Ding-a-ling!
At dusk, the communicator at the Jiang City Martial Arts Association testing center rang shrilly.
In his private office, Wang Xiaoming was startled awake while practicing the Mystic Meditation Method.
He reached for the thick-bottomed glasses on his desk and put them on securely.
Only then did he pick up the receiver.
He listened quietly for a while, his eyes widening behind the lenses. Then he replied hesitantly,
"Mm... I understand, ma'am. Please don't worry. I'll be right over."
Wang Xiaoming, his hair a mess, hung up and stood there dazed for a long moment, shock and disbelief mingling on his face.
A colleague passing by with a stack of documents noticed his light was still on and poked his head in.
"Professor Wang, you're still here this late? Working on your spiritual power research again?"
"Haha, I'm just leaving, just leaving." Wang Xiaoming laughed awkwardly, instinctively trying to cover it up. "I just got a new idea and got carried away."
The colleague shook his head with a smile. "You really work too hard. Everyone at the Association knows you're the most devoted to spiritual power martial arts."
"But isn't the Mystic Meditation Method already gradually being made available for exchange? The results are promising. You should take it a little easier, too."
"Oh, look at the time. I'd better go. See you!"
Wang Xiaoming gave a couple of awkward chuckles and said goodbye to his colleague.
Inside, his thoughts were already churning like a stormy sea.
The call had been from Du Qionghua.
She'd said her son, Chen Yan, had undergone another strange change!
This time, it wasn't a simple case of losing consciousness. Instead... his entire body was wrapped inside a huge, red egg!
She couldn't explain the details over the phone. Her voice had been choked with tears as she begged him, as an expert, to come take a look right away.
Of course, Wang Xiaoming remembered the boy!
He'd been the one to nominate him for the Grandmaster Project!
But how long had it been since that last nomination? Two and a half years, at most?
How had such a huge commotion happened again? And how had he turned into an egg?!
Physical mutation... or a second awakening?
One theoretical term after another surfaced in Wang Xiaoming's mind.
Wang Xiaoming took a deep breath, suppressing the turmoil inside him.
He didn't hesitate any longer. He stood up at once, grabbed his coat, and headed downstairs.
In one of the testing center's rooms, Wang Xiaoming found Du Qionghua, who was frantic with worry, and Yu Lei standing off to the side.
Chen Kefa wasn't there. The first person Du Qionghua thought of—someone she could trust and who could help deal with this kind of "unusual" incident—was Chen Kefa's old comrade-in-arms.
It was Yu Lei who had safely moved Chen Yan's egg here.
"Professor Wang! You're finally here! Come on, come take a look at Xiao Yan!"
Seeing Wang Xiaoming, Du Qionghua clung to him like a lifeline and hurriedly led him to the center of the room.
On a large bed that had been brought in for the occasion lay an enormous egg, over a meter tall and entirely dark red!
Its shell wasn't smooth. Faint patterns resembling blood vessels and sinews pulsed across its surface, and it gave off a slight warmth and an indescribable energy fluctuation.
"This... this is..." Wang Xiaoming adjusted his glasses and leaned in for a closer look. Even with all his experience, he couldn't hide his shock. "It really is an egg?!"
"The kindergarten teacher, Teacher Li, suddenly called and said Xiao Yan had collapsed in the classroom and wouldn't respond no matter how they tried to wake him."
"I rushed over, and the moment I arrived, I saw him like this." Du Qionghua spoke, her eyes growing redder. She gently touched the eggshell.
Her voice trembled with tears and lingering fear.
Wang Xiaoming forced himself to calm down.
He recalled the previous records and turned to reassure Du Qionghua.
"Ma'am, please don't panic just yet."
"Think about it. Didn't something similar happen when Xiao Yan was a hundred days old?"
Du Qionghua froze. "That's right..."
"Back then, he formed a golden cocoon, and later emerged from it..."
"Not only was he fine, you even said it was a good thing and had him join the Grandmaster Project..."
Wang Xiaoming followed her line of thought.
"My guess is that this is probably another positive change brought on by Xiao Yan's special constitution—a deeper transformation."
He did his best to sound relaxed and confident. "Let's run some tests and see the data. Then we'll know what's going on."
Despite his words, Wang Xiaoming had no confidence at all.
He'd studied special constitutions for years, but he'd never heard of anything like Chen Yan's case: two such intense, completely different manifestations in just two and a half years!
He turned to Yu Lei.
"Mr. Yu, sorry for the trouble. Could you bring over the Basic Vital Signs Monitor?"
Yu Lei said nothing, simply wheeling the instrument over to the bed with practiced ease.
Wang Xiaoming might have been getting on in years, but his hands and feet were still quick!
Skillfully, he tried to place the sensor against the eggshell.
But some invisible force field seemed to interfere with the probe. The waveforms on the data screen jumped wildly a few times, then the display filled with garbled characters and error messages!
Wang Xiaoming frowned. "The vital signs... can't be read reliably? The interference is strong."
He thought for a moment, then said, "Mr. Yu, could you bring over the Portable Blood-Qi Measuring Instrument as well?"
Yu Lei did as he asked.
Wang Xiaoming took the finely crafted but sturdy instrument. After a deep breath, he carefully aimed its sensor at the dark red eggshell.
He pressed the test button.
"Beep—beep—"
The instrument let out a piercing alarm, and an error message appeared on the screen.
Wang Xiaoming: "???"
Du Qionghua's heart leaped into her throat. "Professor Wang, what... what's going on?"
Wang Xiaoming didn't answer right away.
Frowning deeply, he silently moved the sensor away from the eggshell.
Then, without warning, he pressed it directly against Yu Lei's arm.
Yu Lei froze.
Though he was puzzled, he trusted Wang Xiaoming and stayed still, cooperating with the test.
"Beep."
The instrument gave a soft tone, and the screen steadily displayed a line of numbers: [Blood-Qi Value: 1788 points].
"This... this thing works?!"
Wang Xiaoming looked at the normal reading on Yu Lei's arm and nearly swore.
The instrument wasn't broken, and Yu Lei's test had gone fine. That meant the problem had to be the egg.
The blood-qi—or energy—contained in the egg itself had already exceeded the measuring range of this Portable Blood-Qi Measuring Instrument!
Fine beads of cold sweat appeared at Wang Xiaoming's temples.
If the instrument had thrown an error, then the being inside the shell had to have blood-qi that was at least approaching the Grandmaster level—possibly even higher.
"Professor Wang?" Du Qionghua saw that he'd been silent for a long time, and her voice was choked with tears. "Is... is Xiao Yan...?"
Just as everyone in the room was growing more and more uneasy, a sharp crack suddenly came from the dark red egg on the bed.
All three of them turned toward it at once. A crack had appeared on the eggshell without warning.
Before they could react, the crack spread rapidly like a spiderweb. With a muffled boom, the entire shell burst apart.
As the eggshell fell away, a naked baby appeared in the middle of the bed.
Chen Xiaoyan happened to be facing away from everyone, his little bare bottom pointed squarely at his mother, Du Qionghua, who was standing closest.
He seemed a little dazed, too. He twisted nimbly around, his bright black eyes sweeping over the three people staring at him in shock.
After a brief silence, he puckered his lips into an extremely awkward smile.
What a mess...
Why are so many people looking at my butt...?
Before you continue