The room had fallen into an awkward silence as Yui cackled at Tim and Riku's embarrassment.
"I was a quadriplegic," Takeshi said abruptly, his voice breaking the atmosphere.
Every head turned toward him. Takeshi was looking down at his own hands—hands that were thick, corded with muscle, and pulsing with a vitality he still didn't quite trust. He flexed his fingers slowly, watching the tendons shift under the skin with a look of pure, unadulterated awe.
"For most of my life, I was in a wheelchair," Takeshi continued, his voice low and raspy. "I couldn't feel anything from the neck down. I sat in that chair for years, a prisoner in a shell of meat and bone. I was a ghost haunting my own house. I watched the world move through a window, unable to even swat a fly off my own nose. To have someone feed you, to have someone bathe you like a child while your mind is screaming to just stand up... it's a special kind of hell. You stop being a perso. I wasn't living; I was just waiting for the clock to run out."
Himari leaned forward, her elbows on the table and her chin resting in her hands. She wasn't looking at him with pity; she was looking at him with a raw, intense fascination. She felt a strange ache in her chest, a resonance with his struggle that made her usual bubbly defences melt away. She hung on every word, her eyes shimmering with respect for the emotional journey he had survived.
He looked up, meeting Master Kurokawa's gaze with a deep intensity. "Then, during the meteor shower, I was struck by a fragment while sitting in my wheelchair. I thought I had died—finally released from my prison. My soul split, and like the others, I was guided by a Will."
Takeshi took a deep breath, his chest expanding as his steel-like muscles rippled. "It led me to a strong man with a weak soul. Currently, as we speak... I am a body cultivator in the other world. When I woke again in my wheelchair on Earth, I looked for a way out of my body's prison. I found it in a method to stitch a soul to a body." Looking down at his new frame, Takeshi looked up with a deep, triumphant grin. "And it worked fantastically."
The silence that followed was profound. Master Kurokawa and Yui exchanged a glance of genuine alarm. Before anyone could formulate the dozens of questions burning in their minds, Himari jumped up, wiping some drool from the corner of her mouth.
"Me too!" Himari blurted out, leaning over the table. "I mean, not the wheelchair part. But the soul-splitting part."
She gestured wildly with her hands, her usual bubbliness returning, though laced with a nervous edge. "I got hit by that fragment in the park, right? And suddenly, I was floating in space. I felt this... this 'Will' guiding me. It was like a GPS locked onto a specific destination across the stars. It felt ancient. Golden."
Her expression darkened slightly, a shadow passing over her features that made her look remarkably like the assassin Kira.
"I was about to enter a body—I think it was the one the 'Will' wanted me to take. But then... this massive Shadow appeared out of nowhere. It didn't care about the golden light or the Will. It just... grabbed me."
She made a violent snatching motion with her hand. "It grabbed my soul and stuffed it into a different body, completely destroying the Will that had been guiding me."
Master Kurokawa and Yui stiffened simultaneously. What can grab souls away from the path of a dying god and stuff them into bodies? Yui thought, her blood running cold.
"And..." Himari trailed off, scratching her cheek awkwardly. "In the cultivation world? I'm a Level 1 Golden Core cultivator. My name is Kira, and I am a kickass assassin," she said with pride, looking for approval from Takeshi.
Takeshi's eyes went wide with genuine admiration. "Wow... that's so cool," he said, staring straight into Himari's eyes.
Himari turned bright red, practically vibrating with embarrassment.
"Golden Core?" Yui said in surprise, giving the blushing Himari a reprieve. "I am a Golden Core Level 3, and believe me, it is not an easy level to reach. Countless beings across the universe struggle to even get past Qi Refining. Golden Core cultivators are like gods to mortals. This isn't normal... the bodies you are all describing were likely dead geniuses. No one became an average mortal. There may still be a fragment of that dead god's plan left in you. Who knows what his dying intent was?"
