Chapter 002

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‘ ‘ for thoughts.

“ “ for speech.

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Warning: May contain mature content (18+) of an adult nature. Read at your own risk.

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In a caravan, a horse drawn carriage had four people in it. There were two men just past their prime, a middle aged man and a young chubby teen boy. The two men in their thirties were armored in chainmail armor and equipped with sabers and crossbows. The middle aged man was wearing a leather jacket and pants with a slim sword sheathed near his waist and was shaking the chubby teen boy who seemed to be dozing. The chubby teen boy was fair skinned with a mild golden tint and had straight hair tied in a short pony tail. He opened his eyes and looked like he was in a daze.

The middle aged man addressed the chubby teen boy “Hao-er, wake up. We have almost reached the Twin Fort City.” The chubby teen boy opened his eyes, and seemed dazed. ‘WTF happened. Am I dreaming? I wasted an entire night filling a shitty survey and some old creep addresses me as Hao-er?’ thought the chubby teen boy. He clasped his head in his hands as he got a throbbing headache and memories seemed to flow into his mind. The middle age man frowned a bit, but waited for a reply from the chubby teen boy.

Memories flowed into the chubby teen boy’s mind. He recalled around a decade worth of memories. Apparently he was the youngest son of a merchant family, with not much aptitude for managing businesses. With all the nurturing he received, while his elder brothers could manage a ledger of a single restaurant at his age, the only way he could be useful at restaurants was at the kitchen. Indeed he had more talent in eating rather than in finance.

‘Hmm, this seems uncannily similar to the background subsection of the character generation of that stupid survey. What is happening? Am I having a lucid dream?’ The chubby teen boy pinched his arm and felt a jolt of pain, confirming that this was not a dream. Meanwhile the middle aged man was observing intently and cursing in his mind ‘This good-for-nothing young master. Because of his sudden impulse, I am his babysitter for this wretched journey. Damn it! If I could breakthrough to the Qi Condensation stage, then I wouldn’t have to be polite to a useless trash like him.’

The middle aged man was cursing young master Fang Hao in his mind. He was a branch clan member, appointed to his post by the Fang family for decades now. It was so inconvenient to leave his cushy position as head of the guards, and accompany this wastrel to Cloudy Sky City. This 14 year old brat was a whoring thief and gave the clan leader endless headaches. Damn it, he missed months of fun with his beautiful concubines for this brat.

Meanwhile “Fang Hao” was assimilating the new stream of memories. He remembered a life on a planet called “Earth” where last he was filling an advertisement survey after a hard day’s work where he was almost 50 years old. Another was as the youngest son of a merchant who managed restaurants in a town. Apparently, he was not very good at managing the finances of a restaurant, but was good at eating!

Fortunately his elder brothers had a far better aptitude than him at business, and his father let him fool around. While “Fang Hao” was fooling around in one of the restaurants eating his fill, what appeared to be a drunken Buddhist monk barged into the restaurant and demanded more wine. From his tattered attire, he didn’t seem to have much money, yet he demanded wine!

When the staff of the restaurant tried to shoo him, the drunken monk beat them up until they were like crippled children. “Fang Hao” was impressed by his prowess and had thought that if he had power similar to the drunken monk he could do whatever he want and not be bullied by his father and brothers! He had immediately kowtowed as asked him to take him as a disciple. The drunken monk laughed and had just ruffled his head before drinking his wine and leaving.

Excluding the drunken monk episode, most of his alternate memories matched with the survey he had filled. ‘Can it be that the survey actually transported me to a different world? If that’s the case good thing I wasn’t too stingy and select penalties like “Orphan” to get a few more CP. At the very least I had selected to be literate and know to speak and write this strange new language that old man spoke in.’ “Fang Hao” was surprisingly calm considering the implications of the conclusion he had drawn. He noticed his surrounding and looked at the middle-aged man. He recalled that he was one of the branch clan members loyal to his father, at the peak of late stages of Qi Gathering Realm.

“Yes uncle Mu, I am awake now. Fortunately the journey was smooth.” Fang Hao replied respectfully. Even though he was the main descendent of a wealthy merchant clan, the middle aged Man had contributed a lot to the clan and was awarded the position of Head of the Household Guards by his father. After a quarter of an hour, they reached a gigantic sand colored fort, which was at least a kilometer across, with a huge steel portcullis. It was strategically placed at the only pass in the vast mountain ranges which spanned for hundreds of kilometers in both directions. At the other end of the mountain pass was another giant fort, and the area between them was a city, which was humongous by medieval standards.

