ATDIWR Chapter 51

Chapter 51: Just a Passerby in My Life, I Want the… He Spoke Of

When Ji An carried the child in, Zhou Qin was just struggling to get up with his crutches. Seeing the child’s tragic state, his expression instantly turned grim. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know, a withered man brought him over, saying he felt pity for him, but I have a gut feeling there’s more to it. It’s highly likely this child’s current miserable condition is related to him,” Ji An said as he carried the child into the outermost individual isolation room.

This room was prepared specifically for the new children, mainly to prevent lice or other diseases they might carry from spreading to the children already in the orphanage.

Ji An placed the person down and immediately took out a regular children’s nutritional supplement from his space to feed the child.

The child’s eyes were tightly shut, teeth clenched, and they couldn’t swallow the nutritional supplement at all. Ji An could only use a gentle force to pry open the child’s mouth and forcibly pour the nutritional supplement in.

Originally, Ji An wanted to give the child some Spiritual Spring Water, but he couldn’t do so under everyone’s watchful eyes.

The effect of Spiritual Spring Water was too good; just a little bit could quickly heal the child’s external injuries and bruises. Everyone would definitely notice the abnormality then.

Anyway, Zhou Qin had called a Healing-type Power User. He would wait for them to come and check before deciding. If the child’s life was truly in danger, he would figure out a way to use Spiritual Spring Water to help her, but he couldn’t expose himself.

A few minutes after feeding the nutritional supplement, the child’s eyelashes fluttered, her eyeballs rolled a few times under her eyelids, and she slowly opened her eyes. She was awake.

Ji An breathed a sigh of relief. “It’s good she’s awake.”

Yuan Ming’an leaned towards the child and asked softly, “How are you feeling? Is there anything uncomfortable?”

The child didn’t reply, as if she couldn’t hear anything. Her eyes were wide open, staring blankly, dull and lifeless. Even with so many people gathered around her in the room, her eyes seemed not to see anyone. She didn’t look at anyone in the room, her empty gaze fixed on a point in the void, yet not focusing.

Yuan Ming’an looked at Ji An, Ji An looked at Zhou Qin, and Zhou Qin looked back at Yuan Ming’an. The three looked at each other. Ji An bent down, leaned close to the child, and waved his hand in front of her eyes. The child’s eyeballs didn’t move, her eyes didn’t even blink, truly as if she couldn’t see at all.

Ji An’s expression darkened. “Can you hear me?”

The child still didn’t answer.

Everyone’s faces turned heavy. Little Stone had already finished his bath. He knew this room was used to isolate new children to prevent the spread of illness, so he didn’t go inside, just stood at the door.

“She shouldn’t be blind or deaf. I heard her speak before,” Little Stone said.

“When and where?” Ji An asked.

“I’ve seen her in many places,” Little Stone said. “We had to beg for food everywhere. It’s hard to get food now, you can’t get any by staying in one place. We often changed places, sometimes several times a day.”

Little Stone was a very resilient child. Talking about the past didn’t make him cry; it only made him cherish his current life more.

“We often saw her, and she also kept changing places. I heard her asking passersby for things,” Little Stone thought for a moment and added, “She’s very pitiful, she seems unable to walk, and her hands are also bad. The few children begging with her were in similar conditions, all very miserable.”

Little Stone sympathized, “A very thin male Power User watched over them. If they didn’t get anything, he would beat them.”

In the Apocalypse, everyone was struggling to survive, and no one had extra sympathy to spare. Those people couldn’t have not known this, but they still beat the children.

“Sometimes, if passersby really couldn’t stand it, they would give a bite to eat. But this didn’t improve their situation much. Instead, because of this, that male Power User would deliberately beat them when there were many people around.”

“Beast!” Hearing this, Yuan Ming’an could completely imagine the miserable life this child had lived before. Perhaps thinking of her missing daughter, Yuan Ming’an started crying and rushed over to hug the child.

Little Stone continued, “They even tried to grab me and Little Rose once. Luckily, we were clever and ran away. But it’s also possible they didn’t really want to catch us, otherwise, two small children wouldn’t have been able to escape from a Power User.

Actually, even very pitiful children couldn’t get much back then, so it’s estimated that Power User was just half-hearted, not really caring if he caught us or not, which is why we escaped.”

Ji An looked at the rosy-cheeked, lively and adorable Little Stone in front of him, and then at the child opposite, missing limbs, emaciated, looking more dead than alive. He couldn’t even imagine what fate Little Stone would have suffered if he hadn’t been clever and fallen into the hands of those traffickers!

Thinking of certain methods, Ji An’s heart ached intensely, and he shivered with cold.

“A very thin Power User guarded them. Was that Power User about this tall, with small eyes that were also bulging?” Ji An described the appearance of the man he saw at the door.

