Opening: Struck by Lightning

Outside Notting City, Lonely Grass Village.

At dawn, the Rising Sun rose, spreading warmth as gentle as Face Wash. A Clear Wind drifted past, and white clouds occasionally floated across the sky.

"Children, follow Uncle inside."

In the village central square, before a Conical Wooden House with a triangular roof and a Sword Symbol printed beside the door, an old man slowly turned around with the support of his Walking Stick. He looked kindly at the line of children behind him.

"Yes, Grandpa Village Chief!" The children nodded obediently.

Seeing this, the middle-aged man standing beside the old man smiled and nodded. "Children, keep up."

With that, he turned, opened the door, and walked straight inside.

The children behind him orderly circled around the old man and followed.

The procession advanced slowly. Morning winds carried thick clouds over, and shadows rapidly spread across the ground, dimming everything around them.

"Rumble!" Without warning, a blazing-white bolt of lightning tore across the sky, bringing a series of thunderclaps.

"It's thundering!"

Accompanied by a shrill scream, a boy in the group collapsed. A patch of charred blackness remained on the ground.

"Boss! Xiao Hai!" Several cries of alarm rang out as figures leaped aside.

Their voices were concerned, but their reactions were honest.

"Damn, a bolt from the blue!" The villagers nearby were also shocked and instinctively backed away several steps. At the same time, they stared toward the accident. On the ground, the boy lay face-down, his thigh trembling faintly.

He seemed not quite dead yet.

"Boom!" Another thunderbolt suddenly descended. The boy shuddered violently, then fell silent.

"Could Xiao Hai have been struck dead?" a villager nearby could not help asking.

"He probably hasn't. Wasn't Xiao Hai struck by lightning before?" a woman beside him replied uncertainly.

The villagers voiced their opinions, but none dared approach.

The morning wind continued, and the white clouds rolled rapidly. Sunlight soon streamed through several gaps, illuminating the boy's body until it gleamed.

Two seconds passed. The third bolt did not come.

"Pfft!" Seizing the opportunity, the middle-aged man who had already run inside moved swiftly.

In a flash, he reached the fallen boy and, like an eagle snatching a chick, grabbed him by the waistband and dashed into the house.

A moment later, a relieved voice came from inside. "Xiao Hai only fainted. Come in, everyone."

"I told you! The Boss is blessed with a great life. He'll definitely be fine!" The children outside immediately brightened and began gloating with hindsight.

"Children, come inside." The old man also relaxed, a glimmer in his eyes. He even seemed rather pleased.

Perhaps Xiao Haizi can awaken a powerful martial soul. With that thought, he shuffled inside.

The children once again lined up and filed in.

Soon, the children stood in a neat line inside the fairly spacious Wooden House. The middle-aged man stood straight ahead. Near the left side, the boy struck by lightning earlier lay peacefully with his eyes closed on a wooden bench, while the white-haired old man sat beside him.

Before long, the middle-aged man's voice rang out.

"Blue Silver Grass. No Soul Power."

"Broom. No Soul Power."

One voice after another sounded, and disappointed children moved to the empty space to the side.

"The Boss should awaken a powerful martial soul." Seeing another companion return disappointed, one child turned toward the boy lying unconscious on the bench.

His face was slightly dark, and his features were sharply defined. He was not handsome, but neither was he ugly.

Hearing this, the old man sitting beside the boy also lowered his head.

Yang Yunhai was a child he had found outside Notting City when he was still serving as an official in the city's Spirit Hall. Since the place where he found him happened to be beneath a Poplar Tree, with clouds filling the sky like a sea of clouds, he named him Yang Yunhai and brought him back to Lonely Grass Village's Orphanage.

Lonely Grass Village was named to signify the children's tenacity and healthy growth, like Blue Silver Grass. "Lonely" also referred specifically to orphans. This was a village that took in orphans. It had originally been Notting City's Orphanage, jointly operated by Spirit Hall and the empire. Later, as the adopted orphans grew up, married, and established careers, some stayed near the Orphanage, clearing land and building houses. Eventually, it developed into a small village.

