Chapter 1 : Chapter 1
Chapter 1: I Had Enough of This in My Previous Life, So I Chose the Cold-Blooded Constitution!
In the north of the Great Qian Dynasty.
At the River-Severing Sect.
A young man in disciple robes hid in a concealed spot. Beneath the disciple uniform, he wore another outfit patterned with four-clawed flying fish.
He shook the blood from the long blade in his hand, his expression cold.
“I can leave at last...”
But in the very next second—
A deep voice rang out, and an immense pressure crashed down onto him.
“My own son has taken a life. This is no ordinary offense. He must be punished by family law!”
...
Half a day later.
“To commit murder with such vicious cruelty—how could I have given birth to a son like you?”
The stern-eyed middle-aged man had a square, imposing face and an authority that did not require anger to be felt.
His palm slammed heavily onto the table, cracking it on the spot.
Beside him, a beautiful woman in luxurious robes lowered her head, her eyes filled with tears and grief.
Before them stood a tall young man covered in wounds, his head hanging low.
The young man remained dazed and silent, which only made the middle-aged man angrier.
“Speak!”
The shout sent out a wave of force that staggered the young man backward. Then a pair of bewildered eyes flew open.
“Why are you yelling so loudly?!”
The room instantly fell silent.
Cheng Yu answered on instinct, only to feel pain all over his body. And after the pain came endless shock.
“It hurts! What is going on?”
Did dying hurt this much?
No.
This was not right!
Where was this place? Had he transmigrated?!
The last image in his memory was still one of hysterical screaming and wailing.
In his previous life, his supervisor had schemed against him, kept him under his thumb, and worked him like a beast of burden under a ruthless zero-zero-seven, on-call-at-all-times schedule.
He had worked himself ragged to support the girlfriend he had met through matchmaking, who stayed home and enjoyed life full-time. He handed over his entire salary and could not even afford a pack of cigarettes for himself.
Even the smallest trivial matter was enough to earn him smashed objects and a vicious scolding.
Worst of all, his supervisor and his girlfriend had gotten together behind his back.
One paid him the miserable wages of a workhorse, and the other squandered that money extravagantly.
The two of them worked in perfect tandem, completing a neat little cycle with the money he had earned through blood and sweat as a beast of burden.
Driven to utter despair, he had no choice but to walk into a hardware store, sharpen a blade, and get to work...
After settling the score, he slit his own throat.
Faced with this kind of transmigration, Cheng Yu did feel a trace of regret, but he did not think he had lost out.
It was the first time he had discovered that his absurdly stingy boss could also be extravagantly generous.
He had started offering money by the tens and hundreds, without a trace of his old penny-pinching attitude.
It was also the first time he had heard his emotionally unstable, endlessly unreasonable girlfriend apologize again and again.
Some things only got settled when you showed people what you were made of.
His previous life had gone up in smoke, and he no longer cared to think about it.
In the next moment, a torrent of information surged madly into his mind.
A world of martial arts, where human strength could move mountains and fill seas...
He really had transmigrated—into a world where martial strength reigned supreme, and when great figures “reasoned” with you, everyone had to nod along, whether they wanted to or not.
The Great Qian Dynasty had held the realm in suppression for a thousand years, locked in opposition with countless forces of the Jianghu.
“Heaven has seen me relying on power-fantasy novels to relax every day and was finally moved enough to send me into one as the protagonist?”
As a veteran NovelFire reader of ten years, no one understood transmigrators better than Cheng Yu.
Demons from beyond the world, peerless talent, systems that let you sign in and become invincible...
The good days were about to begin!
But as more and more information continued pouring into Cheng Yu’s mind, he realized something was wrong.
He had been pleased with himself too soon.
He raised his head and looked at the middle-aged man before him, whose face was filled with authority and anger, and at the beautiful woman in fine robes.
A powerful pressure continuously radiated from both of them, and the furnishings around them were refined and luxurious.
Then he lowered his head and looked at the calluses on his own hands.
His black clothing was covered in dust, and a long saber hung at his waist.
According to the memories now in his mind, Cheng Yu’s identity in this life was that of a Jinyiwei under the Emperor of the Great Qian Dynasty.
He had been born ordinary, with mediocre talent. In order to live like a human being in this dangerous world of martial arts, his blacksmith foster parents had hoped he would one day be able to take control of his own fate.
