The Fengyun world hummed with a different kind of peace now. Xiongba sat on the public bench in the martial hall, calm and unoffended. The martial association of his world had settled firmly into his control; disciples were competent and loyal. In middle age, what a man wanted most was a legacy, and he had it. He allowed himself to enjoy this small triumph.
Then a ping from the cross-world chat cut through the silence.
Someone had posted into the Wanjie group. Xiongba frowned. He activated a small bubble of internal breath to focus — ten meters around him grew so still that a falling needle would sound like thunder. For a second he suspected an illusion.
"Who's speaking to me?" he asked aloud, cheeky and wary.
On the group feed the messages kept flashing. Li Er typed first: "Brothers and sisters, new arrival's affairs are yours — I'm stuck in the Tomb of Saints, can't break out yet."
Tanjiro replied: "+1. Territory's packed with good players. Haven't had such a thrill in ages."
"Brother… I envy!" Master Murong added. The Demon Sword Spirit quipped about being the reception desk again. The fox who only loved money offered to take the role and rest.
Then a longer note: "@天下会帮主, please read the intro videos in the group first. There are gods in this chat — watch your words. If you seek meditation strength, ask. Knowing is half the way."
Rin Tohsaka (now, incredulously, a four-star divine envoy) cleared her throat and began her ceremonial lecture at once. "Ahem. As a four-star envoy, allow me to explain to @雲儿: no matter which plane you're from, remember — God is omnipotent…"
A chorus of scoffs and jokes rolled in: Kaoru: "Are you a magic stick?" Deliverable laughter, ninja scientist snorts, a delighted Gothic Queen of Vampires remarking on the Versailles drama. The chat was its usual chaotic self: envious, snarky, and oddly reverent.
Xiongba sat back, slightly amused, watching the parade of messages. Then someone else posted: a short video.
Rin had uploaded footage. The angle was grand: the Eternal Shrine looming like a small sun, the long River of Time sliding above the shrine like an orange aurora, light bathing the ground. The planet at the shrine's base — a sphere so massive and brilliant — took up the screen. The chat fell into near silence.
"The Eternal Shrine… that's where the gods dwell!" the Demon Sword Spirit whispered.
"Tosaka, is that the god's sun at your feet?" Blond Boy Sam asked, awed.
Chu Dashan wrote, stunned: "⊙﹏⊙ …I meant to promote God's power in my world, but Rin Tohsaka keeps beating me to it."
Videos cascaded. Members posted their own glimpses of Wei worlds and Tomb skirmishes. The Tomb of Saints fight raged heavy, Li Shimin and Tanjiro embroiled in a frontline that looked like the end of the world. Others sent clips of their own domains: unification campaigns, newly summoned priestesses, novices opening to divine truth.
Then Xun'er joined.
A new member notification blinked: Xun'er has joined the group.
Ping. The room rapidly filled with welcomes and curious probes.
A newcomer's message read, arrogant and sharp: "I am a princess of the ancient clan. Many strong elders serve our house. What rank are you, a mere stick of magic?"
Rin bristled. "Excuse me? @Xun'er, who do you think you are to speak of gods so freely? Respect the shrine."
Xun'er's answer was cold: "I have no patience for tutors who lecture without power. I will watch your videos. If the God is as real as you say, then fate favors my people — and I intend to carve a path for them."
She opened the uploaded shrine clip and watched. On-screen, the Eternal Shrine's radiance still hummed, and something old and tremendous moved in the footage — the River of Time, scenes of entire histories folded into light. Then, in the video, the god had risen.
At that moment Xun'er's breath caught. The memory fragments streamed across the footage — not hers, but pieces of others' deliverance: a scene of the Eternal God turning aside a titanic stone fetus; the mud-born being collapsing under divine radiance. The sheer scale of the god stunned her so hard she felt her soul reel.
A cold sweat rose along Xun'er's spine. Her limbs trembled.
This is real. The thought that had hovered at the edge of rumor became a solid truth. The Eternal God was not a parable, not a legend swallowed by time. He was real. He was everything.
If such a being existed, could Xun'er make use of Him? Could she lead the ancient clan from the abyss into dazzling fortune? Could she ensure their survival — even to the point of dominating other bloodlines?
Ambition awoke in her with violent clarity.
She dove into the group's resource folder and downloaded the Eternal Meditation tutorial immediately. She scrolled through every video, every report. She duplicated the runes, traced the breathing patterns, stored the mantras.
The meditation didn't feel like any cultivation she had tried before. It felt like opening a new organ. It felt like a long-dormant seed exploding in the chest.
Within hours — or so it seemed to her — she had surged. Her body pulsed; veins lit, ancestral blood answering the call. Her soul tightened like a drawn bow and then released.
Her cultivator's metrics spiked. Dou Ling. Dou Wang. Dou Huang. Dou Zong. Dou Zun. Each step rose faster than custom. She burst through boundaries concern by concern: semi-sage approached, then tremulous edges of sage. Her newfound power shocked her attendants — Yao Lao and small Xiao Huo stared with open jaws.