He himself had once been an orphan. At the age of six, he awakened a Longbow martial soul and was fortunate enough to possess Level 2 Soul Power, beginning his path as a Spirit Master. Because his talent was limited, he had never broken through the Level 29 barrier to become a Soul Elder. In the end, he joined Spirit Hall as an official. While protecting Lonely Grass Village, he awakened the martial souls of its children. At sixty, he retired and became the village chief.

He also served as the Orphanage's director, doing his final bit for the place that had sheltered him.

The child before him, Yang Yunhai, was precisely the one he had found the year before his retirement.

Strangely, this child seemed to possess some special constitution for an unknown reason.

Whenever he went out on a rainy day, he was certain to be struck by lightning!

For safety, and for the sake of the other children in the Orphanage, he had no choice but to forbid Yang Yunhai from going outside on cloudy days. But weather could change in an instant. Just now, lightning had descended suddenly beneath a clear sky, making it impossible to guard against. He could not lock the child indoors every day, or the boy would suffocate from boredom. Thus, over the past six years, Yang Yunhai had inevitably been struck by lightning dozens of times.

Most importantly, every time he had survived without danger. After sleeping for a while, he would become lively again.

For that reason, the old man had always believed that the child would awaken a powerful mutated martial soul with the Thunder Attribute. Even if it could not compare to the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon, the hereditary martial soul of the famed Upper Three Sects' Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan, being a little weaker would still be impressive.

Why did he call it a mutated martial soul? Because he had already investigated Yang Yunhai's origins.

He had been abandoned by people from another village. Apparently, on the night of his birth, wind and rain had raged, and lightning had thundered the instant he was born. Not only had it split the century-old tree before the house in two, it had also set the family's roof ablaze. Fortunately, heavy rain fell that night, preventing the fire from spreading. Yet because of this strange incident, Yang Yunhai's family and fellow villagers regarded him as a bringer of disaster and abandoned him on the Official Road outside Notting City.

When something abnormal occurred, there was usually a reason. After uncovering Yang Yunhai's background, the old man became even more expectant.

Although one of Yang Yunhai's parents had a Bamboo martial soul and the other had Blue Silver Grass, neither possessed Soul Power—

But what if?

What if the child constantly attracted lightning because his martial soul had mutated?

Carrying this suspicion and anticipation, he had taught Yang Yunhai about Spirit Masters and soul beasts from childhood, together with his own grandson. He had even brought out the illustration records of the soul beasts raised in the Beginner Soul Hunting Forest for them to study.

His younger son had better talent than he did. When he awakened his martial soul, he possessed Level 3 Soul Power and broke through to become a Soul Elder in his thirties. He currently served in the Spirit Hall Enforcement Team, responsible for patrolling the Beginner Soul Hunting Forest, and knew the soul beasts within it like the back of his hand. This Soul Beast Illustration Book was precisely the record he had compiled to teach his own grandson, and it was more comprehensive than what Intermediate Soul Master Academy and beginner academies taught.

Strangely enough, Yang Yunhai's learning ability was truly remarkable. At such a young age, he could already read and write. While studying the Soul Beast Illustration Book, he also combined the beasts with the bedtime stories his grandmother told the children, wildly adapting them into so-called monster tales. A Cockscomb Phoenix-Tail Snake turning into a beautiful girl and falling in love with a human man, a love between a human and a ghost—

The children loved listening to them!

Because of this, he had not only gained his grandson's admiration but also that of every child in the Orphanage. Naturally, this also made his wife's work easier, since she no longer needed to coax the children to sleep late at night. He certainly would not stop such a good thing. Besides, his youngest grandson had gone to the Spirit Hall Exclusive Soul Master Academy two years ago, while both of his sons lived in the city and had their own careers.

Thus, the children in the Orphanage became a source of emotional support and a responsibility.

Yang Yunhai was diligent, studious, clever, and perceptive, naturally earning even more of his affection.

As for telling Yang Yunhai about his origins, he decided to wait until the child was older. Setting aside whether the family would accept his special lightning-attracting constitution, being abandoned by his Biological Parents could easily inflict a tremendous blow on a young heart.

