Starting with the titmouse, seventy-two transformations

Chapter 194 Deduction: The Origin of the White Snake, Yin Water Forms into a Dragon (Part 1)

In the 104th year, you emerged from underground and roared to the sky.

From snake to viper, you have evolved and are now a great monster.

The awakened bloodline urges you to go further, transforming from a viper into a dragon.

But you have no clue how to become a dragon.

You quietly returned to Snake Valley, only to find it long since deserted.

After losing your control, the snakes and their offspring have long since dispersed.

The rock in the valley where you often lingered remains, but the small mound beside it is now overgrown with weeds.

That's Lu Sheng's grave.

In the 105th year, you lived in seclusion in Snake Valley for a year, consolidating the changes in your body and contemplating movement after a period of stillness.

Remembering Lu Sheng's wish before his death, you decide to let him return to his roots.

So they unearthed his remains, cremated them, sealed the urn, and left the Valley of the Serpents for his homeland—

Lujia Village, Qiantang County.

In the 106th year, you left the mountains and entered a small town.

You want to ask someone for directions.

But your enormous size terrified many people as soon as you appeared, attracting an attack from both the military and civilians.

Such attacks are like tickling; with the slightest movement, you can pass through walls and crush the entire field, leaving the whole city in agony.

Until a wandering monk appeared, carrying a golden alms bowl, claiming to be Fahai of Jinshan Temple, and denounced you for poisoning the people.

Before you could explain, they raised the golden alms bowl, drew you inside, chanted an incantation, and you died from your blood.

【you are dead. 】

……

Hey?
No, he died after only three years!

What does this mean?

That monk Lingyou from Jinshan Temple, without distinguishing right from wrong, killed the incarnation of the Azure Scaled Serpent in one move.

Is he a Qi cultivator?!
Liu Sheng licked his lips, his expression as steady as an old dog.

I'm not in a hurry, not at all, really—

Gan!
Can this lousy system please stop messing with people's mentality?
I'm about to explode!
Who would have thought that a Qi Refining expert would wander into this small town?

Still that kind of clueless, brain-dead blockhead!

Next time, let's try a different direction.

[In the 104th year, you emerged from underground...]

...

In the 106th year, after being lost for more than half a year, you finally left the mountains and entered a small riverside town.

You want to ask someone for directions.

So he shrunk his size and wandered around the city. Only after confirming that there were no Qi cultivators did he feel relieved.

To avoid causing a riot, you tied up several scholars overnight and took them to a dilapidated temple outside the city.

When you revealed your true form, you scared two people to death on the spot.

The remaining few were also trembling, defecating and urinating in unison, reminding you of Lu Sheng.

He was in a similar sorry state when you kidnapped him to Snake Valley.

Because you love the house and its people, you didn't harm them. You simply used their tails as a pen to ask them for directions, promising a generous reward if the task was accomplished.

But they betrayed your good intentions, passing the buck and saying they didn't know the way.

So you opened your mouth and spat out poisonous mist, killing the two people on the spot.

The remaining few instantly "regained" their memories.

You recall a saying Lu Sheng once said: "Most scholars are shameless, fearing power but not virtuous."

You wholeheartedly agree.

Ultimately, you chose a scholar as your guide and led him on the journey.

In the 107th year, you traveled over mountains and rivers to reach Qiantang County.

Along the way, you encounter many monsters and learn from them that the world is in chaos, with powerful clans and military garrisons ruling over various regions.

A monster occupied the mountain and split the earth, gathered demons from all directions, called himself king and ancestor, demanded blood offerings, and lived a carefree life.

Some demons also transform into humans, infiltrate the imperial court and the martial arts world, and are granted titles and positions, captivating all living beings.

Some human cultivators even occupy blessed lands for quiet cultivation, or travel to the rivers and lakes to subdue demons and accumulate merit.

Humans and demons rise together, a truly great era.

You have no interest in this; you only want to help Lu Sheng fulfill his last wish and then become a dragon.

Following his instructions from back then, you arrived at Lujia Village.

Under the moonlight, only two sections of the crumbling wall remained, overgrown with weeds.

You are full of doubts. It has only been about forty years since you forcibly abducted him to Snake Valley. Why has his family fallen into such a state of decline?
You arrested nearby villagers and interrogated them in detail before you learned the reason behind it.

