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Volume 1: The Rebirth of a Prodigy, Chapter 001: Execution by Firing

The autumn morning breeze, carrying gusts of chill, incessantly swept across the half-baked poplar trees, occasionally bringing down a few dry leaves from the branches. Those withered yellow leaves drifted in the morning wind, like a lone boat lost at sea, filled with an atmosphere of desolation and loneliness...

Near the east side of the funeral home, in an open area enclosed by barbed wire, twenty-six death row inmates dressed in prison garb knelt in a row. Hundreds of fully armed police officers stood solemnly guarding the four sides of the execution ground, their guns pointed at the prisoners, waiting for the commander's final order to carry out the execution.

Yang Hongtao knelt amidst a group of prisoners, his lowered body stiff as a withered wooden stake. He knew that at this point, it was too late for anything he said; struggling or resisting would only hasten his death. Earlier in court, Yang Hongtao had considered recanting his testimony, especially when he saw his once-beloved girlfriend, Xiaoya, and his boss, Huang Lianshu, who had framed him, walking intimately into the courtroom. A surge of rage nearly consumed him.

But when his gaze fell upon the tear-streaked faces and concerned eyes of his elderly parents and sister sitting in the audience, the surge of anger and the primal desire to survive that had just welled up within him were immediately overwhelmed by this warmth of family affection! He knew that he could never defeat Huang Lianshu; in fact, it was an unequal struggle, with the two sides completely on different levels.

Once he calmed down, Yang Hongtao realized that even if he dared to tell the truth in court, it would be useless, because he had no direct evidence to prove that his boss, Huang Lianshu, was the mastermind behind that series of economic frauds and criminal cases. Even if the judge accepted Yang Hongtao's testimony, Huang Lianshu could easily find another scapegoat to take the blame for all the crimes, at most causing Huang Lianshu to lose some more money.

However, Yang Hongtao could not escape Huang Lianshu's vicious revenge afterward, and ultimately could not escape death. Even all his relatives were implicated... Yang Hongtao did not want his parents and sister's family to be buried with him, so in the end he could only grit his teeth and bear everything...

After walking out of the courtroom with the mindset of certain death, Yang Hongtao thought he could face death calmly. However, when he truly felt the cold, hard muzzle of the gun pointed at the back of his head, constantly radiating the aura of death, he couldn't help but feel fear...

Unfortunately, regardless of whether Yang Hongtao could accept this ending, what was destined to happen would eventually happen. With a command from the commander of the armed police force, a series of "click-click" sounds of bullets being chambered came from behind. The crisp sound was like an invisible hand knocking heavily on the gates of hell.

"Ready—Fire—"

As the final command was given, a chorus of gunfire echoed across the execution ground, and at the same time, twenty-six 7.62mm rifle bullets, burning with furious flames, roared into the back of each condemned prisoner's head.

Just moments before the gunshot rang out, knowing his life was about to end, Yang Hongtao, filled with an infinite longing for this wonderful world, naturally and rapidly recalled, like a movie playing in his mind, every unforgettable face he had encountered in his short life… his kind mother, his strict father, his most beloved sister, and the girl next door with whom he had once been childhood sweethearts…

Then... Xiaoya's beautiful yet ruthless face and Huang Lianshu's sinister and disdainful face were etched into Yang Hongtao's mind. These two faces were then magnified infinitely, like two legendary ghosts who would snatch away souls, mocking Yang Hongtao, a death row inmate who was about to be deprived of his right to live, with cold and sharp eyes...

Intense anger and resentment burned like a raging fire in Yang Hongtao's soul. As the saying goes, things reach their extremes and then reverse. When this anger and resentment reached their peak, Yang Hongtao's mind suddenly returned to calm.

Whether by some strange twist of fate or by divine will, when his life was about to end, the last face that appeared in Yang Hongtao's mind was an old face covered with wrinkles and vicissitudes!

Yang Hongtao met the old lama by chance in a dilapidated temple during his trip to Lhasa three years ago. The old lama had kind eyes and a benevolent face, and looked like a highly accomplished monk. However, after some persuasion, Yang Hongtao managed to buy a jade pendant from him for 500 yuan, which would have sold for at most 5 yuan on a street stall.

