Fan Lin was on his way to the academy. He was a full fledged Soul Scholar, as accordingly to his martial soul awakening ceremony the previous day.
Adding to the status update of his as a child in the third installment of the novel that he was in, he had some things that he had to oblige for his body's physical age.
According to the regulations set by the Sun Moon Federation, elementary and intermediate academies had free tuition and were compulsory. Focus on the compulsory part as Fan Lin was a child that had come of the suitable age to begin his begin his studies.
And today was the day he would begin attending the academy because he was officially enrolled in the Red Mountain Academy's Soul Master class. No one asked him. He was just enrolled. Perks of being an orphan.
All in all, this would be the first day of his nine years of learning as Elementary academy was three years while the intermediate academy was six years long.
After he would be done with these, he could then advance to the fabled "Advanced Academy. It was not compulsory. It was costly.
There were several ways to enter an advanced academy: outstanding achievements, paying an exceedingly expensive tuition, or entering an academy of science and specializing in a field of study. Fan Lin was going to do none of this. He had made his mind, he would not do the advanced course and instead would focus on what he wanted to do.
Anyways, the Soul Master class specially had a teacher at the front doors to welcome the new students. Clearly, they were treated much better than the ordinary students. Fan Lin gestured the Teacher to show the way.
He followed her to his class that and sat down in one of the chair while she went back to the academy gates to get the other remaining children. Such dedication, wonder how she will teach the class.
"Partial woman."
He glanced at her leaving back and whispered in a low voice. He turned his gaze to the students and after not finding the protagonist among them, he stopped looking at his class and started to read the newspaper that he had taken from the newspaper stand.
After a while, all the students had been escorted to the class and after a quick roll call, the classes began.
This year's Soul Master class only had 16 students, the number of children who had awakened soul power were simply too low. It was even more apparent in a small city like Glorybound City. This year's arrivals could actually be considered a lot.
They were all the same age, all brimming with curiosity and anticipation for the Soul Master class. But they were stupid as well. They are kids and kids are stupid.
Why?
Well...
"Hello everyone. I'm your homeroom teacher, Lin Ximeng. I'll be teaching you the basic knowledge required for Soul Masters over the next three years. How about you all introduce yourselves now? Tell us your name, martial soul and innate soul power rank."
There were only 16 students, so the introductions went by quickly. When Li Ximeng heard that Tang Wulin's martial soul was Bluesilver Grass, she couldn't help but be startled while the other students roared with laughter.
All of the students had already displayed their martial soul and boasted about its characteristics. And after this... after this, they started to trash talk and made cliques and rankings and what not, all in front of the teacher and the "victims".
There were truth to their words though. Regardless of which martial soul it was, they were all potentially better than the Bluesilver Grass.
The teacher, Li Ximeng was a qualified teacher to say as after a bit, she calmed the whole class and began the lessons. The lessons were easy and all the knowledge was something that most of the commoners wouldn't know.
Fan Lin looked at the book in front of him in doubt. He didn't know how to read whatever language it was in front of him.
'At least now I know what I will be spending my time on.'
I need to get used to this world.
....
All day the students were thought different things and finally the school ended at last. Even though he was enthusiastic at the beginning, most of the things that they were taught were pretty basic and stuff and he knew that as a reader.
After his classes ended and he was free to go, Fan Lin took a detour and left to the nearby market.
Money he didn't have any. That was the problem and he was going there to solve it. Sadly though, no one gave him any kind of wageable work since he lacked a creditor who can vouch for me and neither was there any guardian to sign for him. He was a Soul Master but he wasn't of a rank where he will be considered an adult and thus he was a child.
A child needs permission to work. That was the labour laws of the federation and he could do nothing against it. Being an orphan sucks. Obviously!
The only way he could get work would be if he was a Spirit Master, aka possessing soul power above rank 10 and having a spirit ring.
Till then though, he was just a 6 year old child and he had no way to earn an income.
..
Now I need a way to amass wealth as in this city or to be precise in this whole continent, wealth is a form of power and stability.
He needed a stable future. He wanted a stable future.
Then there's also the Shrek's admission requirements. There are only a few hundred quotas for students in the whole continent and even then it is given only to those with power and prestige.
Raiding the protagonist luck is something my ego won't agree and even if I want to I can't because my Martial Soul is Blue Silver Grass. When I finally get on level 10, my protagonist, Wulin would have already crossed his level 20, becoming a Soul Grandmaster.
I need to create my own "protagonist luck" and I know just the way to do it.
I love how determined I am sometimes.
*Time skip*
Three years later. Red Mountain Academy.