For fifteen bitter years, he had endured hardship, gritted his teeth again and again, and clawed his way upward through struggle.
Some people spent their entire lives simply trying to stay alive. To live with even a shred of dignity was already a luxury. Determined not to fail himself or the hopes of his foster parents, he had climbed desperately upward, shedding the spirit of youth long before his time.
If he wanted to live like a person, he had to be ruthless.
He had to give everything he had.
Anyone who stood in his way?
Kill them!
Heaven did not disappoint those who persevered. At last, he had risen to the honorable rank of Banner Captain in the Jinyiwei.
Martial cultivation devoured money. In order to save resources for him, his overworked foster parents had ruined their health and passed away.
He had not even managed to tell them the good news of his success before they died.
His foster parents had raised him with one plain, honest hope—that he might live like a human being in this world.
They had succeeded.
That was how most people’s lives went, and he had thought his own life would amount to no more than becoming an ordinary Jinyiwei...
And then, a man and a woman of extraordinary strength had found him.
The man was named Cheng Zhenjiang, Sect Master of the Great Qian Jianghu’s super-sect, the River-Severing Sect.
He was also the current head of the thousand-year-old Cheng Family.
He was ranked on the highest of Tianji Tower’s three lists—Heaven, Earth, and Human—the Heaven Ranking.
His strength had reached the Ninth Rank. In an age where Grandmasters no longer emerged, that placed him among the rarest of the rare. His status and power towered over the Jianghu.
He had once pursued a colossal demon for ten thousand li with sword in hand and slain it at the North Sea with a single strike, saving countless lives and earning immense reverence throughout the Jianghu.
Because of his unmatched strength and renowned chivalry, he was honored as the Martial Alliance Leader of the North of the Great Qian Dynasty.
People respectfully called him “Great Hero Cheng.”
And this man was Cheng Yu’s biological father.
Eighteen years ago, barbarian tribes had lured demons through the passes and launched a pincer assault on the capital. Countless Great Qian citizens had been massacred, and the dynasty had stood on the edge of ruin. The imperial court had done everything it could, and the sects could not stand aside either.
As a hero praised by all, Cheng Zhenjiang had no choice but to go with his wife to resist the great calamity.
The grudges of the Jianghu were tangled and complex. Taking advantage of the chaos, Cheng Zhenjiang and his wife were ambushed by enemies seeking revenge, and a great fire swept through the River-Severing Sect.
A household servant had fought to the death to rescue Cheng Yu and carry him a hundred li away. Before dying, that servant had entrusted four-year-old Cheng Yu to a blacksmith couple living far from the front lines.
The young Cheng Yu had fallen gravely ill, and afterward forgot that he even had biological parents. He grew up as an ordinary child under the care of his foster parents.
Eighteen years later, Cheng Yu was finally found and brought back.
Still lost in grief and confusion over the deaths of his foster parents, he had chosen to understand and accept the two of them.
The Great Qian Dynasty was vast, and there were countless people in it. Finding one person was like scooping a needle out of the sea.
But after the joy of reunion, Cheng Yu had caught a trace of disgust in Cheng Zhenjiang’s eyes.
Disgust directed at the Xiuchun Saber and the Flying Fish uniform he wore.
At first, he thought he was mistaken.
But when he followed them back to the River-Severing Sect and saw his pampered, radiant younger sister, his beautiful elder sister living in silks and luxury, and his younger brother with bright eyes and sword-brows whose name was already known throughout the Jianghu—
He finally understood that he had not imagined it at all.
“Three of them! Three!”
He had fought through more than ten years of wind, frost, rain, and bloodshed, gambling with life and death just to become a mere Banner Captain in the Jinyiwei—a tiny, inconspicuous figure at the very bottom of the Jianghu.
Cheng Zhenjiang and his wife claimed they had been too busy to find him, yet they had kept other children by their side, cared for them attentively, poured countless resources into them, and raised each of them into a famed young hero of the Jianghu.
His younger brother, Cheng Feng, in particular, had not even turned eighteen and was already ranked among Fengyu Tower’s one hundred and eight young geniuses on the Human Ranking.
His reputation in the Jianghu mirrored his father’s chivalric fame so closely that people called him the Young Northern Alliance Leader.
They had time to lovingly raise three other children, yet left their vanished eldest son, Cheng Yu, hanging in the wind for more than a decade.