The jade pendant is engraved with the famous six-syllable mantra of Buddhism in Tibetan script. According to the old lama, this six-syllable mantra is the mantra of the compassionate Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara. Long ago, Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva himself attained Buddhahood by practicing this mantra.

After selling the jade pendant, the old lama enthusiastically taught Yang Hongtao to recite the six-syllable mantra several times. However, Yang Hongtao felt that the lama's tone when reciting the mantra sounded a bit awkward, like a foreigner speaking Chinese. Perhaps it was precisely because of this that it left such a deep impression on Yang Hongtao.

In that final moment before his death, he inexplicably thought of the cunning old lama and subconsciously began to recite the six-syllable mantra that the old lama had taught him.

"Om Mani Padme Hum—"

However, to Yang Hongtao's utter surprise, just as the six-syllable mantra was reciting in his heart, he seemed to see six enormous characters fly into the air and transform into six white halos of different sizes. The white halos emitted a sacred radiance that enveloped his entire body. Then, before Yang Hongtao could realize what was happening, the six halos began to shrink rapidly.

Although Yang Hongtao's body remained kneeling there, he felt as if he were a fluffy cotton candy being brutally kneaded and suppressed by the six light rings, quickly turning into a small piece of rock candy. In the blink of an eye, Yang Hongtao had completely lost control of his body; all his consciousness was compressed and concentrated into a single point in his mind by the six light rings.

Just then, a scorching bullet, accompanied by a piercing gunshot, pierced through the back of Yang Hongtao's skull, carrying a bloody, unstoppable aura that swept through his mind... Whether by sheer coincidence or not, the bullet, a symbol of death, passed precisely through the center of the six strange, compressed circles as it pierced Yang Hongtao's skull, without missing a beat or deviating even slightly.

The six white halos vanished the instant the bullet passed through, as if they had transformed into an invisible net pattern imprinted on the tiny bullet. The scorching bullet, however, showed no hesitation, gliding past without a second glance before being ejected from Yang Hongtao's wide-open mouth, landing with a "ding" sound seven or eight meters in front of him.

After the gunshots rang out, the twenty-six death row inmates fell to the ground, each with a bullet hole the size of a peanut in the back of their head, like the eyes of demons from hell.

After completing the execution, the armed police officers quickly began cleaning up the execution site. First, a forensic doctor used a special instrument to insert into the bullet hole in the back of the corpse's head and rotate it twice to confirm that the prisoner was completely dead. Then, the officers, in pairs, carried the bodies to the vehicle according to their numbers.

Then, logistics personnel came and quickly cleaned up the blood-stained ground, collecting the spent cartridge cases and bullets used in the execution. These items were to be processed in a standardized manner; once a certain quantity was accumulated, they would be transported to the arsenal to be melted down and recast into various types of bullets.

According to regulations, after each execution, the personnel responsible for cleaning up the scene must collect all the spent cartridge cases and bullets. However, sometimes, perhaps due to the angle of the shot, a few bullets will hit the ground in front of the prisoner after exiting the prisoner's mouth.

Of course, the staff wouldn't dig up the entire execution ground just to find one or two bullets, so collecting two or three fewer bullets each time wasn't a problem at all.

This time, three bullets were not found. The staff responsible for cleaning the execution site did not pay any attention to it either. Seeing that the bloodstains on the ground had been covered with yellow soil, they sealed the found bullets and casings, got into their cars, and drove away amidst the noise of car horns and thick black exhaust fumes...

Yang Hongtao felt as if his consciousness was a block of extremely compressed cheese, tightly bound within a cold, hard bullet. No matter how much he struggled, the moment he touched the invisible mesh on the bullet's surface, he was immediately bounced back to its center. Meanwhile, the bullet was tucked under a flat rock, and through the gaps between the rocks, Yang Hongtao could clearly see everything unfolding before him.

He watched helplessly as "himself," with empty, lifeless eyes, collapsed powerlessly onto the dusty ground, becoming a mangled corpse. Then, he was lifted into a car and driven away. He couldn't tell whether he felt sorrow, shock, or excitement.