Wan Yunchao twisted his chubby body, moving closer to Tang Wulin's side and whispered, "Wulin, I heard that Zhou Shao Long broke through rank 10, and he's going to buy a spirit soul tonight. How about you? Didn't you tell me last time that you're already at rank 9? We're about to graduate. If you're not rank 10 by the time we graduate, you'll have to go home and cultivate without the academy's recommendation letter. It'll be very troublesome to enter an intermediate academy later."
Three years had gone by, and with it came big changes for Tang Wulin, aka the Protagonist of the DD3- The Legend of the Dragon King.
Originally only 1.2 meters in height, he had now grown to a height of 1.4 meters. He was already somewhat taller than his peers. With a moderate build, he was neither fat nor thin. From an outsider's perspective, he didn't seem particularly strong. Along with his growth, his face had become increasingly handsome, especially his crystal clear black eyes that reflected light like mirrors. Although his martial soul was Bluesilver Grass, he was still very popular within Red Mountain Academy solely due to his looks.
Another thing to add was that he reached level 10 in just three years even though his innate soul power was 3. And today he will go to buy his first spirit Soul and wallow in misery.
But well why am I thinking of this? My name is Fan Lin. I am a reincarnated person. My original name was... Something something, I forgot actually. Now I am dropped in this world and I have to bear all of this for the sins that I had done in my past life. I don't accept this punishment as I don't regret the things that the "God" has sent me here for.
I have sinned. Sinned many times. I have no problem with bearing the punishments for those. This wasn't for that though. This was personal vendetta and I don't accept it. And that God is not accepting my disacceptence over this matter.
Whatever...
I am a Vegetarian and along with me being a member of forest conservation department(self proclaimed)... I was. Now I am just a Vegetarian Soul Master living in a world where 99% of the world's human wants the eradication of soul beasts(?) due to unknown reasons and the veracity of this claim haven't been proven yet but I still hate this world and the humans in it because this world doesn't align with my thoughts. I am petty. I know.
Why am I ranting about this? Well I neglected that I wasn't me in here. I am but in a child body and even that child is truly malnourished.
Now think of a scenario: there are two people with the same starting point but one of them gets ahead in all the department, the other one is going to be mocked. I am personally experiencing it myself because my poor and pitiful classmates could not do anything to Wulin, he is as strong as an ox, so they started taunting me to heal their shattered pride that was shattered everyday with the rising cultivation of Tang Wulin.
And I was barely able to stop myself from massacring them; and this made me realise something really obvious that I wasn't even paying any attention towards. I am not in my mature state, as in when I was in my actual body.
I am currently acting like my six year old self but with the memories of my old self. At least partially since I can't remember much now.
Who cares. I am happy now. Now that the students are graduating and I will not be seeing them any time soon...
Another thing that made me happy was that after three years of hardwork, I can finally concoct my poison now.
Concoction of poison was the last choice but since my promise was to never use country wide poison, I am not breaking anything.
The past three years were hard for me. Extremely hard.
I didn't have money except for the Alliance funding with whom I can barely feed myself. Now I understood why Wulin had to hammer the ores and only after three years, he barely had enough for a random draw. Not even a normal 10 year old Spirit Soul but A RANDOM DRAW.
I tried my hardest. I ate berries from the forest to fill my stomach. I only bought a single uniform in a year and I also did many odd jobs like cleaning dishes, washing clothes and many more, all for meager ingredients that I didn't have the money to buy; I did so many different odd jobs with little to no pays as without money, I had to find other ways to gather the things I need. People didn't even allow me to sweep their stores for money but if it was measly items or some leaves or small things, everyone was on board to slave me to death.
Was I an incarnation of destitution or something?
So after all this time and work, I barely collected 500 Alliance coins.
Just 500!!
It was the Alliance funding at that. I made no actual income from any of the odd jobs that I did.
My memories are hazy and blemished. For the past three years, I was searching for a way to recreate my past learnings while learning to read this world's language. I was able to find that many herbs and vegetables here are the same as my previous world's but there was a difference, the herbs here were more potent, far more potent than they were on my previous world.
It should be the effect of spiritual energy of this world. It was a good news for me. In just a few months I would be able to create the ones that I can use. Till that time, I shall put all my focus on cultivation and nutrition.
I didn't want to do this but last resort, for no matter what happened, I am going to create a better future, even If I have to destroy mankind.
Thankfully, I barely have any of my memories of my poison creation or anything to that. As time had passed, my memories had faded day by day, and I personally don't care. Everything had ended already and this was for the good. I promised that I won't use my poisons to hurt the others.
No point to remember things now. Now, I am not using my poisons. I am learning from scratch. A different way to what I used. This is a new form and these are Fan Lin's poison. I will use it to save the future. Our future.