Praise Before Criticism

On the outskirts of the Star Dou Great Forest

A stream burbled with a clear, pleasant sound.

Mu En and Zhang Lexuan sat by the river, each holding a fishing rod, looking like ordinary anglers.

Then, all at once, both opened their eyes.

So this was transmigration.

Having traveled between worlds, the breadth of one's horizons and the heights of one's thinking truly provided considerable help in cultivation.

Even with a poor temperament, a child given an adult's life experience would surely work harder.

[Of course, life experience and knowledge were only the basics.]

[Cheats were what transmigrators truly relied on to establish themselves in an unfamiliar land!]

[Simply put, cheats were means of cheating. Some were strong, some were weak, but each had its own special features.]

[To give a few examples...]

[Take Brother San, for instance. The Mysterious Heaven Treasure Record he learned in his previous life was his cheat on Douluo Continent.]

[The internal cultivation method Mysterious Heaven Skill, the hand-training method Mysterious Jade Hand, the eye-training method Purple Demon Eye, the grappling method Controlling Crane Capturing Dragon, the movement method Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track, and the method for using Hidden Weapons, Hundred Solutions to Hidden Weapons!]

By the river, Zhang Lexuan relayed the information in her mind to Mu En as she received it.

Mu En nodded gently. Ten thousand years ago, six Self-Created Soul Skills could indeed be considered a means of cheating.

Suddenly, Mu En noticed the shock on Zhang Lexuan's face and hurriedly sent her a voice transmission. "Lexuan?"

Zhang Lexuan steadied herself and repeated the words one by one...

[Mysterious Heaven Skill was a superior Daoist cultivation method. On Douluo Continent, if cultivated from childhood, it could allow ordinary people without Soul Power to cultivate Innate Soul Power, or even Innate Full Soul Power!]

[Mysterious Jade Hand made the hands as solid as cold jade and impervious to all poisons!]

[Purple Demon Eye was a rare method for cultivating spiritual power. Even ten thousand years later, or twenty thousand years later, it was exceedingly precious.]

[Leaving Controlling Crane Capturing Dragon and Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track aside for now, Tang San once used a Hidden Weapon from Hundred Solutions to Hidden Weapons to pierce the heart of the Angel God, Qian Renxue!]

[Was it that the gods of Douluo Continent were too weak, or was Hundred Solutions to Hidden Weapons truly that powerful?]

Mysterious Heaven Skill could be cultivated to Innate Full Soul Power?

Impossible! How could that be possible!

Mu En's thoughts were in disarray. If the Tang Sect truly had such a powerful cultivation method, how could it have fallen to its present state?

That made no sense!

However, Shen Yichen's diary gave the others no time to think.

[In another world, the Mysterious Heaven Treasure Record might not have counted as a powerful cheat, but on Douluo Continent, it certainly counted as a means of cheating!]

[My own cheats came from two sources. One was my foreknowledge from holding the script, and the other was this Diary System.]

[As for other kinds of cheats, there were too many to count, such as Magic Treasures with heaven-defying abilities and strange, powerful bloodlines...]

[That was a transmigrator: someone who could be a savior, but could also be an Otherworldly Demon!]

For a moment, all three holders of Diary Copies grew more wary of the identity of "transmigrator."

[Now that we know what a transmigrator is, the standards for judging Brother San should be a little more flexible.]

[Every transmigrator with a cheat had one underlying trait: arrogance!]

[Not only did Tang San possess the Mysterious Heaven Treasure Record, he also had Twin Martial Souls. His father, Tang Hao, was hailed as the youngest Titled Douluo on the continent, and his mother was the Hundred-Thousand-Year Transformed Soul Beast Blue Silver Emperor. The master he apprenticed himself to was a gloomy old boy who could even carry on with the Pope of Spirit Hall, and the person he dated was likewise a Hundred-Thousand-Year Transformed Soul Beast, a Soft Bone Rabbit.]

[With so many "coincidences" coming together, who wouldn't be arrogant in his place?]

[The canvas had arrogance as its base, while its other two striking colors were "deep affection and loyalty" and "heartlessness and ingratitude"!]

[As a steadfast warrior of feudalism, his deep affection and loyalty were directed toward heaven and earth, sovereign, family and teacher. In plain terms, he loved his family, respected his elders and teachers, and revered his ruler.]

[Even though Tang Hao abused him like that when he was young, all it took was one hug from Tang Hao to move Tang San to tears.]

[Perhaps because he was an orphan in his previous life and lacked love in this one, he placed particular importance on family!]

The corners of Shen Yichen's mouth curled upward. There was a writing technique called praise before criticism.

Only by making them sound good first would the turn afterward bring a more intense shift in emotion!

[Respecting his teacher was another thing Tang San did exceptionally well. To put it bluntly, Yu Xiaogang's knowledge was like a half-empty bottle that sloshed around.]

[Some of his theories were riddled with holes, while the rest were common knowledge.]

[The greatest help Yu Xiaogang gave Tang San was to disgust Bibi Dong and shake her state of mind. Bibi Dong was already abnormal, and once Yu Xiaogang stood there, well, she went even crazier.]

[If I were Tang San, after finding out that Yu Xiaogang was fucking useless and had taught me nothing but erroneous knowledge, I might not immediately turn hostile and disown him, but I could only maintain a show of cordiality.]

[Tang San truly treated Yu Xiaogang like his own father. If Gangzi hadn't been such a waste, Tang San might really have brought him to the Divine Realm.]

Star Dou Great Forest

Mu En's expression was complicated. Yu Xiaogang was, after all, an ancestor of his branch of the family.

Now that someone had dismissed him outright, it would be a lie to say he had no complicated feelings about it.

Of course, Mu En had long since passed the age of youthful impetuosity. When he was young, he might have braced himself and stubbornly argued a point or two, but now he merely sighed with regret.

[That was all for his deep affection and loyalty. Tang San showed all the others the same "heartlessness and ingratitude" without distinction.]

[Because of that underlying arrogance, Tang San always seemed faintly above others when dealing with them.]

[Call him heartless and ungrateful, or call him calculating.]

[All in all, he couldn't be called evil, but he couldn't be called good either. He had done many good deeds, and quite a few bad ones too. He was just an ordinary person not so different from you or me.]

Mu En had thought the current affairs commentary would be like the daily essay, condemning Tang San outright as an utterly wicked villain.

Unexpectedly, it was reasonably objective.

It had spoken of Ancestor Tang San's good points as well as his bad.

Strip away the flattering filter of the Sea God, and Tang San might truly have been an ordinary person.

Mu En and Zhang Lexuan looked as usual, but in the White Tiger Duke's Mansion, Huo Yun'er's admiration for the Sea God shattered all over the ground.

Elsewhere, Jing Hongchen's expression was not nearly so pleasant.

If a god was an ordinary person with joys and sorrows, then... could the Sun Moon Empire's great undertaking truly be accomplished?

If Sea God Tang San...

Words once again emerged in the diary.

[The above was an assessment of Tang San of the Tang Sect, not an assessment of the Sea God.]

The turn... was coming!

[Objectively speaking, Tang San before becoming a god could still be considered a selfish ordinary person. But after becoming a god, Sea God Tang San was a great cancer upon the world!]

[Power was a poison that corroded the heart. A nobody could be selfish, but someone in power could not.]

[When a god's character was unworthy of the power he wielded, it was a disaster for all ordinary people!]