Chapter 1: Bitterness Ends, Sweetness Begins.
Douluo Continent.
This is a world belonging to Martial Souls. There is no flashy, dazzling magic, no battle energy cultivated to its peak there are only the ever changing and diverse Martial Souls!
...
Night. The bright moon hung high in the sky.
Gentle moonlight spilled over a small courtyard.
"Sigh, twenty six years since I transmigrated, and I've achieved nothing..."
A young man dressed in white, with his hair tied up in the style of an immortal cultivator, sighed deeply at the moon, his face full of despair.
His name was Ye Cheng, a transmigrator. In his past life, he came from a blue water planet, and after dying unexpectedly, he was reborn into this world as the young master of the Ye family in Baiyun City.
The Ye family of Baiyun City was merely a mid tier family on the Douluo Continent. Their ancestral Martial Soul, the Flying Rainbow Sword, was a decent offensive sword type Martial Soul. It couldn't compare to the Seven Kill Sword, one of the continent's top tier Martial Souls, but it still barely ranked as an upper class Martial Soul.
The strongest member of the Ye family was Ye Cheng's mother, Ye Lisha, who, at over forty years old, had reached the Soul Emperor stage.
With a Soul Emperor mother to protect him, Ye Cheng had been showered with love since birth. Even when he awakened his Martial Soul at six years old only to find it had mutated into an ordinary iron sword with no innate soul power no one in the family dared to look down on him. His life was still quite comfortable.
If things had continued that way, it wouldn't have been so bad.
Under his mother's protection, Ye Cheng could have lived his life in peace. So what if he was useless? It wasn't like he was the only failure in the world.
But soon, everything changed. Not long after his Martial Soul awakening, disaster struck.
The Ye family's enemies came knocking.
That night, Baiyun City became a bloodbath.
It all happened too suddenly. The enemy had clearly planned this for a long time, even joining forces with other family factions. In a single night, they wiped out the Ye family completely!
Only Ye Cheng survived, thanks to his mother, who sent him into a hidden underground passage just in time.
Before he left, his mother gave him a storage ring containing most of the Ye family's resources, along with a mysterious jade pendant an exquisite, seven colored glazed pendant shaped like a miniature pagoda. She told him to seek refuge with the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect!
Ye Cheng was confused, but as his mother explained, he finally understood his origins.
It turned out that his biological father was none other than Ning Fengzhi, the current sect master of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, one of the three upper sects!
However, despite his father's prestigious identity, Ning Fengzhi was a notorious womanizer. He probably didn't even know Ye Cheng existed, and his mother had been nothing more than a brief romantic fling.
In other words, he was an illegitimate child, one of many.
But that didn't matter. As long as he had this jade pendant and revealed his mother's name, he could prove his identity!
At that point, regardless of his lack of talent, the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect would at least give him a place to stay.
Then, Ye Cheng was pushed into the passage.
Although he was heartbroken, he knew he couldn't change anything. All he could do was escape as best he could...
But afterward, he didn't go to the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect as his mother instructed.
He knew that since he couldn't become a Soul Master, even if he went there, he would never be valued. At best, he'd be treated like a parasite for the rest of his life.
That wasn't the life he wanted. And the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect would never avenge a useless illegitimate son like him.
If he wanted revenge, he had to rely on himself!
As a transmigrator, he still held onto a bit of hope, thinking he could use knowledge from his previous life knowledge different from this world's to carve out a new path.
Perhaps he could cultivate martial arts or immortal cultivation… Maybe one day, he'd even be called the Martial Ancestor or Immortal Ancestor.
But that was nothing more than the arrogance and blind confidence of a transmigrator.
And now, at twenty six years old, after wasting twenty years, he had accomplished nothing.
He should have realized it earlier. In a world where Martial Souls determine everything, if your Martial Soul is weak, you are weak in every way. Without innate soul power, every path was blocked to him. How could mere human willpower defy the rules of this world?
Countless times, in the dead of night, he had cursed the heavens. Even if he had just a little bit of innate soul power, he could at least train. Even if he spent his whole life cultivating, he might never reach Grand Soul Master, but at least he'd have a goal to strive for, rather than remaining a useless ordinary person.
What frustrated him even more was that this world one he had been so familiar with had somehow changed.
About six years ago, a mysterious "Random Q&A" phenomenon suddenly appeared across the entire Douluo Continent.
It would randomly select a certain area and conduct a prize based Q&A.
The questions varied they could be multiple choice, short answer, or open ended. Answer correctly, and you'd receive a reward. But answer wrong, and you'd lose something important your Martial Soul, soul rings, soul power… or even your life!
Once, someone answered incorrectly and lost eighty years of their lifespan. A young man, who looked no older than twenty, turned into a frail old man within seconds and died of aging on the spot.
It was terrifying beyond words.
At the same time, every intelligent being on the Douluo Continent human or soul beast as long as they had sufficient intelligence, would be pulled into a massive chatroom or live broadcast space, where they could communicate with one another.
Since the mysterious Q&A began six years ago, dozens of sessions had taken place. The timing and locations were completely random, but the questions always related to past events or future occurrences.
No one believed it at first, but as the videos shown in the broadcasts were gradually verified as real depicting both past and future events people finally accepted its authenticity.
