Eastern Wasteland, Purple Sun Prefecture.
Beneath the bright blue sky, carriages and horses clattered along the official road. The caravan numbered over a hundred people, with more than a dozen carriages, all racing ahead at full speed.
A young man in silk robes pulled back the carriage curtain, his face pale as he tried to take a few breaths of fresh air.
"Phew..."
"Traveling long distances in ancient times really is murder. Cough."
The young man lifted the curtain, only to choke on the dust kicked up outside and cough twice.
"Young master, it's still two days' journey to Clear Abyss Sect," the steward said with a deferential smile from the driver's seat.
Then he added cautiously, "The carriages in our household are already about as comfortable as they come for traveling."
"Fine."
Li Mo answered with a sigh in his heart.
High-speed trains and planes were still so much more comfortable.
Two days ago, he had broken through the mystery of his prenatal memories and awakened the memories of his past life.
In his previous life, he had lived in a place called Blue Star, where modern technology was highly advanced.
Great Yu was different.
It was a world where everyone revered the martial path, and power belonged to the individual.
He had just turned sixteen. Before he'd had his fill of the leisurely life of an ancient wealthy household, his old man had shoved him into a carriage and sent him to Clear Abyss Sect, one of the three great sects in Purple Sun Prefecture, to take its entrance exam.
"Martial arts, huh..."
Li Mo gazed longingly at the three suns hanging high in the sky.
On the road, some other youths heading to Clear Abyss Sect had told him that in this world's martial path, even people like his old man—human-shaped Gundams—were only stubborn bronze-tier fighters.
It was said that the three suns in the sky were the incarnations of two successive emperors of Great Yu.
This wasn't some mythical legend. It was a piece of history with clear records.
An hour later.
Dusk fell.
The convoy, escorted by an armed escort agency, came to a slow halt outside the Post House.
Li Mo had just jumped down from the carriage when the curtain of the carriage behind him was pulled aside at the same time.
The girl wore indigo cloth clothes, and her skin was as fine and pale as white porcelain beneath the moon.
Her slender frame had begun to take on graceful curves, and she was almost as tall as Li Mo.
Days of travel and the torment of illness lent a touch of frailty to her exquisite, noble beauty, yet she was still breathtaking.
She was tired and weak, dressed plainly, but anyone who saw her at first glance would believe that "the beauties of the six palaces lose their color" was no mere figure of speech.
The girl's name surfaced in Li Mo's mind.
Ying Bing.
The Li and Ying families were old friends, close since their grandfathers' generation.
By their generation, the elders of both families had even hoped to match the younger pair in marriage, bringing the families closer still.
"If there's anything you want to eat, I'll tell the kitchen to make it."
Li Mo said casually.
The girl acted as though she hadn't heard him. Her eyes, clear and cold as ice, didn't even glance at Li Mo as she passed him and entered the Post House, leaving only a faint, delicate fragrance behind.
"Miss Ying has only recently suffered a tragedy at home, so..."
"You don't need to make excuses for her. I used to be too much of a wastrel."
Li Mo sighed helplessly.
What a mess.
He'd switched worlds, so how had he become a brat?
His family was wealthy, and everyone doted on him. He'd done no shortage of rotten things.
Like peeking at the young maids bathing, or hiding firecrackers in the woodpile...
A few years ago, Calamity Beasts invaded the city, and the entire Ying family had perished. Ying Bing alone had survived, so his old man had let her settle in at Li Mansion.
He'd deliberately bullied her more times than he could count, even while secretly liking her.
It was a little like a middle school boy liking a girl, then deliberately pulling her hair to get her attention...
"As everyone knows, anyone whose whole family gets sacrificed to heaven usually isn't ordinary."
As a novel enthusiast in his previous life, Li Mo couldn't help making the connection.
"Your soup is here!"
The shop assistant came over with a tray, beaming.
Li Mo's mouth twitched. He muttered,
"I've lived two lives, so how come I don't have some kind of cheat..."
"Hello. You do."
"Who's speaking?"
Li Mo sprang to his feet like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.
"Young master?" The steward looked bewildered. What was the young master freaking out about now?
"It's nothing. Must've been ringing in my ears."
Li Mo furrowed his brows. Just as he began to wonder if he'd imagined it, that voice rang out in his mind again:
"Since you, host, have asked so earnestly, this system has no choice but to appear."
Li Mo: "...?"
So if I hadn't asked, you weren't planning to show up this lifetime?
Fine. That wasn't the point.
"What's the system good for?"
"This system is the Investment Rebate System."
"The host can invest in any target. The stronger the target's 'heavenly mandate,' the better the rewards."
"If an investment target makes a major breakthrough, you may also receive additional rewards."
Li Mo raised an eyebrow slightly.
Any target?
"Can I invest in myself?"
"The Heavenly Mandate Divine Eye has been granted to the host. Please judge for yourself whether you have investment value."
So, yes.
As Li Mo thought this, he suddenly felt that something incomprehensible had appeared in his mind. He couldn't see or touch it, but it was undeniably there.
He didn't know what was so profound about it, but he discovered that he could use it.
The strange information was hard to understand. It was neither a voice nor text.
The Heavenly Mandate Divine Eye?
Li Mo frowned. He couldn't make heads or tails of this either.
The next moment, a panel appeared before him, seemingly making a human-friendly adjustment.
[Name: Li Mo] [Age: 16] [Root Bone: None.] [Realm: Mortal.] [Heavenly Mandate: Gray (Born deficient, ill-fated)] [Evaluation: Born deficient, you're weak and frail, and unsuited to martial arts. Aside from being handsome and having a good father, what else do you have? What are you, anyway?] [Recent Encounter: Met this system.]
