The Transmigration Stone finally disintegrated in the skies and generated a green, purplish glow to wrap around Tian Long's soul. The radiance then suddenly shot towards in a certain direction, faster than the standard speed of light.
In a place few kilometers away from the Transmigration Stone that appeared in the middle of nowhere a few seconds ago.
"Not good, he's not going to make it…" A middle-aged man sighed; his expression was full of gloom. His pupils were trembling, but it looked like it was out of fear rather than sadness.
This middle-aged man stood wearing a blue armor with a tiger's image imprinted on it. Other than the armor being intimidating, it was quite damaged, looking ruined.
"He's been in a coma ever since you found him, is it even worth to care that much for a child you don't even have any relations with, Grey?" Another middle-aged man with the same blue armor asked.
"I arbitrarily picked him up, and then I should be the one to take care of him, shut your mouth, Mel." Grey snapped back.
His loose red hair made only one of his eyes visible. He possessed an irritated expression on his face that instantly made Mel's expression turn ugly.
"That's it! I had enough of your righteous act, Grey. You don't even do the things our Captain commands properly, and all you do is take care of that child. Is that child your illegitimate son?!" Mel shouted in anger.
However, to Grey, Mel just couldn't help but find trouble once again.
Grey's eyes became a little cold. He unsheathed his sword out of his scabbard as the blade reflected the sunlight.
"I know you have some enmity with me, Mel, so stop finding fault with me time and time again. If you have the guts, let's end this once and for all."
"You think I am afraid of you? I'll show you who's going to obtain the Captain's status after our Captain retires in our Blue Tiger Mercenaries!" Mel also unsheathed his sword, taking a battle stance to fight.
Hearing that Mel indirectly accepted the fight, Grey shot out with an unbelievable speed for his current cultivation base. He created a blinding light with his sword that instantly covered the whole area with brightness.
'What!? A new battle technique?' Mel momentarily went stiff.
He almost peed his pants when he saw his vision being obstructed by the light. He didn't move since he couldn't see as his eyes were blinded and even experienced momentary pain in his eyes because of the light.
And at the subsequent moment, a unique glow dimmed by the brightness released by the battle technique shot to the child who had just stopped breathing momentarily.
Both of them who were entangled in the battle didn't notice the strange phenomenon.
Mel opened his eyes only to see a sword in front of his neck. He could feel his life slipping out of his hands, or it was better to say his neck. He started shivering involuntarily out of fear, afraid for his life. His lips trembled, wanting to talk but couldn't.
"I think I had enough of your provocation, moron…" Grey coldly uttered. His arm moved, and just when he was going to sever Mel's head off, a voice sounded, prompting him to stop.
"Wait!"
"Tch, it's the captain…" Grey muttered as he backed off.
This was rather a critical time, and he had no leisure to bother with Mel or the Captain.
Meanwhile, Tian Long, who had entered the child's body, started to feel warm but disoriented at the same time. Tian Long faced absolutely no resistance when he entered the body. It was as if the child's soul didn't exist in this body in the first place.
However, he felt rather weak but at the same time, felt something inwardly, a warm, pleasurable, and a relaxing sensation.
'Is the Transmigration Stone healing this child's weak body?'
At the same time, Tian Long couldn't believe the fact that this child's body is his own from now on! It was such a fantasy that even he felt disoriented from reality for the moment!
However, his calm thinking still operated his mind even while he felt slightly unreal.
"Haha, I'm saved! I'm saved! Captain, Grey tried to kill me for real. Kill him! He's a traitor!" Mel exclaimed full of happiness and framed Grey without even caring for his own image. It was as if he became crazy for the moment.
"Is that so?"
The Captain walked to where Mel was pathetically shouting.
Just when Mel thought that he could get his revenge, a fist appeared in front of his face, making his eyes widen in shock!
*Boom~*
The Captain punched with force, not holding back at all.
Mel's cheeks slightly caved as he flew two meters away from where he stood, crashing on a wall. The wall did not completely break but held Mel.
Grey blinked to this scene, not understanding the gist of it, feeling confused as to why the Captain didn't protect Mel this time.
"Why!?" Mel, who was stuck on the wall, muttered with a dumbfounded tone while the pain he felt made him feel quite humiliated.
"You think I don't know your ploy? How many times have I told you not to mess with Grey?"
Captain reproached Mel and turned to look at Grey.
