Daily life of a cultivation judge-Chapter 1032: Two shining lights

Zheng Hu's story, like that of most within the walls of the Order, was one marred by misfortune.

From what he shared, Zheng Hu had been born in a town too sparse and underdeveloped to be considered a city, but too large and well-off to be considered a village.

Zheng Hu never got to spend much time in that town, and the time he did spend there was anything but pleasant.

Although the Southern Continent was so rich in resources that it could be considered a blessed land, tragedy, and death often struck it without rhyme or reason. One could throw a rock in any direction and hit a place cursed by misfortune. This was the fate of Zheng Hu's hometown.

Before he was born, for reasons unknown, a cultivator at the peak of the Core Formation realm decided to undergo their tribulation for the Palace realm within that town. The residents were none the wiser.

The cultivator did not put up any protective measures to contain the tribulation's impact. Perhaps they didn't care about the town, or some circumstance forced their hand, like a sudden life-or-death situation demanding an immediate breakthrough.

Whatever the reason, that Core Formation expert underwent their tribulation in Zheng Hu's town without any safeguards, and because of this, the town found itself caught in the chaos.

When the calamity struck that cultivator, the concentrated power of the tribulation radiated far enough to impact the town. Although the direct focus was on the cultivator, the aura and energy left in the aftermath were potent enough to devastate the surrounding area, given that it was a Palace realm tribulation.

One could only imagine what would happen to a town where the strongest expert was in the Foundation Establishment realm if it were hit by a Palace realm tribulation.

The outcome was catastrophic yet, horrifyingly, not as severe as it could have been. Three-quarters of the town was razed to the ground, erasing every trace of life within that area, be it a blade of grass, a simple earthworm, a budding treasure, a new life being born, or any living thing at all.

As for the remaining quarter, though it endured, it was left a twisted remnant of what it had been. Buildings and landscapes lay shattered, melted, and utterly ruined. And the survivors, human, and animal alike, were broken husks of their former selves, their bodies and minds twisted like the wreckage around them.

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When the tribulation fell, Zheng Hu had yet to be born. His mother was just weeks away from giving birth to him and was both fortunate and unfortunate enough to have survived. The fortunate part was her survival, though barely; the unfortunate part was the injuries that nearly cost her life.

She was left horribly burned, her life sustained by sheer will alone. Her driving force was the life of the child within her, urging her to endure long enough to bring him into the world, which she did.

Through some miracle or perhaps because the heavens took pity on her, Zheng Hu's mother managed to endure. She even summoned the strength to nurse him for three weeks before eventually passing away, a peaceful smile on her face as if content with her final act.

Whether she knew it or not, those three weeks not only saved Zheng Hu's life then but continued to do so after it became an anchor for him in the hardest of days.

After his mother died, his father, who had also survived the calamity, but with fewer injuries, took on the role of raising him, if it could be called that.

Years after the tribulation, its shadows still haunted those who had survived, many unable to escape its lingering effect even after leaving the town. Zheng Hu's father was one of those who couldn't escape. His body may have endured, but his mind had not. What remained within him was an unstable brew of fear and hatred, the fear born from what he had witnessed, the hatred from having survived it.

To numb these feelings, he turned to drink and every vice it brought with it—from gambling and women to fighting. Eventually, the fights spread from strangers to those closest to him, before finally it settled on Zheng Hu

Sometimes, Zheng Hu wondered if his father had kept him alive as a child only to have someone to beat on, like a farmer raising livestock. Yet as misfortune often births fortune, Zheng Hu's life was a testament to that saying.

For reasons unknown, Zheng Hu was born with a body far stronger than most. From birth, he had reached the gold body of the body refinement stage, and that innate strength was what allowed him to survive the countless beatings, neglect, and all that followed. One could only guess the tribulation that hit his hometown may have had something to do with the strength he was born with.

As his father's downward spiral continued, he racked up debts to dangerous people. In time, his only recourse was to sell the one thing of value he had left: his son, Zheng Hu.

Zheng Hu, aside from his abnormal strength, was striking to look at. With his flaming red hair and radiant golden skin, he looked more like a noble than a gambler's son—a fact the buyers appreciated. He was sold to a criminal syndicate that used him to pose as a noble, swindling others until, eventually, they targeted the wrong person, and the syndicate was wiped out, with only a handful surviving—including Zheng Hu.

Zheng Hu was spared because one of his captors saw potential in him, but that appreciation only went so far. They forced him to become a death warrior, a gladiator of sorts. From the time he was four until he was twelve, he knew nothing but violence, a world of darkness where a single misstep could mean death, all because of the father who sold him to pay off his debts.

Two lights kept him afloat in that darkness, one of those lights was the faint memory of a mother he couldn't even picture clearly, softly humming a broken melody of love. To Zheng Hu, that broken hum was a heavenly song, his one true comfort.

The second light was an old soldier—childless and without family—who had also been part of the death soldier's retinue. This old man became a grandfather figure to Zheng Hu, teaching him all he knew and eventually giving his life to grant Zheng Hu a chance at freedom. Zheng Hu seized that chance and eventually arrived at the Order's doors.

In honor of the old soldier, Zheng Hu took his family name, ensuring that the man's memory would live on.

What Zheng Hu had seen and endured made him intimately familiar with the world's darkness and sharpened his resolve to thrive within it. Yet, thanks to his two lights, he managed to endure that darkness without succumbing to it.