sitting posture.

"Is that girl your sister? Where is she?"

"Yes, her name is Ahua."

None of them were their real names. Chen Xuan knew that children over ten years old would have formal names and wouldn't be called by their nicknames forever. Moreover, it was impossible for a poor family without a surname to raise such a person.

However, he didn't care much about that, since ability trading doesn't require a real name.

Why did you come to my manor?

“I…I don’t know either.” Ajiu hesitated for a moment. “At the time, I only remembered that my sister was dying and I had to find a safe place to put Ahua down before I collapsed. Then I saw a light ahead and walked over without thinking, and then you appeared…”

This experience was basically the same as that of the previous guests.

However, if he was just looking for a place to survive, he probably wouldn't attract any shops, since he's already alive. If Ah Jiu had encountered some kind farmer or passerby instead of himself, who pried open his mouth and poured some sugar water into him, he might have survived too.

This is not a problem that necessarily requires ability to solve.

The fact that he was able to find the ability shop suggests that he has a bigger goal in mind.

Chen Xuan had long since seen through the shop's tricks.

"Do you know where this is?"

"Uh...you just said...your manor?" Ajiu answered honestly.

"No, I was just kidding."

The boy was speechless.

"This is the Celestial Realm, and all those who live here are Immortal Masters," Chen Xuan said again.

A strange expression appeared on Ah Jiu's face.

“Don’t believe me? Look at that tube in your hand. Can you find such a delicate and transparent tube outside?” he said seriously. “This tube is delivering medicine into your and your sister’s bodies. Without it, you wouldn’t have recovered so quickly.”

Ah Jiu clenched her fist and found that she did indeed seem to be much stronger than before.

“Take a look at this,” Chen Xuan said, taking out his phone and playing the security footage from when he entered the store. “This is called the Mirror of Time. Do you think there would be something like this outside?”

The boy was clearly shocked.

The palm-sized cube was glowing, and it clearly reflected his bloodstained face!
"And the blanket you're using, the furnishings in the room, the lights on the wall... Is there anything wrong with me saying this is the heavenly realm?"

Ah Jiu found herself speechless.

He had long realized that this was no ordinary place; wherever there was light, it was an unchanging, soft glow. He couldn't see any flickering flames, nor could he smell the greasy aroma of oil, not to mention that everything within sight exuded extremely high quality—even the notoriously luxurious mansions of Western Region merchants in Chang'an couldn't match this. However, the idea of ​​a celestial realm was still a bit too far-fetched.

He was desperately fleeing in the wild... how did he end up in the celestial realm?

Chen Xuan could naturally guess what he was thinking. "This is fate. Sometimes it appears when you jump off a cliff, and sometimes it appears when you fall into the water. The fact that you were able to find this place means that you have a connection with it."

"I... have a connection with the Heavenly Realm?" Ajiu asked in disbelief.

“That’s right, I am Immortal Master Chen Xuan, who is in charge of managing this place. Besides me, there are also Immortal Master Lin and Immortal Master Liu. If you have any unfinished business or want to find answers to certain questions, you can get the answers you expect here,” Chen Xuan said patiently.

Ah Jiu's mind was a little foggy; this was simply too absurd for him. "I... I don't understand what you mean..."

"To put it bluntly, what do you want most right now? As long as you're willing to pay the price, the heavens can help you make your dream come true."

"How could this be?!" He clutched his head, his face contorted in pain.

"I'm not taking your money in advance, so what's wrong with giving it a try? Don't worry, you can stay in the Heavenly Realm for three days... If you still have doubts after three days, then you can leave on your own."

Chen Xuan didn't intend to get an answer right now. Since the customer was already in his hands, he had nine ways to make the other party willingly make the deal.

"It's late today, you should continue to rest."

After saying that, he turned around and prepared to leave.

"Master Immortal!"

Just as Chen Xuan reached the door, A Jiu suddenly gritted her teeth and shouted, "I want immortal techniques—immortal techniques that will allow me to take revenge!"