So it turns out that after a person dies, there really is a soul! Then the so-called cycle of life and death must be true! But he still doesn't understand why other people's souls are free, while his consciousness is bound in a small bullet after death and he can't move at all.

Yes... Yang Hongtao could clearly see the souls of the other twenty-five death row inmates who were executed in the same batch. In his eyes, those souls were like transparent shadows, which hovered and floated in front of their respective corpses after they appeared, just like a group of children who had lost their house keys and were helplessly guarding their door.

However, the menacing aura emanating from the armed police officers instilled unparalleled fear in these bewildered ghosts. So when the officers carried the body away, despite their immense reluctance, not one of the spirits dared to stay beside the body. They could only helplessly remain where the body had been, drifting aimlessly...

Yang Hongtao simply couldn't understand why he was so unlucky! In life, he had to take the blame for others and was framed by his boss, and after death, as a ghost, he was trapped inside a tiny bullet! Could it be because he recited the six-syllable mantra before he died?

Oh no! This six-syllable mantra is supposed to be the supreme mantra of Buddhism, meant to exorcise evil spirits and demons.

The problem is that Yang Hongtao seemed to turn into a ghost the moment he finished reciting the six-syllable mantra, and naturally became a demon in people's eyes that needed to be purified and eliminated by Buddhism. And he was still silently reciting this mantra in his heart before he died, so wouldn't that be a curse that tormented himself?

Just as Yang Hongtao was wallowing in self-pity and hating himself for being bewitched, the hazy sky grew brighter and brighter, and finally... a warm sun slowly climbed up behind the low hills in the east, casting a ray of golden sunlight onto the boundless earth.

In an instant, the ghosts that had been wandering around the execution ground suddenly became like live chickens thrown into a hot pot, emitting a series of shrill and tragic screams, struggling desperately and scattering in all directions in a daze.

Of course... the cries of those ghosts are probably inaudible to the living; only Yang Hongtao, being one of their kind, can clearly sense the despair and fear in those cries.

The struggles and escapes of those ghosts were utterly futile. The all-pervasive sunlight was like countless sharp swords, piercing through the already ethereal ghostly shadows, leaving them riddled with holes. In an instant, all the ghosts were riddled with holes, none remaining intact. Although they had not yet completely disappeared, it was only a matter of time before they were truly annihilated.

Yang Hongtao stared in disbelief at everything before him, his fear not diminishing at all despite his temporary escape from disaster.

Although his soul was completely compressed inside a bullet and coincidentally hidden under a rock, preventing the sunlight from reaching him, the sunlight refracted through the ground already made him feel as if he were being roasted in a furnace.

Moreover... in just ten minutes, or even a few minutes, the sun will shift a little further west, and the sunlight may shine directly on the bullet through the gaps between the rocks. At that point, would his ghost, which is firmly compressed inside the bullet, still have any chance of escaping?

Although strictly speaking, Yang Hongtao is now dead, he still possesses a strong will to live. Knowing that his soul exists after death, Yang Hongtao no longer feels the same fear regarding the death of his physical body. However, he now knows that if he is directly exposed to the scorching sunlight, the consequence might be the complete annihilation of his soul. Only then would death be truly and utterly complete; once his soul dissipates, Yang Hongtao would be forever gone from this universe.

No—I don't want my soul to be scattered! I don't want to die again!

As he watched the ghosts slowly melt away in the sunlight, Yang Hongtao roared madly in his heart...

Volume 1 The Rebirth of a Prodigy Chapter 002 Soul Fusion

Yang Hongtao's intense, almost obsessive, will to survive made it impossible for him to calm down at this moment. The more he couldn't calm down, the more he felt the sunlight, seemingly penetrating every crevice, relentlessly eroding his soul. The once cold bullet head began to gradually heat up...

He couldn't wait any longer! Yang Hongtao knew that such passive waiting would only lead to his death. However, he was now unable to move or run away, so what else could he do but wait passively? Suddenly, Yang Hongtao thought of the Six-Syllable Mantra again. After all, he had personally verified that this six-syllable mantra indeed possessed incredibly miraculous power.

