Auntie, want some nail art?

Dongfang Bai felt the trip had been worthwhile-indeed, she could be said to have reaped a rich harvest.

Though she was strong-willed and believed herself no worse than any man, the world was what it was. She had no power to change it alone.

But Tian Hao's words had cleared the fog from her mind, giving her a belief to stand on.

That was right. Women truly were no worse than men.

"Are you that afraid of dying?"

Calming her surging emotions, Dongfang Bai looked at Tian Hao's collar.

Earlier, she had tried to haul the boy up, only for the silk to snap. A closer look had revealed a heavy layer of chainmail beneath his clothes.

The sword on his back was no ordinary weapon either. The blade and scabbard together had to weigh over a hundred jin, and the total weight had to be four or five hundred jin. No wonder the silk had snapped.

"The world is too chaotic these days, and there are too many bad people. Otherwise, my family wouldn't have been destroyed when I was little."

Tian Hao sighed deeply, feeling that he had rather disgraced his fellow transmigrators. First, his parents had died horribly and his younger sister had gone missing. Then he had been sold into slavery. Only at fifteen had he found a chance to wipe out Guan Family Fort and join the Mount Hua Sect.

In fact, only a few months ago had he worked out the proper way to use his golden finger and begun quietly building up his strength.

"Could you tell me about your past? I'd like to hear it."

Resting her chin in her palm, Dongfang Bai grew interested in the youth's past. She wanted to know what sort of experiences had given him such beliefs.

"There isn't really much to tell. I was born in a small village. When I was four, bandits attacked it. My mother hid me under the bed, but she and my father were killed by the bandits.

"This world is rotten, and I don't like it at all. One day, I'll shape it into what I want it to be."

Recalling what had happened back then, Tian Hao's killing intent flared.

Perhaps other children could not remember events from when they were four, but he was a transmigrator. Every last detail remained vivid before his eyes.

It was precisely those events that had made him cast aside the beliefs of his previous life and recognize this world's cruelty.

There had been nothing he could do before, but now that he had figured out how to use his golden finger properly, he would change this twisted world.

He would make everything under heaven take the shape that he, Tian Hao, desired!

"Then you joined the Mount Hua Sect to learn martial arts and avenge them?"

Looking thoughtful, Dongfang Bai roughly guessed the course of Tian Hao's past. Such stories were a dime a dozen in the Jianghu.

"No. Those bandits were experienced repeat offenders. They eventually found me under the bed, then sold me into slavery to work at a forge.

"When I was twelve, I found a chance to escape. Unfortunately, I failed. After they caught me, they whipped me in public every month-killing a chicken to scare the monkeys, to keep the others in line.

"One fellow even took a fancy to me. It wasn't until I was fifteen that I found a chance to escape and join the Mount Hua Sect to learn martial arts."

Sighing deeply again, Tian Hao felt that his minus-one-hundred luck stat was all too accurate.

If he had not poisoned the people of Guan Family Fort and made them slaughter one another, his rear end would certainly have been in peril.

He had never imagined that Guan Family Fort harbored such a pervert-one who preferred men to women, especially strong, muscular men.

He had personally witnessed a man being tortured to death. Fortunately, he had escaped with the help of ginger, or he would surely have met the same end.

"There are people like that?"

Dongfang Bai was disgusted. She had never imagined that such revolting people existed. Then a key point occurred to her.

"Are you saying you've only been in the Mount Hua Sect for three years? And you mastered Embrace Origin Force in just three years?"

Her beautiful eyes widened. Dongfang Bai found that hard to believe.

The Mount Hua Sect had once been a great enemy of the Sun-Moon Divine Cult, so the cult had studied its martial arts extensively. One generation of the cult's ten elders had even used the profound principles of the Sunflower Manual to unravel every sword technique of the Five Mountains Sword Sects.

The characteristics and key principles of Embrace Origin Force were also recorded. The punch Tian Hao had used to cripple the man surnamed Bai had undoubtedly displayed the power of mastery.

Yet mastering Embrace Origin Force was incredibly difficult. She had assumed the boy had joined the Mount Hua Sect as a child and trained diligently for over a decade. Who would have thought he had only been there for three years?

His cultivation speed was frightening. His aptitude was no worse than her own.

She had never expected the Mount Hua Sect to be hiding such a genius.

"I just practiced a little."

He waved a hand with an air of effortless superiority, indicating that it was nothing worth mentioning.

Wasn't all that misery behind the scenes precisely so he could show off in front of others?

"By the way, I still don't know your real name, Auntie. I'm Tian Hao. Tian is the character made from two next-door Wangs, and Hao has 'sun' above 'heaven.' My courtesy name is Rugged Man. What about you?"

Seeing that the time was right, Tian Hao introduced himself while wondering whether Aunt Dongfang would give her real name or keep stringing him along.

"Pfft!"

"Your teacher certainly is an interesting man, giving you a courtesy name like that."

Dongfang Bai laughed. It was her first time hearing of anyone using Rugged Man as a courtesy name.

"Auntie, you need to read more. 'Rugged' conveys boundless vastness and majestic grandeur, while 'man' means a true man of character. My honored teacher hoped I would become a great man who could stand tall between heaven and earth. That's why he gave me the courtesy name Rugged Man."

Shaking his head with a sigh, Tian Hao felt disappointed by the auntie's learning.

You actually think just like those ordinary fools. How disappointing. That hardly does justice to your swagger as leader of the Demon Cult.

"It has that meaning?"

Her dark brows creased slightly. Dongfang Bai had never heard such an explanation before.

She had read plenty of books, but never studied them in depth. Most of her energy had always gone into practicing and comprehending martial arts.

Still, judging by the boy's expression, he probably was not deceiving her.

"My name is Dongfang Bai."

After some thought, Dongfang Bai gave her real name.

The boy was interesting and talented. Once she had unified the Jianghu, she would snatch him up and put him to work as a lackey.

"Aunt Dongfang, want some nail art? My way of doing it is different from everyone else's."

Taking the bag hanging at his waist and setting it on the table, Tian Hao asked excitedly.

"Then I'd like to see just how different it is."

Glancing at the bottles and jars Tian Hao took out of his bag, Dongfang Bai grew interested.

She was no stranger to nail art. It was fairly popular among wealthy households-a technique for dyeing fingernails.

But since the boy had put it that way, he surely had some novel nail art technique.

"You're definitely in for a surprise, Auntie."

With a mysterious smile, Tian Hao took Aunt Dongfang's fair little hand and began working with the various supplies he had bought from a cosmetics shop.

Nail art had existed since ancient times, but the old techniques were monotonous. They merely dyed nails a single color, without painted designs, and fell far short of the variety available in modern times.

Although he had never had his nails done in his previous life, he had seen plenty of other people's nail art. Copying the cat to draw a tiger-imitating what he had seen-would be no problem.

He had even considered using nail art as an excuse to maintain prolonged skin-to-skin contact with his beautiful master's wife.

But his beautiful master's wife and Tushu disliked such flashy things and were very conservative, so he had given up.

He had not expected to encounter this version of Aunt Dongfang tonight, either. That was why he had doubled back to buy supplies, even asking Lao Denuo to get him some clear varnish.

There was no helping it. Materials were limited in this era, so he could only substitute clear varnish for the final topcoat. The effect was about the same anyway.