Garion groaned, lowering himself into another squat with a thick log balanced across his shoulders.
His legs were trembling, sweat dripping down his face, and his arms burning, but he kept going.
"What the hell do I do now, huh?" he muttered through clenched teeth.
He wasn't an ordinary man. He was a famous fitness influencer and a professor of physiology.
He was someone who devoted his entire life to studying the human body through training, diet, and exercise.
He was just a man who was obsessed with one question: how far can the body really go?
But that same obsession had cost him everything.
---
For years, he dug through every scrap of research on nutrition, recovery, and performance.
Where others saw barriers, he saw puzzles. Where others gave up, he doubled down.
Ultimately, he developed what he termed the world's first genuine superfood.
It was a nutrient mix that combined proteins, fats, and micronutrients in the exact ratios needed to push recovery and growth beyond what ordinary food could achieve.
It wasn't a gimmick. It wasn't another overpriced "miracle shake."
It was safe, effective, and backed by meticulous data.
He tested it on himself, then on athletes under his supervision.
The results were staggering: faster muscle repair, longer endurance, sharper focus.
It was everything he had dreamed of.
And that was the problem.
If his formula went public, it would topple an industry built on pills, powders, and endless supplements.
Pharmaceutical giants who had grown fat from monopolizing "health" products suddenly had everything to lose.
So they silenced him.
At first, it was subtle: research papers rejected, accounts frozen, warnings whispered by colleagues who didn't dare speak too loudly.
Then came the smear campaigns that claimed that he was reckless, irresponsible, and even dangerous.
Finally, when none of that was enough to stop him, came the night in his lab.
He was alone, working on his latest batch, when the "superfood" that had always revitalized him instead poisoned his body.
His muscles seized, his lungs burned, his vision blurred.
The man who had spent his entire life mastering the human body felt it betray him all at once.
---
Garion lowered the log from his shoulders and dropped it onto the ground with a thud.
He sat on it, wiping sweat off his forehead with the back of his arm.
His chest rose and fell heavily as he caught his breath.
"Damn… still the same body. Strong, but what the hell am I even doing here?" he muttered, staring at his calloused hands.
Although his old life had ended in betrayal, he was given something others could only dream of: a second chance.
An isekai.
He had woken up in this strange world with the exact same body he had before the "superfood" disaster.
"Perfect body, sure," Garion sighed. "But perfect body without a plan? Feels useless."
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, staring at the dirt beneath his feet.
For a year, he had lived in this small house he built himself, surviving off simple food and whatever he could hunt.
There was a town not too far away, and somehow the people spoke the same language as him.
Maybe it was a transmigrator perk, but he didn't really care about it.
He had also gathered some information from the city.
"This world… yeah, it's one of those worlds," Garion said, shaking his head. "A cultivation world. Just like the novels."
He remembered what he heard in the tavern, the drunkards bragging about realms and stages.
"They just sit down, breathe in mana, and call it training," Garion muttered.
He stood up, grabbed the log again, and rested it on his shoulder. "Seriously? Mana meditation? That's their big secret to strength? It's unscientific as hell."
Still, he couldn't ignore the fact that this was another world. Their rules worked differently.
Garion exhaled slowly, replaying the words he overheard from cultivators.
"The first realm's called the Mana Refinement Realm. Then comes the Foundation Establishment Realm."
He frowned. "And each one has four stages: initial, intermediate, advanced, and perfect. Real creative names."
He rested the log back down and rolled his shoulders, grimacing at the tightness.
"So that's all I know. Just two realms, four stages each. And people worship this system like it's the ultimate truth."
He gave a dry laugh. "Guess I'll have to test it myself."
Garion clenched his fists, looking at his arms.
"They've got mana. I've got muscles. Let's see which one wins."
---
Not far from Garion's little house, a young girl was making her way through the forest path.
She had clear blue eyes, black hair tied into a simple ponytail, and looked about twelve years old.
"So he really lives here…" she whispered, gripping the hem of her clothes as she walked.
She had heard the rumors in the city.
People said there was a man who lived deep in the forest, far away from everyone else.
He rarely came to town and never stayed for long before returning to the forest and disappearing.
Most people laughed at him.
"Crazy," they said. "Only a fool would live alone in a dangerous place like that."
Some called him a waste of talent, someone who gave up on life.
Over time, people stopped caring and simply forgot about him.
But the girl didn't believe that.
"There has to be more to it," she thought. "No sane person would choose to live here unless there's a reason."
In her mind, only one kind of person would live in seclusion: someone strong.
An immortal sage, the kind of person who already had power beyond that of normal cultivators.
Legends said such people hid themselves away, living in peace until the world needed them.
She nodded to herself, her little hands tightening into fists.
"That has to be it. He must be one of them. He just looks young because his cultivation is so high."
Her steps quickened, her face full of determination.
If he really was an immortal sage, then she had only one goal.
"I'll ask him to take me as a disciple. If he accepts, I'll be safe… no matter what happens."