Chapter 1 The Failed Cultivator

'What a strange place.'

Wang Jixuan roughly flipped through the memories of this body, feeling somewhat bewildered.

Had he entered some bizarre little world?

This place had no rumors of Immortals, let alone traces of cultivation. The Human Race, called humans here, were living on this blue star, currently in a difficult situation, barely surviving after a great catastrophe.

Catastrophe? Blade Beasts?

What in the world were these things? Had the Devil World made its way here?

Wang Jixuan's residual soul was merging with this body.

To be precise, this young man named Mu Liang had ended his life moments ago by hanging himself, and Wang Jixuan's residual soul descended here, gradually taking over this body.

Possession?

No, no, no, that was something the demon people of the Demon Path would do.

Wang Jixuan preferred to think of his current situation as...

Rebirth!

Infinite Heavenly Venerate.

'Heavenly Tribulation can't do anything to me?'

Wang Jixuan wanted to laugh out loud, but unfortunately, he had yet to feel the existence of the body.

Grateful that he had survived the Heavenly Tribulation by a fluke, he couldn't help but look back on his long yet fleeting life.

Wang Jixuan felt like a joke.

He was called a once-in-ten-thousand-years genius in the Cultivation World, and in his previous life, he always strived to fulfill his natural talent for cultivation.

He had lived for one hundred and twenty-six years, of which one hundred and twenty were spent in arduous cultivation in the mountains.

When his parents passed away in the mortal world, he did not appear, only sending a sum of mundane gold and silver to his siblings through a fellow disciple;

When his master died in battle during the siege of a Demon Cultivator, he was earnestly in seclusion and had not yet had the chance to avenge his master when the old monster of the Demon Path was exterminated by the Righteous Cultivators.

For the sake of wholehearted cultivation, Wang Jixuan refused the proposals of companionship from Spiritual Sense Junior Sister and Senior Rou Ni;

And to strengthen his resolve toward the Dao, instead of enjoying the blessings of a Mahayana expert descending to the Lower Realm and flaunting power for three thousand years, he resolutely decided to face the Immortal Heavenly Tribulation, which had a success rate less than one in ten, upon reaching Mahayana Perfection.

And then... he was struck dead by a lightning tribulation.

Wang Jixuan thought he would be utterly annihilated, his centuries of hard cultivation leading only to ashes and smoke, but unexpectedly, there was a turn of fate. His residual soul floated in the darkness, somehow ending up here, occupying the body of this young man.

Wang Jixuan had a myriad of feelings:

'Sigh!'

'If only I could do it over again, I would definitely leave the place where I secluded myself for cultivation and see more of the world's colors.'

Of course, now wasn't so bad either.

No need for 'if'—he was going to live again.

In this life, he must strive mightily to become an Immortal and brave the Heavenly Tribulation once more!

He definitely wanted to see that rumored Immortal Realm!

Suddenly;

The suffocating feeling of the rope around his neck manifested;

Wang Jixuan felt dizzy and saw stars before his eyes, unable to muster any strength in his body, he instinctively began to struggle, but his struggles were too weak.

Something was off!

Very off!

He had possessed—no, been reborn into a young man who had just hanged himself! If he couldn't extricate himself from his current predicament, he would soon be hanged as well!

Even his residual soul had already merged with the body.

If he really died here, he would have no chance of even a residual soul escaping!

What to do, what to do?

The choking sensation and intense dizziness surged back and forth, Wang Jixuan was on the verge of losing his soul, his complexion reddened again, and the blood in his body circulated more frantically. His mind flashed through various profound spells, talismanic magic, and formations, none of which could be of any use now!

Although Wang Jixuan's cultivation career was seldom involved in fighting with others, he was still proficient in various skills. On the brink of death, he came up with a desperate plan. Using the last of his strength, his hands grasped the sheets that had been cut and twisted into a rope, and he recited through clenched teeth:

"Heaven round, earth square... the nine chapters of the law... Li Huo Ning Guang..."

Whoosh!

Two small flames emerged from his palms.

Wang Jixuan held his breath, for fear of extinguishing the two flames.

The flame on the right went out after two breaths.

The flame on the left started burning the cloth rope, and the fingers of this body were scorched!

His neck suddenly loosened, his feet hit the ground first, and then he collapsed limply to the floor, falling into a daze.

Wang Jixuan squeezed his eyes shut, breathing deeply the somewhat murky air, his ears constantly ringing, and his heart beating irregularly.

The pain coming from all over his new body couldn't ruin his surprisingly good mood.

I survived.

Although it was quite disgraceful.

Wang Jixuan felt relieved but also a bit puzzled.

Even if it was just a thread of his residual soul and had little Primordial Spirit Power, how could the simplest Fire Separation Spell he cast produce only two candle flames?

