Chapter 1: The Sage Dao Stele

“Young Master Baker, Miss said that you must properly prepare for the Sage Dao Stele trial. Without her permission, you are not allowed to leave Dongxian Garden.”

A maid of about fifteen or sixteen desperately clung to the arm of a young man in green, about sixteen or seventeen years old, her face full of anxiety.

“She, Susan Grant, is just my wife, not my mother. What I should or shouldn’t do is none of her business.”

Charles Baker said irritably.

Charles Baker had always considered himself a well-educated and refined person. Eating, drinking, and having fun were his strengths; fighting and killing were absolutely not for him.

But fate played a joke on him, making him transmigrate into this world where demonic forces run rampant and monsters abound. The only thing to be thankful for is that this world is not purely one of brute force, but a strange world where both literature and martial arts are cultivated. The power of literature is also an essential factor in gaining great strength.

There are five ranks: Scholar, True Person, Sage, Supreme Person, and Saint. Each rank requires one to condense words with power, imprinting one’s own writings and poems onto the Sage Dao Stele. The stele automatically judges the quality, and only by meeting the requirements can one advance in rank and receive the power bestowed by the stele.

The better the writings and poems created, the stronger the power obtained.

However, one must have corresponding strength to condense words with qi and leave one’s writings on the Sage Dao Stele. Both literary and martial cultivation are indispensable.

This body of Charles Baker was originally a rich second generation. His father, William Baker, was a powerful Sage rank figure, a well-known person in Qingyun City. Unfortunately, he fell in a demonic battle, leaving only Charles Baker behind, who was taken in by his fiancée Susan Grant, becoming a live-in son-in-law and living under someone else’s roof.

But this Charles Baker was also disappointing. Already sixteen or seventeen, he still hadn’t passed the Scholar rank’s stele trial and failed to obtain the symbol of the Scholar rank—the “True Fate Dao Seal.”

He even tried to rape his wife Susan Grant, but ended up failing and was beaten so badly he fell into a coma, which led to Charles Baker’s transmigration.

The only thing that comforted Charles Baker was that the previous Charles Baker had practiced the “Cangtian Dominant Qi Art” left by his father William Baker since childhood, cultivating a body full of powerful and domineering qi, enough to imprint words on any grade of Scholar Sage Dao Stele, saving him more than ten years of hard cultivation.

Literature is divided into upper, middle, and lower grades, and so are the Sage Dao Steles. If it’s a lower-grade Scholar Sage Dao Stele, no matter how brilliant your writing, you can only obtain a lower-grade True Fate Dao Seal.

If you possess an upper-grade Scholar Sage Dao Stele, and your literary talent is sufficient, you can obtain an upper-grade True Fate Dao Seal, whose power is far beyond that of the lower grade.

Above these three grades is the Saint grade, but Saint grade Sage Dao Steles are extremely rare, and only peerless works that are passed down through the ages can be imprinted upon them. Cultivators with such literary talent are few and far between, rarely seen in a hundred years.

Moreover, the higher the grade of the Sage Dao Stele, the harder it is to leave a mark on it. One must have strong enough qi—this is Charles Baker’s only advantage.

The previous Charles Baker lacked literary talent and insight, yet insisted on advancing as a Scholar with a high-grade True Fate Dao Seal. As a result, even at sixteen or seventeen, he still hadn’t advanced to Scholar.

“Where are you going?”

Ignoring the maid’s obstruction, Charles Baker walked to the courtyard gate, only to be blocked by a beautiful young woman in green, about twenty, with bright eyes and white teeth.

“To drink.”

Charles Baker’s gaze fell on the beautiful woman, showing no intention of backing down.

This wretched place had no TV, no computer, no cell phone, no internet—he was so bored he was about to go crazy, so he couldn’t care less about anything else.

The woman in green was Charles Baker’s wife, Susan Grant, the Miss of the prestigious Gong family in Qingyun City. At the age of nine, she passed the upper-grade Heavenly Maiden Sage Dao Stele trial with her essay “Heavenly Maiden,” obtaining the upper-grade Heavenly Maiden True Fate Dao Seal, earning her the reputation of Qingyun City’s number one talented woman. Her looks were also elegant and refined, making many sons of noble families and young heroes drool with envy.

Everyone envied Charles Baker for marrying such a talented and beautiful wife, but Charles Baker knew very well that although Susan Grant and the previous Charles Baker were husband and wife in name, they were not so in reality.

Susan Grant looked down on Charles Baker, never allowing him into her room. Let alone being husband and wife in truth, he had barely even held her hand a few times.

“Tomorrow is the day of the Sage Dao Stele trial, and you still want to go out drinking?”

Susan Grant frowned at Charles Baker.

“It’s not the first time, what’s there to be nervous about?”

Charles Baker had no interest in Susan Grant. He was not the previous Charles Baker, and felt nothing for this beautiful stranger.

The reason Susan Grant kept her promise to marry Charles Baker was only because William Baker had once saved her father’s life. Susan Grant agreed to marry to repay the Bai family’s kindness, but deep down, she didn’t think much of Charles Baker.

“You know it’s not the first time?

With your literary talent, you could try for a middle-grade Sage Dao Stele. Why insist on the upper grade?”