Desire to Hide

Protagonist: Zang Jing

A transmigrator whose soul belongs to an overworked office drone who worked himself to death in his previous life. This time, his life goals are crystal clear: no overwork, no fame, no responsibilities.

On the surface, he is a wandering physician lodging at a ruined temple. His medical skills are decent, his fees are dirt cheap, he barely speaks, and he walks hunched over, looking like a scholar who hasn't slept in days.

In reality, every time he “shuffles past with his shoulders hunched,” he is forced to deal with something that should have nothing to do with him.

His cultivation works backward, too. While others sit in meditation to cultivate their energy, he cultivates while sleeping. The System gives him a technique called the Lie Flat Heart Sutra. As long as he truly doesn't want to fight, his inner strength grows on its own. The less he wants to fight, the better he gets at it. And so the story's greatest paradox emerges: Zang Jing cultivates to avoid fighting, but the result of his cultivation is that he has to step in even more.

Signature line: “I cultivate so I don't have to fight. I fight so I can retire. I retire so I don't have to fight. Could you people please let me break this cycle?”

His character arc takes him from “treating retirement as an excuse to escape the world” to “realizing this world isn't worth retiring from.” In the end, he chooses to stay of his own accord, rather than being forced to stay by the System. It is the only time he ever takes action of his own volition.