đ CHAPTER 2: The Whisper of A Future Self
Consciousness returned in waves of cold.
Huo Yuhaoâno, Ayushâno, bothâwoke not to the softness of a bed, but to the hard, damp chill of stone beneath his cheek. The smell of moss and old wood filled his nostrils. He pushed himself up, his body small, thin, trembling.
Where�
Memoriesâtwo setsâcrashed into him like tidal waves.
Memory One: A cramped room in India. The glow of a phone. Rage at a story's ending. A Black Book falling from the stars.
Memory Two: A lifetime of grey. The cold opulence of the White Tiger Duke's mansion. His mother's gentle, fading smile. Her last, whispered words: "Live well, Yuhao. Be free." Years of humiliation, hidden meals of scavenged fish, a Spirit that marked him as differentâthe Spirit Eyes.
He looked down at his hands. Small. Calloused. A boy's hands. He was in a rough-spun grey tunic, kneeling in a shallow cave littered with dry leaves. Through the entrance, he could see the dense, primeval green of an enormous forest.
The Star Dou Great Forest.
"I'm⊠here," he breathed, his voice young and unfamiliar to his own ears. "This is the day. The day he was supposed to meet the Ice Silkworm. The day everything began."
A deep, resonant thrum pulsed from the center of his being.
In his mind's eye, the Black Book materialized. It was no longer a distant artifact; it was part of his spiritual foundation, floating serenely above a newly formed, azure poolâhis Sea of Consciousness. The Book was open to the first page. Words glowed with a soft, silver light, not in Hindi or English, but in a script he instinctively understood.
"HOST CONFIRMED: HUO YUHAO"
"CONSCIOUSNESS SYNCHRONIZATION: AYUSH â 100%"
"DESTINY OVERRIDE PROTOCOL: ACTIVE"
"PRIMARY DIRECTIVE: BREAK THE SCRIPT"
"SYSTEM INTEGRATION: 40% â STANDBY MODE"
Below the text, a simple, transparent panel appeared, hovering in his peripheral vision.
[ Status ]
Name: Huo Yuhao
Age: 11
Cultivation: Spirit Person, Rank 10
Spirit: Spirit Eyes (Mutated â Pending Evolution)
Secondary Spirit: [LOCKED â Requires First Spirit Ring]
Physique: Frail (Malnourished)
Soul Power: 10 (Innate Full Spirit Power)
[System Functions: LoadingâŠ]
A wave of dizziness hit him. The fusion of memories, identities, and this cold, systematic reality was overwhelming. He was a reader in a character's body. A ghost in a machine of fate. The absurdity of it almost made him laugh.
Then, a new sensationâa presence, vast and weary, brushed against the edges of his newborn Sea of Consciousness. It felt like an echo of his own soul, but aged, shattered, and burning with a quiet, unextinguishable fury.
A voice spoke. Not from the Book. Not from the system. From the treasures orbiting the Book like captive stars in his spiritual sea.
"âŠso, you've arrived."
The voice was his, yet not his. It was the voice of a man who had lived a thousand years, fought gods, and lost everything.
The Future Huo Yuhao.
"Do not panic. What you feel is my last imprint. A message in a bottle, thrown backward through the ruin of time." The voice was calm, laced with an infinite, tragic exhaustion. "I amâwasâthe you who lived the 'canon.' The you who trusted, loved, and was broken. The you who became the God of Destiny and still lost to the script."
Images, sharp and painful, flashed before Ayush's inner eye: A golden leash around his neck. Tang San's smiling face from a divine throne. Wang Qiu'er dissolving into light. The feeling of his own divine power being used to reinforce the very chains that bound him.
"He controls everything," the whisper hissed, the exhaustion giving way to a spike of pure, soul-deep hatred. "The 'tests,' the 'fated meetings,' the 'sacrifices'âall his design. Your life, our life, was a play staged for his benefit. To make a loyal guardian for his daughter. A powerful dog for his Tang Sect."
