"If you devour thousand-year, ten-thousand-year, or hundred-thousand-year soul beasts... if you devour Ultimate Fire, Ultimate Ice, or strange energies born of heaven and earth..."
"What will Little Gold and Little Silver become in the future?"
"No... how high will I rise in the future?"
Beneath the moonlight, stars seemed to burst in the boy's eyes, dazzling and brilliant.
"From today on, you'll be called Little Gold, and you'll be called Little Silver." He bent down and solemnly addressed the two little ones.
"Roro!" Little Gold pushed its head against his palm.
"Roro~" Little Silver nuzzled his cheek affectionately.
With their names settled, it was as if some kind of contract had been sealed. Yu Tianlong could feel his connection with them growing closer.
Just as he was preparing to continue his research—perhaps testing what would happen if Little Gold and Little Silver absorbed the same energy at the same time, or trying to actively guide their abilities—
"Knock, knock, knock."
Someone rapped on the courtyard gate.
Yu Tianlong frowned. His little courtyard was quiet and secluded. Aside from the steward who delivered his monthly allowance, he rarely had visitors, especially at night.
"Who is it?"
"It's me, Yu Xiaogang." A muffled voice came from outside, hoarse with the distinctive rasp of a boy going through puberty, and weighed down by an inescapable dejection.
Yu Tianlong stood up and signaled for Little Gold and Little Silver to return to his body before going to open the door.
Yu Xiaogang stood alone outside. He had changed into clean clothes, but his hair was a mess, and his eyes were red. He had clearly cried quite a bit that afternoon. He clutched a book in his hand, his knuckles white.
"What is it?" Yu Tianlong asked, blocking the doorway without any intention of stepping aside.
He didn't dislike this younger cousin of his; in fact, he even felt a little sorry for him. But right now, he was caught up in the excitement of discovering his golden finger and really didn't want to be disturbed.
Yu Xiaogang seemed unprepared for such a cold response. He froze for a moment, then said quietly:
"I... I want to go to the family Library Pavilion and look up some information. About... about Martial Souls. Do you... do you want to come with me?"
"No," Yu Tianlong refused flatly. "I still have to cultivate."
"Cultivate?" Yu Xiaogang jerked his head up, his eyes full of disbelief. Then it turned into a scornful sneer, almost cutting in its cruelty.
"Cultivate? With Luo Sanpao? Yu Tianlong, don't you understand? Our Martial Souls are trash Martial Souls! So what if we have Innate Full Soul Power? The nature of a Martial Soul determines its limit! Luo Sanpao, a Martial Soul that's... that's like a pig! No matter how hard you cultivate, the most you'll ever manage in your whole life is to become a Two-Ring Soul Grandmaster! That's the very bottom of the Soul Master World! It's worthless!"
He grew agitated, his voice rising as his chest heaved violently.
"Face reality! With Martial Souls like ours, we should find another path as soon as possible! Study literature, enter politics, go into business, or get a desk job at Spirit Hall! The path of a Soul Master is closed to us! Wasting time cultivating is nothing but inviting humiliation!"
Yu Tianlong watched him quietly.
He looked at this boy, only six years old, who had been battered by reality until he was covered in wounds, and could only hide his despair behind anger and cruelty.
In the original story, Yu Xiaogang would spend twenty years traveling across the continent and enduring countless insults before finding a way to redeem himself through theory. But now, he was just a child who had only recently fallen into the abyss.
Pitiful, tragic, but still not someone to emulate.
"Are you done?" Yu Tianlong asked calmly.
Yu Xiaogang was so choked by his reaction that he opened his mouth, but no sound came out.
"Yu Xiaogang." Yu Tianlong stepped forward and looked straight into the other boy's evasive eyes, speaking each word clearly and forcefully.
"In this world, there are no trash Martial Souls."
"Only trash Soul Masters!"
Yu Xiaogang shuddered all over, as if struck by lightning.
"So what if Luo Sanpao has a pig's snout and looks like a dog?" Yu Tianlong's voice wasn't loud, but it carried an unshakable force.
"As long as you find the right method and follow the right path, even an earthworm can bore through solid rock, and even a sparrow dares to laugh at the vault of heaven."
"My Luo Sanpao will grow claws and fangs, don scale armor, swallow clouds and spit mist, and soar through the nine heavens."
"It will become an existence that even the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon must look up to."
"And you..." He paused, his gaze sweeping over Yu Xiaogang's deathly pale face.
"If you give up now, if you slap the label of 'trash' on yourself now, then you really will spend your whole life as a useless fool who farts thunder."
Those words were supposed to be spoken by Yu Xiaogang to Tang San twenty years later. Now, he had returned them to Yu Xiaogang ahead of time.
Yu Xiaogang was stunned for a while, his face turning from green to red!
"What do you know? A trash Martial Soul is a trash Martial Soul... it can't be changed. The future is set in stone. It can't be changed."
Yu Xiaogang didn't listen at all. He just thought Yu Tianlong was an idiot.
The two parted on bad terms!
Dawn was breaking, but the thin mist had yet to lift.
Today, Yu Tianlong received word that he was to go to the family hall, where the family would distribute cultivation resources.
The family hall stood at the center of the compound. It was a grand, imposing palace with upturned eaves and interlocking brackets. Usually solemn and dignified, today it was somewhat noisy, with thirty or forty children gathered inside.
They were all newly awakened Soul Masters, their faces full of excitement, nerves, and anticipation as they chirped away like birds.
When Yu Tianlong stepped into the hall, the din eerily fell silent for a moment.
Dozens of gazes landed on him all at once. Curiosity, scrutiny, envy, jealousy, disdain, mockery... all kinds of emotions mingled in those still-innocent eyes.
The events of yesterday's awakening ceremony had already spread throughout the family. The bizarre combination of Twin Luo Sanpao and Innate Full Soul Power had inevitably made him the center of attention.
"Look, that's Yu Tianlong..."
"Twin Martial Souls, and they're both Luo Sanpao..."
"So what if he has Innate Full Soul Power? His Martial Soul's no good. He'll never amount to anything."
"Shh, keep your voice down. He may have Innate Full Soul Power, but still..."
The whispers buzzed like mosquitoes, faintly audible in the vast hall.
Yu Tianlong remained unfazed, calmly sweeping his gaze across the crowd. He soon spotted the figure in the corner, shoulders hunched, wishing he could bury himself in the ground.
Yu Xiaogang.
He had changed into an old, dusty-gray outfit. His hair was a mess, and he stared down at the tips of his shoes as if they held some profound secret.
The children around him had deliberately left a little space, creating an awkward vacuum around him. Now and then, someone glanced his way, but their looks were mostly pitying or undisguisedly mocking.
When Yu Xiaogang noticed Yu Tianlong looking over, his body stiffened, and he lowered his head even further, though his ears turned bright red.
Yu Tianlong sighed inwardly but said nothing, simply finding a place to stand off to the side.
His calm, composed bearing, which even seemed faintly relaxed, caused some of the murmuring to die down.
After all, for a six-year-old child to remain so composed in the face of so many strange looks was unusual in itself.
"Putting on an act..." Yu Xiaogang muttered under his breath, digging his fingers hard into his palm.
He thought Yu Tianlong was doing it on purpose—deliberately drawing attention to himself, deliberately making sure everyone noticed him, so they could drag him, Yu Xiaogang, out as "the other Luo Sanpao" and compare and mock him again and again.
Why? They both had trash Martial Souls. Why could Yu Tianlong act so self-righteous?