“Finally, I’ve encountered a human with a spiritual attribute.
It’s a pity I can’t shed tears, or else I’d surely be weeping with joy!”
“Plucking the sun and moon with my hands, there is no one like me in this world.
I never expected that this old man would still have a wisp of a remnant soul left in this realm!”
“What dares to snatch my prey away from me?”
Hearing those familiar voices, Huo Yuhao knew he had returned to where his dreams began.
But somehow, that sentiment felt far too poetic.
It would be more fitting to call it the place where his true nightmares commenced.
Using his divine sense to stabilize Ilex’s spiritual consciousness, Huo Yuhao held nothing back.
He laid out the entire chain of events from beginning to end: how he had fled the White Tiger Duke’s mansion, how he had met everyone here starting from this very spot, how he had taken sides in the divine realm’s power struggles, siding with Tang San against the God of Destruction, how he had exhaustedly schemed for the Tang family’s camp during the black hole crisis, how he had lent the Elder I’s Necromantic Calamity Scepter to his senior brother Long Haochen to complete the redemption of the Heaven-Reprimanding God, thereby helping the Tang family win that god over, how he had planned for his son Huo Zhanji before the Tang family sent him to the Falan Star to establish a new divine realm, and finally, how he had been transported here by the explosion of the Divine Star when Tang San’s ultimate Divine Star Plan ultimately failed…
“Elder I, I cannot resurrect you.
Brother Tianmeng, even though I became a god and took you to the divine realm, you know full well the plight of beast-kind in a divine realm ruled by humans.
I haven’t truly accomplished anything of real substance.
This time around, will you still follow me?” Huo Yuhao asked.
It took a long while before Ilex and the Tianmeng Iceworm, having digested everything Huo Yuhao had recounted, fell into silence.
“At my current state, I’m roughly a bit stronger than a Rank 100 soul master on the Douluo Continent.
Given that the current favored child of the era is the spiritual attribute, one for one, I could probably trade blows with that Silver Dragon in the Star Dou Forest.”
“But anything beyond that is out of the question.” At this point, Huo Yuhao spread his hands open.
“Especially when it comes to you, Elder I.
I simply cannot think of any good way to avoid what Tang San is about to do to you.”
“That loss of control during the cultivation session at the Haotian Sect wasn’t even just the doing of the Divine King Tang San—it was the doing of the true Creator God of this universe.” As he spoke, a dark expression crossed Huo Yuhao’s face.
“If the Creator God were to grant me the authority to resurrect you, Elder I, then He would overturn the contractual agreement He made with the beings of His universe.”
“He won’t do it,” Huo Yuhao said, doing his best to appear at peace, though a faint trace of melancholy still lingered.
“And without His approval, even I at my peak could not accomplish it.”
The Tianmeng Iceworm squirmed restlessly within Huo Yuhao’s spiritual sea.
“Little Yuhao, are you saying the only solution you’ve come up with is to laze around and wait for death?”
Huo Yuhao tapped Tianmeng’s head within the spiritual sea and said, “Brother Tianmeng, could you please choose a more refined term?
Let’s call it living the life of a carefree cloud and wild crane!”
As if struck by a sudden thought, the Tianmeng Iceworm asked, “But Little Yuhao, do you truly believe that the one in charge of the divine realm of this era will actually allow you to live a life of lazing around—er, I mean, a life of a carefree cloud and wild crane?”
Hearing Tianmeng’s question, Huo Yuhao paced back and forth within his spiritual sea, pondering for a long time before finally replying, “If I don’t join the Tang Sect, don’t go to Shrek, and don’t encounter that woman Tang Wutong, then all of Divine King Tang San’s schemes for me in this era will be rendered completely void.”
“I can’t think of any better way than this.” With those words, Huo Yuhao sat down beneath the gray orb of light that Ilex had transformed into.
“Looking back, how utterly monotonous those days were after I stepped into the game: obtaining those abridged Tang Sect secret techniques as my first pot of gold?
Growing up as ‘Dai Yuhao’?
If this were before my rebirth, I might have revered Shrek and Tang San as an absolute, lofty Other to be worshipped.
But now, I simply cannot do that.”
“However, lad, if you want to avenge your mother, lying flat won’t cut it.” Ilex suddenly spoke up.
Even though Huo Yuhao had tried his best to recount things calmly, Ilex could still detect the deep-seated resentment simmering beneath his words.
“At the very least, you must not act too stiffly in front of that girl out there.” Ilex’s aged voice spoke slowly.
“You wouldn’t want the one watching you from the divine realm to notice anything amiss, would you?”
“Elder I, your reminder is spot on.” Huo Yuhao scratched his head.
“Why hasn’t he woken up yet!” When Huo Yuhao’s consciousness once again took control of his body, he felt Tang Ya patting his face while casting a questioning glance toward Bei Bei beside her.