Although the changes brought about by this magical power may not be good, for Yang Hongtao, who was destined to fall into a desperate situation sooner or later, no change could be more terrifying than his soul being slowly dissolved in the sunlight until it was completely destroyed.

If that's the case, then what does Yang Hongtao have to fear? So, under the increasingly intense pressure of the sunlight, Yang Hongtao once again began to silently recite the six-syllable mantra deep within his soul—a mantra that seemed simple yet was actually filled with profound and mysterious truths of heaven and earth.

"Om Mani Padme Hum... Om Mani Padme Hum... Om Mani Padme Hum..."

Perhaps because he couldn't concentrate at first, the first dozen or so recitations didn't produce any effect. However, the Six-Syllable Mantra, hailed as the most fundamental mantra of Buddhism, is no exaggeration. The repeated recitations gradually calmed Yang Hongtao's originally restless and anxious mind. Under the unconscious influence of the Six-Syllable Mantra, he even felt that major events like life and death were as ordinary as passing clouds.

A strange white halo was born once again as Yang Hongtao silently recited the six-character mantra in his heart. This time, the halo covered a wider area. Every time Yang Hongtao recited a word in his heart, a huge character flew out of thin air and transformed into a huge halo with a diameter of about ten meters. Then, the halo began to shrink from the outside to the inside at a constant speed until it shrank to the extreme before entering the bullet and disappearing without a trace.

Yang Hongtao was at the center of these endless halos, silently feeling those mysterious halos shrink into his soul one by one.

At first, he didn't feel anything too strong, but when he discovered that a fragmented remnant soul, already scorched by the sun, was also being compressed towards the center of a halo and eventually forced into his soul, he realized just how powerful these inexplicably appearing halos along with the Six-Syllable Mantra were.

When that first wisp of remnant soul forcibly squeezed into his soul, it really startled Yang Hongtao. It felt as if someone had forcibly attached a bloody human hand or leg to his body, causing him to instinctively feel a sense of rejection from the bottom of his heart.

But when that wisp of remnant soul truly merged into his own, he was surprised to find that it was an incredibly wonderful tonic for him.

Under the powerful compression of the aperture, the remnant soul that had long lost its independent consciousness was completely purified into a pure soul energy. Without the slightest resistance or waste, it was completely integrated into Yang Hongtao's soul, making Yang Hongtao's soul feel much stronger all of a sudden.

Once he discovered the benefits of absorbing remnant souls, Yang Hongtao quickly put aside his psychological aversion and, as if addicted to opium, began to crave the feeling of devouring soul energy.

The six-syllable mantra continued to be chanted deep within Yang Hongtao's soul, while the eerie halos, like the tides of the Qiantang River, endlessly converged from all directions toward the location of Yang Hongtao's soul, bringing with them wisps of fragmented souls that drifted within the area shrouded in the halos.

Each time Yang Hongtao fully absorbs the pure soul energy transformed from a wisp of remnant soul, his soul strength rapidly increases, and the halo formed when he recites the Six-Syllable Mantra again also grows larger, making the area covered by the halo wider.

It's unclear how much time passed, but after the last wisp of soul in the execution ground was completely swallowed by Yang Hongtao's soul along with the shrinking halo, Yang Hongtao finally stopped chanting the Six-Syllable Mantra. At this moment, the halo formed by the Six-Syllable Mantra had expanded from its initial diameter of about ten meters to about sixty meters, almost completely enveloping the entire execution ground.

By this time, the sunlight had already shone directly onto the bullet through the cracks in the rocks, due to the angle of the sun's deflection. However, Yang Hongtao, whose soul power had increased tenfold invisibly, no longer felt that the sunlight was anything to fear.

Originally, Yang Hongtao's soul, after being compressed to its limit by the Six-Syllable Mantra, was far more solid than an ordinary soul. Now, after frantically absorbing the remnant souls of more than twenty death row inmates, his soul had become so solid that it seemed almost tangible. How could ordinary sunlight possibly harm it? Only then did Yang Hongtao realize with astonishment that what he had devoured was not just pure soul energy, but also... the memories of those remnant souls from their previous lives.

