The Magpie of the Qi Family, One of the Nine Gates

After the War of Resistance against Japan ended, Qi Tie Zui adopted the orphaned Hei Xiazi, and the whole family moved far away to Germany. In his later years, he received a secret letter from the Jiumen. He learned that Xie Lianhuan had adopted a son and realized that “it” had finally set its plan in motion. He had thought he would spend the rest of his life growing old in a foreign land. Then, one morning, a magpie arrived at his door, and his divination revealed: “A child of destiny will descend from the heavens.” When he opened the door, he found a one-year-old girl sitting at his feet, calling out to him in a babyish voice: “Grandpa.” He calculated the signs carefully, and the reading pointed straight to this little girl as the surprise fate had in store for him. He waited all day, but no one came to claim her, so he had no choice but to adopt her and name her Qi Que. At the age of three, Qi Que revealed an astonishing talent for the mystic arts, and Tie Zui taught her everything he knew. After Hei Xiazi completed his training and wanted to return to China, Tie Zui looked at his gifted granddaughter in his arms and decided to bring his two treasures back to their homeland. When he set foot on familiar ground, Tie Zui gazed at the Jiumen's walls, familiar yet strange: the wheels of fate had never let him go.