Chaos and monsters begin with the red dragon's clone.

"It's nothing! I was just too tired and couldn't catch my breath. Thank you everyone!"

As dusk fell, Zhang Xun thanked the person who had taken care of him, and then had his senior brother from the inner courtyard check his pulse to make sure he was alright. He then mingled with a group of young men in coarse cloth jackets, sweating profusely, and walked out of the boxing academy.

The boxing academy was located in a corner of the town, surrounded by a cluster of large buildings with high, thick walls, black tiles, and yellow eaves. The streets were bustling with people and vehicles, vendors, porters, and peddlers shouting and hawking their wares, creating a noisy and lively atmosphere.

Zhang Xun walked onto the street, his emotions still unsettled. He stared intently at the two contrasting scenes before him: lava erupting from the volcano and the bustling crowds on the street, both blurry and clear, overlapping each other.

"What happened?"

"Do I have two bodies?"

Human body and red dragon body?

After Zhang Xun vaguely confirmed that he hadn't made a mistake, he felt both strange and confused, but what welled up in his heart was an intense joy.

The Red Dragon, one of the five dragons, is an extremely evil and powerful dragon. It breathes fire, has steel scales, and is naturally strong. In the world where the Red Dragon was born, it was already a legendary creature belonging to the top tier. Now, in Zhang Xun's perception, his two consciousnesses seem to be not far apart. Although he doesn't know why he has two bodies with one soul, and the Red Dragon is still somewhere north of Flying Scythe City.

But it is obvious that the Red Dragon will be more powerful in Flying Scythe City.

Zhang Xun didn't know much about the martial artists here. The head of the Flying Stone Fist Academy once demonstrated how to shatter a wooden stake the size of a large bowl with a single punch. He had heard that there were even more powerful masters above him. But as long as one was a mortal, one was no different from a piece of paper in front of a legendary creature like the Red Dragon.

"Anyway, this is a good thing!"

"We'll study the various aspects of the red dragon's body more thoroughly when we get back."

Zhang Xun turned into a garbage-strewn alley in the slums, avoiding the sewage and excrement on the road, and hurried home.

Both bodies must have perished together, and it's getting late, so it's probably not safe.

As I adjusted to the two different perspectives along the way, I meandered through the narrow lanes and soon arrived at the alleyway near my home.

At that moment, a group of people gathered noisily around a house across the street, along with two policemen wearing yellow shirts and carrying swords and spears. Prayer, chanting, and exclamations could be heard coming from inside.

A thought struck him, and he paused slightly, then, amidst the flickering shadows, he saw a large patch of blood in the room, and several corpses of women and children with their bellies ripped out.

"Xiao Xun, what's wrong with you?"

An old man approached and, noticing the dirt on Zhang Xun's clothes, asked him with concern.

"Grandpa Wang, this is from practicing at the boxing academy, it's nothing serious." Seeing it was his neighbor, Grandpa Wang, Zhang Xun brushed aside his own filth and asked, "What's the situation with the Liu family?"

Grandpa Wang sighed: "The Liu family didn't bolt the door properly last night, and the corpse ghost sneaked in and ate the whole family's hearts and lungs. It was only discovered when someone went to visit them not long ago."

"A ghoul?"

Zhang Xun repeated it over and over, his expression slightly grim. Outside the city of Feilian, shrouded in a thick fog, lived many ferocious beasts and monsters. Occasionally, they would break into the city at night and attack people. They were collectively known as intruding ghosts—and the corpse ghosts were one of them.

The red dragon should not be afraid, but his human form is another matter.

"Oh, right."

Grandpa Wang tugged at his sleeve and whispered, "Xiao Xun, I wanted to tell you that your mother went to the Gao family this afternoon and was kicked out. The Sanlian Gang probably knows about it too."

"Thank you, Grandpa Wang."

Upon hearing this, Zhang Xun felt a pang of anxiety and hurried home.

The Sanlian Gang is a local gang that collects fees under various pretexts.

