Ding-a-ling-!
"Hello."
"Oh, it's Auntie Li. Are you looking for my Third Uncle?"
"All right, please wait a moment."
Hearing his nephew Duan Ming talking to the person on the other end of the phone,
the middle-aged man sitting on the sofa immediately grew tense.
He hurriedly waved at Duan Ming and whispered, "I'm not here. Just tell her I'm not here."
Duan Ming nodded knowingly, as if to say, Leave it to me.
"Oh, um, my Third Uncle says he's not here."
Pfft-!
The middle-aged man nearly spat blood in anger.
What a disaster!
Could he really keep a nephew like this?
He stood up, feeling utterly hopeless, and walked over to Duan Ming to take the phone.
"I'm going to die of anger because of you one of these days. I can't even refuse to take the call now."
"Li Yan, oh, well, the thing is, my nephew just thought I wasn't here."
"I left my phone in the car. I don't have it on me."
"What, meet up? I'm afraid I can't right now. I've been a little busy with work these past couple of days. How about we wait a few days?"
"Mm-hmm, all right, then we'll do it in a few days. I've got something to take care of, so I'll hang up first."
Beep-beep-!
After hanging up, the middle-aged man looked at the teenager lounging leisurely on the sofa and said crossly, "You brat, you nearly got me killed."
Duan Ming said helplessly, "Uncle, I think you should meet Auntie Li and explain things to her in person. Besides, I think Auntie Li is a pretty good person and a good match for you."
His Third Uncle said, "I don't like her at all. Why would I meet her? Meeting face-to-face would only make this kind of thing more complicated... You're just a little kid. You wouldn't understand even if I told you."
Duan Ming corrected him, "To be precise, you only stopped liking her after you found out she wasn't a rich woman."
"Ahem... Is that so?" His Third Uncle's face reddened slightly. "What's wrong with that?"
Duan Ming was speechless, too exasperated to complain.
After sitting down, his Third Uncle grew serious. "You're awakening your Divine Mark tomorrow, right?"
Duan Ming nodded. "That's right."
His Third Uncle sat beside him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Relax. Don't overthink it. The burden of revitalizing the family rests on you now. You're the only Divine Power Master our Du family has ever produced, so you have to bring honor to the family!"
"Now that you've said that, I feel like I'm under even more pressure..."
In his sleep,
images of bloody battles appeared in Duan Ming's mind, one after another.
He could clearly hear blades slicing through flesh and see bloody, mangled limbs flying everywhere.
It felt as if he were right there.
Since this wasn't the first time he'd had a dream like this,
he no longer woke up drenched in cold sweat from fear.
The next morning, a ray of golden sunlight fell across Duan Ming's face.
After getting up, washing, and having breakfast with his Third Uncle, he headed out for school.
The university Duan Ming attended was the only Divine Power School in the entire city.
Divine Power, as the name suggested, was a miraculous force.
Put simply, it was a kind of Qi. All things possessed it; the only difference was how strong it was.
As long as one learned how to control the Qi within the body properly, one could become a powerhouse.
To enter a Divine Power School, one's developable potential had to meet the admissions requirements.
Once admitted to a Divine Power School, one would be taught how to use Qi.
After graduating, one could become a Divine Power Master, admired by all.
According to statistics, more than half of the world's top five hundred richest people were Divine Power Masters.
Those who didn't meet the requirements could only take the college entrance exam and enter a university.
After graduating, a small portion of these people could become elite members of society.
Most, however, would end up as miserable wage slaves,
running around everywhere just to make a living.
Class 1, Grade 1.
In the classroom, the nineteen students had split into three or four little cliques, chatting and bragging in their own little territories.
Nearly all the boys had gathered around one rich second-generation kid.
And almost all the girls had gathered around one rich girl.
Duan Ming was the last to arrive.
But it didn't matter. He wasn't late, after all.
He walked straight to his seat and sat down.