Yui sighed, looking at the group. "Okay, well, I guess you have to know. I am Yui, a Golden Core cultivator from the Starward Artificers Sect. My family holds a prominent position in the sect, but due to internal politics, my father sent me here with a retired elder—Master Kurokawa—for protection. This was meant to be a backwards world without Qi, but that's all changed now, thanks to this big oaf." She gestured at Takeshi.
"What did I do?" Takeshi replied in shock..
"Well, Takeshi, do you know how a world gets Qi?" Yui replied, her eyes narrowing as she looked out the window at the lingering ozone in the night sky. "It's not common knowledge in the outer galaxy, but when a native being of a mundane world defies the Heavens and brings down Tribulation Lightning, it acts like a cosmic defibrillator. If an outsider—like me or Master Kurokawa—brings lightning, the world just treats it as a foreign invasion. But because you are of this earth, your defiance forced the Heavens to acknowledge this planet. That lightning didn't just strike you; it scorched open the unseen pathways—the qi pathways of the planet itself—allowing Qi to flow in for the first time in eons."
She turned back to him, her expression a mix of irritation and profound respect. "Do you know what you have done, Takeshi? You have turned Earth into a cultivation world. From this moment on, every child born here, every plant that grows, every creature will be touched by qi. You've ended the age of machines and started the age of cultivation."
The silence that followed was heavy, the air in the dojo already beginning to feel thicker, more vibrant, as the first trickles of planetary Qi began to settle into the wood and stone.
Cultivation World
The dust was still settling in the stadium crater. Lia stood there, her heart still racing from Varek's kiss and the terrifying realization of Earth becoming a cultivation world. She looked over at Kira, who was still glowing with a faint, embarrassed heat from the connection to her Earth self.
"Wait a second," Lia said, her voice turning sharp as her Tim-side logic began to piece things together. "Hey, Himari... why were you trying to kill me earlier? You were right behind me with a poison dagger. You had an assassination mission on me, didn't you?"
Kira jumped, her daggers spinning nervously in her palms. "Oh! Right. That mission." She laughed nervously, the bubbly Himari-mask struggling to stay in place over her lethal, shadow-shrouded assassin's face.
"Well, you see, back at the Shadow Veil Sect, I'm kind of a big deal! Not long ago, the Corpse Cleansing Sect put out a massive, top-tier bounty. Five thousand spirit stones just to eliminate two Foundation Establishment 'nuisances' named Varek and Lia. They even wanted me to retrieve your special pendant." She looked at Lia sheepishly. "I didn't know it was you guys! I just saw the target descriptions and thought it was a quick way to buy those high-grade cultivation pills I've been eyeing. I was literally a second away from a strike when I heard Riku scream 'Lia lookout!' on Earth. My soul almost jumped out of my skin when I realized it was you guys"
Lia looked at Kira, her expression shifting from annoyance to genuine worry. "Wait... if you were sent here on a job by a demonic sect and you just chose to help us instead, won't you get in trouble? The Shadow Veil sounds like the kind of place that has a 'no-refunds' policy on loyalty."
Varek grunted, his large hand still resting protectively near Lia's waist. "She's right. Assassins don't usually get a 'get out of jail free' card for protecting the targets."
Kira's playful grin faltered for a split second, a flicker of cold reality crossing her eyes before she forced a shrug. "Trouble? Oh, I'm toasted. By tomorrow morning, there will definitely be a contract on my head with my own name on it. The Corpse Cleansing Sect pays top soul-stones, and they really hate being stood up. My 'colleagues' will be looking to collect on my bounty before the ink is even dry. I've basically betrayed the most dangerous organization on the continent."
She looked around the smoking ruins of the stadium, her daggers spinning with a frantic energy. "Honestly, we really need to get somewhere safe. Somewhere even the shadows are afraid to go. If we stay out in the open, I'm basically a walking target for every dagger-for-hire in the central continent."