Li Mo: "..."
Painfully accurate.
It wasn't very polite, but he had to admit there was no investment value in him.
"Surely there are a few promising sprouts among the people from our county going to Clear Abyss Sect."
Li Mo had lost his appetite. He lifted his head.
A flicker of obscure light passed through his eyes as he looked at his fellow townsfolk eating and resting in the main hall.
[Name: He Yong] [Age: 16] [Root Bone: None.] [Realm: Blood-Qi Realm, First Vein.] [Heavenly Mandate: White (The bearing of a rush)] [Evaluation: One among the common multitude, like a rush or mayfly—nothing remarkable.] [Encounter: Born a woodcutter, he borrowed his travel expenses from the neighbors and was worrying about paying them back.]
[Name: Chen Xiaoyan] [Age: 16] [Root Bone: None.]
After checking several people, Li Mo found that most had white heavenly mandates. The best he'd seen was green.
Only when he turned his gaze toward a corner did a blue-green glow appear before his eyes.
[Name: Wang Hu] [Age: 16] [Root Bone: Tiger Arms and Leopard Waist.] [Realm: Blood-Qi Realm, Third Vein.] [Heavenly Mandate: Green (Some talent)] [Evaluation: Some talent. If he studies and trains diligently, he may achieve something in the future. However, he is narrow-minded and vindictive, as well as arrogant and domineering, making it easy for him to go down an extreme path.] [Recent Encounter: His boxing technique has hit a bottleneck, and he urgently needs to spar to break through.]
In short, there wasn't anyone particularly worth investing in.
The only one who seemed halfway decent, Wang Hu, also had a grudge against him.
Just then.
"Guest, here's the chicken soup you ordered. As requested, we added a ten-year-old wild ginseng."
"I'll bring it up to the second floor for you."
The Post House's shop assistant gave him a quick greeting and prepared to carry the food box upstairs.
"Wait."
Li Mo had a thought and called out to him:
"I'll take it up myself."
As the shop assistant watched in confusion, Li Mo took the food box.
His gaze settled on the room at the far end of the second floor.
What kind of heavenly mandate did she have?
Knock, knock—
After a few knocks, a soft voice came from inside:
"Come in."
The girl sat quietly by the window. Moonlight spilled through the gauze screen onto her silken hair, and her eyes seemed to gleam faintly.
When she saw that the person entering was Li Mo, her delicate brows furrowed.
But Li Mo was too stunned to read her expression. He stood frozen in place.
Information about her had appeared before his eyes:
[Name: Ying Bing] [Age: 16] [Root Bone: Lunar Phoenix Physique.] [Realm: None.] [Heavenly Mandate: ...]
At this point, the Heavenly Mandate Divine Eye began to stutter, as if the karma she carried was too immense and had caused it to crash.
A few seconds passed before the rest of the information slowly appeared.
[Heavenly Mandate: Red (Born with an emperor's bones, fated to profound ice, with a spirit like autumn waters and the aspect of Phoenix Heaven)] [Evaluation: Her fate is beset by tribulations, yet she always turns danger into safety. Her wings are still unformed, but when the winds and clouds shift, she will surely soar high above the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths, and the phoenix will descend upon the Six Harmonies and Eight Desolations.] [Recent Encounter: Before the Lunar Phoenix Physique opens its meridians, it manifests as a severed-meridian body. Until she fully controls the Taiyin Power, she must endure bitter cold every day.]
Li Mo: "?"
Well, what had he told himself?
There wasn't even a color for this one. It went straight to counting as an auspicious sign.
According to the Heavenly Mandate Divine Eye, heavenly mandates ranked from lowest to highest as follows:
Black, gray, white, green, blue, purple, and gold.
Above gold was the red heavenly mandate.
A heavenly mandate of this level couldn't be classified by color alone. It came with all manner of auspicious signs.
The Martial Emperor, Grand Ancestor who had established the human race's dominion over the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths and founded the Great Yu dynasty, was clearly recorded in the history books as having been born beneath a sky where the sun and moon shone together. The Purple Micro Star stirred, and a Divine Turtle Carrying the Stele bestowed his name upon him.
Come to think of it, this was also what they called an omen of Heaven's mandate.
His fiancée, who had yet to enter his household, was actually an existence who could one day stand shoulder to shoulder with the Grand Ancestor, the Martial Emperor?
Well, that was pretty baldly sudden.
Little Li fell into deep thought, beginning to question his entire life.
"Er... the chicken soup. Drink it while it's hot."
Smack—
The door closed.
"So I actually came back on this very day."
"So this is what rebirth through Nirvana meant."
Ying Bing picked up a piece of chicken and tossed it into the backyard through the second-floor window.
The yellow hound guarding the estate wolfed it down. Nothing unusual happened after a moment.
It was just ordinary chicken soup?
It wasn't that she held a grudge. Apart from her closest kin, those distant loves and hatreds had long since become fleeting clouds and passing smoke to her.
It was just that, in her memories, Li Mo had always loved using childish tricks to play pranks on her.
Why had he taken the initiative to bring her chicken soup today?
"Ding-dong—"
At that moment.
A crisp sound suddenly rang beside her ear.
"Who?"
Ying Bing narrowed her eyes in an instant.
The voice seemed completely indifferent to her wariness and rang out once more on its own:
"System binding successful."
"The victor becomes king, and the defeated feed the dust. Are you... ready?"
Before you continue