I, Song Mian, used to write ad copy for an advertising agency. I died suddenly after working overtime for three months straight.
When I opened my eyes again, I'd transmigrated into a cultivation world and been bound to a System.
System: Today's task: Get up at 4 a.m. and meditate.
Me: Go ahead and deduct the points. I already lost my perfect attendance bonus for three years in my last life. One more day won't matter.
System: ...Task revised. Copy two thousand characters of a storybook and you can sleep an extra hour.
I pulled the romance novel out from under my pillow and started copying it. The System broke down.
I thought I'd coast through this life, until one day I was lying in the courtyard, sunbathing, and noticed someone standing by the wall.
The head of Qingyun Sect, Shen Zhi. The coldest, most relentlessly driven genius in the entire cultivation world, rumored to sleep only two hours a day.
She watched me for ten minutes. She came back the next day, then again on the third.
On the fourth day, she knocked. "Can you teach me that sunbathing technique of yours?"
Me: "That's lying down, not a technique."
Her: "Are you going to teach me or not?"
Me: "...Fine."
Later, she broke through the Nascent Soul peak bottleneck she'd been stuck at for ten years. The whole sect was stunned, but nobody knew I was the one who taught her.
The System started neglecting its duties and gave me tasks every day:
"Today's task: Go to the cafeteria with the sect head and fight over braised pork knuckles."
"Today's task: Lie flat beside the sect head and sunbathe."
"Today's task: Hold the sect head's hand. Success rate: 94%."
Me: "Are you a System or a matchmaker?"
System: "Host's personal safety is highly dependent on their emotional state. Recommendation: Proceed."
On the day of the tribulation, Shen Zhi took three bolts of heavenly lightning for me and fell to her knees, blood at the corner of her mouth.
I grabbed her hand. "Didn't you say cultivation was all about working hard? Have you worked hard enough yet?"
She wiped the blood from her mouth. "I've worked hard enough for you."
From then on, Qingyun Sect gained two new legends: an outer-sect disciple who built her foundation by lying flat, and a sect head she'd led astray.
The System's final pop-up read: "Mission complete. May you both eat well, sleep well, and somehow improve your cultivation."
With my eyes closed, I lay in the courtyard sun with Shen Zhi, mumbling:
"Next life, I don't care where we end up. Just remember to come find me."
Shen Zhi didn't answer, but the rocking chair swayed more slowly.
Premise: Could you please stop working yourselves to death?