More than forty years ago, when news of the mainland student's disappearance on his way to take the imperial examination reached the mainland, his family was devastated.

Later, the eldest son, Lu Ming, followed in his father's footsteps, went to take the imperial examination, and achieved the highest honor in all three categories. He was then chosen by the emperor to be his son-in-law, and his fame was unparalleled for a time.

However, the fact that she had married and had children in her hometown was exposed and reached the ears of the emperor.

The emperor was furious and, for the crime of deceiving the emperor, had him beheaded in front of the Meridian Gate, and his entire family was exterminated.

But everyone in the village said that Lu was wronged.

This is because Lu Ming is extremely filial, serving his mother and taking care of his younger brother. He has never married, so how could he have had children?

He offended a powerful minister, was framed, and thus met his demise.

In every dynasty on earth, the emperor is revered, his words carrying the weight of heaven's laws and his authority being absolute.

If there are powerful ministers in the court who can frame the imperial son-in-law and even get the emperor to issue an edict to behead his entire clan, is that emperor truly an emperor?

The villagers also said that Lu Sheng's youngest son, Qing, was put into a wooden basin by the villagers and pushed into the river at the time of the incident. He was swept downstream and his whereabouts are unknown.

You begin to wonder why the villagers treat the Lu family so well.

When asked again, the morning sun shone down, and the villagers vanished like bubbles.

The scene was desolate, with bones scattered everywhere, graves everywhere, and weeds growing rampant – what a chaotic burial ground!

You then realized that you had spent the night talking with ghosts, who were villagers in their previous lives and had all died because of Lu's involvement.

People value blood ties and ancestral worship above all else.

You consider Lu Sheng a friend and decide to give him an explanation.

So most of Lu Sheng's ashes were buried under the locust tree at the entrance of the village, returning to his roots and fulfilling his last wish.

The remaining traces serve as a guide to trace its lineage.

In the 108th year, you traveled downstream, searching for terrestrial bloodlines.

The river is teeming with monsters, including alligators, turtles, fish, and shrimp, and they gather together aquatic creatures to carve out their own territory along the river.

You are of dragon blood, your flesh and blood highly nutritious, making you a target for demons. One day, three demons—a crocodile, a turtle, and a shrimp—joined forces and imprisoned you somewhere.

【you are dead. 】

……

"The Azure Scale Serpent is just a large monster. Even if it is a dragon, it is no match for the three-headed monster."

Liu Sheng rubbed his temples. Although the previous deductions were only a few years old, they contained a lot of information.

Having conducted numerous simulations, he was able to confirm that the key to this upgrade lay in the descendants of mainland students.

There are many demons in the river, so with my current strength, I should try to avoid them.

So he rallied and began another round of deductions—

[In the 104th year, you emerged from underground...]

...

In the 108th year, you traveled downstream, searching for terrestrial bloodlines.

The river is teeming with demons. You are of dragon descent, and your flesh and blood are highly nutritious, making you a target for the demons. Therefore, you have turned to the land.

...

In the 112th year, after years of using extraordinary techniques to track down the Lu Sheng bloodline, you finally found it in the shantytown of Lin'an City.

A brother and sister who depend on each other for survival.

The twelfth sister, named Xu Jiao, was a junior embroiderer at the Jade Embroidery Workshop.

My younger brother is seven years old and his name is Xu Xuan. He works as an apprentice at Baohetang Pharmacy.

They lived in poverty, relying on the help of their neighbors to barely make ends meet.

They looked very much like Lu Sheng, especially the younger brother Xu Xuan, who inherited Lu Sheng's charming eyes. Although still young, he already showed signs of being romantic.

But they are clearly of the Lu family bloodline, so why do they have the surname Xu?

Puzzled, you decide to observe secretly and help it grow.

You abducted and imprisoned Lu Sheng for over forty years, causing his wife and children to be separated, his family to fall into ruin, and his bloodline to be nearly extinct. You must eventually pay for this karma.

So you shrunk your body, transformed into a small green snake, coiled up in the attic, and lived there in seclusion.

They would occasionally bring them wild game from land and water to supplement their meals.

Or perhaps they carried copper coins in their mouths to slightly improve their lives.

