PS: Chapters two and three contain some personal gripes about bugs in the original story. Skip them if they aren't your thing; it won't affect anything.
The Douluo Continent was a world where a hundred flowers bloomed, yet one alone stood above the rest!
There was no dazzling magic here, only some rudimentary swordsmanship and spear techniques, along with a profession everyone on the continent called the noblest of all-soul masters.
Martial souls were unique to the Douluo Continent. From royalty and nobility down to ordinary commoners, regardless of wealth, status, or rank, everyone was certain to manifest a martial soul of their own on the day of their martial soul awakening at age six.
With even a trace of innate soul power, one could cultivate to become a soul master. And if one's innate soul power was level six or higher, congratulations-you were a genius.
By hunting creatures unique to the Douluo Continent-soul beasts-soul masters could obtain halo-like objects called soul rings. Soul rings produced skills that the soul beasts had possessed while alive: soul skills.
Soul rings produced by soul beasts with ten years of cultivation were white; those with a hundred years were yellow, a thousand years purple, ten thousand years black, a hundred thousand years red, and a million years gold.
A soul master's rank could be determined by the number of soul rings they bore. From one Soul Ring to Nine Soul Rings, they were known respectively as Soul Master, Soul Grandmaster, Soul Elder, Soul Ancestor, Soul King, Soul Emperor, Soul Saint, Soul Douluo, and Titled Douluo.
Soul skills varied in strength: powerful ones could cleave through city walls, while weak ones were only good for digging holes and farming.
But there was no denying that the more soul masters a faction possessed, and the higher their ranks, the stronger that faction became. Thus, numerous sects had emerged across the Douluo Continent.
The most representative were Spirit Hall, the Heaven Dou Empire, the Star Luo Empire, the Clear Sky Sect, the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, and the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan, for they were the six strongest factions on the continent.
The Clear Sky Sect, the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, and the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan were all sects built primarily around bloodlines and inherited martial souls, while the Heaven Dou Empire and the Star Luo Empire drew their strength chiefly from their aristocracies and royal families.
Spirit Hall, however, was different. Founded by the Angel God, its principal policy was to help commoners awaken their martial souls for free and recruit commoner soul masters to bolster its strength. After years of growth, it had become the continent's foremost faction.
This approach made the Heaven Dou Empire and the Star Luo Empire deeply wary, for both empires were alliances of aristocratic and royal interests, fundamentally sustained by squeezing profit out of commoners.
Spirit Hall's actions were, quite literally, digging up the roots of the Two Great Empires. Consequently, both regarded Spirit Hall as a thorn in their eyes and a splinter in their flesh.
Yet because Spirit Hall had been founded by the Angel God, the Two Great Empires could only swallow their anger for the time being. They had even carved out a province-sized territory along their shared border for Spirit Hall to govern freely.
Spirit City, the headquarters of Spirit Hall, was a city built around a mountain. The striking landmark halfway up the mountainside was the Papal Palace, while Douluo Hall stood at the summit.
The Papal Palace was the residence of Spirit Hall's supreme ruler, the Pope. Douluo Hall, meanwhile, admitted only deceased Titled Douluos from across the continent—in short, it was a tomb for Titled Douluos.
Inside a grand residence southeast of the Papal Palace in Spirit City, a lean old man with snow-white hair and beard, dressed in golden robes and appearing to be eighty or ninety, paced anxiously outside a room. The sounds that occasionally came from within made him even more agitated.
Behind the old man stood a middle-aged man with long golden hair and a sharp gaze, who looked to be in his forties. Their brows and features bore a certain resemblance.
These two were Spirit Hall's current Great Enshrined, Qian Cunxun, and his son, Qian Chongguang.
Qian Cunxun had long since lost his usual composure and calm. With anxiety burning inside him, pacing was the only way he could find some relief.
Watching Qian Cunxun pace endlessly before him, Qian Chongguang couldn't help saying:
"Dad, all that pacing is making me dizzy. There are so many experienced midwives and healing soul masters in there. You're letting worry cloud your judgment."
Qian Cunxun said, "Of course I know that. But your mother's health hasn't been good these past few years, and she's getting on in age. How could I not worry?"
Qian Chongguang nodded. Though he looked forty or fifty, he was actually over eighty. His profound cultivation merely made him appear young.
Just as father and son were talking, a colorless ray of light slipped silently into the room.
"Waa! Waa! Waa!"
"Master, the mistress has given birth. It's a boy."
An infant's cries rang out from the room. Father and son exchanged a glance and hurried inside.
On the bed lay a middle-aged woman of breathtaking beauty, her face pale and her head drenched in cold sweat as she gasped for breath.
Qian Cunxun sat down beside her, taking her delicate, jade-like hand, soft as though it had no bones, between his palms. "Yun'er, thank you for all you've been through. How are you feeling?" he asked with concern.
The middle-aged woman, Zhou Yun, shook her head and said softly, "It wasn't so bad. I just feel a little drained."
Zhou Yun's voice was gentle and warm, though somewhat lacking in strength. Perhaps, as she had said, it was simply weakness after childbirth.
"I want to see our child," Zhou Yun said.
At that, the maid beside them hurried forward and brought the child in her arms before Zhou Yun. Gazing at the baby with happiness written all over her face, Zhou Yun then looked at Qian Cunxun. "Brother Xun, look at our child. He's so adorable."
Qian Cunxun said, "His eyes and nose look so much like yours."
Qian Chongguang, who had been standing to one side without a chance to get a word in, watched his parents shower each other with affection and couldn't resist speaking up. "Dad, Mom, have you chosen a name for my little brother?"
Suddenly gaining a younger brother when he himself was nearly a hundred had certainly caught him off guard, but what Qian Chongguang felt most was joy.
Although Spirit Hall's Qian Family possessed vast wealth and holdings, ever since the Ancestor of the Angel God, theirs had been a single line of descent with few family members.
Having another younger brother would not only let him experience being an older brother, but also give him someone to help safeguard and spread the Angel God's glory. He could ask for nothing better.
Zhou Yun said, "Like you, he belongs to the Chong generation. Let's choose the character Ling-Qian Chongling!"
Spirit Hall's descendants, the Qian Family, used sixteen characters to mark the generations in their genealogy: "Shen Zhen Xie Hun, Wan Gu Chang Cun, Chong Guang Bu Xi, Dao Xun Ren Yuan"-"The divine suppresses evil souls, enduring through all ages; renewed radiance never ceases, the path seeks distant heights."
The family, basking in their happiness, failed to notice that the infant beside Zhou Yun had already stopped crying. He opened his eyes and stared at them blankly with sea-blue pupils.
Didn't I have a tense, thrilling Yu-Gi-Oh! duel with Old Wang last night? I'd even summoned my fist in attack position and was just about to win! Then everything went black.
Where am I now? And why has my body become so tiny?
Before you continue