The people of this world speculated that this terrifying Q&A might be the work of the gods. But why the gods would do such a thing was beyond the understanding of mere mortals.
And since they couldn't resist, they had no choice but to accept it.
Unlike the natives of this world, Ye Cheng had read fanfiction with this kind of "spoiler Q&A" concept before his transmigration. Some of those novels were purely ensemble stories, where the Q&A had no mastermind behind it just a mechanical question and answer system. But in some of them, there was a protagonist secretly controlling everything from behind the scenes.
Ye Cheng didn't know whether the Q&A in this Douluo Continent had a mastermind manipulating it. So for the past six years, he had kept a low profile. Even when the Q&A sessions were open to anyone, he who had read the original Douluo story and knew the truth never stepped forward to try and gain any benefits.
After all, if there really was a transmigrator mastermind behind this Q&A, wouldn't he expose his identity as an outsider the moment he correctly answered questions that the locals had no way of knowing?
But as time passed and he saw many people change their fate by answering correctly, Ye Cheng started to struggle with temptation. He wanted to risk it all and participate.
He wanted to bet that there was no mastermind behind the Q&A.
If he was right, his fate would change forever.
If he was wrong, at worst, he would just die.
So Ye Cheng made up his mind next time an open Q&A appeared, he would definitely answer!
…
"Ding!"
A crisp sound suddenly rang in his mind.
Ye Cheng, who had been sighing at the moon, froze. He thought he had been selected by the terrifying Q&A and would have to answer a question. But then, a mechanical voice echoed in his mind, leaving him completely stunned.
[... Role Playing System successfully activated!]
Ye Cheng's expression shifted from shock to wild joy.
A golden finger!
His transmigrator cheat had finally arrived!!!
And that wasn't all.
Soon, more system notifications followed.
[Detected the presence of another system in this world...]
[Analysis complete. Identified as remnants of a destroyed system, confirmed to be the "Live Streaming Spoiler System," currently unowned...]
[Attempting capture and absorption... 1%... 10%... 16%...]
[Absorption failed. Insufficient system energy.]
[Current absorption progress: 50%. Low level permissions acquired.]
[Notice: To fully absorb and obtain the highest authority over the "Live Streaming Spoiler System," the host must role play, collect energy, and assist in system upgrades. Only then can the unowned system be completely absorbed.]
[For details, please check the system interface.]
After a flood of dazzling notifications, Ye Cheng took a few deep breaths to calm himself.
Then, he opened the system interface with his mind.
[Role Playing System Create a persona. The more people believe in it and experience shock, admiration, or fear toward it, the more real it becomes!
Current role: None.
Previously played roles: None.
External plugin: Live Streaming Spoiler System 50% (Absorption progress insufficient. Only low level permissions available. Can freely generate questions, fabricate and alter videos, set Q&A rewards and punishments. Cannot receive Q&A rewards. Full control over the system requires 100% absorption.)]
After carefully studying the interface, Ye Cheng finally grasped the situation.
First, this Role Playing System was his transmigrator cheat. Its function was simple he could create a persona and role play as that character. For example, if he designed a Sun Wukong persona and people believed he truly had Sun Wukong's abilities, then once the role playing progress reached 100%, he would obtain all of Sun Wukong's powers.
Of course, the more powerful the persona, the more people had to acknowledge its existence and believe in it. Honestly, while this system was incredibly strong, the real challenge was figuring out how to convince people of his fabricated identity in the early stages.
Moreover, if the role playing progress didn't reach 100%, he wouldn't be able to use the abilities of the persona. If he were just an ordinary person trying to act like a top tier expert, he would undoubtedly expose himself and get beaten to death on the streets.
But now, things were different.
With the unexpected acquisition of low level permissions from the "Live Streaming Spoiler System," Ye Cheng suddenly realized that these two systems were a perfect match!
Getting people to believe in his personas? Simple. He could just fabricate a "future video" and broadcast it to the entire world! Wouldn't that instantly boost his role playing progress?
Even with only low level permissions, preventing him from receiving rewards or claiming the things stripped from punished individuals, it was still more than enough for now. Combined with the Role Playing System, it was like adding wings to a tiger!
After struggling for twenty six years, Ye Cheng had finally reached the turning point where bitterness ended and sweetness began!
As for the mysterious "Live Streaming Spoiler System" that had appeared in Douluo Continent six years ago, Ye Cheng had learned through his cheat that it originally had an owner. However, that person had apparently offended an unfathomably powerful figure in some higher level world and was utterly obliterated!
The once complete Live Streaming Spoiler System was also affected, shattered into pieces, with most of its functions destroyed. Only the core parts survived, drifting through chaotic space time before coincidentally landing in this world.
To repair itself, the fragmented system automatically activated the live streaming spoiler feature, gathering the willpower of living beings and converting the items taken from punishments into energy for restoration.
Once fully restored, it would select a new host.
But fate had other plans.
Just as the system was recovering, Ye Cheng's cheat suddenly awakened and captured it, making the system's remnants his own.
"So… I spent the last six years playing mind games with thin air?" Ye Cheng muttered, half amused, half exasperated.
(End of Chapter)
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