Ayush-Huo Yuhao clenched his fists, his new-old nails digging into his palms. The theoretical rage of a reader was now the visceral, personal fury of the victim.
"I have little time. This echo is fading. But I stole from him. From the world. I took pieces of the board itself."
The orbiting treasures in his spiritual sea glowed brighter:
·A nine-colored mist that roiled with ancient, draconic majesty.
·A crystalline lotus radiating absolute cold.
·Dozens of glowing blue bone fragments.
·Two crystalline cores, one gold, one silver.
·A simple, sharp carving knife humming with purified soul energy.
"The Dragon God's remnant soul. The Ten-Thousand-Year Ice Lotus. Frozen Marrow for body refinement. The Cores of the Dragon Kings. The Soul-Carving Knife of a friend⊠and more. I pulled them from their places in time and hid them in the Black Book, a dimension he cannot perceive. They are yours now."
"Why?" Huo Yuhao whispered aloud, his voice cracking. "Why give them to me? You failed. What can I do?"
"Because you are not just me," the echo replied, a faint, grim smile in its tone. "You carry the rage of the reader. You know the whole story. You saw the trap from the outside. That perspective⊠is a weapon I never had. Use these tools. Not just to get stronger, but to think differently. Do not walk the path I walked. Do not go to Shrek. Do not let his daughter become your weakness."
The voice began to fray, dissolving into the spiritual ether.
"The Black Book is your anchor. Its system will guide you, but you must choose. The 'live-stream' it mentions⊠it connects to your old world. To readers like you. Their will, their ideas, their defianceâit can become power. Remember⊠the most important thing is to break his narrative control. Be unpredictable. Be a variable."
A final, intense flash of emotionâregret, love for a mother lost, hatred for a father who wasn't, and a desperate, hopeful pleaâwashed over Huo Yuhao.
"Goodbye⊠me. Don't let him win. Make our mother proud."
The presence vanished.
Silence filled the spiritual sea, broken only by the gentle rotation of the stolen divine treasures and the silent, ominous presence of the Black Book.
[System Integration: 65%]
[Treasury Module: Unlocked â (Access: Limited)]
[Live-Stream Module: Detected â (Synchronizing with Host WorldâŠ)]
[Mission Module: Generating First DirectiveâŠ]
Huo Yuhao took a deep, shuddering breath. The ghost of his future self was gone. He was alone.
No. Not alone.
He had the Book. He had the treasures. He had the memories of two lives and the burning fury of a third.
He stood up, brushing the dirt from his knees. His Spirit Eyes, without him consciously activating them, cast a faint golden sheen over his vision. The world became sharper, distances clearer, the flow of minute spirit energy in the leaves visible.
"First," he said to the empty cave, his voice firmer now. "I need a spirit ring. But not like before."
In the original story, he met the million-year Tianmeng Iceworm here. It became his first spirit ring and the source of his second, ice-attribute martial soul. It was a cornerstone of his power.
But it was also a part of Tang San's script. A calculated "fortune."
[Mission Generated!]
â First Step of Rebellionâ
Objective:Secure your foundational power WITHOUT following the pre-ordained path.
Option A:Seek out the Tianmeng Iceworm and accept its sacrifice. (Reward: Stability, Early Ice Attribute, +10 System Affinity)
Option B:Use the Ten-Thousand-Year Ice Lotus from the Treasury to forcibly awaken and attune your ice-attribute spirit NOW, creating a unique foundation. (Reward: Mutated Ice Spirit, ???, +20 Rebellion Points)
Warning:Option B is high-risk. Host's body is frail. Success rate: 47%.
Huo Yuhao stared at the transparent screen. Rebellion Points? System Affinity?
He looked inward, at the glowing Ice Lotus floating among the treasures. It was a thing of pure, serene, terrifying cold. The future him had said to think differently. To be a variable.
Taking the pre-packaged power from the Iceworm was safe. It was the known path.
"Do not walk the path I walked."
His jaw set. He was not here to be safe. He was here to break the script.
"I choose Option B."
[Command Acknowledged. Preparing Treasury Extraction: Ten-Thousand-Year Ice Lotus.]
