Chapter One: Li Qi

The sun hung high in the sky, its rays piercing through the thick fog and spilling onto the earth. Though it was winter, the warmth it brought chased away the chill, making the cold almost unnoticeable.

Li Qi stepped out of his home, weariness weighing heavily on both his body and mind, causing him to stifle a yawn. The breath he exhaled formed little clouds of white mist in the crisp air.

As he walked, his phone kept vibrating incessantly—messages flooding in from both the family group chat and his class group chat. In the family group, people frequently tagged everyone; it was a large group tied to the family business, with a maximum capacity of two thousand members. The Li clan was vast, having grown steadily over decades since the patriarch founded the family enterprise. Though the clan members numbered far more than two thousand, they were split across several groups.

The class group, naturally, was one without teachers.

Normally, at just past eight in the morning during winter vacation, students wouldn’t be awake this early. But today was different.

In the southern region, clan traditions were strong. With only three days to the New Year, today was the day of the clan’s ancestral rites. So early in the morning, the group chats were filled with groans and complaints—people bemoaning being woken from their sleep.

After the lamentations, the more lively began seeking amusement, discussing all sorts of novel and abstract topics. This explained the frequent mass mentions.

During school days, boundaries between people had never felt so rigid.

Within the brief time Li Qi had been outside, the topics in the chats had shifted from speculation about the school’s post-holiday reopening, to whether the weapon-fighting club would see a dark horse rise, to defeating the “female demon” and claiming the “Southern Star” crown to dominate the entire school, and even launching expeditions against other schools. Then the conversation veered toward a certain overseas champion whose skills were mediocre—imagining if Li Qi himself were in charge, he would make dark dueling part of the national health insurance so ordinary people could watch death matches daily, enjoying their thrill and excitement...

In short, the chat was full of youthful energy, exactly as one would expect from young people of their age.

Li Qi, however, had little interest in idle chatter, even though he was young himself.

He was sixteen years old, a second-year high school student.

But that simple fact belied a more complex reality—this life was not his first.

Though even in his previous life, he was not much older.

In his last life, Li Qi had lived until twenty-five, freshly graduated and beginning to endure the grind of the 9-to-9-to-6 work culture. Then, on a business trip, he had slept in a hotel on a small island. When he awoke, he found himself in a different world.

Both worlds were called Earth, sharing many similarities—roughly the same timeline, comparable technology—but there were many differences too. History had taken a major turn over five thousand years ago, yet at certain points, it looped back upon itself, as if influenced by some mysterious parallel universe force.

As for Li Qi, he had not undergone a soul transmigration but a womb transmigration—his memories only returned recently, about three months ago, along with the appearance of his “cheat system.”

“So how exactly did my previous self die...?” Li Qi wondered as he glanced at the translucent panel that floated before him, reflecting his thoughts. Nearly a hundred days had passed, and he still could not be certain of his cause of death.

His last memory from that life was drifting in sleep, vaguely hearing a warning from his phone about an incoming nuclear strike and being urged to seek shelter in a bomb shelter. Then came an endless flash of light. He hadn’t even felt heat, likely because death was instantaneous.

Yet Li Qi doubted whether this final memory was truly real or merely a dream.

After all, though he had traveled for work to an island in the sea, it was a popular tourist destination, not a desolate area. The idea of a nuclear strike there was so fantastical it defied logic—even novels wouldn’t dare depict such a scenario.

Besides, in his previous life, the nation of Yanhuang was not weak.

“Damn it! I died too fast. Old Zhao still owes me money and never got around to paying me back. We promised to never forget each other if we got rich. But now it’s this kid who benefits…”

Recalling past memories, Li Qi felt a pang of melancholy.

Old Zhao had been a close friend in his previous life, close enough that Li Qi lent him a significant sum without hesitation. The key point was that Old Zhao had borrowed the money under the pretense of going abroad to make a name for himself. No one with a casual acquaintance would have lent him money.

Only Li Qi hadn’t asked many questions—he had just said, “Never forget each other if we make it big,” and lent out all the red envelope money he’d saved over the years, leaving himself just enough for living expenses.

Now, thinking back, Li Qi wasn’t concerned about reclaiming the impossible debt but rather mourning a past that could never be revisited.

The gap between then and now wasn’t merely time—it was an almost unimaginable distance.

“But surely, Old Zhao wouldn’t have used a nuclear bomb just to avoid paying me back, right? Erasing the creditor from existence to clear the debt... that would be too extreme.”

Li Qi’s thoughts wandered off again, spinning wild theories.

