Heaven Dou City, the Sky-Blasting Gang headquarters, Yang Ming's office.
Of the six people Yang Ming had summoned to his office, Xiao Wentian was the youngest, at only ten years old.
As it happened, Xiao Wentian could even be considered Yang Ming's fellow townsman. He came from the Xiao Clan of Notting City—yes, the very same Xiao Clan to which Boss Xiao, whose name had long since been forgotten, belonged.
The Xiao Clan's patriarch had been a Soul Ancestor above rank forty, enough to count as a local overlord in the little border city of Notting. Unfortunately, when war had broken out between the Heaven Dou Empire, the Star Dou Empire, and the Spirit Hall Empire, Notting City had naturally been swept into it. As the city lord, the Xiao Clan's patriarch had no choice but to don his armor and take the field. With his paltry strength, his inevitable end had been death on the battlefield.
Without the patriarch's protection, the sprawling Xiao Clan scattered like monkeys fleeing a fallen tree. Moreover, the clan had never cultivated virtue, habitually bullying merchants and tyrannizing the marketplace. One by one, its members fell from their lofty positions to become rats crossing the street, hounded by everyone who saw them.
From that moment on, Xiao Wentian fell from a young master born with a golden key in his mouth to a beggar seeking scraps. He wandered northward all the way to Heaven Dou City.
Fortunately, the Sky-Blasting Gang had been opening its doors wide at the time, establishing schools of various levels throughout the land to recruit ordinary civilians as students. Knowing this was his only chance to rise above the crowd, Xiao Wentian eagerly enrolled.
The schools established by the Sky-Blasting Gang provided nine years of compulsory education. Besides reading and