The town of Weish, A small ordinary town within the Holy Kingdom of Alz. Surrounded by the great Rocky Mountains and forests crawling with mysterious magical creatures, not many dare to travel through this town.
On the outskirts of town, rich, lush fields of growing vegetables were abundant. Men, women, children all alike with sweat under their brows could be seen harvesting the latest crop.
In this field, a little boy looking about 5 years old was struggling.
“Unnnnnnnnn”
“Plop!”
The boy fell over right on his back. In his hands was a 2.5 meter long tulip. Anyone there could see that the tulip was at least twice as big as the boy. Standing right back up with a victorious grin on his face, he made his way through the field running with the tulip in his hands.
“Mother, mother!! I finally did it!!”
A tall beautiful woman with skin so pale and hair black as night looked at the boy with widened eyes.
“Wow Xian, you need at least the strength of a high-level 1st rank fighter to be able to successfully lift up the turnip king!”
“Hehe, it’s all thanks to the fighter training I’ve been attending!!”
“Haha, I see, speaking of fighter training, don’t you have to go training now?”
A look of surprise fell on young Xian’s face. Xian quickly handed the gigantic tulip over to his mother.
“Oh Noo! I was so engrossed in pulling this tulip that I completely forgot about today’s training!!”
Xian quickly ran off, faster than any average 5 year old could run.
Then, a plummy, friendly looking woman who listened to the entire conversation approached.
“Wow Sheila, your son has already reached the high-level of 1st rank fighter? Isn’t he only five years old? My son is only at the mid-level of 1st rank, and he’s already 8 years old!”
After such a compliment, Sheila couldn’t help but feel an indescribable feeling of proudness in her heart. Ever since Xian has been born, Sheila’s life has been filled with nothing but joy and happiness. Compared to the sorrow she felt after her husband disappeared, right now, she felt like she could take on the world.
“Haha, everyone grows at their own pace Leila. Although Xian is getting stronger quite quickly, your son seems happier since he smiles a lot more than my Xian.”
“Hmm, you’re right Sheila, I do not mean to offend, but there was always something odd about your son ever since birth.”
Sheila recalled all of Xian’s odd behaviors. Unlike most children, Xian did not cry. The only times he did cry was when he was hungry or required a change. Xian did not make any friends, yet there was some kind of charm to him that attracts people. He displays politeness and conduct. He also hardly smiles, in fact, today was one of the very few times he did smile.
Nevertheless, Sheila loved Xian with all her heart since he is the only thing “That Man” has left behind.
In the southern part of Weish was a large grassy open field. Right now, hundreds of children were sparring intensely with one another. Overviewing all of these tiny fighters was a giant muscular man wearing nothing but loose pants.
Xian finally arrived at this field. Immediately, he made his way to the giant muscular man, fell on one knee and cried out.
“Teacher Sho! Xian is here to report himself! Please punish Xian for his tardiness!”
Sho looked at Xian with pleasant surprise. In all his 43 years of teaching experience, he has never seen a five year old be so honest and firm.
“Xian, you have been attending this fighter training for almost a year now, and you have never been late. What made you come so late?”
“It was completely my fault teacher. I was so concentrated in pulling out the King Tulip that I lost complete track of time.”
The King Tulip is special vegetation that can only be pulled out by a 1st rank high-level fighter. Most people reach this level when they are around 10, so a 5 year old trying to pull this out could only be described as foolish.
“Hahahaha, I see. That is quite ambitious considering you are only five years old! You’re going to have to be several years older before you can do that!!
The fighters who were taking a break from sparring jokingly laughed along with the instructor.
“Oh, but I was finally able to pull it out today.”
Everyone immediately stopped laughing. For an average male it takes at least a couple of years to advance from one level to the next. For a 5 year old child who only started training in less than a year to jump 2 levels was no laughing matter.
“Y-y-you… What did you say?!!”
Xian once again repeated what he said.
Teacher Sho immediately grabbed a head sized stone laying on the ground. Any fighter could tell that Teacher Sho was adding special qi into the stone to make it heavier than it seems.
“We will test if you are telling the truth. This stone weighs about 50 kg, throw this stone as far as you can.”