[Warning: Excruciating pain imminent. Host's willpower will be tested.]
A searing cold, different from any natural chill, erupted in his dantian. It felt like a star of absolute zero had been planted inside him. His breath fogged instantly in the warm cave air, and frost crackled over the stone floor around him.
He screamed, collapsing to his knees as the glacial energy tore through his meridians. His frail, malnourished body was a terrible vessel for such power. Visions flashedâof freezing to death, of his spirit shattering.
"Live well, Yuhao. Be free." His mother's voice.
"Don't let him win."His future self's plea.
"This is wrong! It should be different!"His own, original reader's rage.
"I REFUSE!" he roared into the cold.
The Black Book in his spiritual sea flared. The Frozen Marrow treasures lit up, and a gentle, reinforcing coldâa nurturing frostâseeped from them into his ravaged channels, guiding the violent energy of the Ice Lotus, strengthening his bones and meridians as they were ravaged and repaired.
It was agony. It was rebirth.
[Rebellion Point +1⊠+1⊠+1âŠ]
When the pain finally receded, leaving him gasping and soaked in freezing sweat, he felt⊠different. The world through his Spirit Eyes was still clear, but now he also sensed the flow of cold. The moisture in the air, the latent frost in the shadeâit was all an extension of his perception.
He held out a hand. With a thought, a shimmering, pale-blue mist coalesced above his palm, and from it, delicate, razor-sharp snowflakes crystallized and danced.
His second spirit wasn't the Ice Empress Scorpion. Not yet.
It was something purer,more fundamental. A Manifestation of Ice itself, born from a treasure outside of fate.
[CONGRATULATIONS!]
â Mutation Successful!â
New Secondary Spirit Awakened: [Primordial Ice Seed]
Rank:Growth-Type (Currently equivalent to 100-Year Spirit)
Spirit Ability Unlocked: [Frost Sense]â Can perceive and minimally influence temperature and moisture.
Reward:20 Rebellion Points. Body Constitution slightly improved.
[System Integration: 85%]
[Live-Stream Module: Online. Connecting to host world viewersâŠ]
A new, smaller screen flickered to life in the corner of his vision. Text began to scroll, fast and chaotic.
[Earth Viewer 1]: "Holy crap, the stream's live! Is this really Douluo?"
[Earth Viewer 2]: "He just mutated his spirit! That wasn't in the novel!"
[Earth Viewer 3]: "Huo Yuhao! Don't go to Shrek! Tang San is watching!"
[Earth Viewer 4]: "Use the dragon bones next! Enhance your physique!"
Huo Yuhao stared, stunned. They were real. People from his worldâreadersâwere watching. They knew. A wild, fierce grin spread across his face. He wasn't alone at all.
The sound of snapping twigs and a low growl came from the cave entrance.
His Spirit Eyes and Frost Sense flared in tandem. A lean, dark shape slunk into the lightâa Wind Baboon, eyes glowing with malicious intent. His first real test.
In the original story, he'd nearly died to this creature before the Iceworm intervened.
Now, he had no Iceworm to save him. He had only himself, his mutated spirit, a body still throbbing with new power, and a chat of frantic, encouraging voices from another universe.
He slowly stood, the frost on the floor crackling under his feet. The Wind Baboon tensed, sensing the unusual, dense cold emanating from the small human.
"Alright," Huo Yuhao whispered, to the beast, to the viewers, to the heavens that were watching. "Let's start the rewrite."
He raised his hand, and the air around his fingers dropped ten degrees.
[Live-Stream Chat Explodes with cheers and Douluo Coin tips.]
---
TO BE CONTINUEDâŠ
(Chapter 3 Preview: Trial by Ice & Wind â Huo Yuhao faces his first spirit beast battle with unorthodox tactics, guided by real-time viewer suggestions. The battle attracts unexpected attention from two passing Tang Sect members. Meanwhile, in the God Realm, Tang San's brow furrows as a minor thread of fate grows curiously⊠faint.)