The Zhou Family of Hangcheng.
After leaving the class reunion, Zhou Kai had been in a state of extreme excitement for an entire day and night.
Because he had latched onto a powerful connection!
Though he had betrayed his first love, he had gained the favor of Young Master Jiang.
While the Zhou family was a prominent first-tier family in Hangcheng, they paled in comparison to the intricate web of influence behind Jiang Che.
What shocked Zhou Kai the most was... Jiang Che was actually a grandmaster-level martial artist!
"Perfect. With Young Master Jiang's support, the position of Zhou family heir should be mine without a doubt."
Zhou Kai clenched his fists tightly. A person’s lifetime offers only a handful of sky-high opportunities, and even fewer can be seized. Fortunately... Zhou Kai had managed to grab his!
Just then, visitors arrived downstairs.
A line of black cars drove into the Zhou family villa compound, followed by rows of black-suited bodyguards.
A middle-aged man in a Zhongshan suit stepped out of the car, and the bodyguards quickly gathered around him. From the back seat emerged a boy around sixteen or seventeen years old.
"Father..." Zhou Kai's eyes narrowed slightly when he saw the man, but when his gaze landed on the boy at the back... his expression turned sharp as an eagle's.
An overwhelming sense of crisis surged through him.
He was the eldest son of the Zhou family, the future heir—but just a few months ago, his father had inexplicably brought home this illegitimate child.
Zhou Weiguo had over a dozen illegitimate children outside, but Zhou Kai had never paid them any mind—until now. This kid was the first to be brought into the Zhou household!
Not only that, Zhou Weiguo had even granted him power and company shares. Later, Zhou Kai learned... this boy was the product of his father’s first love.
Fearing that Zhou Weiguo might transfer the family assets to this younger brother, Zhou Kai had desperately tried to curry favor with Jiang Che.
...
"Zhou Kai? Next month is your brother’s 16th birthday. Arrange a celebration for him. Since it’s his first birthday in our family, make sure it’s grand."
Zhou Weiguo called Zhou Kai down and gestured toward the thin, frail-looking boy beside him.
"Fine." Zhou Kai responded with a darkened face.
His eyes, however, were filled with malice. He truly wished he could kill this brother of his.
To protect the family fortune, he had exhausted every ounce of his effort.
"Father, I recently made a new friend," Zhou Kai said.
Zhou Weiguo frowned. "A friend? What kind of riffraff have you gotten involved with now? I’m telling you... cut ties with those lowlifes."
Zhou Kai choked back his words. To Young Master Jiang... he was probably the riffraff.
"Father, he’s not riffraff. It’s Young Master Jiang!"
"Young Master Jiang? Even if it were Young Master Long, it wouldn’t matter—wait, which Young Master Jiang are you talking about?"
"Jiang Che of the Jiang family in Hangcheng. He showed up at my class reunion..." Zhou Kai briefly explained the situation to Zhou Weiguo.
Soon, a glint of approval flashed in Zhou Weiguo’s eyes.
"Good. Perfect timing. Our company has a major negotiation deal with Yuanche Group. You handle it..."
Zhou Kai was speechless. He knew full well... he wasn’t Jiang Che’s friend, just a temporary lackey.
If he cashed in this favor now, it would be much harder to get close to Jiang Che later.
Wouldn’t it be better to use this opportunity to become Young Master Jiang’s permanent underling?
Zhou Weiguo fell silent for a moment, then nodded. "Do as you wish. If used wisely, Jiang Che’s favor could elevate our Zhou family to new heights..."
Overjoyed, Zhou Kai glanced at his unwanted brother, Zhou Fan!
His eyes brimmed with provocation.
Zhou Fan also looked up, meeting Zhou Kai’s gaze. His expression was calm, but deep within his pupils lay an ocean of hatred!
[Strange. This doesn’t match my past life. Where did this Jiang Che come from?]
[But it doesn’t matter. Just another ordinary fool. Zhou Kai... in this life, I have a hundred ways to torture you to death.]
Zhou Fan’s eyes dimmed. In his past life, shortly after being brought back to the Zhou family, he had been relentlessly targeted by his elder brother Zhou Kai, who eventually hired assassins to kill him and throw his body off a cliff.
But fate had other plans. Not only did he survive, but he also crossed over into another world—a brutal, ancient realm where people cultivated martial arts and divine powers.
Through three centuries of bloodshed, Zhou Fan had risen with unparalleled might, attaining the title of Martial God—crowned as the "Demon God!"
The name "Demon God Zhou Fan" struck fear into the hearts of all who heard it in that world.
