Somewhat Difficult Beginning

Cold and hungry.

Lu Ming struggled to open his eyes. The first thing that came into view was a mass of black.

"What is this?"

Just as he puzzled over what the black thing was, a foul stench suddenly surged into his nostrils.

He hurriedly covered his nose and mouth. Then, as though springs had been installed beneath him, he shot upright with a "boing."

Taking another careful look, he realized that the black mass was a pile of feces.

"How could this..."

Lu Ming soon sensed that something was wrong. How could there be feces where he had slept? And he was not sleeping on a bed now, but on a patch of grass.

He hurriedly scanned his surroundings.

Sure enough, the familiar room was gone. All around him was a strange wilderness overgrown with weeds and tangled trees.

"What's going on? Wasn't I sleeping in my room? Where is this?"

Lu Ming was still filled with confusion when, at that moment, a sudden stab of pain shot through his mind. A flood of unfamiliar memories surged in like a tide.

After quite some time, Lu Ming finally understood what had happened. He had transmigrated—into the body of a little beggar who had frozen to death.

To be honest, this was a rather unfortunate start.

However, Lu Ming quickly stopped dwelling on it and shifted his attention elsewhere.

Through the memories, he discovered that this world was far from ordinary. It was a fantastical world where people could cultivate martial arts.

The powerful could shatter a mountain or cut a river in two. The even stronger could soar through the skies and burrow through the earth, becoming immortal and imperishable.

However, all of that was information the original owner had heard while begging. He had never witnessed it himself, so Lu Ming did not know whether it was true.

One thing was certain, though: martial arts truly existed in this world, and the original owner had seen them with his own eyes.

For instance, he had personally watched a man in blue robes lightly leap into the air and soar atop a city wall more than ten zhang high, leaving behind only a dashing silhouette.

He had also seen an iron-armed man casually slap a massive boulder into pieces, earning cheers from the surrounding onlookers.

And he had once seen a cold-faced man standing with his arms crossed as three steel blades hacked into his body. Not only was he left completely unharmed, but the three blades that struck him were shaken into fragments.

There were countless scenes like these in the memories. Clearly, Martial Artists were everywhere.

This further proved that it was a world centered around martial arts.

"It really is amazing."

Lu Ming was still savoring the scenes from his memories, deeply captivated by them. As a martial-arts enthusiast, who had never dreamed of living the life of a martial hero?

Repaying grudges and kindness as he pleased, upholding justice and aiding the helpless.

That had been his dream since childhood, and now he had the chance to make it come true.

But his fantasies were soon shattered by cold reality. He remembered that he was still a beggar with barely any clothes on, unable even to keep himself fed and warm—let alone practice martial arts.

What was worse, even if he wanted to learn, no one would be willing to teach him.

Even with the original owner's limited knowledge, Lu Ming knew that Martial Artists were extremely reluctant to pass on their martial arts.

To learn, he would have to join some faction, but that was easier said than done.

Most factions had extremely demanding requirements for recruiting people.

Of course, there were some simpler options. However, they either required one to become a servant or maid, or demanded a huge sum of money.

And even then, one would basically never receive the true inheritance. Being able to learn three moves and two techniques would already be something to thank the heavens for.

"I'm getting ahead of myself..."

Lu Ming hurriedly shook his head again, casting aside these impractical fantasies. He felt that his first priority was to solve his problem of food and clothing. Everything else was secondary.

"But I'm definitely going to practice martial arts!"

After witnessing those bizarre and fantastical scenes, Lu Ming found it impossible to let go. Once he secretly made up his mind, he turned his attention back to reality.

After sorting through his thoughts, he decided that the most urgent thing was to leave this place.

He now knew that, aside from alluring martial arts, this world was also filled with all kinds of dangers.

Especially in the wilderness.

Here, the most obvious danger was the temperature, which ordinary people could hardly withstand—either bitter cold or scorching heat.

Although the sunlight was glaring now, the temperature was extremely low, and gusts of cold wind blew past from time to time. At night, things would be even worse.

The original owner had frozen to death the previous night.

And aside from these natural dangers, the wilderness was also filled with all kinds of venomous insects and savage beasts, some of which even Martial Artists could not defeat.

In the memories, there were many scenes of Martial Artists being bitten by venomous insects and carried away by their companions for emergency treatment.

He had also heard that some expert or another had accidentally been swallowed whole by a savage beast.

In short, as an ordinary person, surviving in the wilderness was incredibly difficult.

What was more, there was already a warning right before him.

Judging from the size of that black pile of feces, its owner was clearly no small creature, and steam was still rising from it.

In other words, the owner of the feces had not left long ago.

As for why it had not eaten him, perhaps it was a herbivore. Perhaps it was not hungry yet and had left its feces as a marker, intending to save him for its next meal.

In any case, this was no place to linger. Every sign urged him to leave as quickly as possible.

Thus, Lu Ming hurriedly struggled to stand. However, his vision immediately swam and his legs went weak. He had barely straightened up when he fell back down with a "plop."

It turned out that the original owner had gone a long time without eating and had also been exposed to the cold for far too long. He was now incredibly weak, and moving would be difficult.

"No. I can't just sit here and wait to die."

Although Lu Ming was kneeling on the ground and panting heavily, he did not despair.

He himself was an exceptionally strong and calm person. Even if there were only a sliver of hope, he would never give up on himself.

Besides, this small difficulty was not enough to defeat him.

After slightly calming his breathing, Lu Ming immediately reached out and yanked up a handful of wild grass in front of him by the roots. When he saw the pure-white rootlets, a smile appeared on his face.

He recognized this grass. Its roots were faintly sweet, with a texture like sugarcane. He had eaten plenty of it as a child in his previous life.

Although he did not know whether this grass had mutated in this other world and developed some kind of poison, he could not worry about that now.

After shaking off the sand clinging to it, he stuffed the whole thing into his mouth and began chewing hard.

"It's really sweet..."