Of course, because Yang Hongtao absorbed remnant souls that had been ravaged by sunlight for a long time, the memories of the souls he obtained were also incomplete.

However, generally speaking, the memories that can be preserved under such circumstances are considered a kind of obsession. For example, the things that a soul was most proud of in its previous life, the biggest secret that it had always kept in its heart, and the professional knowledge and skills that the soul was most proficient in in a certain field. Yang Hongtao can easily search for these in the messy memories of the remnant soul.

After sorting through the scattered memories he had just acquired, Yang Hongtao realized that none of the twenty-five death row inmates who had been executed with him were ordinary people. If you really wanted to count them, apart from four whose souls had dissipated so much that they had too few remaining memories for Yang Hongtao to figure out their specific identities, only he and a foreign language translator from a travel company were considered to have relatively low social status. The rest of them were almost all elites in their respective industries during their lifetimes.

The fragments of memory formed by the obsessions of so many powerful individuals, when put together, would undoubtedly be an astonishing treasure.

In fact, the feeling of suddenly gaining countless knowledge and skills was quite wonderful. It was just a pity that Yang Hongtao was currently only a wisp of soul trapped inside the bullet, so even if he possessed more knowledge, it would be useless. However, since Yang Hongtao's soul could not roam freely outside the bullet anyway, he began to slowly sort out these countless fragments of memories that had suddenly appeared.

Fortunately, these things could distract Yang Hongtao and give him something to do; otherwise, the feeling of his soul being imprisoned in a small space could easily drive him mad. However, no matter how many fragments of memory he had, there was always a time when he could sort them all out. After countless days and nights, when all the unexpectedly acquired fragments of memory had been completely integrated into his soul, Yang Hongtao finally deeply experienced the feeling of loneliness and despair.

This was a designated place for executing death row inmates, and no one ever came here normally. So Yang Hongtao could only stare helplessly at the barren earthen slope every day, his cries for help going unanswered. Fortunately, not long after, another batch of death row inmates arrived at this execution ground.

This time, a total of seventeen death row inmates were executed here—fifteen men and two women. One of them, a tall, thin man, was a notorious armed bandit who had been wanted nationwide for several years and was responsible for more than a dozen murders. After the execution, the souls of these seventeen death row inmates also lingered on the execution ground, wandering aimlessly for a long time, until the sun rose and immediately shattered them under its light.

Yang Hongtao hesitated only slightly before resolutely reciting the Six-Syllable Mantra. The six mysterious characters, shining with holy light, instantly transformed into six pure white halos, squeezing all the shattered remnants of the soul within them. In the blink of an eye, they turned into pure soul energy and jumbled fragments of memory, merging into Yang Hongtao's soul.

Yang Hongtao had no idea what would have happened if those souls hadn't been devoured by him. Would they have been taken to the legendary underworld, or would they have been completely reduced to nothingness under the scorching sun? However, Yang Hongtao guessed that the latter was more likely. Moreover, even if Yang Hongtao hadn't devoured the remnants of these death row inmates' souls, they would have long since lost their independent self-awareness under the scorching sun. Naturally, Yang Hongtao wouldn't have much of a psychological barrier to devouring such remnants of souls that were basically devoid of consciousness.

Each time Yang Hongtao devours a newborn soul, even a small remnant of it, he absorbs a portion of pure soul energy, making his own soul stronger and more solid. At the same time, as he recites the Six-Syllable Mantra, the white halo formed by the six talismans grows larger and larger. If he concentrates his mind and recites with all his might, he can even expand the white halo to a diameter of about a hundred meters.

This range is precisely the range that Yang Hongtao's soul can perceive. Souls do not have eyes, but they can perceive every blade of grass and every tree within the area covered by the soul energy through the dissipated soul energy. This soul perception is a hundred times clearer than what the naked eye can see, and it can simultaneously perceive all angles from 360 degrees around itself, as if a person has eyes in all directions.