"Is this… a consecrated reincarnation?" Yao Lao murmured, baffled. "This speed of awakening — impossible for someone of her background."
Xun'er laughed to herself in the small room, a laugh half-delighted and half-wild. She could feel the old clan's ancient lineage strengthen in her. She could feel the possibility of becoming a goddess in the not-so-distant future.
When Xiao Huo finally intruded — breathless, clutching the ring he'd given her — he refused to accept what she'd just announced.
"Xun'er. Why are you leaving? Why the rush?" he asked, hurt coating his words.
She glanced at her hand where his ring had glowed. Inside the jewel a whisper had glimmered — a promise she hadn't known she would make aloud.
His voice softened. "Is someone forcing you? Are you being coerced by the family?"
"No," Xun'er replied, voice flat as steel. "I have promised this body to the gods. If you want to grow strong, you must let go of such chains. This ring binds you to ordinary things—ragged priorities—while the gods grant true ascension. If you cling to adornments, you will only become another wedge in their trap."
Xiao Huo's face paled. The sentiment cut like a knife.
"You speak like you've buried me," he whispered. "I thought you were a daughter of the clan; we share blood. Don't toss us aside."
Xun'er's eyes glittered — not with love, but with frigid resolve. "A faint soul that drinks the grudges of others — what face does it have, really? If you still insist on such weakness, I will arrest and execute you. Don't test me."
The threat hung in the air. It was not mere bluster. It was a promise carved in certainty.
Xiao Huo retreated, stunned and furious in equal measure. He stared down at the ring as if it could answer him. Xun'er gathered her meditation scripts, sealed her satchel, and walked out into the courtyard — the silver light of her clan's altar striking her shoulder like a badge.
Back in the group chat, reactions cascaded. Some members cheered the new member's courage. Others scolded her coldness. Rin sent a terse admonishment: "One does not marry a god lightly." The fox chimed in: "Worship our God, not your arrogance. We'll help you pray."
But Xun'er had already turned inward. The Eternal Meditation took root. The ancient phrasework, at first foreign and jagged, soon bent to her will. The result was a surprising cascade: body refinements, ancestral blood blossoming, new meridians opening. Her clan's dormant gifts flared to life.
It was a harvest the elders had thought dead.
By dawn she had awakened to a new rank: a doubling of Qi, the feel of a semi-sage's depth. Her servants gaped. The household's old guard — stoic Yao Lao included — found themselves clutching their chests as a power older than time brushed past.
"Is this a reincarnation blessing?" Yao Lao said, awed. "But she's too young to trigger this…"
Xun'er only smiled. The ambition in her chest had become a furnace. She could already map the future in her mind: sacrifices, shrine devotion, a rising goddess-cadre, her family remade at the feet of the Eternal. The idols they'd once bowed to — petty, decayed ancestors that kept the clan's power starved and inward — would be swept aside. She would reforge them into ministers of God.
That night, when the chat group quieted and only the regulars remained online, Xun'er posted a short declaration: "I have betrothed this body to the gods. All who follow me shall be elevated; all who resist shall be crushed."
Rogue laughter. A flood of emoji worship. Messages of "Hail Xun'er" and "Betrothed? Congrats" filled the lines, mixed with a dozen snide comments — old cyber-skeptics who couldn't believe a mortal could rise so fast.
Rin messaged privately: "Be careful. Being chosen by a god is to be in a bargain you do not fully control."
Xun'er's reply was blunt: "I know. I choose my bargain."
She didn't tell them then — not yet — that the bargain had its own teeth. In the private silence of meditation she had glimpsed the god's gaze in the footage: not amorphous benevolence, but a horizon. The Eternal God gave more than power; He also took. Devotion required price. But Xun'er had decided she would pay it gladly, because the cost was smaller than her clan's extinction.
Across the plane, other gardeners of fate handled their own harvests. Chu Xuanfeng had already become a Four-Star Divine Envoy by decree; the reincarnation land's offerings had fed the god's domain. Heroes and knightly lines woke in strange rooms, knights kneeling before new thrones, priests learning liturgy in a language that smelled of stars and old rivers.
Xun'er took her first steps down the path with no illusions. She would bargain, but she would bargain hard. She would fashion the bridegroom's altar until the gods himself could not turn away. She would not merely be chosen — she would make the choice that shaped the choosing.
Before sleep took her, she tapped a final message into the Wanjie group: "If you want true power, come and worship. But remember: the gods do not love weakness. Prepare to be remade."
A thousand answers poured back. Some mocked. Others bowed. A few, like Chu Dashan and Tanjiro, sent quiet thumbs-up. Xiao Huo read the line and closed his eyes, the metallic warmth of the ring shining weakly in his palm — a symbol that had once meant betrothal, now a thing that trembled on the cusp of being sold.
Above all of them, in his unshakable seat, Liu Che watched the small dramas with patient amusement. A new recruit, one more heart turned toward the Eternal, was another drop in the river of faith. The plane war to come would not be merely an exchange of blades — it would be a competition for hearts, for vows, for souls. Xun'er had made her wager. Let the game begin.