Myriad Blood Bead

Chapter 2: Myriad Blood Bead

"Thank you, Uncle Li. I'm going back to my room to rest."

Li Fei stood up.

"Take this plate of strawberries with you."

Zhang Yuqing added.

So Li Fei picked up the fruit plate from the table and returned to his room.

In the living room, Li Lei looked despondent.

"If Xiao Fei's father hadn't taken that stab for me back then, I would have died on the battlefield long ago. I wouldn't have the family fortune I do today, either. I promised Xiao Fei's father that I would treat Xiao Fei as my own son, but now..."

How could he not see through Li Fei's intentions? He knew that Li Fei had voluntarily said he would not take the university entrance exams and would go to the Military Academy because he did not want to put him in a difficult position.

Zhang Yuqing took her husband's hand and comforted him. "Haven't we treated Xiao Fei well enough all these years? Whatever Tian Yu had, when did I not prepare an identical share for Xiao Fei? Even for children in an ordinary family, if there is only one opportunity, shouldn't the more talented one be the one to go? You've seen Tian Yu's talent for yourself."

"Mm."

Li Lei nodded.

After thinking for a moment, he turned to Zhang Yuqing. "Xiao Fei must be unwilling to accept this, or he wouldn't have thought of going to the Military Academy. He must want to fight for one of the Military Academy's guaranteed admission slots to university. No matter what, we should still support him and let him give it a try."

Zhang Yuqing understood what her husband meant.

Although the expenses of attending the Military Academy were not as high as attending a university's Conflict Mitigation Department, practicing martial arts required money at every turn. Li Lei did not want Li Fei to suffer hardship, which meant the household would have another substantial expense.

Zhang Yuqing looked at Li Lei and smiled gently.

"You're the head of this family. Your word is final."

In his room, Li Fei sat at his desk.

The bookshelf on the left held all kinds of books, most of them related to martial arts, such as Illustrated Guide to Deadly Human Acupoints, Thirty-Six Styles of Capturing Hands, Third Edition, and Complete Collection of Great Blue Dynasty Martial Arts Sanshou. These were all textbooks for the Conflict Mitigation Departments of Great Blue Dynasty technical secondary schools.

What Li Fei was holding and reading was Great Blue Records, a book about the history of the Great Blue Dynasty.

"This world really is wondrous."

Li Fei could not help sighing as he read.

He had not originally belonged to this world.

In his previous life, after graduating from university and entering the workforce, he had relied on his cautious and thorough manner to avoid a single mistake for ten years. At last, he earned a chance at promotion.

But right at that moment, he happened to uncover a secret and saw things he should not have seen.

After being careful and timid for ten years, he ultimately could not hold back. In a moment of impulse, he wrote a letter of accusation.

After that, his chance at promotion was gone, and he was subjected to every kind of targeting and bullying at work.

All the hardest, most exhausting jobs were thrown at him, and every holiday shift had his name on it.

Every day was overtime, overtime, overtime. He was also cursed at, made to take the blame, and forced to endure crushing mental pressure.

Li Fei had considered resigning, but having passed the age of thirty, it was already difficult for him to find another job.

So he endured for another two years. Then, one night when he worked overtime until dawn, he suddenly died. When he woke again, Li Fei discovered that he had actually transmigrated! The technology of this world was roughly at the level of the nineteenth century in his previous life. The most powerful nation in the world was still a feudal empire called the Great Blue Dynasty, which regarded itself as the Celestial Empire and had stood for over five hundred years.

The Great Blue Dynasty had originally been an imperial system, but later changed into a dual constitutional monarchy, with the Emperor and the cabinet ministers jointly governing the nation.

Over those five hundred years, many far-reaching events had taken place in Great Blue Dynasty history. In the past few decades, however, there had been two major events.

The first had occurred seventeen years ago, when the Great Blue Dynasty went to war with several Western countries at once, only to be driven by the allied forces all the way to the gates of the Imperial Capital.

In the end, the Great Blue Dynasty's strongest Azure Blue Iron Cavalry crushed the allied army outside the Imperial Capital and saved the dynasty.

Although the Great Blue Dynasty had ultimately won that battle, the strength of the Western countries had alarmed many people. Thus came the second major event—the Mingxin Reform.

The reform involved introducing the culture and technology of the Western countries, striving in every respect to "learn the barbarians' superior skills in order to subdue the barbarians."