The Caravan broke apart into many smaller camps as members for each camp made separate arrangements to enter Twin Fort City. Uncle Mu dealt with all the arrangements and they passed through the fort swiftly entered the city. Entering the “city”, Fang Hao was shocked to see fields cultivating wheat. Seeing Fang Hao’s shock, Uncle Mu explained that this Twin Fort city was an independent city state ruled by a council of High lords. Many nearby kingdoms were eyeing it for its strategic location, but it could endure a siege for years if required. While it was being sieged, the loss in trade was enough for the merchant conglomerates to pressure other kingdoms to attack the besieging kingdom and the balance of power was maintained.

‘Apparently, if you have enough of money, you can make even Royalty your bitches, eh. But I guess this just goes for the mortal kingdoms. A stronger cultivator could easily eradicate a smaller sect if he had an excuse, and nobody would take any action.’ thought Fang Hao, as he heard Uncle Mu’s explanation on the political scenario of Twin Fort City. He was here to be delivered to a mid-sized sect as an outer disciple. His father had given up hope for him to manage businesses, and had decided to pay some tribute to a locally powerful sect, making them take him as an outer disciple. In case his good for nothing 14 year old son does succeed at cultivating, it will be a huge boost to the clan’s reputation (aka “face”).

They rested at a medium-sized inn for almost a week, during which Fang Hao thoroughly assimilated the memories of the previous Fang Hao. Apparently his host liked to visit brothels a lot, and stole money from business to finance his escapades. He also was a fat glutton who preferred to hold a position of responsibility at restaurants… so that he could steal exquisite food as well as money for brothels. His father was at his wits end as to how to discipline him, since his mother always supported and defended him. Finally it was decided for him to be a disciple at a sect, even if the tribute required was huge.

This time, Fang Hao also tried various ‘game’ commands like staring at objects and thinking/saying commands like “Inspect” and “Observe”. All his attempts failed, and he only succeeded once when he mentally shouted “Status Screen”. A translucent blue screen floated in his vision.

STATUS SCREEN Name: Fang Hao Race: Human Gender: Male Age: 14 years Titles: Class: Mortal Level 0 Current Experience: 0 Level Up at Experience: 50 Active Effects: Stats Physique: 0.5 Finesse: 0.5 Spirit: 0.8 Traits Calm Lucky Primal Instinct ??Blessed by a Drunken monk??

‘Looks like my status screen looks identical in the survey, except for the “??Blessed by a Drunken Monk” part. It seems that the drunken monk part is my diligence bonus.’ thought Fang Hao, as he reviewed his status screen. He recalled that he had spent a good chunk of his CP to acquire the traits “Calm”, “Lucky” and “Primal Instinct”. Too bad he would have to sacrifice almost everything worthwhile if he wanted even one of the better traits like “Unshakable Will of the Divine Mountain”, “Heavenly Good Fortune” and “Heaven Revealing Third Eye“. He could only dream about a top tier trait like “Bloodline of the Primordial Dragon.” And/or starting with possession of any of the heavenly treasures.

‘Maybe I could afford the godly treasures if I had selected an apocalyptic setting or something which would probably give me more CP for character creation.’ So he had settled on three useful, but not earth-shaking traits. His logic was that a bit of luck, a calm mind and some instinct to avoid danger would go a long way for a cultivator. They were the most useful traits he could afford anyway. While character creation, he had deliberated on the three Stats Physique, Finesse and Spirit and in the end chose to pump the entire leftover CP for 60% Spirit bonus because wasn’t Cultivation about insight and spiritual stuff? Other than recognizing Mt. Tai and slaughtering for treasures of course.

He assumed that Physique stat affected the strength, constitution and endurance of his body; Finesse stat affected his agility, reaction speed and perception; Spirit stat affecting the power of his spells and resistance to mental enchantments. He also assumed that a fully grown human mortal in his prime would have 1.0 in these 3 stats…otherwise the stat system would be pretty arbitrary. Those were just guesses though and without leveling up and testing he won’t know for sure.

Soon it was the appointed day when the representatives of the Sect would arrive. His entourage took him to a huge coliseum, where the guards waited outside, and only Uncle Mu and he were allowed to enter when uncle Mu showed the personnel at the coliseum a silvery token. Fang Hao and Uncle Mu navigated the interior of the coliseum and sat at the stands among hundreds of other people. They waited a few hours before they saw a giant lotus leaf descending, which landed at the center of the coliseum.