"Grey, please forgive my nephew Mel, he won't do this again, and I will personally handle the punishment for him." He slightly bowed.
Grey nodded his head and didn't say anything. He could only accept his hardships out here and do his best currently. However, the situation seemed rather hopeless for a long time, with the child's health weakening over all these years.
The Captain sighed at his gesture before his eyes imperceptibly flashed, "By the way, did you see anything glowing around here?"
"The only thing glowing here was my sword…" Grey gave a harrumph.
"Not th… Alright," The Captain suddenly stopped giving information. He thought he had found a treasure and so he wasn't willing to share it with anyone.
Tian Long, who possessed his new body, started sweating a little when he heard their speech. Not because he heard the Captain mention the glow but because he couldn't understand anything they said.
'Is my fate so terrible? Of all the weak people under twenty out there, why a child? I couldn't even take care of myself in this state. I'm doomed!'
Tian Long had a listless expression on his face.
He looked upwards, towards the cloudy sky which looked similar to his fate, gloomy as ever. The little sunlight that fell on his face failed to provide him warmth.
He suddenly made a determined face to keep on living in this world, which was quite cute in itself. However, there was still the matter of five minutes, so he was rather waiting for that moment to pass.
Although the Death Book had disintegrated, the damage to his soul was already done, so he remained doubtful on whether if he would survive the five-minute time limit.
Grey turned around and returned to where the child was lying down with his back. He was instantly astonished to see that the child was awake!
"Kid! Can you hear me? Are you fine?"
Grey shouted in excitement as he kneeled beside the child.
"Calm down, Grey. He's just a kid who was in a coma ever since the time you found him. Do you truly expect him to talk?" The Captain chuckled.
"Ah, right, I just lost myself in happiness, sorry…." Grey replied in a slightly embarrassed tone.
"Alright, take care of the kid, I got things to do…" The Captain bid farewell and left. His eyes flashed with a deep glint as his head moved left and right, trying to find the source of the glow.
'What the hell are these guys talking about? I can't understand… What language is this?' Tian Long's mind only after calming down did calmly tried to make sense of the situation, 'Actually, where is this place and who is this child?'
He then looked at the middle-aged, who seemed rather worried about him.
'Could this person be my… this child's father?'
Suddenly Tian Long's glabella, the prominence between his eyebrows, started throbbing painfully.
"Arghhhhh!"
"Kid! What's wrong?"
Grey panicked as he looked at the child, shout in pain, "Oh no!"
He felt his body going cold!
'What is this black thing in front of my eyes?' Tian Long saw an eerie sight in front of him. His vision suddenly disappeared, and it became pitch black as if lost all sight, but a moment later, the pitch-black became an anomaly in his view.
A rather familiar anomaly if he should say…
Tian Long tragically screamed as he kept holding his head until he fainted from the immense pain.
Grey, who panicked quickly became eerily composed as he saw that the child stopped suffering. He checked the child's pulse and heaved a sigh of relief.
"He's just fainted, thankfully… Perhaps, he just got scared of my face… It makes sense. After all, its the first time I'm seeing him open his eyes…"
'This child sure does like to keep me hanging on a thread.'
He laughed ruefully and sighed as he thought about the hardships he had faced until now.
'It's almost this child's third birthday, good thing he woke up before that or else I would have had my head severed…'
Noticing the coincidence, Grey thanked the heavens.
He then carried Tian Long to his room and made him sleep in his bed. He then sat before the table and wrote a letter in clean strokes, imprinting it along with a somewhat moderately patterned secret seal.
He stood beside the window and whistled. A beautiful pigeon flew through the window and stood on Grey's shoulders. Its eyes looked sharp, and it rather had an imposing presence when compared to its tiny stature.
Grey then tied the letter to the pigeon's leg. The next moment, the pigeon then flew away from him his shoulder to its pre-determined destination.
'That's about it. My mission is finally going to be over soon… If everything goes smoothly, I guess…' Grey had experienced too many hardships in these two-plus years. He had used every coin on him to look after this child, leaving him to be worse than a beggar.
He had no choice but to join a mercenary group to support the child and himself.
"It's been almost three years since I left the Empire, and hopefully, the tide has crossed over, and if it hasn't, then we'll both die." He again laughed ruefully and collapsed on the floor, his eyes completely shut, making him appear as if he was dead. However, he rather let out a sound snore in a few seconds.
For the first time in his life after accepting the mission handed down to him personally, Grey peacefully slept.
