The air in Holy Spirit Village was crisp, scented with pine and the dry earth of late summer. Inside the village temple, built of rough-hewn stone and dimly lit by the mid-morning sun filtering through high, narrow windows, six-year-old Lin Feng stood motionless. Outwardly, he appeared to be a nervous child awaiting a pivotal moment; internally, he was a calculating man trapped in a cosmic joke.
Lin Feng had been a corporate drone and an avid otaku on Earth before a reckless bus driver ended his mundane life and thrust his consciousness into this new world. For six years, he had lived with the terrifying, exhilarating knowledge of this world's future—a future where he was meant to be nothing but cannon fodder. He knew about the Spirit Hall, the God Realm, the Clear Sky Hammer, and most importantly, the boy currently standing beside him: Tang San. Lin Feng understood the rules of the game: talent was measured by Martial Soul quality and Innate Soul Power level. If he wanted to survive, let alone thrive, he needed one of the two to be extraordinary. He had hoped, prayed, that his reincarnation would grant him some kind of innate cheat.
The village elder, Old Jack, a kindly man with a deeply wrinkled face, beamed at the two boys. The Spirit Hall Deacon, a low-level Spirit Master named Su Yuntao, with his worn uniform and slightly bored expression, stood ready, holding the blue crystals of the Martial Soul Awakening Array. Lin Feng was called first. He stepped into the six shining stones, and the energy rushed into him. The light was faint, almost pathetic, unlike the brilliant glow he knew should accompany a powerful Martial Soul. When the light dissipated, the results were painfully clear.
Floating above Lin Feng's hand, shimmering with a sickly, weak energy, was the epitome of uselessness: The Scrawny Chicken. It was a small, dusty-looking fowl, barely larger than his thumb, and it offered no spiritual or physical strength. The Deacon sighed, his boredom returning tenfold. "It's a beast soul, child, but... one of the most common, non-attacking type. Useless." Lin Feng felt a heavy stone of despair sink in his stomach. He was a Scrawny Chicken Master, destined to be a peasant for life. But the final nail was yet to be driven. Deacon Su Yuntao placed a crystal sphere in Lin Feng's hand to check his soul power. It remained dark. "Innate Soul Power... Level 0. Child, you cannot even sense soul power. You have no path as a Spirit Master." Old Jack's face crumpled with pity, and the other villagers whispered in sympathy.
Next up was Tang San. The energy surrounding Tang San was instantly brighter, stronger, and more focused. When the light faded, the iconic image appeared: a shimmering Blue Silver Grass—another famously useless Martial Soul, but at least slightly stronger than a scrawny chicken. However, the next test stunned the Deacon and the villagers: the crystal sphere in Tang San's hand glowed with an unprecedented, vibrant light. "Innate Full Soul Power! Level 10!" Deacon Su Yuntao roared, his voice laced with shock and awe. Tang San, standing next to his thoroughly humiliated peer, gave Lin Feng a brief, almost arrogant glance of pity—the look of the chosen one realizing his inevitable superiority. The universe had confirmed the hierarchy: Lin Feng was the trash; Tang San was the destined hero.
Lin Feng walked out of the temple, the crushing weight of his failure making his small shoulders ache. The contrast between his Level 0, Scrawny Chicken failure and Tang San's Level 10, Full Soul Power success was a chasm he could never cross with conventional means. He fled the whispers and the pity, hiding behind the village forge shed. The shame and rage were a boiling cauldron in his chest. Six years of planning, six years of knowing the future, and I am still stuck as the biggest loser in the whole damned continent? His past life knowledge felt utterly meaningless without the power to act on it.
Despair reached its nadir. Lin Feng slammed his fist against the rough wood of the shed, and in that moment of absolute desperation and physical contact, a cold, mechanical voice that seemed to bypass his ears and speak directly to his soul sounded in his mind:
[BEEP] Soul Resonance Detected. Conditions for Hostile Environment Stabilization Met.
[WELCOME, HOST. THE INFINITE FUSION SYSTEM (IFS) IS NOW ACTIVE.]
Lin Feng froze, his heart pounding a chaotic rhythm against his ribs. The voice was real, metallic, and devoid of emotion. A transparent, ghostly blue panel materialized in his vision, visible only to him. At the top, in impossible characters, the system's core function glowed: FUSE ANYTHING. ANYTIME. NO RESTRICTIONS. Below it, the first quest appeared, an immediate, life-altering challenge:
QUEST 1: BREAK THE LIMITS
Objective: Achieve Level 1 Soul Power from your current Level 0 state. Prove that the concept of 'Innately Useless' is meaningless to the Host.
Reward: Fusion Blueprint Library (Tier 1), Martial Soul Evolution Boost (Tier 1).
Failure: System Deactivation and Host Death.
The panel solidified his purpose. His useless Martial Soul and Level 0 Soul Power weren't limitations; they were the catalysts for the ultimate cheat. Lin Feng's humiliation evaporated, replaced by a terrifying, cold excitement. He looked at the Scrawny Chicken Martial Soul shimmering faintly in his hand, a symbol of his past failure. Now, with the Infinite Fusion System, it was merely a piece of raw material waiting to be fused with the concept of infinity. His weak-to-strong journey was about to begin, and the path to making Tang San's life a living hell had just opened.