“It was him,” Little Stone nodded.

Ji An said to Zhou Qin, “That was the man who brought this child over just now. According to Little Stone, they should have many more children like this little girl in their hands. They are likely a group of human traffickers, specifically making children look like this, neither human nor ghost, to gain people’s sympathy and beg for money to live.”

Zhou Qin’s hands clenched the head of his crutch hard. Unable to control himself, he used too much force and actually snapped the crutch in half in the middle. Zhou Qin lost his balance, stumbled, and was about to fall to the ground. Fortunately, Ji An reacted quickly and grabbed Zhou Qin to support him.

Zhou Qin’s face was even uglier, both angry at the inhumane traffickers and frustrated by his current powerless state.

Seeing that the atmosphere in the room was wrong, Little Stone silently pulled away Little Rose, who had just finished her bath and come over.

“I remember the appearance of that trafficker. I’ll draw him now, and the rest is up to Commander Zhou.” Originally, Ji An wanted to ask Gu Jinsheng, but now he wanted to hand this matter to Zhou Qin. Ji An believed Zhou Qin would go all out and also distract him a bit, so he wouldn’t constantly dwell on his leg.

“Okay,” Zhou Qin readily agreed.

There were paper and pens in the orphanage, which Ji An had bought. He didn’t choose fancy crayons or anything, just used a pencil to draw.

Little Stone, Little Rose, and the other children gathered around when they saw him drawing. They saw Ji An simple strokes on the paper quickly outline a human figure.

With just a few more simple strokes, the person’s facial features took shape. At this point, it already had a preliminary human form.

Little Stone and Little Rose had never seen anyone draw before and felt it was amazing. Their little mouths were wide open, but they covered them with their small hands, not daring to exclaim and disturb Ji An.

Ji An drew intently, carefully comparing the drawing repeatedly with the image in his brain. His brain, having awakened Mental Power, had become exceptionally powerful, like a scanner that could precisely remember everything his eyes saw.

Half an hour later, the person Ji An drew on the white paper was lifelike. Anyone, whether they knew the person or not, could recognize the person in the drawing at a glance after seeing the picture.

Little Stone and Little Rose covered their mouths, their eyes wide with shock, looking at Ji An. “Brother Ji An, what you drew looks exactly like that person!”

Little Rose said admiringly, “Brother Ji An, can you teach me? I really want to learn, it’s so magical!”

“Yes, I’m busy with work these days and might not have time to teach you, so I’ll hire a drawing teacher for you,” Ji An said. Ji An was currently working on an experiment, a very important experiment on cell tissue regeneration.

Little Rose wisely asked, “Then I won’t learn, Brother Ji An, don’t spend any more money.”

Hearing Little Rose’s sensible childish words, Ji An’s depressed mood lightened considerably. “It’s okay, Brother Ji An has plenty of money, this little bit doesn’t matter. If Little Rose likes learning, you should study hard. Brother Ji An will wait for the day Little Rose learns and draws a portrait for your brother.”

“Mm, okay, I will study hard,” Little Rose clenched her small fists to cheer herself on.

Little Stone quickly leaned in and said, “Me too, me too.”

“Okay, then I’ll draw a family photo for all the children in our orphanage and Director Yuan.”

“Okay,” Ji An extended a finger to Little Rose. “Let’s pinky promise, it’s settled.”

“Mm!” Little Rose linked fingers with Ji An and made a solemn promise.

Zhou Qin took the drawing and was also quite shocked. He said in surprise, “I remember you were seemingly… How can you have so many talents? Minor languages aside, you can even draw?”

Zhou Qin deliberately used vague terms instead of saying “orphan”.

Ji An smiled, “It’s okay, that’s all in the past, and that’s also a part of me.”

Ji An said to Little Stone and Little Rose, “Actually, I’m also an orphan, the same kind of orphan as you. I wasn’t separated from my family by accident, but when I was born, I was left at the entrance of an orphanage, and I grew up there.”

“What? Brother Ji An, you’re an orphan too?” Little Stone was completely incredulous. “Brother Ji An, you’re so amazing, how can you be an orphan? You’re so outstanding, why didn’t your parents want you? I thought your parents would surely brag everywhere about having such an excellent son!”

Ji An rubbed Little Stone’s and Little Rose’s heads. “But no one is born that excellent. When I was born, I was just a little baby who only knew how to cry. Of course, I think if my parents knew how outstanding I could become now, they probably wouldn’t abandon me even if it killed them.”

Spatial Storage Items, nutritional supplements, just these two things are enough to revitalize a base or destroy one. If the parents who abandoned Ji An had foresight, they probably wouldn’t abandon Ji An for anything in this life except death.

Little Stone immediately said, “Brother Ji An, I must study hard in the future and become as excellent as you.”

“Okay, I’ll be waiting.”

