Xiao Chenyu closed the Chat Screen.
He walked over to the withered Blue Silver Grass, crouched down, and rummaged in his backpack for a small shovel and a clay pot.
His father, Xiao Chengkun, had prepared them before he left.
He'd said that when you were out and about, you might come across some precious medicinal herbs and could dig them up along the way.
At the time, Xiao Chenyu had thought his father was making a fuss over nothing. He wasn't going out to gather herbs.
He just hadn't expected that he'd actually find a use for them.
Only he wasn't digging up a medicinal herb. He was digging up Tang San's mother.
As Xiao Chenyu carefully dug away the soil around the Blue Silver Grass, he kept an eye on it.
It seemed the Heart of Blue Silver's affinity was taking effect.
Ah Yin's seedling trembled gently in his hands. A faint blue light flickered across its leaves, as though it were responding to his touch.
The limp leaves even unfurled slightly, as if stretching after a nap.
"Come on. I'll take you somewhere you can bask in the sun."
"My backyard gets plenty of sunlight. It's a thousand times better than this miserable place."
Xiao Chenyu settled the Blue Silver Grass securely in the clay pot, sprinkled a little water over it, then carefully tucked it into his backpack.
He took one last look at the cave where Ah Yin had been trapped for six years.
Dark and damp, with no sunlight. Even the moss grew more miserably than it did outside.
"Ah Yin, Ah Yin. You keep saying you love her, yet you left her to fend for herself in a dump like this."
"She's worse off than a potted plant. At least a flower can sit on a windowsill and soak up some sun."
He shook his head, his voice tinged with disdain.
"No wonder the Will of Douluo Planet called you trash. At first, I thought she was just badmouthing you. Now it looks like she was going easy on you."
Once he'd packed everything up,
he walked to the cave entrance.
The waterfall roared deafeningly, and mist filled the air.
He activated the flying ability of the Blue Silver Emperor Right Leg Bone.
A moment later, pale blue light enveloped him, and he shot out of the waterfall like an arrow loosed from a bow.
The curtain of water burst open behind him, and the spray refracted the sunlight into a brilliant rainbow.
He steadied himself in midair, relishing the wind rushing past his ears.
Below him stretched mountains and dense forests. Above, the sky was an endless blue, without a cloud in sight.
"Flying feels so damn good!"
He spread his arms and breathed in the crisp, chilly air high above the ground.
The feeling of soaring freely was more thrilling than riding a roller coaster in his previous life.
And it was free—no gas, no tickets. All it took was a Soul Bone he'd stolen from someone else's dad.
Just as he was about to turn around and head back to Nuoding City, something moving in the distance caught the corner of his eye.
"Hm?"
He narrowed his eyes and focused.
It was a small figure.
In the dense forest behind Holy Soul Village,
a child of about five was darting through the trees at an unbelievable speed.
His movements were elusive, his footwork impossibly strange.
Every step landed somewhere an ordinary person would never think to put their foot—a protruding tree root, the jagged edge of a rock, the slick surface of moss.
He dodged and weaved between rocks and roots, landing with pinpoint precision each time.
Sometimes he turned sideways to slip between two nearly touching tree trunks; other times, he stepped on the stones in a stream and launched himself into the air.
Those were movements no ordinary five-year-old could manage.
Even an adult Soul Master might not have footwork like that.
It looked like an instinct honed through endless practice.
High above, Xiao Chenyu's pupils suddenly contracted as he recognized the moves at once.
Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track!
Tang San's Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track!
One of the Tang Sect Secret Arts, a supreme movement technique famed for passing through a field of flowers without disturbing a single leaf.
There was only one person on the entire Douluo Continent who knew this technique.
And that was—
[Xiao Chenyu]: @everyone, come watch the show.
[Will of Douluo Planet]: What's up, Avenger? Found something new?
[Xiao Chenyu]: Take a look at the person down there.
The Chat Group fell silent for two seconds.
Then it exploded.
[Will of Douluo Planet]: Holy crap!!! It's Tang San! Five-year-old Tang San! He's practicing Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track! (°ο°)
[Will of Douluo Planet]: I know that movement technique too well. Tang Sect Secret Arts—I'd recognize it even if it turned to ash!
[Man Faced Demon Spider]: Tang San! Kill! Kill! Kill!!!
[Man Faced Demon Spider]: Tear him apart! Tear him apart! Tear him apart!!!
[God of Destruction]: Hmph. The body of a five-year-old child, inhabited by the soul of an adult who transmigrated from another world.
Asura, oh, Asura. You really went to a lot of trouble.
You stuffed an adult soul into an infant's body, and you still have the nerve to call this fair?
[Goddess of Life]: Chenyu, don't act rashly.
[Goddess of Life]: Even though he's only five, he's still the Child of Destiny. You can't kill him. If you attack recklessly, you might be struck by the backlash of his destiny.
[Goddess of Life]: You're carrying the hopes of more than just yourself now.
[Will of Douluo Planet]: That's right, that's right. Avenger, stay calm! Destiny isn't something to joke about!
[Will of Douluo Planet]: If you attack now, you might get hit by a meteor falling out of the sky, or step on a banana peel and tumble off a cliff—the power of destiny just doesn't play fair!
Xiao Chenyu hovered in midair, watching the little figure below, who was training diligently in the forest. His eyes narrowed.
Tang San.
The future Sea God and Asura God.
The most hypocritical Child of Destiny in the history of the Douluo Continent.
The Tang family's ancestor, whose story spanned Douluo I, Douluo II, Douluo III, Douluo IV, and Douluo V.
And the common enemy of everyone in the Chat Group: the Will of Douluo Planet, the God of Destruction, the Goddess of Life, the Man Faced Demon Spider, and all the others.
At that moment, he was only a five-year-old child.
More precisely, he was a Tang Sect transmigrator wearing the disguise of a five-year-old child.
A soul that had lived two lifetimes was trying to reclaim the pride of the Tang Sect in this unfamiliar world.
Diligence, perseverance, discipline—those were qualities worth praising in any child.
But Xiao Chenyu knew what this hardworking child would do in the future.
He would stand on the moral high ground and judge everyone.
He would turn Douluo Planet and the Divine Realm into the Tang family's private property.
For the sake of his ten-thousand-year plan, he would even split his own daughter's soul into three parts.
After a brief silence, Xiao Chenyu suddenly grinned.
[Xiao Chenyu]: I know I can't kill him.
[Will of Douluo Planet]: Then what are you planning to...
[Xiao Chenyu]: But who says I can't mess with him?
[Xiao Chenyu]: A Child of Destiny might be impossible to kill, but he can still be humiliated, right? He can still embarrass himself, right? He can still be scared into tears, right?
He opened the backpack his father had prepared for him and rummaged around inside.
Xiao Chengkun had been afraid his son would suffer while away from home. He'd practically wanted to pack up the entire City Lord Mansion and stuff it inside.
Rations, a canteen, a change of clothes, ointment, bandages, a small shovel, a fire starter...and a whole pile of odds and ends.
Before long, his fingers found a small cloth pouch, heavy in his hand.
It was filled with white powder, fine as flour.
Xiao Chenyu looked at the pouch in his hand, then down at the five-year-old Tang San, who was focused on his training. The curve of his lips grew more and more dangerous.
[Xiao Chenyu]: Everyone, I've got a great idea for messing with Tang San.
[Will of Douluo Planet]: ?
[Man Faced Demon Spider]: ?
[Goddess of Life]: ?
[God of Destruction]: ?