Innate Variant Constitution, Flying Mortal?

"Hhm?" 

Patriarch Auna became even more suspicious when he noticed the unusual behaviour of the young man. The latter had appeared jittery as soon as he focused his Divine Sense on him.

"I think I found something," Patriarch Auna said as he withdrew his focus, looking straight at his daughter. "Leila, is there something you missed out in your report? Now would be the time to tell me."

"Errr," Leila Auna's tone shifted defensively as a thought popped into her mind. Still, she stubbornly insisted, "I told you the full details, Father."

"Are you sure about that?" Patriarch Auna squinted his eyes as he glanced at Da Sha and the rest. "I could always ask them instead."

"Fine," Leila gritted her teeth, knowing fully well that her subordinates would spill. "I fed the mortal an healing pill just before we returned." Now that she thought of it, why wasn't his dead body here?

"He didn't die?" Her father frowned. In the original version of her report, Leila had recounted that the mortal present died due to the explosion.

"Not exactly," Leila lowered her head guiltily as she replied, "I mean, he was on his dying breaths, and I....."

"Which pill did you give him, yours?" Her father interrupted her.

Leila was silent.

"You fed him one of your goddamn failures," Patriarch Auna exploded in anger. "What were you thinking, testing out a failed product on a dying person?"

Leila's eyes filled with tears as her father yelled at her, but her subordinates secretly rolled their eyes. Those tears were induced, not real. This wasn't the first time the Young Miss had applied this particular tactic which seemed to work every time.

Sure enough, Patriarch Auna's expression instantly softened, and he calmed down.

"Well, the mortal did survive, although I suspect it has something to do with the Supreme Primordial treasure."

"Wait, he survived?" Four voices exclaimed simultaneously in disbelief, including the pill refiner herself, who was ironically the most surprised.

"He did, and he's only some metres away from this location," Patriarch Auna nodded. "There's something strange about him though."

"What?"

"I'm not sure," Patriarch Auna shrugged. "But then again, I can just get the answer directly from the guy himself, right?"

Following his words, he focused his Divine Sense on Di Tian again.

******

"I have to get away from here!" The urgent thought appeared in Di Tian's mind.

If the goosebumps that abruptly appeared on his skin some seconds ago wasn't enough hint, Di Tian knew that the overwhelming feeling of dread gripping his mind at the moment was his clue to leave.

"Hey dude, what's wrong? Where the hell are you going?" Jiang Po yelled in surprise. One minute, he was yapping away to Di Tian. The next, he was looking at his friend's back view as the former suddenly made away without warning.

Di Tian didn't reply his roommate, breaking into a run as the warning from his intuition grew stronger. 

But his escape plan came to an abrupt halt when some figures suddenly appeared out of nowhere just when he dashed into an alleyway, blocking his path.

The one in the lead was a middle-aged man with stern features. Di Tian recognized the amber-eyed lady behind him as the "deity" from earlier. Then, there was a snarky-looking girl and two men whose features created a startling contrast besides each other; tall and short, ugly and handsome, dull and cheerful-looking.

"You seem to be in a rush?" Patriarch Auna's eyes twinkled mischievously as he observed the young man with his Divine Sense up close. At the same time, he released a bit of his aura to lock him in place.

"It's this invisible killing intent again, but stronger!"

Under the pressure, Di Tian froze, unable to move a bit of his body. He could only stay put as Patriarch Auna unhurriedly grabbed his hand.

What followed was a faint scorching sensation in his body, as if the man was injecting something into it.

"Don't worry, he's just scanning your body with qi. You'll be fine," Leila spoke. "You're the first living proof of my pill refinement ability. I'll have Father spare your life just for that reason alone."

"That's actually not the case though. Your pill was a failure," Patriarch Auna said as he released Di Tian's hand. "His body was only able to absorb the properties of the pill due to his unique constitution ."

"Oh," Leila's brows raised involuntarily in surprise. "He has an innate physique?"

"It seems to be a variant constitution that allows him convert energy to vital force," Patriarch Auna explained, withdrawing his Aura Lock.

"So that's how he was able to extract the energy from the pill to recover from his injuries," Leila understood, then turned a bit forlorn. It looked like she had to put in more effort in her pill refinement, she thought to herself.

Di Tian felt his body relax as the invisible pressure disappeared.

"It's rather strange," Patriarch Auna continued speaking. "I can presently sense a unique energy signature on all the mortals on the planet. That can be explained as some sort of energy contamination from the explosion, but it's particularly thicker on him."

He glanced at Li Mei. She didn't have the energy signature on her.

"It might be due to proximity, Clan Head," Da Sha spoke for the first time. Unlike Miss Leila, his tone was very respectful. "He triggered the explosion after all, he would have borne the brunt of the energy wave."

"Hhm," Patriarch Auna grunted absentmindedly as his gaze returned to Di Tian. His eyes took on a darker hue as he asked, "There's just one thing though. Why were you trying to run away just now?"

Di Tian instantly felt a compelling force take over him as his eyes were involuntarily drawn to the man's eyes.

"Shit, it's some sort of hypnosis," he thought, guessing the man's intention was to make him rat himself out.

And it seemed to be working. He felt suffocated as his vision started to shimmer dreamily.

Luckily for Di Tian, the Grand Primordial Helix in his mind made a move at this moment.

Subtly, his consciousnes split; a portion remained under the effect of the spell while another entered an Omnipresent Mode in his Soul Space. The good news was, the latter was capable of overriding the hypnosis and remotely controlling the former.

All of this happened in a split second without any anomaly shown on the surface.

"How smart," Leila said. "Father is doing a mind search."

"It's not a mind search but an hypnosis technique, Miss," Da Sha said. "A mind search would involve the Clan Head invading the boy's Soul Space with his consciousness."

"Why doesn't he just do that?" Leila questioned naively.

"I think the Patriarch suspects that Yi Ming might have somehow possessed the boy and hidden the treasure in his Sea of Consciousness," Da Sha continued. "If that's the case, it would be a deadly move to attempt mind reading, the backlash for intruding on a protected soul is frightening."

"But if Father's suspicion is correct, wouldn't an ordinary hypnosis test be easy to pass?" Leila thought for a bit and asked.

Da Sha struggled, "I don't know about that, but the Patriarch must have a plan."

Patriarch Auna indeed actually had a plan; he wasn't interested in Di Tian's answers but was closely observing his physical state to notice any form of intentionality in his passive body functions, including heart rate and breathing.

That way, he would be able to tell the real 'truth' from the truth.

The "hypnotized" Di Tian was unaware of this devious scheme as he replied," I've had a strong instinct since childhood, and just now, I felt a strong sense of danger. That's why I ran."

"Hhm, he's telling the truth," Patriarch Auna thought as he prepared to ask another question.

But his Divine Sense which was passively sweeping the surroundings suddenly caught something strange.

There was a mortal nearby that seemed to be....flying?