"Should I let go of my feud with the heavens, just to distance myself even more from an MC template?

"No...I might be a coward, but I still have some dignity left. Can't let go of a grievance that humongous."

Muttering to himself inside his hut, Xuhan packed up some clothes and food for his journey.

He was going to visit the orphanage today. He needed some sort of a clarity, a direct look at his past life and a proper contemplation of his past self. What else had changed in him without his notice?

His conversation with the sect master had at least assured Xuhan of one fact; he was a very valuable asset, for now. He could get away with a lot of actions that wouldn't be approved of by the rest of the sect.

Being absent from his daily tasks happened to be one of those. Just a flash of the medallion was all it took to settle the senior disciple in charge of the task management team.

His orphanage wasn't actually that far from the sect. During his entrance examination, he had reached the sect on foot after a ten hour long trekking. Since Mu Ran was out on his own adventures, it was a good time to take care of the issue before another disaster popped up.

Hauling up his baggage on his back, Han Xuhan set off. On his way, he met up with Yuen Zhou for a chat. After her 'impressive lecture ' last time, many more disciples would be interested in knowing what exactly was being taught there. The business would surely spike upwards soon, heheh....

"Martial sister Zhou, what exactly did you do yesterday? Not that I'm complaining that you've improvised the script but...what the hell did you do?" That was the first thing he blurted out as soon as he saw her.

Yuen Zhou did not appear particularly disturbed by Xuhan's outburst.

"Remember the law seals on our dao foundations?"

"Yes, I do. I remember very well."

"I executed a very ancient, risky technique to employ the consciousnesses of numerous low level cultivators to summon a heavenly tribulation reserved for evil techniques. You can think of it as an alarm bell of sorts. Whenever the signs of the technique appear in our world, the laws of the universe will instantly try to obliterate it through various means such as heavenly tribulations , natural disasters," she answered with a deadpan expression, stunning Xuhan.

"I used the tribulation to wipe off the seal from my dao tower."

Heavens above! What kind of technique did she execute? Executing forbidden techniques to take care of her personal issue? So bold?!

"Er...I thought your family background was pretty ordinary, martial sister."

"It is. Both my parents are mortal, and long dead. Do you remember me telling you that I was specially invited to the sect by an elder? That elder was actually not my first master. Many years ago, when I was young, an old man who sold vegetables to my family told my parents that I have great aptitude for cultivation and taught me all about basic cultivation. But he died a few years later and left me with all of his possessions, which included an entire legacy of law manipulation techniques. The technique I used yesterday was something I learned from him."

Xuhan stared blankly at her with a complex expression.

Was he supposed to believe that story? Really?

Perhaps his disbelief and skepticism was a bit too obvious on his face, because Yuen Zhou hesitantly revealed a bit more information after seeing his face.

"That was also the actual reason why I could navigate my way into the Holy Land of Laws. My first teacher was one of the few people who escaped from the disaster that struck the land of laws due to sheer luck. From the old man's stories, I figured out where the portal was. So I had been keeping an eye on anything strange happening around that area for quite a while. I wanted to see if I could salvage anything useful from the remains. Didn't expect that there would be such danger inside."

"....Ohhh, now it all makes sense!" Xuhan exclaimed while internally raising his guard up even more frantically. While her explanation did make sense, he would be a fool to completely believe her. He had already been fooled due to her unclear agenda multiple times by now, and the problems popping up around her were getting more and more disturbing every time. He had trusted her back at the land of laws last time when she told them that she had no other agenda other than investigating the suspicious gathering of so many cultivators.

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

It turned out to be false now. Moreover, the technique she had indirectly supplied him through Qian Yun was part of an even more insidious scheme. She obviously was aware that Xuhan was the one in need of the technique after seeing Qian Yun handing it over to him. Yet she hadn't warned him about its side effects.

"Ah, that settles my concerns, martial sister. Hopefully, the sect master didn't make things difficult for you after taking you away for interrogation," he said out loud with a relived tone.

"Oh no, not at all. The sect master was actually quite impressed by the technique and asked me if I would sell it to him. He offered a pretty good price, and I do need the money. It'll probably be a reserved technique though even if they make it available to the disciples. Summoning heavenly tribulations is no joke," Yuen Zhou said lightly.

Han Xuhan instantly made a mental note to buy the technique as soon as it appeared in the archives. That was too awesome a technique to let go of!

But there was something even more important he needed to make sure.

"Since your financial problems are now taken care of, you're not going to renege on our deal, right? Please tell me you're not planning to stop teaching, martial sister!"

