[Behind-the-Scenes Mastermind] [Split Souls] [the Myriad Worlds] [System] [Old Master] [Subverting Expectations] [Lighthearted] [Fantasy]
The Mother Realm, the end of the Myriad Worlds.
Immortal Venerables who ascend from the outer worlds are fit only to pull weeds in the spirit fields. Chen Gou transmigrated here three years ago. With a common-grade spirit root and first-stage Dao Insight, he has just one thing to do every day: survive. He pulls weeds to save up spirit stones, digs a hole to hide food, and sleeps in a cave with three bends in it, each piled high with broken stones. If someone sneaks in, he hears them first, then runs. His cultivation plan is precise down to the day: one Qi Condensation Pill raises his spiritual power by 0.1 percent, and one bottle lasts ten days. When he's out, he buys more. Stay alive. One day at a time.
Later, a sliver of his consciousness was torn away and cast into a small world in the midst of a famine. His counterpart there was a farmer. When bandits burned the village, he hid in a woodpile, biting his sleeve and not making a sound. Only after they left did he emerge, and the first thing he did was check the woodpile: the thickest log was still there. Chen Gou opened his eyes in the Mother Realm and discovered that he suddenly knew how to weave straw sandals.
He realized he could put this life to use in another way: hauling mine tailings through a fissure earned him forty spirit stones in one night, enough to survive another four hundred days. On the Servant Peak, he won people over, but stopped halfway through teaching them how to pull weeds. Teach them any more and he'd give himself away. When Zhao Ping set his sights on him, Chen Gou acted exactly as he had three years ago, keeping his cultivation hidden without the slightest leak, walking close to the walls, and never changing the shape of his smile. Zhao Ping called him an ant. He nodded. Exactly, an ant. The greatest advantage of being an ant is that nobody goes out of their way to step on one.