Even so.
Cheng Yu had still foolishly believed he could emerge from the grief of his foster parents’ deaths and find the love of family again.
What he stepped into instead was a future so absurd it felt like a cruel joke.
Eighteen years of bitter hardship and peril had already shown him the true nature of the world and filled him with thorns.
The Jianghu was not merely a place of killing and fighting. It was favors, obligations, and the ways of the world.
But only those with the power to kill and fight were qualified to speak of such things.
The Cheng Family, who prided themselves on chivalry, said he was too murderous by nature. They were unwilling to nurture him for fear of raising a tiger that would one day turn on them, yet they also refused to let him leave and return to his former life.
They called it discipline, a chance to reform his character.
In truth, it was imprisonment under relentless pressure.
“What terrible luck. I had already seen through the world’s dangers and falsehoods, yet I was still being forced to bow my head before hypocritical benevolence.”
Cheng Yu could not stay in a place like this, so he chose to leave in secret.
But he was spotted by one of the disciples. Seeing Cheng Yu’s situation clearly, the disciple threatened him and demanded resources. Then, after the fact, he went back on his word and informed Cheng Zhenjiang of everything.
Cheng Zhenjiang flew into a rage.
He punished Cheng Yu for trying to leave, yet while preaching chivalry at every turn, he tried to make light of the disciple’s extortion.
With Cheng Yu’s sharp and uncompromising temperament, there was no way he could tolerate someone like that—someone who had harmed him so thoroughly.
So he cut the disciple down with a single stroke.
And that had completely enraged his father, Cheng Zhenjiang, who had the family punishment carried out.
Ignoring how weak Cheng Yu’s strength was, he insisted on severe punishment. Only after he had beaten Cheng Yu to death did he frantically bring out treasures to try to save him...
And when those eyes opened again, the Cheng Yu inside was now the transmigrator standing here in the present.
As Cheng Yu absorbed the memories flooding through his mind, he clicked his tongue inwardly.
“He actually got his own son killed, and a man like that is called a peerless hero of benevolence and righteousness...”
At the same time—
Because Cheng Yu had just instinctively snapped back at him, the room had fallen completely silent. Cheng Zhenjiang’s hand trembled slightly.
Bang!
His palm struck the table again, and it split apart at once.
“You insolent wretch! How dare you talk back! Is this the filial piety you learned?!”
Cheng Zhenjiang’s face was filled with fury.
In his understanding of righteousness and honor, filial piety was of the utmost importance.
A father could beat or scold his son if he wished—but how could a son dare speak back to his father like this?
“For generations, the disciples of my Cheng Family have upheld order in the Jianghu and protected the people of the realm for a hundred years. Every generation has been full of men of benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom. Who in the Jianghu sees us without showing some measure of respect?”
“And yet when it comes to you, you have no manners at all. You have learned only the grave offense of contradicting your elders. You wear that skin of an Imperial Hound all day long, act with ruthless cruelty, and utterly disgrace my Cheng Family, leaving us as a laughingstock!”
Cheng Yu’s face grew colder still.
In the memories he had inherited, Cheng Zhenjiang had shown endless disdain the moment he heard that he was part of the Jinyiwei.
A hound of the court. Ruthless and cruel. Despised by the Jianghu.
An embarrassment to a great man like him. A stain upon his cherished chivalry.
But had he ever considered that the sects judged people according to status, and without talent or backing, there was never any way upward?
The declining Jinyiwei had been the only road available to someone like Cheng Yu, who had neither background nor support.
And if a man had no background and no one to rely on, how could he possibly survive without being ruthless?
It was Cheng Zhenjiang himself who had abandoned Cheng Yu and created the very desperate circumstances that had forced him down that path.
And now he spoke with a high-sounding, righteous face.
What nonsense.
A surge of anger rose in Cheng Yu’s chest. Just as he was about to argue back, an icy voice sounded in his ear.
【Ding! Detected the host’s desire to vindicate the Jinyiwei!】
【The Jinyiwei System has been activated! Please choose your Jinyiwei route shortly!】
“A system?”
The anger in Cheng Yu’s heart was instantly suppressed.
The greatest thing a transmigrator could possibly possess—his cheat—had finally appeared!
If it had come even one second later, he would already have gone head-to-head with Cheng Zhenjiang.