Revenge? It seems I guessed right. He really was forced to flee because he had a feud with someone. Chen Xuan thought to himself, this request is much more specific than those of the other guests.

He turned back again, asking, "Whose revenge?"

The boy hesitated, as if he wanted to say something but then stopped.

“You can’t do this without explaining yourself clearly… If we don’t understand your specific needs, the shop… Heavenly Realm can’t provide the right solution.”

Ajiu looked at the syringe on the back of her hand, then glanced at her sleeping sister beside her, and finally spoke as if she had made up her mind, "I don't know who they are... but they must be cultivators!"

Once the door was opened, Ajiu could no longer suppress the resentment in her heart. "Five people in total, I can count them clearly! It was them who killed my parents, my master, and everyone else in my family!"

It was actually a case involving the annihilation of an entire family?

"where is your house?"

“Feng County is located southwest of Chang’an City.” Ajiu was overcome with grief at the mention of this, and tears instantly welled up in her eyes.

His family wasn't particularly wealthy; they had a dozen or so members who routinely gathered medicinal herbs in the mountains and sold them to local sects. They lived a fairly comfortable life. Over the years, they had saved enough money to renovate their courtyard and build a cultivation and insulated house, hoping to transform their herb gathering into herb cultivation and further expand their income sources.

There are many families in Feng County who rely on their sect for a living.

One day, his father found an injured man in the mountains. The man claimed to be a wandering cultivator who, to repay his family for saving his life, began teaching them knowledge after he recovered, such as reading, writing, calligraphy, astronomy, geography, and so on. He had been teaching them for five years. He originally planned to leave after he recovered, but two years ago, Ah Jiu and Ah Hua suddenly gained the ability to sense qi, so he changed his mind and decided to stay and teach them how to cultivate.

"Why not go to a legitimate sect and instead learn from a rogue cultivator?" Chen Xuan asked with concern.

Even within the Immortal Alliance, where numerous sects exist, there are still independent cultivators, a fact he already knew from the tea master. In the words of the old man, there will always be mavericks; they are either geniuses or fools.

“Master wouldn’t let us go. He said those sects would only waste my talent… He used to say that Ah Hua and I were both born prodigies, much stronger than those inner disciples.” Ah Jiu wiped her eyes and said intermittently, “I know that’s just Master praising us, but it’s quite enjoyable to cultivate with Master, so we didn’t spend money to find a sect.”

"Do they charge people for their services?"

Ajiu nodded. "Regardless of whether they pass the test or not, whether they can become disciples or not, they still have to charge an 'opening eye fee.' Master said that this is all to deceive those who lack talent, making them waste a lot of money on it every year. But those with high talent will become very strong in the end, regardless of whether they join a sect or not, and Ahua and I are those kinds of people. He also said... once we officially join the sect, we'll build our own sect, and there's no need to put up with the bullies outside."

Ten days ago was the day the two entered the sect—the rogue cultivators prepared a jade tablet for each of them, engraved with the names their master bestowed upon them for joining the sect.

Chen Xuan had also heard the old man mention this common knowledge: in addition to a common name, cultivators would receive a Daoist name on the day they became formal disciples. These names usually began with a fixed surname, followed by a given name according to seniority, somewhat like a Buddhist Dharma name. If it was a prestigious sect, others could immediately know which generation of disciple a cultivator belonged to simply by stating their name.

For a newly initiated cultivator, being given a Dao name is undoubtedly a joyous occasion worthy of celebration, as it means that the Immortal Alliance will remember his name.

"But neither Ahua nor I received that jade tablet..." At this point, Ajiu bit her lip, a trickle of blood seeping from the corner of her mouth. "That night, while Master was focused on carving the sect's wooden tablet, those cultivators suddenly stormed into our courtyard! Master fought them fiercely, but didn't forget to warn us hiding in the house, secretly instructing us to use the Turtle Breathing Technique to crawl into the well in the backyard. I don't know... how much time passed... when we climbed out and discovered..."

After that, Ajiu was almost unable to speak.

He saw the house burned to ruins and the blood-covered corpses of his family members.

(End of this chapter)