The last thing Liang Chen remembered of Earth was the taste of burnt coffee and the flicker of his computer screen at 2:47 a.m. The rain outside his apartment window had been relentless, drumming against the glass like an impatient hand. He had been reading—no, devouring—another cultivation novel, half-mocking it, half-wishing that life were truly that simple. Gain power, break limits, ascend. Unlike reality, where effort didn't always mean reward.
He leaned back in his chair, eyes stinging from exhaustion.
Then the power went out.
Darkness swallowed the room, followed by a sound that did not belong—like the sky itself tearing apart. The air grew heavy, crushing, and before Liang Chen could even stand, the floor vanished beneath him.
He fell.
Not down a staircase. Not through a building.
Through nothing.
Colors bled into one another—gold, violet, endless black—while ancient whispers brushed against his ears in a language he didn't understand, yet somehow felt. His body stretched, tore, and reformed. Pain existed for an instant… then vanished, as if even suffering had been left behind.
When he could feel again, it was cold.
Liang Chen gasped and sat upright, coughing violently as water spilled from his mouth. His palms pressed against damp soil, thick with the scent of moss and old rain. Above him stretched a sky unlike any he had seen—vast and deep, with clouds shaped like coiling dragons and stars faintly visible despite the daylight.
"This has to be a dream," he muttered, his voice hoarse.
But dreams didn't feel this sharp.
His clothes were different. Gone were his jeans and hoodie. In their place was a simple gray robe, rough in texture but warm. His hands—he stared at them in shock—were leaner, stronger, the calluses unfamiliar. When he stood, his body moved with a strange lightness, as if gravity itself had loosened its grip.
A sudden pressure swept over him.
It wasn't physical. It was… spiritual.
The air hummed, alive with an invisible energy that poured into his skin the moment he inhaled. Liang Chen froze as warmth flooded his chest, spreading through invisible pathways. Information surfaced in his mind without warning—meridians, dantian, spiritual roots.
His heart pounded.
"Qi…" he whispered.
He had read about this countless times, laughed at it even. Yet now, sitting cross-legged on foreign soil, he could feel it—an ocean of power waiting to be drawn in.
Before he could test the sensation further, a distant roar echoed through the forest.
Trees shook. Birds scattered in terror. The sound was deep, ancient, and filled with hunger.
Liang Chen's blood ran cold.
Whatever world he had fallen into, it was not peaceful. And if the cultivation novels he loved were right, then power here was not a luxury—it was survival.
Clenching his fists, Liang Chen looked toward the shadowed forest ahead.
"If this world runs on cultivation," he said quietly, eyes burning with resolve, "then I'll climb it… from the very bottom."
The wind howled in response, carrying with it the scent of danger—and destiny.