The two siblings went from being afraid and resistant at first, to gradually accepting you and treating you as their family snake.

...

[The 120th year, spring.]

My elder sister, Xu Jiao, got married. Her husband's family were constables in Lin'an City.

Over the past eight years, under your protection, the brother and sister have grown up healthily.

Their family wealth multiplied several times over, they moved out of the shantytown and bought property.

As a result, you secretly killed many scoundrels who had designs on them, and wiped out many gangs and wealthy households, but they were unaware of it.

The younger brother, Xu Xuan, entered school to prepare for the imperial examinations.

Over the years, you have pieced together their father's past from their fragmented words.

When the Lu family suffered a disaster, their youngest son, Lu Qingshun, fled down the river and was rescued by a fisherman surnamed Xu. From then on, he took the surname Xu and lived a life of hardship.

In her middle age, she married a widowed embroiderer and they had two children, a brother and a sister named Xu Jiao and Xu Xuan.

Later, the couple both met with misfortune and passed away, leaving behind their two children to depend on each other for survival.

Fortunately, Lu Qing had studied literature since childhood and had a basic understanding of it, so he taught Xu Xuan to recognize characters.

The key to his being able to become an apprentice at Baohetang Pharmacy was his literacy.

Over the years, Xu Xuan's appearance has become increasingly outstanding. He studies literature, rides horses, shoots arrows, and participates in poetry gatherings. He is heroic and dashing, and people call him "Zhou Lang reincarnated".

Demons began causing trouble in the city, but you remained indifferent and kept a low profile.

When a female centipede, lusting after Xu Xuan's beauty, tried to abduct him, you intervened and killed her.

How strange, can spirits also distinguish between beauty and ugliness?

...

In the 123rd year, Xu Xuan's fame grew, and he and three other scholars were hailed as the "Four Great Talents of Lin'an".

Unfortunately, he failed the imperial examinations several times and only obtained the title of Xiucai (a scholar who passed the lowest level of the imperial examinations).

Even so, matchmakers came to propose marriage so many times that they almost wore down the doorstep.

But he was arrogant and ambitious, and he was determined to become the top scholar in the imperial examination and clear the Lu family's name.

So he moved to a hut outside the city to study diligently, and only then did the disturbances cease.

...

[Spring of the 125th year.]

You accompanied Xu Xuan on a spring outing outside the city, when you suddenly realized that someone was watching you, so you stayed behind to hold off the enemy.

Suddenly a woman appeared from the water, dressed in light white silk, saying that she had come to repay a debt of gratitude.

He claimed that his surname was Bai and that he had cultivated himself at the foot of Qingcheng Mountain for a thousand years. He said that his purpose in coming here was to repay the karmic debts of a thousand years and that he wanted to marry Xu Xuan.

Scholars are insightful and perceptive, and their refined manners can enhance one's wisdom over time.

In the past two years, many mountain spirits and monsters have tried to take advantage of Xu Xuan, but you have thwarted them all.

Although the woman in white before him did not possess any demonic aura, she was likely nothing more than a mountain spirit or wild fox, who had come to absorb Xu Xuanwen's energy.

Therefore, you ridiculed him and spoke rudely.

Enraged, the woman in white revealed her true form—a hundred-foot-long white dragon—and charged towards you, splitting waves in its wake.

【you are dead. 】

……

"Is it because you're being sarcastic?"

Liu Sheng's lips twitched, but he immediately perked up.

This time, a white dragon has arrived, a descendant of the true dragon, and one of the top beings among demons.

There must be a way to transform into a dragon!

As expected, my guess was correct.

The next step is to obtain the method to become a dragon.

Since she says she's here to repay a debt of gratitude, then let her... go and repay that debt of gratitude?

As for Xu Xuan, he'll have to sacrifice his looks for the sake of the Dragon Formation Technique.

Liu Sheng's eyes flickered a few times, then he focused and began to deduce again—

[In the 104th year, you emerged from underground...]

I am deeply sorry, but ever since I wrote this prediction a few days ago, I have been restless and unwilling to write. In addition, my father's illness has relapsed, leaving me feeling completely numb. I have been relying on my stockpiled manuscripts to keep going these past few days. I apologize to all my fellow supporters and hope you will give me some time to recover. Thank you!

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(End of this chapter)