The Gao family is a prominent family in the town. His aunt became a concubine of a branch of the Gao family a few years ago, which brought the family a lot of benefits. For example, the Sanlian Gang did not charge the family too much money. His mother worked in the Gao family's leather workshop, which enabled him to train in martial arts at the Feishi Boxing Academy.

With his mother being kicked out, he immediately realized that it must be because he had been practicing martial arts for a year but had not yet mastered the basics and had no future. No one would be willing to keep helping poor relatives—but what if the Sanlian Gang found out that his aunt's family had cut ties with his family?

Not far along, turning into a small alley, we saw three tall, strong men standing in front of a mud-brick house not far away.

The three men were dressed in gray-brown short-sleeved shirts, with red, yellow, and blue cloth strips tied around their arms—the very insignia of the Sanlian Gang.

At this moment, they are constantly moving clothes, bedding, rice, and other items out of the room.

A haggard-looking middle-aged woman tried to stop them, but was violently pushed to the ground by the burly leader.

Zhang Xun's eyes darkened. Seeing that his mother, Yao Cuiling, was helped up and surrounded by neighbors, and that the Sanlian Gang members dared not make another move, he finally felt relieved.

In front of the Zhang family's house.

"Stop! Liu Biao, do you three gangs have any sense of rules? Didn't we already hand over this month's protection money to you?" Yao Cuiling shouted angrily as valuables were taken from her home.

"We've paid, but it's not enough; we need to make up the difference," Liu Biao, the leader of the Sanlian Gang, chuckled.

"Why didn't you bring it up then?"

"Hey Aunt Yao, you should be more sensible. Don't you know why you need to replenish your body?" Liu Biao said with a sarcastic smile.

"You..." Yao Cuiling's hands trembled with anger, her momentum weakening. "My son is still training at the Flying Stone Fist Academy and will become a formal disciple. Shouldn't you at least consider his feelings?"

"Your son has been practicing for so long, even if he's only just starting out, there's no future in it. Are you doing this for his sake?" Liu Biao sneered. "Not to mention, if he wanted to start practicing, he should have started earlier. Dragging it out until now, there's absolutely no hope! Aunt Yao, don't worry, if your son can actually start practicing, I'll come and kowtow to you three times and nine times."

"Aunt Yao, then I'll eat that pile of dog poop to apologize to you!" Another man pointed at a pile of dog poop on the muddy road and laughed strangely, which made the other two laugh.

Yao Cuiling's eyes reddened as she listened. After the three of them left, she wiped her eyes and hurriedly went inside to tidy up.

As the light dimmed, a hazy mist and shadows filled the sky, and wisps of white smoke rose from the chimneys on the rooftops.

creak.

The wooden door was quickly opened and then closed again.

"Mother, I'm back."

"You're back so late today? What happened to you?"

"It's nothing, someone at the boxing academy got a cut and bled, that's what got on it."

"Oh, the house is a bit messy. Your Aunt Gui came to borrow some things earlier and rummaged through the place. Come on, it's getting dark, let's eat."

"Um."

Zhang Xun walked into the dark room, pretending to know nothing about the Sanlian Gang, and went to eat at the soy sauce-colored table.

The meal consisted of a large bowl of porridge mixed with an egg, accompanied by two fist-sized sweet potatoes roasted in the ashes of the stove. These sweet potatoes resembled potatoes and yams, requiring little fertilizer and yielding a higher output than in the previous life. This allowed them to support the extremely large population of Feilian City in an era of low productivity.

After washing his body with water after the meal, it was completely dark. There was no money left to light an oil lamp, so Zhang Xun lay down on the bed fully clothed.

There were only two beds in the house, one for his parents and one for him and his older brother. The room, which was less than 30 square meters and included a stove, tables, and chairs, was not comfortable, but it was still much better than other families where everyone squeezed into one bed.

The wind howled outside, interspersed with faint, low growls and the scraping sounds of claws scratching the walls.

After hearing his mother fall asleep, Zhang Xun closed his eyes and then opened them again, and what greeted his eyes was—

Volcanoes, reddish-brown bubbles, swirling hot air, burning red rock walls, surging lava.

And the awakened red dragon hatchling.

"Let me see what's going on!!"