Chapter 3: The Beginning |
On the rooftop of a rental apartment.
A stabbing pain seared through the man's mind, slowly dragging his hazy consciousness out from the darkness.
He opened his eyes and looked ahead, seeing a busy, filthy street not far in the distance.
On both sides of the street, colorful neon signs flickered above, while above them loomed rows of pitch-black buildings crammed together, as if trying to blot out the sky.
Beneath his feet was a run-down apartment building. The faded red brick walls were still playing a financial services ad, featuring flying, teleporting immortals promoting an interest-free Cultivation Loan for new users for thirty days.
“Wasn’t I just playing a black-market game?”
“Where the hell am I?”
As he tried to piece things together, he turned his head—and saw the rooftop was filled with candles.
Rows of scarlet flames flickered, encircling him and an old, worn-out doll.
The bizarre scene seemed to shock his brain into action. Fractured memories surged through his mind, tumbling and clashing.
“This isn’t China anymore… I’ve transmigrated to another world?”
He struggled to accept the truth.
But the vivid memories of Immortal Dao technologies kept hammering at his awareness. As he gradually merged with this body’s former consciousness, he could no longer deny it—this truly was another world.
This was Kunxu: a colossal, pyramid-shaped superstructure rising from the earth. It had thirty-six levels aboveground and eighteen below.
Starting from the vast first floor, each level was like its own miniature world.
As for what lay outside Kunxu, Zhang Yu had no clue.
All he knew was that within Kunxu, power belonged to the great sects of the Immortal Dao.
These sects sat at the top of the hierarchy, monopolizing nearly every industry—food, energy, transportation, education, research, medicine, finance, internet. Even the government and military seemed more like glorified security guards compared to the sects' enforcement squads.
Ordinary people, however, could barely enjoy any benefits of Immortal Dao technologies. They toiled each day just to survive.
Zhang Yu was one of them—a high school student living on the first floor of Kunxu, attending a school called Songyang High. Recently, he had become obsessed with a strange ritual...
“Now, I’ve become the Zhang Yu of this world.”
Just then, a sharp pain jolted through his palm, snapping Zhang Yu out of his daze.
Looking down, he saw a transparent symbol appearing in his palm, slowly darkening at a snail’s pace.
“What the hell is this now?”
A gust of wind swept across the rooftop, making the red candle flames waver.
The ragdoll on the ground stared up at him with its hollow button eyes, unmoving.
Zhang Yu tried to recall what had happened, but the more he thought, the worse the headache and dizziness became.
The atmosphere grew increasingly eerie and oppressive. Holding his spinning head, Zhang Yu felt the whole world begin to tilt.
By the time he came to, he found himself stumbling back home, dazed and confused.
He glanced at an overdue rent notice stuck to the door, then stepped inside. All that greeted his eyes was a bed and a desk.
“So this is my place?”
His skin was sticky with sweat, the room sweltering with heat. He instinctively searched for the air conditioner remote—only to remember there was no air conditioner here.
He went to wash up, only to find the water had been cut off.
Zhang Yu collapsed onto the bed, helpless.
“What a dump.”
“So what if there are Immortals? Life here’s even worse than in a world without them.”
Scanning the room, his gaze landed on the wall behind the desk, plastered with certificates of achievement from grade school onward.
First grade, second grade, third grade… all the way through ninth. The former Zhang Yu had ranked first in his year nearly every time.
As he stared at the awards, memories of receiving them surfaced in his mind: “The original Zhang Yu was a diligent, high-achieving student.”
“Songyang High is one of the top schools in the city.”
“I was a straight-A student.”
The thought lit a spark in Zhang Yu’s eyes. “If I get into a prestigious university, I can build my Foundation. Join a top sect and I can form a Core. Then I can climb higher through Kunxu, escape this slum, and enjoy more Immortal Dao perks. I might even live a few extra centuries.”
With that hopeful thought, Zhang Yu started to feel like coming to this world might not be so bad after all.
Just then, his phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Mr. Zhang Yu. Your loan from our platform is now three days overdue…”
After hanging up, Zhang Yu checked his inbox, only to find it flooded with debt collection messages—reminders from various platforms where the original body had defaulted on loans.
At the same time, the related memories came flooding in.
“This guy started borrowing money for tutoring even before high school. After getting into Songyang High, he tried to keep up with his classmates by taking more loans to buy performance-enhancing supplements and pay for cram schools. He kept borrowing to pay off previous loans, forcing himself to improve, but in the end, not only did his debt grow out of control, his potential was drained too.”
“This jerk pretended to be a genius cultivator—propped up entirely by borrowed money.”
“Even his own mother couldn’t take it anymore and walked out on him.”
After tallying it all up, Zhang Yu broke out in a cold sweat.
With compounding interest, the total debt had ballooned to over 700,000 yuan across all the platforms.
And his bank account? Just over fifty yuan left.
“Seven hundred grand in debt? What the hell!”
Zhang Yu slammed a fist onto the bed, cursing, “In this world… even for top high school graduates, that’s a crushing amount of debt.”
“No wonder he got obsessed with all those weird rituals… He was just a desperate debt dog with no way out.”
“He lived it up, and now I’m the one stuck repaying it?”
Just then, the lights in the room went out.
Zhang Yu flicked the switch a few times, then peeked outside at the neighbors, confirming what he suspected—his power had been cut off too.
“This dump…”
“If only I could wake up tomorrow and be back home…”
Thoughts swirled chaotically through his head until finally, Zhang Yu drifted off into a restless sleep.
Meanwhile, the transparent symbol on his palm had already turned one-tenth black.
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