The Ascended Prodigies of the Lower Realm Today
"..."
After a long while, the waiter—Ye Fan—finally raised his head as if he had used up all his strength. His face was almost completely drained of color, leaving only boundless bitterness and the dejection of someone who had accepted his fate.
Then, in a hoarse voice thick with self-mockery and helplessness, he sighed quietly:
"Honored guest... you remember correctly!"
"That..."
"That really was me."
"That self-important Ye Fan who ascended from that savage little world... was none other than yours truly."
He admitted to who he had been before ascending, which also meant admitting that his former arrogance and overconfidence now seemed like a joke.
"Heh..."
He let out another long, deep sigh.
His sigh was weighed down by something difficult to put into words. Perhaps Annie's question had stirred up old memories, or perhaps, in front of Annie—a young guest he had met by chance who had seen right through him at a glance—he could finally let down some of his guard.
In any case!
He paused, then continued in a low, almost self-muttering voice, bitterly sighing:
"You wouldn't know, honored guest, would you?"
"In my old world... I might have been... No, I really was a prodigy, unrivaled under heaven, the Great Emperor of the Savage Lands, revered by all!"
"My cultivation journey had been smooth sailing. I'd never encountered a bottleneck, and I'd defeated every opponent under heaven. I thought my martial path had reached the divine, and that the whole world was in my grasp..."
"Back then, I thought ascending to the upper realm would be like a carp leaping over the Dragon Gate, opening the way to a broader world where I could pursue an even higher martial path."
As he spoke, perhaps remembering the version