A gentle halo caressed the delicate skin of the clouds like a mother's hand, lending the illusory space an unusually moving sense of substance. Dimly, not far away, a towering palace seemed to stand, both illusory and real beneath that soft halo's touch.
A figure stood silently among the clouds, holding a transparent, crystalline sphere that seemed to have been fashioned from the finest crystal. Inside it, a sunlike streak of light radiated brilliance, but whenever that brilliance touched the sphere's outer wall, it was reflected back in its entirety.
"The will of Douluo Star's plane? Heh. There has never been anything I, Sea God Tang San, wanted that I couldn't obtain!"
This person-or rather, this thing talking to himself-was none other than the God Realm Enforcer, both Asura God and Sea God, the pure and chaste Buddha Tang.
"What a pity. If the laws of heaven and earth weren't protecting you, preventing me from killing you outright and having my father take your place, Douluo Star would probably already be my Tang family's private property." A contemptuous smile appeared at the corner of Tang San's mouth. "But you actually exhausted your last scrap of strength trying to create a child of the plane to save you? Heh. That saves me the trouble of going to such great lengths."
"Just watch. Under my schemes, the child of the plane you created will become a dog that obeys the Tang family's every command. And the day he ascends to the Divine Realm will be the day you vanish completely!"
"Xiao Qi seems quite interested in Douluo Star, where Xiao Wu and I once lived. If possible, I could arrange for her to descend and form a bond with that child of the plane, easily turning him into the Tang family's loyal hound."
"Let me think... split Xiao Qi into two individuals, one male and one female. The male body would suppress the child of the plane, while the female body quietly protected him from the sidelines. Then the two would merge and keep him on a leash at her side... no, that isn't quite suitable..."
"Xiao Qi has soul beast blood. I could split her into two soul beasts, then have her form a bond with the child of the plane in the Star Dou Great Forest. That might work... no, that isn't quite suitable either..."
"Oh, I've got it..."
Just as the pure and chaste Lord Sea God was immersed in boundless fantasies about the future, a soft, gentle call suddenly came from behind him.
"Brother San, come here..."
Hearing his sword sheath-oh, no, his beloved Xiao Wu-calling him, Tang San hurriedly handed the crystal sphere imprisoning the Douluo Plane Will to a trusted second-level god who had long been waiting nearby.
Straightening his clothes, Tang San hurried off into the distance. Anyone listening closely could still hear Lord Sea God's rather gloomy muttering.
"Come to think of it, Xiao Wu was originally a hundred-thousand-year soft bone rabbit reincarnated as a human. Aren't rabbits supposed to breed like crazy? Why don't I even have a son yet... could there be something wrong with me down... no, I'll have to get the God of Medicine to give me a thorough examination sometime..."
Inside the crystal sphere, the will of the Douluo Continent's plane suddenly flashed with dazzling golden light. But that light vanished in an instant, escaping even the notice of the god guarding it.
The Douluo Continent, on the outskirts of the Star Dou Great Forest.
A rather short, scrawny figure ran forward with all his might, while a dark silhouette followed close behind him.
Anyone with keen eyesight who looked carefully would have recognized a baboon about a meter tall. Brownish-yellow fur covered its body, and its eyes were brown. Its arms were exceptionally long, its fingers tipped with sharp nails, and its canine teeth protruded past its lips. A vicious gleam shone in its eyes.
"Hello, everyone. I'm Huo Yuhao, and I'm about to croak."
"Fuck, where are the transmigrator perks I was promised? Didn't I transmigrate as Huo Gua? Then where's my White Tiger Dagger? How am I supposed to kill this wind baboon without it?"
The illustrious child of the plane, Huo Yuhao, founder of Shrek City's street-stall business empire, was currently darting about like a headless fly, using his already unimpressive speed to dodge the wind baboon's repeated lunges from behind.
Yet, by sheer coincidence, every pounce from this wind baboon-which possessed only ten years of cultivation but considerable combat experience-was coincidentally evaded by Huo Yuhao.
Why did Huo Yuhao call himself a transmigrator, you ask? Naturally, because he had already become Huo-soul-swapped-Yuhao!
