Awakening and Doubts

"This is way too frustrating!"

Zhang Bufan slammed the physical copy of Douluo Continent in his hand onto the dorm room desk with a dull bang, drawing a glance from his roommate, who was gaming beside him.

"What's wrong now, Brother Fan? Why are you taking it out on a book?" His roommate didn't even turn around, his fingers flying across the keyboard.

"Isn't it all because of Tang San?" Zhang Bufan took a swig of the now-warm soda and ranted indignantly. "He starts with Twin Martial Souls and Innate Full Soul Power, practically cheating, yet he insists on keeping a low profile and enduring everything. He watches Spirit Hall throw its weight around, watches Xiao Wu sacrifice herself... Frustrating! So damn frustrating! If I got transported there, who cares about Spirit Hall or Tang San? I'd crush everyone and become invincible right away. And while I was at it, I'd win over that tsundere girl Huo Wu, hold her in my arms and kiss her every day. Wouldn't that be perfect? Is there something wrong with the author's brain? Why insist on writing this kind of protagonist-torturing plot..."

The more he spoke, the more worked up he became, his finger nearly jabbing Tang San's face on the cover.

His roommate merely smiled, long used to this. "Give it a rest. You daydream every day. Hurry up and log in so we can queue together. I'll help you clear the Promotion Match."

"Coming, coming!" Zhang Bufan answered, setting down his soda and reaching for the computer tower's power button.

Just as his fingertip was about to touch the button, a sudden change erupted!

Everything before him—the dorm room, his roommate, the computer, the book—warped and blurred violently like reflections on water disturbed by a thrown stone. Colors peeled away, light vanished, and boundless darkness swallowed him whole. He could no longer feel his body, as though his soul had been torn free and was plummeting madly through a vortex where time and space had no meaning.

What the hell... What's happening? Low blood sugar? Or am I about to drop dead?! That was Zhang Bufan's last thought before his consciousness sank into chaos.

No one knew how much time had passed. It felt like an instant, yet also like eternity.

A faint ray of light pierced the darkness, accompanied by a flood of noisy sounds entering Zhang Bufan's consciousness.

He struggled to open his eyes. A fierce wave of dizziness and stabbing pain surged from the depths of his mind, as though someone had smashed him with a blunt weapon before pouring an entire bucket of paste into his head.

"Ugh..." He let out a pained groan and instinctively tried to rub his temples.

Yet the sensation from his arm was strangely unfamiliar—heavy, slender, nothing like his own untrained but fairly sturdy arm.

He abruptly sat up, making the dizziness even worse, but he had no time to care as he looked around in shock.

This was an antiquated room. Its wooden ceiling was carved with simple patterns. Beneath him was a hard wooden bed covered by a thin mattress that carried a faint mildew smell. The windows were papered, and hazy daylight filtered in from outside. He could vaguely hear merchants calling in the distant marketplace and carriage wheels rumbling over stone pavement.

There was little furniture in the room: a battered wooden table, a chair that looked ready to fall apart, and an old wardrobe. The air was filled with the faint mixed scent of plant ash and aged wood.

"Where... where is this? A film set? Some prank?" Zhang Bufan's heart began to race as an absurd yet uncontrollable thought rose from deep within him.

He scrambled off the bed and staggered toward the only copper mirror in the corner, its surface covered in dust.

The blurry mirror reflected an unfamiliar figure.

It was a boy who looked around eleven or twelve years old. He was thin, his face pale from apparent malnutrition, yet his features were unexpectedly refined and handsome. There was still a trace of youthful spirit between his brows that had not fully developed. His short black hair was slightly messy, and he wore a rough cloth outfit that had been washed until it had faded white.

Zhang Bufan's eyes widened, and so did the boy in the mirror.

He raised a hand and tremblingly touched his own face. The boy in the mirror made the same movement.

The touch beneath his fingertips was cold and real.

"Hiss—" He pinched his cheek hard, and a sharp pain immediately followed.

"This isn't a dream... It really isn't a dream?!"

