Cloud Province of the Great Yin Dynasty.
The Outer City of Gaoye City.
Inside a small house in Bluestone Alley.
A small-statured, pale-faced young man lay in bed.
Wang Yuan lifted his eyelids with great effort, his vision somewhat blurry.
Where is this? Wasn't I working overtime at the company?
He found himself lying on a hard wooden bed, the mattress underneath him so thin that he could clearly feel the cockroach-ridden wooden slats below it.
The light in the room was dim, narrow, and cramped.
The air was also filled with the bitterness of herbal medicine and a musty odor.
Wang Yuan merely moved his fingers.
At this moment, a strong sense of weakness, mixed with a burning, dull pain in several places, instantly swept over him.
Mhm?
It made him couldn't help but draw a sharp breath, letting out a suppressed grunt.
Meanwhile, another set of fragmented memories poured into his mind.
They belonged to Wang Yuan, who shared the exact same name as him.
Did I time-travel? Confusion flashed in Wang Yuan's eyes.
"Cough... cough cough..."
At this moment, he only felt his throat dry and tight, and couldn't help coughing twice, his chest vibrating to make his head ache even more.
"Yuan'er? Are you awake? How do you feel?"
A female voice carrying anxiety immediately sounded by the bedside.
Following closely, the face of a middle-aged woman full of sorrow leaned in.
Her skin was rough, and the corners of her eyes were covered with fine wrinkles.
Her hair was hastily pinned up with a wooden hairpin, the kind of appearance worn down by years of impoverished life.
This is... the original body's mother?
Wang Yuan opened his mouth, making no sound, his brain a complete mess.
"It's good that you're awake, it's good that you're awake!"
Seeing him with his eyes open, the woman breathed a slight sigh of relief, and hurriedly turned to fetch a coarse earthenware bowl from the small tea table beside them.
Inside was a pitch-black medicinal decoction.
"Hurry, drink the medicine. The doctor said your injuries require quiet rest."
The medicine bowl was brought to his lips, and that indescribable bitterness became even more pungent.
Frowning, Wang Yuan took the bowl and swallowed it in small sips.
This also allowed some residual memory fragments of this original body to slowly fuse with his own consciousness.
This place is... the Great Yin Dynasty?
Cloud Province?
A completely unfamiliar ancient world.
And he himself, also named Wang Yuan, was the youngest son of an ordinary family in Bluestone Alley of this Outer City.
As he was drinking the medicine, a low male voice suppressing anger came from the outer room.
Separated by the thin wooden plank wall, Wang Yuan heard it intermittently, yet every word was clear:
"It must be the handiwork of that Black Tiger Gang!"
"They are truly going too far! Do they really think our family is made of clay?"
The woman holding the medicine bowl trembled slightly, a few drops of medicinal liquid splashing onto Wang Yuan's chin.
She hurriedly wiped it with her sleeve, her eye rims turning even redder as she spoke in a low voice:
"Your father... is bottling up his anger inside."
The memories continued to fuse.
His father, Wang Gui, worked as a laborer at a fur shop in the city, while his mother, Madam Zhou, took on some sewing and mending jobs.
His elder sister, Wang Yu, had recently relied on someone and pulled some strings to enter the household of a wealthy family surnamed Zhang in the Inner City as a short-term laundry maid.
Because of this matter, his parents felt that the family finally had someone who could build a connection with the Inner City.
Even though she was just a laundry servant, speaking of it still counted as having a bit of "face."
The "filial piety money" given to the Black Tiger Gang this month could perhaps be delayed, or paid in a lesser amount.
However, the Black Tiger Gang simply would not buy into this trick.
As a place where all sorts of people mingled in the Outer City, the Black Tiger Gang was the local emperor of this neighborhood of alleys.
They did not care who you worked for in the Inner City; as long as you lived in this alley, you had to pay up according to their rules.
You wouldn't pay?
Or you wanted to default?
This was the end.
The original owner, Wang Yuan, had been ambushed at the alley entrance two evenings ago while walking home, had a sack pulled over his head, and had been beaten half to death with muffled cudgels before being dumped at his doorstep.
This was no accident, but a warning.
A warning intended for the Wang Family, and even more so for every single resident living in Bluestone Alley.
That so-called "Inner City connection" meant less than a fart in the eyes of the Black Tiger Gang.
A chill gripped Wang Yuan's heart.
He had transmigrated, yet he was neither a prince, a noble, nor the young master of a wealthy estate.