The soul currently inhabiting Huo Yuhao had been a person from Blue Star in his previous life. Unlike an ordinary Blue Star resident, however, he had been an elite assassin raised from childhood by a powerful organization.
After once again completing his mission flawlessly, he had been ruthlessly silenced by the organization's leader, who sent him to the Underworld Yellow Springs with a cup of rich, fragrant poisoned wine.
Unexpectedly, however, he had not died. Instead, he had caught the great wave of transmigration. Thanks to the memories lingering in his mind, he had easily figured out whose body he had entered.
He had transmigrated into the era of Peerless Tang Sect, the second installment of Douluo Continent, and even become its protagonist, Huo Gua-Huo Yuhao.
The moment of his arrival, however, was precisely when Huo Yuhao encountered the pinnacle of martial might among the Douluo Continent's soul beasts, the true Beast God, the near-godslayer: the wind baboon.
Some assassins liked cutting people's hair outside work. Others liked finding a man to raise a little pink-haired girl with during their downtime. He, on the other hand, liked reading webnovels to pass the time.
So not only did he know the ending of the first Douluo Continent installment, where the Sea God fought two gods, he even knew the fourth installment's plot in which Lan Xuanyu's filial piety pierced the heavens as he slapped his grandfather Tang San silly!
To be honest, though, binge-reading the first through fourth installments of Douluo Continent during a rare vacation had left him a little mentally unbalanced. He had nearly failed his next mission and lost his life.
Indeed, after reading all four Douluo Continent installments from beginning to end, even an assassin like him, hardened by brutal training and possessed of formidable mental resilience, truly couldn't take it!
Peerless Tang Sect, in particular, had completely rewritten his worldview. Although his values had already been rather warped as an elite assassin, he had never expected that esteemed gentleman's mental state to be even more outrageous than his own!
Huo Yuhao's emergence should originally have been the Douluo Plane's final attempt to save itself from Tang San's grasp. Boundless hopes had been placed upon him. Not only had he been handed a Million-Year Soul Ring at the start to lay his foundation, he had even been given a heaven-defying martial soul combination of a mental body martial soul and an ultimate ice martial soul.
Even that hadn't been enough. Huo Yuhao had also received a demigod tutor from another plane, complete with a god-tier undead martial soul, making him the continent's first-ever, almost inconceivable bearer of triple martial souls.
Even in fanfiction, an opening like that would have been so explosively heaven-defying that readers would have lambasted it as brainless, overpowered-protagonist fare.
The plane's will really... it was enough to make him cry his eyes out!
Yet this perfect opening, a setup that would have let even someone as hopelessly dim as Guo Jing become a god while lying flat if he played in his place, had been utterly squandered by Huo Yuhao himself.
Every time he opened his mouth, he went on about avenging his mother until readers' ears practically grew calluses. Yet beneath Buddha Tang's all-illuminating Buddhist radiance, he had chosen to forgive his father, even letting that scumbag ascend to the Divine Realm and become a god.
Most importantly, even his final scrap of dignity-the "Huo" in Huo Yuhao-had become the surname Dai in the Divine Realm. And when Huo Yuhao had knelt before Dai Mubai back then, he had done it with remarkable speed and efficiency.
Electrolux, the teacher who had passed on everything he had learned over his lifetime, had been forced by Tang San's schemes to burn his divine soul. Even the final relic he left behind had been mercilessly destroyed by Tang San.
Yet Huo Yuhao had unhesitatingly become a dog for Tang San's precious daughter, shamelessly taking pleasure every day in triggering the restrictions Tang San had placed on her.
It was like tying a carrot in front of a mill donkey's forehead. The donkey could see it but never eat it, yet the stupid beast never tired of the game.
Disloyal, unfilial, heartless, and faithless-such values were simply outrageous!
A true man standing between heaven and earth-how could he languish beneath another forever? Since he had transmigrated as Huo Yuhao, he would never allow such a fate to unfold again!
But it seemed he had transmigrated to a parallel version of the Douluo Continent, or perhaps heaven had played a little joke on him. He had indeed become Huo Yuhao. His father was the White Tiger Duke, Dai Hao, and his mother was Huo Yun'er, a maid of the White Tiger Duke's Mansion, making him the White Tiger Duke's illegitimate son.