The first time he used the Fire Separation Spell as a little daoist boy, he had successfully summoned two flames the size of bowls...

Wang Jixuan recited a calming technique, allowing himself to quickly recover calmness at the cost of amplifying the pain in his body several times over.

The first thing he needed to do was to check his surrounding environment.

This thread of residual soul was too weak to send out his Spiritual Sense, and he could only struggle to sense the presence of Spiritual Energy after lying on the ground for a while.

The amount of Spiritual Energy in the air was very low, probably only one-tenth of the ordinary mortal world where Wang Jixuan originally was.

'This small world is not only strange in terms of the clothing and architecture of its inhabitants, but it also isn't very conducive to cultivation.'

Wang Jixuan inwardly heaved a sigh.

It was already good enough to still be alive;

Besides, although the Spiritual Energy in the air was scarce, it was not entirely unfit for cultivation. He remembered having insights about cultivation from the Foundation Establishment Four Realms to the Mahayana Realm. He would just need to gather more Spirit Stones or treasures with abundant Spiritual Energy to gradually make progress and face the Heavenly Tribulation again!

This failure of tribulation had forced Wang Jixuan to self-reflect.

Was the Tao Foundation of his previous life not stable enough?

Was his own understanding of the Tao not profound enough?

Perhaps only a true immortal could give him the answers.

Now that he had been reborn and was to cultivate anew, he was determined to work even harder than in his past life, to forge a more perfect Tao Foundation and understand a deeper level of the Tao and magic.

He would definitely step into the Immortal Realm and see the so-called Immortal Realm for himself to see what was so different from this mortal world!

'It's time to look at the memories of this body.'

'The language and characters they use seem not too different from those of the world in my previous life.'

'Mu Liang? Now that I live on your behalf, I will naturally take care of your family... Not bad, you don't actually have a family...'

Wang Jixuan was muttering to himself continuously as the pain throughout his body subsided a lot.

He remained lying down without moving rashly, his tightly furrowed brow gradually smoothing out as he repeatedly recited the Heart Clearing Spell in his heart.

The Heart Clarity Spell was a spell used to help oneself enter meditation quickly, and it also had the effect of clearing the mind and improving memory.

Wang Jixuan didn't see it at the moment, but as his mind recited the spell, very faint specks of light appeared in the air around him, converging toward his head.

Gradually, the originally blurry childhood memories of this body became clear and coherent.

Wang Jixuan pondered for a moment and chose to observe from the body's childhood, rapidly mastering the language and characters of this world through the memories of this young man named Mu Liang, who learned to speak and recognize characters as a child.

'The language is indeed similar to that of my original world, and the written characters also originate from the same source as my original world. They evolved from simple pictures into words, so they're not difficult to understand.'

Wang Jixuan revealed a faint smile, greedily learning the many new and curious words of this place and fully understanding their meanings.

This world, which he found very strange, was about to reveal just the tip of the iceberg to him...

Bang!

The locked iron door was directly smashed open with a battering ram.

Seven or eight men in orange uniforms looked inside the room, and the leader shouted, "Quick, save him," prompting three team members to rush in immediately.

Wang Jixuan immediately made a decision to continue lying there pretending to be unconscious, even as he accelerated the reading of the body's memories.

He could already basically understand what these people were saying.

"The person is alright! Just passed out!"

"There are marks on the neck!"

"Take pictures first, preserve the scene, he has seriously violated the regulations of the Self-Harm Act!"

"Fine, let's get him to the medical compartment for now, we'll worry about whether he's broken the law later! That needs to be determined by the Judicial Court and the doctors."

"Isn't someone who is saved from a suicide attempt supposed to undergo brain tissue removal surgery?"

"Another young person who has had a mental breakdown, how many does that make today? Mu Liang, the name is quite interesting, a Third-level common citizen, a mid-level technician, worth our rescue efforts."

"Use the stretcher! Stretcher! Don't carry him directly! Follow the procedures to avoid secondary injuries!"

"I'm actually moving a living person for the first time; every previous rescue ended up carrying away a corpse... Well, what I really mean is, how did this guy survive? There's no lighter here, right? His rope seems to be burned through, with charred edges, Captain."

"Thank the damned Human Rights Protection Act, we can't install public recorders in private spaces, who knows how he got down! Don't fret over these trivialities, save him first."

The team carefully placed Wang Jixuan onto the stretcher.

Wang Jixuan was somewhat puzzled.

What exactly was the Self-Harm Act?

According to these mortal government officers, even a suicide attempt was a grave sin, and he might face imprisonment?

Interesting.

Wang Jixuan's heart swelled with a bit of anticipation.

He continued to read through the memories of this body so that he could later convincingly impersonate this young man named Mu Liang, without giving himself away to these people.