Ji An then continued the previous topic. “Life was hard back then, but there were also many sweet moments. I wanted to record those hard-earned beautiful moments, but I couldn’t get a camera back then. For me at that time, a camera was an expensive luxury I could never afford. The only things I could access were paper and pen. So I started trying to draw with paper and pen. Perhaps I had some talent, I could draw quite well just by looking at those simple drawing books in the orphanage.

But later, when I could earn money myself, I did study drawing further.”

Ji An was far more outstanding than Zhou Qin had imagined. Perhaps the growth of every genius is accompanied by pain, but pain doesn’t defeat them, it only polishes them to be even more brilliant!

Zhou Qin didn’t ask further. He didn’t want to stir up Ji An’s sealed past.

Just then, Yuan Ming’an came out holding a towel. Her eyes and nose were red.

“She’s a girl. I just wiped her body and wanted to feed her some water, but she won’t cooperate with me at all.”

“It’s okay, she’s had nutritional supplement, she’ll be fine,” Ji An comforted.

“I’ll teach you how to feed her the nutritional supplement in a bit. There’s a trick to it. When I’m not around, you can feed her using the method I teach you,” Ji An said. “This child must have very serious psychological problems, it won’t be cured in a day or two. Just keep feeding her like this for now, we’ll see later.”

“Alright,” Yuan Ming’an said.

Ji An taught Yuan Ming’an how to feed the child water. During the process, Yuan Ming’an couldn’t get the hang of the technique and poured many times without success, getting it all over the child. The child neither struggled nor moved, as if they weren’t handling her.

Fortunately, after failing a few times, Yuan Ming’an finally learned. Just then, Fang Rurong also arrived.

Ji An greeted her, “Miss Fang, how is your recovery?”

Zhou Qin had been checking on Fang Rurong frequently during this time, so he knew about her recovery and didn’t ask again.

Zhou Qin called Fang Rurong not to have her treat the child, but because Fang Rurong was the head of the Healing-type Power Users at the Base. All assignments of Healing-type Power Users were under her management, so it wouldn’t be right to go over her head and find someone else directly.

“Pretty good,” Fang Rurong replied.

But she still needed more time to recuperate. The excessive power consumption caused by cross-level healing was not easy to recover from.

After a brief exchange of pleasantries, Fang Rurong examined the little girl’s injuries.

Even though Zhou Qin had told her about it before, Fang Rurong was still startled when she saw it, feeling pity.

Fang Rurong said, “I can help heal these external injuries on her body, as well as the deformities of her wrists and ankles, but I can’t do anything about that severed leg.”

The healing ability of Healing-type Power Users was not limitless; they couldn’t just heal anyone whose power level was lower than theirs.

Fang Rurong explained, “This child’s leg looks like it was cut off in one go by an external object. It should have been cut with a Power User’s ability, otherwise, the cut wouldn’t be so clean. In this case, if she had kept the lower half of the leg bone, even if it was a leg bone without flesh, I could use my ability to reattach it and even make new flesh and skin regenerate.

But in a case like this, where the lower half of the leg bone is completely gone, it requires the entire lower half of the leg bone to grow back from scratch. I have no way to make a severed bone regrow.”

Even if the little girl’s bones were severely fractured, shattered into dust, Fang Rurong could make them heal instantly.

Or if the little girl’s flesh was cut into a thousand pieces, Fang Rurong could restore it to its original state in minutes.

For example, if the little girl’s internal organs were punctured with a hole or cut down to the size of a fingernail, Fang Rurong could make them recover to their original appearance in the blink of an eye.

Even if the heart was pierced, as long as the person still had a breath of life, it was fine. Kidneys, loins, liver, and all other internal organs were not a problem.

But if one kidney was removed, leaving only one, and Fang Rurong was asked to figure out how to regenerate another one, she couldn’t do it.

Even organs like the gallbladder, which don’t have a significant impact if removed, cannot be regenerated once excised.

In other words, what Fang Rurong could do was promote the healing or growth of existing cell tissue; she couldn’t regenerate.

Perhaps some people might think that half of the leg bone is still there, so it’s not regeneration, at most it’s promoting growth.

But that’s not the case. Putting aside bones in other parts of the body, the leg bone alone is divided into the thigh bone and the lower leg bone. These are two leg bones. They are not one complete bone but are connected by flesh and tendons.

Strictly speaking, these are two independent leg bones. Therefore, if only the thigh bone remains and the lower leg bone is needed, that counts as regeneration.

However, if half of the lower leg bone is preserved, a Healing-type Power User stronger than Zhou Qin could help his lower leg bone grow back to a complete state.

But Fang Rurong couldn’t do any of this. Her power level was too much lower than Zhou Qin’s.