That would not be a good thing.

With this thought, he turned back and watched the martial soul awakening ceremony continue.

One child after another entered the formation. Unfortunately, not one awakened a martial soul accompanied by Soul Power.

"Hmm?" With only the final two children remaining, a faint groan sounded. Yang Yunhai, who had been lying unconscious on the bench, slowly woke.

"Xiao Hai, how do you feel?" The old man immediately came to himself and asked worriedly.

"Grandpa Tai, I'm fine. My hands and feet are just still a little numb." Yang Yunhai quickly answered. He then laboriously raised his still-stiff right hand. Fine, pale-red lines spread across his slightly dark arm like a spiderweb.

These were the aftereffects of being struck by lightning. Whenever lightning hit him, he felt as though every meridian and blood vessel in his body were being pierced by needles. The sensation began at the point of impact and instantly rushed to the soles of his feet, causing him to collapse on the spot. Afterwards, these patterns would remain across his body.

Lichtenberg Figures. As an electrical engineering undergraduate and an experienced electrician who had opened an unprofitable appliance-repair shop after graduation to scrape by, he knew a little about electricity and the lightning patterns on his body.

Simply put, they were marks caused by blood vessels rupturing as high-voltage electricity passed through his body. Under normal circumstances, such patterns were difficult to remove. He had dozens of them, which undoubtedly affected his appearance greatly. For that reason, he had deliberately grown his hair long to cover the patterns on his neck and forehead. Fortunately, there were none on his face.

The lightning mostly struck his back. He had no idea why.

Regardless, after being struck dozens of times and surviving, he found it incredibly strange.

Aside from guessing that the place where he had been reborn was another world, with things like Soul Power and different laws of nature, he also believed, like the Village Chief, that some powerful Thunder Attribute martial soul was hidden within him, merely waiting to awaken. As a lucky man who had been struck to death by lightning while walking at night in his previous life before transmigrating and being reborn, carrying a trace of the Thunder Attribute in his soul was practically standard procedure in a transmigration novel, wasn't it?

Moreover, he had been reborn on the Love Continent. He was far too familiar with this place.

He clearly remembered all the martial souls described in the story and naturally knew that Thunder Attribute martial souls existed.

During middle school, he had definitely been a die-hard fan of that work. Unfortunately, when he revisited the classic during university, the more he watched, the more wrong it felt. His favorable impression underwent a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree reversal, and he became a complete anti-fan. Afterwards, he had worked hard, spending a long time carefully reading the original work, researching and recording every detail. He even proclaimed himself the Tang Sect's First Senior Brother and fought online with countless cute netizens.

Third Brother's love—he would defend it to the death!

Thinking about it, a Titled Douluo fighting a Level One God alone and Hidden Weapons breaking through defenses were so easy. A god's maximum strength was one million jin, equal to five hundred tons, the weight of a crane in his previous life.

Looking back at it this way, surviving dozens of lightning strikes seemed fairly normal.

If he really had a Thunder Attribute martial soul hidden inside him, his body would naturally possess lightning resistance, turning him into a human conductor. Each time the current struck him, it could smoothly pass through his body and discharge into the ground. Alternatively, perhaps his soul was special and produced a similar effect?

Seen that way, it did seem to make sense.

His frequent lightning strikes could also be explained. Perhaps his special soul had some unique sensitivity to lightning?

"That's good." As these thoughts passed through his mind, the Village Chief's voice sounded again.

"Just in time. The awakening ceremony is nearly finished. Sit here and rest a while. You can go over when the last one is done."

"Okay, Grandpa Tai." Yang Yunhai immediately nodded.

Longbow Tai, the Village Chief of Lonely Grass Village and the Orphanage's director, was someone he had always deeply respected.

He turned back and watched the rest of the martial soul awakenings.

Soon, the final two companions completed their awakenings. Unfortunately, neither tested positive for Soul Power.

"Xiao Hai, go ahead." The Village Chief's voice carried a trace of anticipation.

The earlier chapters may contain more introduction. Please bear with me.