“Still, this world isn’t bad. Here, one can reach the extraordinary and even the saintly—things I never dared dream of in my past life. Had I lived to eighty or ninety back then, I might never have been reborn into this world.”

The panel before him was his cheat system.

Life Owner: Li Qi
Reincarnation Mark: 1 (???)
Innate Talent: ??? 3% (???), Reincarnation Mark (???)
Life Chart: 97% (Loading...)
Realm: Mortal (95%)
Vitality: 1.36 (Note: Health average for 28-year-olds is 1.0) (All Things Refined)
Innate Coefficient: 1.13
Six Dimensions (Note: Health average for 28-year-olds is 1.0) (All Foundations)
Essence: 1.35
Qi: 1.12
Spirit: 1.51
Mind: 1.76
Will: 1.21
Wisdom: 1.15
Skill: Eighteen Tiger Slashes Missing Five (White·Absolute) LV3 (192/300)
Projection: 80% (Loading...)
Fate Count: 135 (+2.5/day) (Everyone has fate; it naturally disperses; extraordinary awakening suppresses fate)
Shop: 80% (Loading...)
Log:

The good news: he had a cheat system for transmigration. The bad news: even after three months, several functions were still unactivated.

Judging by the status of these functions, they seemed to be core features of the system.

The realm displayed on the panel also revealed the greatest difference between this world and his past life: the existence of a near-exceptional cultivation path.

It was described as near-exceptional because the cultivation here differed greatly from Li Qi’s previous understanding.

Was cultivation not supposed to be about absorbing the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, mastering the powers of water, fire, and thunder? At the end, attaining immortality by gathering and dispersing one’s qi, living eternally through countless tribulations?

Unfortunately, this world remained materialistic. There was no so-called energy for humans to absorb. Instead, cultivation had developed into an almost ultimate path of pure physical and spiritual evolution.

The body nurtured the spirit, which in turn controlled and transformed the body, creating a stronger body to nurture an even stronger spirit—a continuous cycle, like stepping from one foot to the other, ascending directly to the heavens.

Ultimately, the spirit neared immortality, and the body approached indestructibility, though humans still died—it was only an approximation.

No supernatural energy was involved. Ordinary people consumed rice and meat for sustenance; powerful cultivators ate large amounts of rice, meat, or concentrated nutritional essences to fuel their bodies. This did not align with Li Qi’s former fantasies of cultivation.

This was the martial way of this world.

Though magic was absent, cultivation at high levels still fulfilled part of Li Qi’s fantasies of the extraordinary: walking on snow without a trace, turning carbon into diamonds, slicing iron with wooden swords, exhaling air as a sword…

The existence of extraordinary martial arts was the main reason two Earths diverged historically. Individuals with immense strength could alter the course of history in certain places.

In this world, martial arts were widespread—everyone had some exposure, though few achieved notable success.

The human desire for strength was instinctual. With the rise of martial arts, the fastest-growing sector in the past thirty years was weapon fighting—known as the weapon-fighting club.

From small school clubs to large social weapon-fighting clubs and myriad tournaments, in this era, if your combat power was strong enough, you could have everything—wealth, power...

Any top weapon-fighting master was more famous than any other celebrity.

Even the royal court used weapon fighting to select talent, though these were no ordinary competitions but the martial imperial exams!

Held every three years, open to those under twenty-two.

The value of a martial champion was unlike that of a literary champion; since martial arts could transcend the ordinary, any martial champion could be remembered as the world’s number one, even if qualified as the “young generation” champion.

In this nationwide fervor, from countries to small schools, anyone who could truly cultivate skills gained widespread acclaim and became a star.

Li Qi’s school was no exception.

But all along, he had been a nobody, far removed from the stars—his grades were average, his martial skills unremarkable.

That was how he was three months ago.

Through the cheat system’s basic functions—“Heaven Rewards Diligence,” “One Certification for Life,” and forced proficiency gain—in just three months, he had leveled his sword technique from novice to a stage nearing minor mastery.

“Hmph! What’s the point of talking big? This winter break, I’ll quietly grind my proficiency and, when school reopens, I’ll break through the weapon-fighting club and show you what it means to have the talent of a Great Sage…”

Li Qi glanced at the class group chat, silently thinking.

After all, he was still young.

He knew full well that breaking through the weapon-fighting club required more than minor mastery of swordsmanship, but dreams were worth having—no harm in that.

As for the family group, it was notifying everyone currently at home to gather at the ancestral hall before nine o’clock.