There were twenty students in the classroom. Apart from one honest-looking chubby boy, he was the only one who seemed a little out of place.
It wasn't that he was a loner. He simply wasn't good at sucking up to people.
Of course, it wasn't because he was arrogant, either. What good would sucking up to a rich second-generation kid do?
Even if you became a big shot, you'd still only be his errand boy number one.
If you were going to suck up to someone, you might as well suck up to the principal!
Just kidding...
Suddenly, the lively classroom fell silent.
Everyone's eyes gathered on a middle-aged man standing in the doorway.
The man's appearance was extremely strange. His hair looked as though it hadn't been washed in half a month, he had half a cigarette dangling from his mouth, and he wore a black suit jacket with a pair of oversized black shorts.
Uh...
Was this how people dressed these days?
"Sir, who are you looking for?" a girl asked in a sharp voice.
Hearing himself called "sir," the middle-aged man was at a loss for words.
At the Divine Mark Association, he was known as Invincible Little Vajra, of all things.
So how had he become "sir" to this bunch of kids?
"Ahem." The middle-aged man walked up to the podium, took the cigarette from his mouth, and said, "Let me introduce myself. My name is Du Qinggang, and I'm the captain of the Divine Mark Association's Third Squad."
As soon as he said that, everyone froze!
The Divine Mark Association?
That was a super organization that brought together top Divine Power Masters!
This bird's-nest-haired middle-aged man, wearing a suit jacket and shorts with a cigarette in his mouth, was the captain of the Divine Mark Association's Third Squad?
Duan Ming sat in the back row, calmly watching the middle-aged man.
"Sir, I've seen you before. Last night, the guy sitting next to me at the internet café all night, with a record of 1-9, was you, right?"
"The captain of the Divine Mark Association's Third Squad stayed up all night at an internet café?"
"Seriously?"
"Wait, we're all awakening our Divine Marks today, and you still went to an internet café all night? Your gaming addiction's worse than that other kind of addiction!"
Although no one dared to impersonate someone from the Divine Mark Association,
in these students' eyes, everyone in the Divine Mark Association was powerful enough to fight a hundred people at once!
They were practically gods in the students' minds!
Now, a slovenly middle-aged man who had stayed up all night at an internet café had suddenly appeared, claiming to be from the Divine Mark Association. Their hopes had been shattered.
"All right, everyone, go back to your seats."
The students returned to their seats, still doubtful.
A short-haired girl sitting right beside Duan Ming asked, "Duan Ming, do you think he's really from the Divine Mark Association?"
"Yes."
The short-haired girl didn't understand why Duan Ming looked so certain.
"Sir, are you really from the Divine Mark Association?"
A boy asked the question everyone was wondering about.
Du Qinggang took a puff of his cigarette and said, "Could I make that up? If you don't believe me, I'll take out the Association badge and show you."
As he spoke, he started reaching into his crotch.
Several students began whispering among themselves.
Several girls showed looks of disdain.
Then he continued, "You should know why I came here. Today is the annual day for awakening Divine Marks, and I was sent by the higher-ups to oversee it. I came to your class because Teacher Lin suddenly had something come up. She won't be back until tonight, when you awaken your Divine Marks. Until then, I'll keep an eye on you so you little brats don't go running off."
"Then can we call you Teacher Du?"
"Mm, sure."
No matter what they called him, at least it sounded better than "uncle."
"Teacher Du, smoking isn't allowed in the classroom."
"Is that so?" Du Qinggang glanced at the cigarette in his hand, took a hard drag, then tossed it on the floor and stamped it out. "Actually, I didn't use to smoke either. It's just that I wasn't feeling well a while back, so the doctor prescribed me some medicine and told me to smoke less."
Uh...
The classroom fell completely silent.
"What a terrible joke."
"Are people from the Divine Mark Association all this ridiculous?"
"Are we sure this guy is from the Divine Mark Association?"
"Suddenly, I feel like my future is pitch-black..."