Yuen Zhou shook her head, something that finally calmed his nerves for the first time during their conversation.

"Don't worry, martial brother. A deal is a deal. Plus, the payment I got from the sect for the technique is barely enough to last me a few weeks. I'll be dependent on our profit from the classes after then. This was the main reason why I made the execution of the technique so eye catching."

Coughing awkwardly, Xuhan ended the conversation right there and bade her farewell. As the saying goes, birds of a feather, flock together. Upon experiencing the effect of her technique, he himself had also envisioned the spike in their business scheme...

........ ........... ...........

Setting his foot on the large town where he had grown up, or rather, his reincarnated self had grown up, Xuhan felt a strong sense of alienation. The town hadn't changed at all, of course. He had been gone for less than a hundred days. Life in the town went on without his presence as smoothly as it was supposed to.

The orphanage was situated at a distant corner of the town. Feeling the urge to renew his memories of this place, Xuhan decided to walk rather than taking a carriage, even though he could afford one without batting an eyelid, something that he would've considered to be a novelty just three months ago.

Now that his memories of earth was present, Han Xuhan's eyes took in a lot more details that he hadn't really thought about in the past.

The society here was...more advanced than he had originally thought. The way the buildings were planned and built suggested that architectural industries were slowly starting to take off. Maybe it wouldn't be long before the familiar sight of smokey skies and multiple storied buildings showed up, just like the black and white photos of the 19th century back on earth.

But it was also blatantly obvious that the passage of scientific advancement here wasn't exactly natural. Occasionally, there would be odd elements that were definitely not supposed to be present in this era; for example, the eerily familiar sewage system running beneath the streets.

How many transmigrators had messed around in this world before him? Xuhan couldn't help wondering.

"Young man, you look quite familiar. Have we met before?"

The voice jerked Han Xuhan back to present, and he took in the sight of the owner of the voice with confusion.

An unassuming looking middle aged man, wearing clothes that could be called...worn, but certainly not cheap, stood in front of him with a somewhat unhinged gleam in his eyes.

Try as he might, Han Xuhan couldn't recognize this person. His clothes didn't quite fit what the townsfolk here wore either. Perhaps a foreigner?

"No, I don't think so...? You got the wrong person, senior."

"Oh, no no. You definitely look familiar, a bit too familar, I'd say. Makes me develop some strange urges, your face does. Where have I seen you...?"

Han Xuhan slowly prepared to turn and run away, then he remembered that he was a cultivator now. What reason was there for him to be afraid of a madman?

"Oh? What sort of urges do you develop upon seeing my handsome visage? I hope it's not sexual! Do tell me!"

Rather than running away, Xuhan stood his ground and asked back in an equally unhinged tone. He had always had a talent for playing a madman for some reason.

"What sort, you ask? Ah, there's one that makes me want to smash you into the ground and reduce you to bits and pieces of flesh and bones. There's another that makes me want to cut you up carefully and see what's inside. Another urge makes me want to simply make you stop existing. Heaven knows, the urges are so hard to keep down. I want to do them one by one, or go all out at the same time. I can't even tell what I want to do at this point. It's so hard to navigate through my thoughts these days. Ever since my toys were kidnapped and taken away, I couldn't control them anymore. I miss my toys so much!"

The man suddenly wailed and squatted down on the ground and started sobbing. Han Xuhan rubbed his nose and looked around to see if anyone was paying attention to them. He didn't want to appear to be a cultivator bullying a poor, insane mortal.

"Well, that sounds unfortunate. Maybe when you grow up and get stronger, you'll be able to beat me up and finally satisfy those urges," Xuhan remarked as he turned to leave.

"That's the problem! I can't! Ever! I can't control my toys anymore! Waaa..."

Hearing the man wailing behind him, Xuhan shook his head and put the incident out of his mind.

This man was indeed insane.

Whoever his caretaker was, they'd find him in a heartbeat with wails that loud. Besides, the lack of curiosity from the passersby and shop owners suggested that they were familiar with such scenes. They probably knew the madman. He didn't need to check if the guy was lost.

Striding through the wide roads, Xuhan relied on his memory to navigate his way to the orphanage. On his way, the number of familar faces increased slowly. People he had talked to everyday back then, people whose home he had visited often, shops he had frequented, yards he had played on...

The memories of his second life slowly got clearer and clearer with each turn of the street, each new landmark that he remembered, until, he saw it.

A small field with a smooth patch of grass lay ahead, the flourishing state of the flora suggesting that no one had set foot in there for quite a while.

The orphanage that occupied this field in his memory...it wasn't there.