Chapter 1: Rebirth
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Tsk, tsk... Innate soul power of 0.5...
What a pity...
Ignoring the noisy chatter of the villagers around him, Li Xun took a fierce bite of his beef-and-celery bun.
It was the first meal he had eaten since crossing into this world today.
It was also the only proper food this body had tasted in the past few days.
As his stomach filled with food, a warm current surged from it and spread throughout his body.
Savoring the richness of the beef and the fresh fragrance of celery between his lips and teeth, Li Xun closed his eyes in intoxication.
For the first time, he felt that being alive was truly wonderful.
“Your Majesty, the buns are delicious, aren’t they?”
The boy standing in front of Li Xun heard the chewing behind him and swallowed nervously.
He scratched his slightly itchy face, then turned to look at Li Xun.
“If you return the throne to me, I’ll bring you two more buns the day after tomorrow... No, tomorrow!”
“I can even appoint you Marshal of the Empire.”
Li Xun paid no attention to the boy’s endless chatter.
He concentrated on eating the bun in his hand.
He was currently the king of a nation with one queen, two ministers, and one commoner.
Though this faction was tiny and all its members were children, they had still imitated adults and established a few rules.
There was one rule Li Xun valued above all others.
For the first seven days after a new king ascended the throne, every member of the empire had to offer tribute to the king each day.
The tribute consisted of little more than snacks and the like, but at least it was food.
In order to fill his stomach, Li Xun had launched a rebellion without the slightest hesitation.
In the end, he had risen to the throne from the position of a beggar.
Swallowing the last bite, Li Xun rubbed the grease remaining on the bun evenly over every part of both hands.
He used it to soothe the cracks in his dry skin.
“Isn’t this just messing with people’s minds?”
Li Xun had never dreamed that after crossing over twice in succession, he would fall from being an overworked wage slave who had died suddenly in modern society to someone who had to become the leader of a group of children just to eat his fill.
Only the night before, he had enjoyed what seemed like a dream opening.
He had transmigrated into the peerless powerhouse Hashirama Senju from Naruto.
Though the event had come without warning, relying on the memories in Hashirama’s mind, Li Xun had still displayed numerous ninjutsu techniques on the battlefield of the shinobi world.
His final technique, True Several Thousand Hands: Top Transformed Buddha, had even terrified countless people across the battlefield.
But perhaps the merciless exploitation of his former boss had simply exhausted him too deeply. Before his fatigue had even begun to ease, he had been standing at a high place when, for one fleeting moment, Li Xun felt his soul grow hazy. The body created through Impure World Reincarnation even showed signs of beginning to collapse.
That instant of vulnerability gave his enemy an opening.
Li Xun felt a chill run down his back.
When he opened his eyes again, he had crossed over into the body of an orphan from Ancient Banyan Village, under the jurisdiction of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Clan in the Douluo Continent.
The village had been named after the Titled Douluo Ancient Banyan, who had stopped there briefly in his early years.
Perhaps the village’s name was simply too conspicuous.
Whenever it was time for the children to awaken their martial souls, this place became somewhere the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Clan could never bypass.
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It was now the annual season for martial-soul awakenings.
“Douluo isn’t so bad, either. Though it’s the floor tiles of the fantasy world, once someone becomes a god, their lifespan is practically infinite.”
Watching the people lined up ahead of him to awaken their martial souls, Li Xun repeatedly consoled himself in his heart.
“Even someone as powerful as Hashirama Senju in Naruto couldn’t escape the fate of birth, aging, sickness, and death.”
Compared with other worlds, where people casually made plans spanning ten thousand years, it was clear just how cheap time became after one ascended to godhood.
And gods didn’t even have to work...
It wasn’t that Li Xun was avoiding work. He had crossed into another world, after all.
“ The Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Clan is still around. I wonder what Tang San is up to now.”
To be honest, Li Xun had no desire to fawn over Tang San.
If he had crossed into another world and didn’t take the opportunity to live freely, choosing instead to become a sycophant...
He might as well have let a dog cross over. A dog would lick more directly than a human ever could...
“Hey! You won’t even accept two buns? Do you really want to fight me again?”
Seeing that his words were being ignored, the boy grew angry. “I only lost by one move this time! If I’m prepared, do you really think you can beat me?”
“You should call me Your Majesty.”
Li Xun looked at the boy’s swollen cheeks and rubbed his still-aching hands.
“Looks like you’ve lost your memory. Go home and look in a mirror later. Take a good look at your face.”
Strictly speaking, as an adult, Li Xun shouldn’t have struck a child so heavily, even for the sake of food.