When Huo Yuhao once again heard Bei Bei’s familiar gentle voice saying something along the lines of, “…his body needs to integrate that power and adapt to the breakthrough in soul power, so naturally it requires some time.
What a pity, it was only a ten-thousand-year Wind Baboon,” he was utterly speechless.
“You just can’t forget that God-Slayer Wind Baboon, can you?” He couldn’t help but grumble inwardly.
“Are you going to go on about that endlessly?”
Then he heard Tang Ya’s voice defending him: “Being able to kill a Wind Baboon all by himself is already quite impressive for him.”
Huo Yuhao’s eyes instantly reddened.
Even knowing full well the truth behind this encounter with Tang Ya, even having come back for a second round, he still could not help being deeply moved.
“What…
what is this situation?” A weak voice escaped Huo Yuhao’s lips, yet his eyes were no longer dazed—they were crystalline clear.
Immediately, he heard Tang Ya’s reply: “Little Yuhao, you really have some nerve, daring to venture into the Star Dou Forest all alone…”
As the God of Emotions, Huo Yuhao could sense that Tang Ya’s concern for him—a stranger she had only just met—was entirely genuine.
And the more genuine it was, the deeper his revulsion for the Tang Sect grew.
Because Huo Yuhao knew: the more sincere the feelings, the better a price they could fetch in the hands of that “pure as ice and jade,” “astonishingly wise,” former father-in-law behind both the Tang Sect and Shrek—the dual-god fused entity of the Asura God and Sea God, the Thousand-Handed Asura, Tang San.
Soon enough, he heard Tang Ya’s invitation: “Little Yuhao, why not join our sect?
Our Tang Sect was once the number one sect on the continent, you know.”
Join the Tang Sect?
What a joke.
In this life, Huo Yuhao had become a “Spectator.” Unlike the naive young boy who had walked out of the White Tiger Duke’s mansion in the bitter winter all those years ago, he was now fully aware of the entire story behind the Tang Sect’s rise, decline, and revival.
There was no need to dwell on the reasons for its rise: it was entirely thanks to his “good father-in-law” encountering Qian Renxue and the Angel family, who were far too honorable in their martial conduct, allowing the Tang Sect’s legendary techniques to carve out a fearsome reputation.
The reasons for its decline were the most intriguing of all.
On the surface, the cause was that the “founder,” Tang San, possessed the Blue Silver Grass martial soul.
As a result, successive sect masters forcibly selected from ordinary Blue Silver Grass soul masters, leading to generations of disciples who were utter failures in soul master cultivation.
On top of that, the sect’s charitable endeavors—supporting widows and orphans—required enormous expenditures.
With the mainstay business of hidden weapon sales rendered obsolete by the technological revolution of soul tools, the sect’s income could no longer cover its expenses, leading to financial bankruptcy.
In essence, Tang San’s successors had adhered too rigidly to dogma, ultimately driving the Tang Sect into ruin.
But in this life, as a “Spectator,” Huo Yuhao knew the direct cause of the Tang Sect’s decline: his good father-in-law “Tang the Pure” and his followers never once mentioned that his martial soul had actually been the Blue Silver Emperor when he rose from humble origins in Holy Soul Village, nor that the Tang Sect secret techniques he left behind were only incomplete fragments.
To put it bluntly, it was all for the sake of Divine King Tang’s carefully crafted persona of “rising from obscurity” that he destroyed any possibility for the Tang Sect on the Douluo Continent to develop in terms of soul master cultivation.
And then, unwilling to let others reverse-engineer “his” craft, he left behind only incomplete techniques, cutting off any chance for later generations to innovate and surpass him.
If that were all, Huo Yuhao might still have been able to convince himself to join—after all, demanding that anyone, even Tang San, be a saint was far too hypocritical.
But what Huo Yuhao saw in this life through his “Spectator” authority—the fundamental root of the Tang Sect’s decline, the truth that it was nothing more than a sacrificial pawn—completely soured him on the sect.
After becoming a “Spectator,” Huo Yuhao could see the underlying code of this world, and there was indeed a rule written within it: “For every gain, there must be a loss.”
In his own era, Tang Hao and the Blue Silver Emperor, who had no possibility of becoming gods, first seized control of the plane’s consciousness to become the Plane Lord and Life Core—beings of “godlike” status who would “dedicate their lives” to the Douluo Continent.
Then, when the Douluo Continent ascended to become a divine realm, they became Divine Kings—such a wonderful turn of events.
But what was the price?
The first price paid by his father-in-law was, naturally, the Tang Sect.
Gazing at the eager anticipation written all over Tang Ya’s face, then looking toward the distant direction of Shrek City, and toward Tang Hao and the Blue Silver Emperor within the Golden Tree of Shrek Academy who were in the process of seizing control of the plane’s consciousness, Huo Yuhao hardened his heart.
He shook his head at Tang Ya and said, “No thanks.
I’m not cut out for cultivation.”