Over seventeen years, under the influence of Western culture, many changes had taken place in the Great Blue Dynasty. The electric lamp in Li Fei's room, the radio on his desk, and the bicycles and automobiles parked outside were all products of the reform.

Such things meant little to Li Fei, who had been accustomed to high-tech products in his previous life. What truly interested him was the extraordinary power of this world.

According to Great Blue Records, the allied forces had wielded Rifled Guns with a range of five hundred meters, Heavy Machine Guns hailed as "the end of the cavalry age," Mortars with a maximum caliber of seventy millimeters and a range of three thousand meters, as well as Armored Vehicles, warships, and aircraft!

Such weaponry should have been enough to sweep aside armies armed with cold weapons.

Yet history recorded that one hundred and twenty thousand allied soldiers had been broken by ten thousand iron cavalry, collapsing in a crushing defeat!

After that battle, the Western countries did not dare stir up trouble at the borders for a full seventeen years.

This made Li Fei realize that the extraordinary power of this world was no simple matter.

This world had martial arts, and it also had sorcery.

Among the Great Blue Dynasty cabinet's six ministries, there was even one specifically called the Department of Righteous Law, whose members were all masters of sorcery.

And since the Great Blue Dynasty had founded itself through martial force, it placed even greater importance on the martial path.

But whenever Great Blue Records touched upon anything extraordinary, it became vague and glossed over it in a single stroke.

Although the original owner of this body had chosen the Conflict Mitigation Department when he entered technical secondary school, the teachers had not said much about martial artists either. They had only said:

"If you can get into university in the future, the Conflict Mitigation Department teachers there will tell you what a true martial artist is."

Li Fei was naturally interested in sorcery as well, but it was too mysterious, and he had no idea how to come into contact with it. Meanwhile, the Conflict Mitigation Departments of the Twelve Universities were martial arts halls clearly laid out before him, so he had to enter a university's Conflict Mitigation Department.

He wanted to become strong. He did not want to be trampled underfoot and manipulated by others as he had been in his previous life!

Touching his chest, Li Fei willed it, and immediately sensed a dark blue bead within his body.

When he had transmigrated, this thing had already been inside him. His thoughts could connect to it at any time, allowing him to instinctively receive the information contained within.

If this information were described in words, it would probably look like this:

Myriad Blood Bead

Level: 1 (36%)
Blood Souls: 10

This Myriad Blood Bead was closely tied to Li Fei's life, quantifying his vitality as ten Blood Souls.

Simply put, these ten Blood Souls represented Li Fei's life force—or rather, his Health Bar.

Once the Health Bar was gone, a person died.

But as long as the Health Bar remained, no matter how fatal Li Fei's injuries were, he would not die immediately.

Most importantly, this Myriad Blood Bead could automatically absorb energy from the human body and level up. Leveling up could increase his Blood Souls and unlock other abilities!

With such a thing, Li Fei was naturally full of confidence in himself.

Moreover, he felt that the Myriad Blood Bead could do more than make him better at taking damage. It might also help his martial arts cultivation.

There was a memory from the original owner's life: two months ago, the technical secondary school had organized a physical examination.

At first, the examination had been the same as before, consisting of routine physical fitness tests. But at the end, every student had been made to drink a bottle of poisonous medicine.

After drinking the medicine, everyone displayed varying degrees of abnormal symptoms.

Some reacted violently, their skin breaking out in allergies all over their bodies as foam spilled from their mouths; others merely felt slight dizziness and nausea.

Whenever someone felt they could not hold on any longer, the teachers responsible for the examination gave them an antidote prepared in advance.

In the end, they were graded according to their physical reactions and how long they endured.

After the test, the school teachers told the students that only those who scored Rank C or above were qualified to apply for a university's Conflict Mitigation Department.

The original owner's score had been Rank B-, which was considered a fairly good result.

It was precisely because of this memory that Li Fei felt the Myriad Blood Bead might be helpful for martial arts cultivation.

"Perhaps martial arts cultivation in this world requires taking drugs harmful to the body, which is why the school tests everyone's reactions to medicine in advance. I have the Myriad Blood Bead, and as my Health Bar grows thicker and thicker in the future, my endurance will become stronger and stronger. Maybe I'll have talent one in ten thousand!"

Li Fei thought this, filled with anticipation.