After all, every action has an equal and opposite reaction.
When you strike someone else’s body, your own hand feels the pain.
He had done it entirely to settle the grudges of his predecessor, a little beggar who was constantly bullied within this empire.
“You’re still trying to deceive me! You only hit me once.”
The boy was startled and suddenly felt a tightness in his chest. He hurriedly rubbed his face with both hands.
No wonder his face had felt numb and itchy all this time.
But he absolutely could not admit defeat.
“Let’s have another contest. We’ll compete to see whose awakened soul power is higher. If you lose, you give up the throne. If I lose, I’ll give you two buns.”
When the boy finished speaking, a cunning glint flashed through his eyes.
The ferocity Li Xun had displayed during their fight had overturned the boy’s former impression of this timid orphan. He knew he had no chance of winning another confrontation, so he decided to take a gamble.
As long as he won and returned to the throne, he could rewrite the rules all over again.
Li Xun smiled and shook his head, paying no attention to the rebellious boy.
As an adult, how could he take children’s games seriously?
The only reason he had become king was to obtain food that could be exchanged immediately for energy.
He needed it to recover his strength and refine the chakra within his body.
After all, martial-soul awakening in the Douluo Continent was highly unpredictable. One was either a genius or a complete waste.
It was best to make preparations early.
If he failed to measure any soul power when his martial soul awakened, he would devote himself fully to studying ninjutsu.
That way, even if his soul-power level could not increase, he could still live well in the Douluo Continent.
And with careful study, perhaps he could even carve out another path.
That was merely his worst-case scenario, however.
After all, becoming a god in this world required both a soul-power level and a divine position. It would be extremely difficult to bypass the gods of the Divine Realm and open up an entirely different path.
“Blue Silver Grass, a useless martial soul...”
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“A pot lid... What a pity. No soul power...”
As the children in front gradually became fewer, even the rebellious boy was defeated.
The entire empire was wiped out along with him.
Uneasy, Li Xun slowly stepped forward.
Though he had ninjutsu as a fallback, he still couldn’t help feeling nervous.
After all, this world’s rules relied upon martial souls and soul power.
“Come. Hold out your right hand.”
Perhaps because his performance had fallen short of expectations, Ning Yuan, the man responsible for awakening martial souls, looked somewhat numb.
Li Xun entered the six-pointed star formation and cautiously extended his right hand.
As Ning Yuan circulated his soul power, Li Xun felt as though an energy deep within his body was slowly emerging.
Gradually, the energy inside him became clearer and clearer. It seemed as though something was about to materialize in both of his hands.
With a single thought, Li Xun instantly recalled all the precautions related to the Douluo world.
A twin martial soul!
Li Xun’s heart pounded wildly. He clenched his left hand tightly and suppressed it with his mind, preventing the second martial soul from appearing.
Twin martial souls were seen only once in a thousand years. Though the second martial soul was difficult to cultivate and there had been records of people exploding and dying from attempting it, that did nothing to stop others from becoming envious.
There were too many eyes watching them at that moment. If he revealed it in public, who knew what trouble might arise?
“Hm? A wooden carving.”
Ning Yuan stared at the martial soul in Li Xun’s right hand in astonishment.
He had traveled among villages for years, awakening martial souls for children of the appropriate age. He had awakened all sorts of ordinary martial souls before.
But this was the first time he had seen a wooden carving.
Moreover, the carving was extraordinarily strange. It depicted a human body bearing countless arms upon its back.
On closer inspection, it was more than a little horrifying.
Still, it also aroused his interest.
“Come, child. Place your hand on this crystal ball.”
Suppressing his excitement, Li Xun shifted his gaze away from the statue and gently covered the crystal ball with his left hand.
The instant his palm touched the crystal ball, a pale blue radiance abruptly burst from its surface.
The light was as gentle as flame, swaying unsteadily.
“This... this light is so dazzling! What level of soul power is it?”
A villager cried out in shock.
“Could it be innate full soul power?”
The boy and the other members of the empire crowded forward to watch.
“That’s it! It must be!”
Ning Yuan’s expression changed from numbness into twisted, ecstatic delight.
He had awakened martial souls in villages for many years, and his best record so far had been an innate soul-power level of seven.
“This time, I’m really going to break the record! I wonder what reward the clan will give me. Hahaha!”
Ning Yuan threw back his head and laughed. Then he turned his burning gaze toward Li Xun.
“Child, can you tell me what your martial soul is called?”
Ning Yuan’s intense gaze made Li Xun feel somewhat uncomfortable.
After a moment of thought, he answered, “My martial soul is called True Several Thousand Hands.”
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