The drawback is that this kind of soul perception cannot reach far. Currently, Yang Hongtao can only perceive a radius of about 100 meters. Beyond that, because the soul energy cannot extend there, all he perceives is darkness. In addition, if the soul energy is dispersed too far, it will gradually lose control, and when it is retrieved, a small portion of the soul energy will inevitably be lost.

Although the number of casualties was not large, it still pained Yang Hongtao greatly. Therefore, after devouring all the remnant souls left behind by this group of death row inmates, Yang Hongtao only tested the maximum range of soul perception once, and never dared to easily disperse soul energy that far again.

The feeling of rapidly becoming stronger was truly wonderful. Even though Yang Hongtao was just a simple soul, he could experience an unparalleled sense of exhilaration. However, comparatively speaking, Yang Hongtao actually preferred collecting the scattered obsessions and memories from the remnant soul. This gave him a reason to be busy, and even collecting some memory fragments that had no real value was enough for him to pass the time when he was lonely and bored.

If it weren't for the fact that one day an old man who collected scraps came to the abandoned execution ground and picked up the bullet that Yang Hongtao had hidden there, Yang Hongtao might have continued living like that until one day he devoured enough remnant souls to make his own soul grow to the point that the mysterious patterns on the small bullet could no longer bind him.

During this period, three more executions had already taken place at this execution ground, and Yang Hongtao's soul perception range had expanded to more than 230 meters...

Volume 1 The Rebirth of a Prodigy Chapter 003 Rebirth

The old man who collected scraps found more than a dozen bullets that had been lying there for who knows how many years in this abandoned execution ground. He then sent them, along with some scrap metal, to a scrap metal recycling station.

Over the next period of time, Yang Hongtao was resold several times along with the blood-stained bullet. Finally, in a small jewelry factory, the bullet was simply ground and processed by the workers, a small hole was drilled in it, and a silver metal chain was threaded through it. Thus, Yang Hongtao was transformed into a pendant for a cheap jewelry item.

Being able to reintegrate into human society was definitely a cause for celebration for Yang Hongtao, who had been confined to the execution ground for more than three years. And the fact that he no longer had to risk being thrown into a steel furnace and reduced to ashes made it even more of a joyous occasion.

As for who will buy him in the future and who will become his personal accessory, Yang Hongtao didn't really care, except for a little expectation in his heart.

A few days later, Yang Hongtao was packaged, loaded onto a truck, and transported to a small department store in a neighboring city. For the next few days, the store owner hung him on a hook on the counter, watching the people come and go in the mall every day, silently enjoying the wonderful feeling of being submerged in the crowd.

Having spent two years alone in the abandoned execution ground, Yang Hongtao's greatest fear was loneliness. Compared to before, his current life was like paradise.

Two weeks later, a girl of about thirteen or fourteen years old bought the bullet-shaped accessory from the counter.

She was an adorable little girl, but unfortunately, Yang Hongtao didn't become her personal accessory. Instead, he was given a fancy makeover and presented as a birthday gift to her cousin. The little girl's cousin was named Zhou Ziwei, about twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. He was of average height and had decent features, but he was pale and weak, clearly a spendthrift who had been ruined by wine and women.

Zhou Ziwei's family was clearly very wealthy, as evidenced by the lavishness of his birthday banquet and his extravagant spending. Seeing how generously he tipped each of the hotel staff three or five hundred yuan, Yang Hongtao even suspected that the guy had printed those colorful banknotes at home; otherwise, why would he pull out stacks of bills from his bag without a second thought?

But after the banquet, seeing the way this kid acted like a complete wretch when he asked his half-brother Zhou Zixu for money, Yang Hongtao was utterly speechless. What a useless spoiled brat, a spendthrift pretending to be rich when he's not!

Yang Hongtao originally thought that someone like Zhou Ziwei, who was obsessed with saving face and pretending to be rich, would definitely not be interested in a small trinket worth a dozen yuan. However, when sorting through a large pile of gifts that evening, Zhou Ziwei was not particularly interested in the gold and platinum jewelry, but he was particularly fond of this worthless bullet-shaped trinket. He simply took off a jade pendant that was originally hanging around his neck and put the trinket that Yang Hongtao was hiding on it.