Chapter 2

As the evening breeze blew, wisps of smoke, like floating clouds, slowly rose from the rooftops of the distant farmhouses. Behind the village, mountains were faintly visible, with ancient trees towering densely, resembling a primeval forest of modern times.

In front of the village, fields lined both sides of the road.

However, the crops in the fields looked worrying, with stunted and small plants struggling and swaying in the cracked earth. The ears of wheat were shriveled, and even a layman could guess that the grain harvest this year would be poor.

Not far from the village entrance was a high slope, from which most of the village could be seen. A boy, around his teens but not yet twenty, stood there in tattered modern clothes, observing the surroundings.

He held a large modern travel bag and, looking around, shook his head helplessly, muttering to himself, "I've been unconscious in the cave by the sea for a few days, and the flame of my soul almost went out. Fortunately, the dragon soul repaired and temporarily replaced the heavenly soul, and I managed to recover!"

"If anyone talks to me about atheism again, I'll beat them up. Oh, my head is still a bit dizzy. Humans have three souls and seven spirits, but if the heavenly soul doesn't return, it's not a good thing."

"Whatever, I'll take it one step at a time. There's a village ahead; I'll go and check it out first."

The boy muttering to himself was none other than Zhu Zilong, who had come back from the dead and traveled through time.

The reason he had transformed from his thirties to his teens was entirely due to the mysterious dragon egg. By now, you must have realized that the strange egg in the cave of the modern 2020 human world was actually a dragon egg?

That's right, not only was it a dragon egg, but it also had a significant background.

The father of the dragon egg was the Vast Strength Bodhisattva, one of the Eight Dragon Kings in Buddhism.

If you still don't understand who this is, let me put it another way: he is the junior brother of the Monkey King Sun Wukong, one of the five members of the Journey to the West, and the one who sits under the buttocks of Tang Sanzang every day.

The White Dragon Horse!

The mother of the dragon egg also had a significant background; she was the daughter of the Dragon King Sagara, the nineteenth of the "Twenty Celestial Beings." She was intelligent and clever, and at the age of eight, she heard Manjushri Bodhisattva preaching the Lotus Sutra in the Dragon Palace. She suddenly gained enlightenment, understood the Dharma, and developed the Bodhi mind. She then went to Mount Sumeru to pay homage to the Buddha and achieved Buddhahood in her dragon form.

The Jade Emperor did not allow any gods other than himself to marry and have children, and Buddhism was no different.

What could they do? The White Dragon Horse and his wife developed feelings for each other on Mount Sumeru and secretly gave birth to the dragon egg. They couldn't just abandon it, could they?

In the end, it was Sun Wukong (the Fighting Buddha, fearless of heaven and earth) who helped. He secretly placed the unformed dragon egg in a cave and set up a spirit-absorbing array.

However, before the dragon could be born, a major event occurred in the outside world.

Alien gods and demon saints invaded Earth's Heavenly Dao. The Jade Emperor and the Buddha calculated that if they did not fight with all their might, everyone would fall. Therefore, they called upon all capable immortals, Buddhas, gods, and demons to fight together, and all past grudges were forgiven.

The outcome of this battle is unknown, and mortals could never know.

It's like modern humans discovering that more powerful aliens are invading Earth, but the war takes place in a non-human system.

After the cosmic war, the Heavenly Dao's laws collapsed, and the spiritual energy gradually diminished. Cultivation became almost impossible, and the immortals, Buddhas, gods, and demons were no longer seen.

That's why, in the 21st century, modern people no longer see cultivators, immortals, Buddhas, gods, and demons. This is the reason.

The dragon egg in the cave was supposed to grow on its own through the spirit-absorbing array, but with the change in the laws of heaven and earth, there was no extra spiritual energy for the array to absorb.

Thus, the unformed dragon child fell into a deep sleep at the infant stage, and its soul almost disintegrated.

Then, Zhu Zilong, who had attempted suicide, accidentally entered the cave. If the array had still been functioning, how could a mortal have entered the cave?

The soul of the dragon child in the egg was not fully formed, and its body had only developed the dragon bones and scales. However, the instinct for survival was strong. Upon colliding with Zhu Zilong's body, it immediately transferred itself by instinct.

Thus, a half-dragon human was created, and he was rejuvenated.

As for why he was transported back to ancient times, hundreds of years ago:

Hehe, that's because Sun Wukong left a backup plan. Once the dragon child was born, it could use a counterfeit Moonlight Box to instantly return to its parents and itself.

Yes, that rectangular box was a counterfeit Moonlight Box.

However, being a counterfeit, and with the Heavenly Dao's laws changed, the destination of the teleportation became the final period of the gods' disappearance, which was the late Ming Dynasty.

Of course, this wasn't the strangest part.

Before the teleportation, Zhu Zilong's soul was split into two halves by the teleportation array. The heavenly soul, accompanied by a large amount of incomplete dragon soul, came through first.

This unformed dragon soul was a true dragon soul!

In an era without any immortals, Buddhas, gods, or demons, even a weak one had divine power, belonging to the class of the True Dragon Son of Heaven!

At that time, the air in the Ming Dynasty was almost devoid of spiritual energy.

To survive, the dragon soul and the heavenly soul instinctively headed towards a place where they could possibly replenish the dragon qi.

The Imperial Palace!

The concept of the True Dragon Son of Heaven was that the emperor was a true dragon descended from heaven, so the emperor was a divine representative of the heavenly mandate.

Zhu Zilong's heavenly soul and dragon soul hybrid quickly moved to the vicinity of the Imperial Palace.

The 15th emperor of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Youjiao, also known as the Carpenter Emperor of Tianqi, had just fallen into the water and was nearly dead, his soul about to dissipate.

(In the seventh year of Tianqi (1627), in August, or according to some historical records in 1626, Zhu Youjiao, accompanied by Ke Shi and Wei Zhongxian, went boating in the Western Garden. A strong wind capsized the boat, and he accidentally fell into the water, dying. However, the people on the boat did not know this and were preparing to rescue him.)

Thus, Zhu Zilong's heavenly soul and dragon soul hybrid, invisible to the naked eye, entered the body of the newly deceased Carpenter Emperor Zhu Youjiao (Emperor Xizong of Ming), taking his place.

However, since this was only the main part of Zhu Zilong's heavenly soul, it would take some time to fully integrate within Zhu Youjiao's body. As a result, after being rescued, he remained unconscious in the palace for several days and still hadn't woken up!

From then on, the emperor's body honorably became Zhu Zilong's avatar.

Of course, Zhu Zilong himself was not yet aware that he had an emperor avatar. He instinctively knew that, as a half-dragon human, his heavenly soul was temporarily floating outside and needed to be retrieved when the time was right.

After being unconscious in the cave for several days and waking up, he walked for dozens of miles along the coast and finally saw a village with signs of human habitation.

(That is, the scene at the beginning of this chapter, where the protagonist first appears at the edge of the village.)

Having not seen a living person for a long time, he was naturally overjoyed!

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