With the verbal arsenal he had built up as a twentieth-century young man, he might well have pushed Cheng Zhenjiang past the limits of his composure and made him lash out in desperation.
A true villain could be guarded against.
A hypocrite was far harder to defend against—he could strike without the slightest warning.
If a Ninth-Rank expert capable of cutting a river with a single sword stroke so much as brushed him, this transmigration would end right there.
【Please choose your Jinyiwei route.】
【Standard Route: The Great Qian Dynasty’s days are numbered, and the heroes of the Jianghu are rising one after another. The once world-shaking Jinyiwei has long become the laughingstock of the Jianghu! Go with the tide of the times and become a pitiful hound of the court. Title: Wild Dog by the Roadside. Reward: Wild Dog Constitution. Grow stronger whenever someone kicks you by the roadside!】
A wild dog by the roadside?
“You made me wait all this time just to spit out something like that? This system of yours is utter trash!”
What left Cheng Yu even more speechless was that the system was not exactly wrong. At present, the status of the Jinyiwei really was not much different from that of a stray dog by the road...
【Infiltration Route: The Jinyiwei is weak, while the powers of the Jianghu are strong. If the mountain will not come to me, then I will go to the mountain. Become an infiltrator hidden by the Jinyiwei within the major sects, save the Jinyiwei by indirect means, and contribute to its renewed greatness! Title: I Am a Good Person. Reward: Double-Agent Constitution. Double the returns on all benefits brought to the Jinyiwei!】
“So now I am a spy? Is something wrong with this system? Can’t it give me something straightforward and brutal for once?”
Cheng Yu felt another blockage in his chest.
Doubling the returns on his contributions sounded wonderful, yes—but the problem was that he was currently the son of the Martial Alliance Leader of the North. There was no way he could infiltrate anything at all.
What was he supposed to do—have Cheng Zhenjiang casually drag him out by the ear the moment he visited some other faction?
Why could the system not just give him something direct and decisive?
Besides, no matter how much he contributed as a spy, it would not change the fact that the Great Qian court’s fate was running out. What if he worked himself to the bone for decades, only to be wiped out in one blow at the end?
【Special Route: The name of the Jinyiwei alone can make children stop crying. Execute first, report later—imperial authority granted! This is what the Jinyiwei ought to look like. What does it matter to me that the court is weak? Sharpen the edge of the Xiuchun Saber. Execute first, report later. Slay Grandmasters, confiscate clans, investigate cases, and exterminate sects! Title: Nightmare of the Jianghu. Reward: Cold-Blooded Constitution. Display the bearing of the Jinyiwei to obtain rewards!】
【Once chosen, you will receive the corresponding gift pack! Please choose carefully!】
The moment Cheng Yu saw the third option, he knew that if he hesitated for even a second, there was something wrong with him.
“Three choices, and at least one decent guaranteed option. So this system still has a trace of humanity after all!!”
“You look down on Jinyiwei, don't you? You think disciples of the Jianghu are born superior? I had enough of swallowing this kind of anger in my last life! I choose the Special Route!”
【Ding!】
【Special Route selected successfully! Congratulations on obtaining the Cold-Blooded Constitution! The reward gift pack has been distributed. Please check it!】
“There is even a gift pack!”
Cheng Yu was overjoyed.
In the memories he had inherited, the Jinyiwei had been cold, powerful, decisive, and utterly ruthless.
To receive rewards merely for displaying the bearing of the Jinyiwei—what could be more satisfying than that?
And he could not help but look forward to what the gift pack contained as well.
A temporary retreat was merely a compromise forced upon him by circumstances.
But with a system in his hands, everything was completely different now!
Cheng Zhenjiang’s voice rang out once more.
“You show no respect to your elders and not the slightest intention of repentance! Get out there and apologize before that disciple’s corpse!”
“Then copy the deeds of our ancestors a hundred times. Take a good look at what true chivalry and magnanimity are, and think carefully about what you have done!”
Cheng Yu slowly lifted his eyes, icy to the core.
“Apologize? Dream on! If someone harms me, why shouldn’t I kill him?”
Hearing that, Cheng Zhenjiang flew into a rage and pointed at Cheng Yu’s Xiuchun Saber.
“By that logic, if I were to harm you, would you murder your own father and confiscate my household as well?”
Cheng Yu let out a cold laugh.
“You can try.”