1 Prologue: A Genius is Born Again

"Wh-what? His mark is... abnormal?"

Li Fu exclaimed as the physician was giving his evaluation of Li Fu's newborn nervously. He pushed the physician aside and rushed towards the room where his wife gave birth. The wife was, as expected, sleeping peacefully.

It had been five hours since the newborn came into the world, but only now did the physician find the time to examine it. For some reason, he got much more jobs than he usually did, resulting in lack of time to address each one instantly. The Zhou clan, of course, was his priority.

The first-ranked minor clan, the Li clan was much lower ranked than the first-ranked major clan, the Zhou clan. Even though they were both big clans, the disparity in both their strength and wealth was not something to be ignored.

Even if he wanted to go and examine the Li clan head's newborn first, he had an obligation to prioritize the higher-ranked ones.

Initially, Li Fu harbored malicious thoughts towards this physician, but now that he discovered that his son was potentially a marked genius, he couldn't care less about him. His face was now filled with joy as he saw his baby's mark. It was very weird, with a part of every single mark appearing on it.

The baby was not sleeping, like his mother. Instead, he had an indifferent expression on his face, as if he was used to being born.

"Oh, Bai er...!"

This baby's given name was Bai, and naturally, his surname was Li like his father's.

Li Fu was overjoyed and couldn't wait to announce it to the rest of the city. With his son being a marked genius, surely the city would support the Li clan, making it rise even more through the ranks!

However, even if he was getting impatient, he knew that this news would be bad to some of the clans, especially the ones who don't have good relations with them, the Li clan.

As such, he needed to wait until this son of his was strong enough to defend himself so that none would be able to assassinate him. But given that his son was a marked genius, this was just a matter of time.

Rushing out of the room, Li Fu paid the physician more than they agreed on and asked him a request.

"Keep this matter a secret, or else..."

The physician nodded his head rapidly, not even daring to oppose the man in front of him. Even though the physician had a slightly higher position than the commoners, he still couldn't compare to the clan heads' position, not to mention that of a major clan!

.....

Night came.

The Zhou clan was celebrating the birth of the newborn baby of the clan head with an unorthodox method - drinking in this tiny pub. Tiny for them, at least.

Coincidentally, the physician was also there, complaining about his wife. He was obviously drunk.

"Him again?"

"He just won't stop..."

The owner of the pub was standing behind the counter, serving wine to everyone ordering. He, of course, noticed the physician's incessant rambling. This time was no exception.

Another drunkard conversed with him. This was the one that always asked about what he did earlier.

"Hey, hey! Yo-you examined some... some babies, right?"

As always, the drunk physician would answer this drunkard for some reason.

"Yeah..."

"Whose babies did you examine?"

"There were pretty many, I couldn't keep count of them. The only memorable ones were the Zhou clan's and the Li clan's..."

"The Li clan?"

"Yeah... the Zhou clan baby... was a Rat. Then... then the Li clan baby... was a Marked Genius..."

Zhou Gang, the Zhou clan patriarch, was conversing with his fellow clansmen when he suddenly overheard the physician's conversation with the other drunkard. He chimed in on the two's conversation, as he became interested in what the physician was saying.

"What did you say? Marked Genius?"

The drunkard became annoyed at the sudden interruption of this unknown person, while the physician, not recognizing that the one he was speaking to now was one of his clients earlier, responded rather quickly to the third party's question.

"Yeah, yeah! A Marked Genius. But I'm not supposed to say that... it's a secret."

As everyone was interested in what the Zhou clan patriarch said, this time, the inquiry of the Zhou clan patriarch and the fast answer of the physician was heard clearly by the other people in this run-down pub.

Zhou Gang was startled by the seemingly confident answer of the physician, and so were the rest of the people in the pub. In fact, they were all too startled to even retort at the physician's claim that the Li clan's newborn was a Marked Genius.

While everyone was still open-mouthed, the physician suddenly took out a large sum of gold, even more than what he should've earned in a week.

"Look, the Li clan patriarch even gave me hush money. He said to keep it a secret."

""...""

The people didn't know whether he was serious or not since everyone knew that he drank one too many glasses of alcohol. They now felt pity for him, as no one knew what consequences he would get as he blurted out the secret that the Li clan patriarch specifically told him to keep shut inside his mind. He even revealed the fact that he was paid hush money...

'He's dead. One-hundred percent dead.'

While everyone was shocked at how shameless someone under the influence of alcohol could be, Zhou Gang made his move.

Zhou Gang was open-minded, therefore he did not get dismayed at the fact that some clan other than his got a Marked Genius, but instead thought about the future prospects of the whole kingdom!

As a celebration of this wonderful day, for him at least, he treated everyone's alcohol.

.....

Li Fu did not have time to take care of his wife and child, because of the huge ruckus outside his mansion. There was a mob for some reason, with the usually amiable Zhou Gang leading it.

Li Fu and Zhou Gang were acquaintances, so the former skipped the formalities and asked the other.

"Zhou Gang, what is this whole... thing?"

Instead of answering Li Fu's question, Zhou Gang had a question of his own, changing the subject completely.

"Li Fu, did you have a son?"

Hearing Zhou Gang's question, Li Fu's eyebrows raised in confusion. Even so, he answered honestly and truly, since he did not find anything wrong with the question at all.

Anyway, in these parts, it was common knowledge that he had a son yesterday, so it was not like he was telling him his secrets.

"Yes, he was born yesterday... why?"

Again, rather than answering Li Fu's question to him, he raised another himself.

"Is he... a Marked Genius?"

At that moment, Li Fu's heart beat faster in nervousness. He had never told anyone this fact... The only four people who knew of this was him, his wife, the servant, and the physician.

He knew that it would be impossible for all of those to disclose the information since his wife knew what dangers could arise if she told the crowd that her son was a Marked Genius. Even if she did want to do that, she was still unable to walk temporarily.

While the latter two were ones that he paid to shut up about it, so how did this information spread, even to the ears of the Zhou clan patriarch?

Li Fu started shaking his head and both hands in denial.

"No, hahaha... of course not. Our measly clan, producing a Marked Genius? Impossible!"

This desperate denial was instantly slashed as Zhou Gang dragged someone else to the front. His hands were tied up with rope, evident that he wanted to escape.

Li Fu's eyebrows creased at the sight of the man whose hands were tied up. His expression darkened, with a face saying that he desired to kill the man in front of him.

It was the physician!

'I paid you to shut up, but you babble it as soon as you got out?'

Zhou Gang noticed his expression and immediately mediated between the two parties.

"Now, now. Don't blame him. I just wanted to have a talk with you."

.....

Six years later...

After the conversation between Zhou Gang and Li Fu, all of the other clans in Backwater City wanted to curry favor with the Li clan since they had such a child in their hands.

The whole city gave it their all to support the Li genius's growth, even incurring losses in their own clan to support the Marked Genius that unexpectedly appeared in their city.

As this was a sure investment, they didn't care at all about how much they have already spent on this Marked Genius.

Li Bai was now six years old, the ideal age to start cultivating, at least for them.

This failed miserably.