The tremendous shock sent him stumbling back two steps before he dropped onto the hard bed, his mind completely blank.

Then, a vast mass of chaotic memory fragments that did not belong to him crashed into his mind like floodwaters bursting through a broken dam!

A violent headache struck again, even worse than before, nearly making him pass out. He clutched his head, curled up on the bed, and gritted his teeth as he endured the torrent of information.

A moment later, the headache gradually eased, and those memory fragments slowly sorted themselves out and became clear.

The original owner of this body had also been named Zhang Bufan. He was an orphan whose parents had died young, barely surviving on handouts from neighbors and occasional odd jobs. He lived in a place called Nuoding City. This world contained extraordinary people known as Soul Masters. Only those with Martial Souls and Soul Power could become Soul Masters, and their status was highly respected. Today was Nuoding City's annual Martial Soul Awakening Day, overseen by Spirit Hall Deacon Su Yuntao!

Every child, regardless of wealth or status, could go to Spirit Hall for the awakening ceremony once they turned six!

"Nuoding City... Spirit Hall... Su Yuntao... Martial Soul Awakening Day..."

Zhang Bufan muttered to himself. Each word was like a key, unlocking the floodgates of memories concerning that novel.

"I... I really fucking transmigrated?! Into Douluo Continent?! And I got the standard useless protagonist opening—an orphan with dead parents and nothing to his name?!"

He sprang from the bed, utterly stunned.

"When other people transmigrate, they become Tang San's brother, or Qian Renxue, the Young Master of Spirit Hall's younger brother. At worst, they're some named supporting character! What about me?! Zhang Bufan? Was there even someone like that in the original story? I don't even count as a random extra! I don't even know where I am on the timeline. Is Tang San still drinking porridge in Sacred Soul Village, or has he already gone to Nuoding Academy? What kind of hellish opening is this?!"

A tremendous sense of loss and absurdity welled up inside him. Just moments ago, he had been mocking Tang San for being so repressed and fantasizing about how he would dominate the world and pick up girls if he transmigrated. Reality had instead slapped him hard—he did not even qualify to become a character in the story. He was merely a nameless nobody in the background!

"Damn heavens, if you had to make me transmigrate, couldn't you have given me a better identity? This opening is way too unfair!" Zhang Bufan raised his middle finger at the ceiling—the heavens as he imagined them—and ranted inwardly. Is my future really going to be spending my entire life as a lowly commoner in Nuoding City, occasionally listening to storytellers recount the legends of the Clear Sky Douluo and the Martial Soul Hall Pope, then marrying an ordinary girl, having a few kids, and living out a mediocre life?

No! Absolutely not!

A fierce unwillingness and stubbornness rose from the depths of his heart.

Now that he was here and had been given a second life, he absolutely could not remain this ordinary!

"Martial Soul awakening... Right, there's still the Martial Soul awakening!" Zhang Bufan's eyes suddenly lit up, as if he had seized his last lifeline. "This is my only chance to turn things around in this world! What if... what if my Martial Soul is amazing? What if I have Innate Full Soul Power too?"

Although he knew the chances were minuscule, especially with his "orphan template," people had to have some hope, didn't they?

He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. According to the original owner's memories, the Martial Soul awakening ceremony was about to begin. If he did not leave now, he would be too late!

He looked at his tattered but still relatively clean clothes, dipped his hand in some water, and hastily smoothed his hair. Then he forced a smile at the blurry copper mirror, one uglier than a grimace.

"Come on, Zhang Bufan! Whether you're a dragon or a worm depends on this one shot! What if... I mean, what if I awaken a Hoe Martial Soul? Then I can work at a blacksmith's shop in the future. Maybe I can even get close to Tang San's father ahead of time?"

With a mixture of anxiety and absurd expectation, Zhang Bufan pushed open the creaking wooden door and merged into the bustling morning crowd of Nuoding City, striding toward the grandest building in the city center—Spirit Hall.

His journey through Douluo Continent—or rather, his road to "survival"—officially began with this seemingly hopeless start.