“It is said that a Level 7 Healing-type Power User can bring the dead back to life and regrow flesh and bones, and can regenerate organs and bones,” Fang Rurong said. “I haven’t seen a Level 7 Healing-type Power User, I’ve only heard of such legends.”

“I understand,” Ji An said. “Miss Fang, could you please ask if any Power User in your team has time? I would like to privately hire them to help treat this child’s injuries. The price is negotiable.”

Ji An didn’t ask Fang Rurong directly to treat the child. First, Fang Rurong herself was injured, and Ji An was afraid that continued use of her healing ability would aggravate her injuries.

Second, although Healing-type Power Users were assigned by the Base to treat injured Power Users, that was only for those injured while working for the Base to receive free treatment.

In a situation like the little girl’s, even if she was about to die, the Healing-type Power User was not obligated to save her.

Individuals seeking private treatment from a Power User needed to pay a hefty price separately. Even so, not everyone with a large sum could get a Power User to treat them.

Fang Rurong coming here was entirely due to her relationship with Zhou Qin, out of personal connection.

Fang Rurong said, “These injuries are minor. I can help with them.”

“But didn’t you overexert your ability last time?” Ji An asked worriedly.

“It’s okay, this child is just an ordinary person, I’m only treating external injuries, it won’t consume much power. If today I needed to treat a Power User, even just a Level 1 Power User, I wouldn’t be able to,” Fang Rurong said as she began treating the little girl.

It truly only took a few minutes, and the little girl’s injuries were all gone, including her wrists and ankles which became normal again.

“Thank you,” Ji An took out a blue Jade necklace from his space. “This is a Spatial Storage Item with a hundred cubic meters of storage space. Please accept it as a thank you gift, Miss Fang.”

Fang Rurong quickly waved her hand. “You absolutely mustn’t. I just helped with such a small matter, such minor injuries would only cost a few hundred Credit Points even if I invited another Healing-type Power User to treat them. How can I accept your Spatial Storage Item, Mr. Ji?”

“But the problem is, even as you said, treating these injuries only requires a few hundred Credit Points, but you simply cannot hire a Healing-type Power User,” Ji An said.

Indeed, Healing-type Power Users weren’t people you could hire just by offering a high price. However, if Ji An or Zhou Qin spoke up, it would be completely different.

Fang Rurong naturally knew this. She understood that Ji An was saying this merely out of courtesy.

“But it’s still not right, I can’t accept it, a Spatial Storage Item is too valuable.” Power Users were hard to hire, but Spatial Storage Items were equally rare, of comparable value.

Currently, a Spatial Storage Item of over a hundred square meters would cost at least over ten million, and even more in the black market. In terms of value, the help she provided was only worth a few hundred Credit Points, the value isn’t equivalent.

Ji An persuaded, “I may need to trouble Miss Fang privately in the future. When that time comes, I hope Miss Fang can help.”

Zhou Qin also advised, “Mr. Ji has plenty of Spatial Storage Items, he can throw one around and it’s fine. If he gives it to you, just take it. If you feel bad about it, just do your best when he asks for your help next time.”

Fang Rurong secretly wanted it. Who wouldn’t want a Spatial Storage Item? Also, she felt that Ji An was capable and was very close to Gu Jinsheng and the others, and Zhou Qin was also urging her. So, she accepted it.

“Then I’ll shamelessly accept it. In the future, if Mr. Ji needs any help, I will do my utmost,” Fang Rurong promised.

“Okay,” Ji An didn’t refuse. He gave such a big gift certainly not because of the small injuries on the little girl, but mainly to build a good relationship with Fang Rurong.

When Fang Rurong left with the Spatial Storage Item, her steps were so light she felt like she could fly. She never dreamed she would get such an unexpected surprise from this trip and was extremely happy.

After treating the little girl, Zhou Qin and Ji An left.

On the way, Zhou Qin said to Ji An, “Coming to the orphanage this time has really touched me. Before, I always felt very miserable, like I was abandoned by the whole world. Now I realize that God still favors me.”

Ji An sighed, “After spending time in the orphanage, you either feel that this world is too unfair, too dark, and life is just so-so. Or you feel that this world is still full of hope, many people worse off than you are still striving to live, so what reason do you have to continue being depressed? Congratulations, you are the latter.”

“And what about you? You are neither?” Zhou Qin asked.

Ji An smiled, “No, when I was very young, I was the former, I didn’t really want to live, I felt life was just so-so, meaningless.

But later, I became neither, because someone once described to me his prosperous future. I want the prosperous future he spoke of!”

Zhou Qin became interested. “Who was that person? The one who told you about a prosperous future? I really want to know who changed you and made you into this outstanding, almost unreal person!”

Ji An didn’t speak for a long time. Just when Zhou Qin thought he wouldn’t answer, Ji An suddenly said, “Just a passerby in my life.”