While attempting to break through to an even higher realm, he was betrayed by a close friend during a heavenly tribulation. His body perished, leaving only a wisp of his soul... yet somehow, he had been reborn?
"A land devoid of spiritual energy, a world cut off from the Dao. Three months, and I’ve only reached the Transformation Realm. And Dragon Country even has spirit-suppressing artifacts to restrain martial artists? How am I supposed to reclaim my Martial God status?"
"But since the heavens have granted me this second chance, it must mean... the path to surpassing Martial God lies in this rebirth." Zhou Fan clenched his fists.
Once he regained his Martial God throne, he would settle every score with those who betrayed him!
......
Meanwhile, at the Chosen Ones Association.
Chen Hao had already sprung into action.
He logged into the so-called "Asura Gate" assassin website—the sixth-ranked killer organization in the world!
Upon entering, he found hundreds of assassins listed.
"Black Iron-level assassin, price: 5,000 yuan?"
"Bronze-level: 50,000 yuan? Silver-level: 800,000, Gold-level: 5 million, Platinum-level: 20 million, Diamond-level: 50 million, Master-level: 150 million."
"There’s even a King-level assassin? The Assassin King... price: 1 billion yuan?" Chen Hao gasped.
This is way too damn expensive!
Chen Hao was broke. He could only afford a Black Iron-level assassin.
Beep. "Please input the target’s information. The system will automatically assess the mission difficulty."
"Xu Rong..." Chen Hao immediately uploaded the vice president’s details and photo.
Beep. "Verifying... Xu Rong, former security guard of Nanyang Residential District in Micheng, Dragon Country. However, he has been missing for the past two years. Threat level exceeds Black Iron, classified as Silver-level. Please pay 800,000 yuan for the assassination. If the mission fails, the system will automatically assign a higher-level assassin until completion."
Chen Hao cursed under his breath. "Screw this! 800,000? That’s enough for a whole year of high-end entertainment!"
But it was a system task. "Place the order!"
Watching 800,000 vanish from his account, Chen Hao winced in pain before shouting,
"Elder Xu! I’m broke! I need a lot of money to complete the system mission!"
Admittedly, Chen Hao was shameless—using the Chosen Ones Association’s funds to assassinate one of their own.
[Ding! Host successfully scammed Xu Rong, gaining 40,000 scam points.]
close your eyes and open them again, only to find yourself transmigrated into the role of a villainous male supporting character. Readers familiar with urban wish-fulfillment novels know that it is only through the relentless antics of the villainous male supporting character that the plot between the male and female leads can progress. As the villainous male supporting character, Long Aotian not only has to bully the female lead, harass the second female lead, and flirt with the third female lead, but he also has to go all out to antagonize the male lead. In the end, when his body is discovered, he is still clutching half a moldy fried dough stick in his hand. Fully aware of the plot, Long Aotian is determined to change his fate, starting with the female lead! In the beginning, the female lead lacks confidence: "Big brother, I hope I didn't scare you?" In the middle, the female lead treads carefully: "Brother Long, please don't hit me, okay?" Later on, the female lead becomes coquettishly clingy: "Aotian, it's time to pay the 'public grain' tonight." Long Aotian's legs go weak, and he feels like crying: "I taught you to be thick-skinned, not shameless!"
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
] [Lone Wolf, No Male Gaze] [Protagonist is pursued early on; extreme protagonist-stans, stay away!] The "Carnival Paradise" descends and slowly devours the real world in the form of a game. By chance, Zhu Yan awakens the talent [Roleplay], becoming one of the first beta players. He thought he could develop safely, but after clearing the first instance, he is branded by humanity as the chief culprit behind the game's spread—a traitorous villain. A villain? Who would ever... become one! He'll be the villain! From then on, Zhu Yan is not only a player but also a lackey for the Carnival Paradise. Between the straight path and the crooked path, he chooses the con. With his left hand, he dons the villain's mantle, staging scenes within instances, infuriating players who decry him as a despicable traitor, all while the game happily promotes him. With his right hand, he joins the non-human organization "Fangcun Mountain," which opposes the Carnival Paradise, transforming into a mysterious player who slaughters game bosses, earning cheers of "Long live the expert!" from fellow players. Gradually, Zhu Yan rises to become an S-rank human player in Fangcun Mountain's archives, while also being the Carnival Paradise's certified top game Boss. But when the final war erupts and both major factions place their hopes in him— Players tag his various aliases: "Experts, this offensive depends on you." The Carnival Paradise's supreme Boss throws an arm around his neck: "Bro, you're the iron, I'm the steel; you can't let me down again!"
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