Instead, he belonged to such a humble family of common folk struggling on the poverty line, liable to be crushed to powder by ruffians and hoodlums at any moment.
With the medicine finished, Madam Zhou helped him lie back down, tucked in the corners of his quilt, and wiped her tears as she went outside.
He was currently immersed in the memories of the original owner.
A faint sound of a door opening suddenly came from the outer room.
Along with a conversation filled with immense worry from his parents.
"Is Yu'er back? Why is she so late today?"
It was the voice of his mother, Madam Zhou.
"Sigh, ask fewer questions. The child is tired too."
His father, Wang Gui, let out a sigh.
Footsteps approached, and the tattered cloth curtain of his small room was gently lifted by a crack.
A delicate face that could hardly conceal its exhaustion peered in; it was none other than his elder sister, Wang Yu.
Seeing that Wang Yuan's eyes were open, she was stunned for a moment, then hurriedly squeezed out a reassuring smile and spoke in a low voice:
"Brother Yuan is awake? Do you feel a bit better?"
"Get some good rest, don't be afraid."
That smile was forced and hurried, and besides concern, her gaze.
Seemed to hide a trace of lingering terror.
Before Wang Yuan could reply, Wang Yu quickly withdrew her head, and the cloth curtain fell back down, cutting off the inside from the outside.
The room grew quiet, leaving only his own heavy breathing.
Wang Yuan felt pain everywhere in his body, and his heart felt all the heavier.
In his past life, although life was cutthroat, safety at least had basic guarantees.
Yet here... the Black Tiger Gang could break your legs today and take your life tomorrow.
That pitiful shred of pride was laughably pale in the face of absolute violence.
"The Black Tiger Gang..." Wang Yuan chewed over these three words in his mouth.
This was the greatest threat he currently faced.
At this moment, the bitter aftertaste of the medicinal broth still lingered endlessly in his mouth.
But right at this instant.
A strange, burning heat rose unheralded from the position of his chest.
At first it was only lukewarm, like pressing a warm stone against himself.
Soon, however, the temperature climbed steeply, turning scorching hot.
It even carried a burning, stinging sensation, firmly branding itself onto the skin over his heart.
Urgh!
So hot!
Wang Yuan let out a muffled groan as this sudden turn of events momentarily even overshadowed the pain from his injuries.
What was going on?
Could it be a high fever caused by a wound infection?
No, this feeling was completely different.
This heat source was so concentrated, so bizarre, as if something wanted to burst out from within his chest.
Enduring the severe pain and weakness, he laboriously raised his arm and tremblingly lifted the patched, thin quilt covering his body.
With difficulty, he then pulled open the lapel of the coarse linen garment across his chest.
In the dim light, he lowered his gaze and looked.
The next moment, his pupils contracted sharply, and his breathing nearly stalled.
On the left side of Wang Yuan's chest, right above his heart, a distinct pattern had somehow materialized on his skin.
It was a circular mark roughly the size of a palm, deep black in color.
The surface of the mark was covered in extremely intricate, fine natural lines that were hard for the naked eye to discern, vaguely forming some kind of indescribable and abstruse pattern.
Th-This is?
Wang Yuan's mind gave a buzzing hum, going completely blank as if struck by a heavy hammer.
The appearance of this bead...
He was far too familiar with it!
It was unmistakably the ancestral black bead from his past life's home, the one said to have been passed down for untold generations and always treasured by his grandfather in a sandalwood box.
He had even sneaked it out to play with when he was a child, and he retained a deep impression of the unique patterns upon it.
Later, after his parents passed away in an accident, he had sorted through their belongings alone and even stroked that cold bead, feeling a poignant sense of how things remained while people were gone.
How... how could it have appeared here?
And turned into a mark upon his very body?
Could it be...
An incredible thought flashed through his mind like lightning.
Could this bead be what brought him across?
Just as Wang Yuan's mind was violently shaken and he was almost incapable of thought,
a massive and chaotic stream of information rudely forced its way into his consciousness without the slightest warning.
"Boom!"
It felt as though a clap of thunder had exploded inside his mind.
Wang Yuan's vision went black and he nearly fainted.
The intense headache caused him to curl his body up, and a dense cold sweat instantly oozed across his forehead.
Yet this pain came quickly and receded just as fast.
After a few breaths, the agony retreated like a receding tide.
That piece of information, however, was clearly branded deep within his memory, just like an innate instinct.
[Talent Bead]
[Conceals the mechanism of creation, harbors the root of all techniques. Absorbs the essence of all things, unlocks innate divine abilities.]
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