“Xian accepts this challenge.”
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
Xian calmly grabs the stone with both hands. Seeing the tiny boy carry the big heavy stone was a funny sight to see, but no one was in a joking mood. Xian’s qi started flowing furiously through his body and with one fluid motion, he threw the large stone as far as he could. The large stone flew up dozens of meters in the air and landed several yards away.
This clearly proved that young Xian has reached the high-level of a 1st rank fighter. Not only that, from the looks of it, he will breakthrough to the 2nd ranked soon.
Everyone was awestruck. Teacher Sho never expected such a rare talent would be found in such a small village. It must be noted that in this world, strength means everything. Battles are often fought between countries. Millions of soldiers are sent out every year to fight, but it is not the number of soldiers that determine the strength of one country, it is the number of highly skilled practitioners.
In order to obtain these skilled practitioners, many countries will offer a great amount of things for their services such as money, glory, women, anything within their power to grant. Needless to say, the countries also use up much of its resource to grow talented individuals to serve the country.
Seeing such amazing potential in young Xian, Teacher Sho was extremely delighted, after all, if Xian becomes famous, as the man who instructed Xian, Sho will become very famous as well.
“Xian! You have such amazing potential! But what is the point of potential if you do not train properly, I will give you the chance to train right below me and if you become strong enough, you can become my number one disciple!”
Xian instantly looked up and responded.
“Teacher Sho praises me too highly. I am not worthy of such honor. Please allow me to decline.”
Teacher Sho was surprised yet again. He was the strongest person in this town without question. With the strength of a mid-level fighter of the 5th rank, no one would dare to question his authority, let alone decline an invitation to become one of his disciples.
Unbeknownst to Sho, Xian had a reason he did not wish to be under Teacher Sho. It is simply because he did not need to. Xian is a special existence, he was somebody that has been reincarnated.
He was known as Xian in the other world as well. In that world, he pursued the life of martial arts. A world quite similar to this one, much blood was shed to carve his existence in the martial arts world. But in the end, he became a legendary figure, someone so strong that there was no one left to challenge him.
Xian Craved for more skills, stronger opponents and enlightenment. But Xian became such an existence that no mortal in his world could challenge him any longer. Xian came to the realization that there was no one left to challenge but the heavens itself.
As if the heavens heard his thought, lightning from the sky showered upon Xian. Countless bolts of lightning struck before Xian could realize. Thousands of bolts came down without a sign of stopping. Eventually, when it stopped, not a single sign of Xian’s former body was left, only his soul. One final lightning bolt came soaring from the sky with the intention of destroying Xian’s soul.
But Xian was not called the strongest without a reason, specifically, he excelled at the art of manipulating his qi which comes from the soul. Realizing the impending doom approaching Xian, the soul automatically created a super thick layer of qi to block the lightning bolt.
95% of the qi was penetrated but the soul was safe from harm.
Then a cry from the heavens could be heard.
“What an interesting mortal… You wish to challenge the Gods?? Fine, challenge us if you dare, and if you win, everything in existence shall belong to you.”
When Xian came to consciousness, he was already a baby and learned that he had been reincarnated. He remembered all of his experiences in his previous life, including the message from the Gods. Even though Xian was recently born, his blood boiled in excitement of the challenge of facing a stronger opponent.
Back in the present, Teacher Sho kept trying to convince him to become his disciple, but Xian kept refusing. Although Teacher Sho was presently way stronger than Xian himself, there was nothing Sho could teach that Xian didn’t really know. Teacher Sho only had strength and speed of a 5th rank mid-level fighter, but no special skills to back it up. If anything, Xian would be more restrained and his training would slow down.
Xian kept on refusing Teacher Sho’s offer and eventually he stopped asking. Seeing such a situation occur, many of Sho’s young teenage disciples were jealous but did not dare say anything while their teacher was there.
Teacher Sho then looked at the students who were all gathered up in a crowd.
“Who told you to stop sparring?!! Give me 15 laps around the village!!”
All of the students immediately started running. Feeling slightly guilty for being the source of the ruckus, Xian also participated but did 20 laps instead.