However, he did not have the White Tiger Dagger-the token of love that, according to Huo Yuhao's mother, Dai Hao had given her!
Instead, Huo Yuhao currently wore a black ring on his right hand. The ring looked ancient and simple, cast from some unknown material, with indistinct patterns etched upon it.
It was not something Dai Hao had given Huo Yun'er. Rather, Huo Yun'er had obtained it from somewhere unknown.
"This ring certainly suits my taste, but this is a matter of life and death! Without a weapon, am I supposed to use it to propose to the wind baboon?!"
Huo Yuhao felt like crying but had no tears. Honestly, if his previous self had encountered this wind baboon, killing it would not have been particularly difficult.
Even if the wind baboon possessed some rather fantastical innate abilities, such as spraying white stuff from its mouth, he could easily have avoided them with his thoroughly trained reflexes.
But things were different now. Huo Yuhao was still young, his body not yet developed.
On top of that, he had suffered abuse since childhood, never having enough food or warm clothing. His vital essence was depleted and his body frail, to the point that even his supposedly immensely powerful body martial soul had only level-one innate soul power.
Even his former self, an elite assassin, couldn't carry such a pathetically weak body!
It was like pairing one of those bulky monitors from the nineteen-nineties with a quantum-level computer. It would be a miracle if the thing could run!
I'm a warrior who just left the beginner village, and the system even stole my starter wooden sword, leaving me to wrestle barehanded with a giant wild boar. Is that something any human being would do?
Still, thanks to the wealth of combat experience from his previous life, Huo Yuhao could anticipate attacks before they came, which was how he had repeatedly dodged the wind baboon.
But this chase consumed an enormous amount of stamina. Huo Yuhao now felt as though his lungs were about to spew fire. His body had reached its limit.
"Hey, Keeper of the Heavenly Horses! Catch my hidden weapon!"
Huo Yuhao suddenly let out a strange, bizarre cry, startling the wind baboon so badly that it involuntarily shuddered.
Then a dark object flew toward the wind baboon's face, cutting through the air with a sharp rush.
The wind baboon had ample combat experience, but that experience came from fighting soul beasts and wild animals. Even for it, fighting a human was a first.
When it saw Huo Yuhao throw something toward it, dodging never crossed its mind. Instead, it instinctively thought to intercept the object with its innate skill.
The wind baboon reared up and hammered its chest with both fists. With a roar, it suddenly opened its mouth wide in Huo Yuhao's direction. A ball of white light immediately shot from its mouth, flying straight toward the dark object.
What Huo Yuhao had thrown was none other than the black ring he had been wearing. He had intended to use it to distract the wind baboon, buying himself enough time to flee farther and find somewhere to rest and recover his stamina.
But the instant the black ring touched the ball of white light, that round white glow abruptly went out. No-more accurately, it was swallowed by the black ring.
Immediately afterward, a tiny, almost imperceptible wisp of white flame suddenly emerged from the black ring. Without the enhancement of his Spiritual Eyes martial soul, Huo Yuhao would never have been able to see it.
Yet that tiny wisp of flame froze the ground, flowers, grasses, trees, and even little insects within a twenty-meter radius, leaving them unable to move in the slightest.
The wind baboon, a ten-year soul beast, was no exception. It froze solid, becoming something like an icy-white statue.
Had Huo Yuhao not already fled some distance and left the twenty-meter radius, he would likely have been frozen instantly as well.
What terrifying cold power. What exactly is that? Huo Yuhao wondered inwardly, puzzled. A black ring, white flame... don't tell me...
Just as Huo Yuhao's mind filled with doubts and a dawning glimmer of understanding, a voice suddenly rang out inside his head without the slightest warning.
"I've finally met a human with a mental attribute! Too bad your brother here can't cry, or tears would be streaming down my face!"
Huo Yuhao froze briefly, and an almost imperceptible smile instantly appeared at the corner of his mouth.
You've finally arrived, Brother Sky Dream!
Before you continue