Death should have been an ending.
Instead, for Lin Fan, it became a cycle—agonizing, clarifying, reshaping him into something that had no right to exist.
Darkness clung to him like tar as he resurfaced from his first true soul death. It was not the silence of mortal dying. It was a complete unmaking—like the universe had ripped him apart at the seams and then tried, clumsily, to stitch him back together with the wrong thread.
His first inhale was a ragged, burning drag, as if fire and broken glass filled his lungs.
His second inhale came easier.
Too easy.
His body was changing.
Again.
---
The Weight of the First Soul Death
Most people died once.
Lin Fan died twice.
The first life—Earth.
A quiet, invisible laborer who saved two children during a factory collapse and paid with his life.
The second life—this cultivation world.
A life of humiliation, starvation of talent, and betrayal.
A weak, talentless scapegoat slaughtered like a sacrificial animal.
And in that moment—
When his soul was severed from the body of the "old Lin Fan" and the cultivator's soul dispersed—
The Doomsday Prime template awoke.
Not qi.
Not dao.
Not spirit.
The perfection of survival.
A living response to annihilation.
Each death rewrote him.
Each adaptation refined him.
Each suffering sculpted him.
His rebirth wasn't gentle.
It was violent—like being shoved into a body that was too small for something infinitely vast.
And this time…
This time it hurt more.
---
A Body Rebuilt the Wrong Way
Lin Fan lay on the cold ground, twitching.
Something in his nervous system was firing wrong.
Signals misfiring.
Instinct overriding biology.
His spine snapped—
Then reset.
Then snapped again—
Reset differently.
Bones thickened.
Then softened.
Then hardened again.
His body was learning.
Faster.
More aggressively.
He felt it in every nerve:
Adaptation had begun taking initiative.
And it didn't care about comfort.
Or sanity.
Or anything human.
Lin Fan's throat tore with a scream.
"STOP—! STOP—! STO—"
His vocal cords liquefied.
Reformed.
Thickened.
Strengthened.
He clawed at the ground until rocks split under his nails.
His vision flickered between darkness, red haze, and something like infrared.
His ears shifted, growing sensitive enough to hear ants crawling beneath soil—then dulling to block out his own screams.
When the pain briefly receded, he collapsed forward, drooling and trembling.
"I… endured it," he whispered.
Barely sane. Barely coherent.
But he wasn't done.
The world was not done with him.
---
Forced Evolution
A cultivator's corpse lay nearby.
One who had struck the killing blow.
Lin Fan's lips curled.
The memory—
the betrayal—
the injustice—
stabbed through his mind like a brand.
He remembered their voices:
"Kill him. He's useless anyway."
"A scapegoat is all he's good for."
"He has no spiritual root—let the beasts eat him."
Every insult stitched deeper into him than any wound had.
His fingers twitched, curling into fists.
Knuckles cracked loudly.
Skin hardened subtly, thickening with a bone weave just beneath the surface.
He felt stronger.
Yes.
But wrong.
As if his body wasn't waiting for danger anymore—
It was inviting it.
Wanting to be pushed.
Wanting to break, so it could rebuild itself stronger.
A terrifying hunger for stress.
For crisis.
For annihilation.
Because annihilation meant adaptation.
---
Energy Manipulation Broken
Lin Fan tried to gather spiritual energy.
Nothing.
He tried again.
Still nothing.
Even before, he had been talentless.
Now?
It was worse.
His soul death had completely severed him from the world's laws.
He wasn't just unable to cultivate—
The very fabric of qi rejected him.
Slipping off him like oil on polished stone.
His energy sensitivity—already weak—was now nearly nonexistent.
He felt blind.
Mute.
Disconnected.
A cultivator cut off from qi was like a swordsman missing both arms.
Helpless.
Hopeless.
But Lin Fan wasn't hopeless.
Because the Doomsday Prime template did not care about qi.
His strength came from something else—
something deeper—
something ancient.
With qi closed to him…
his Kryptonian ancestry—dormant in countless humans but useless without external stimulation—
began to stir.
Soul death had triggered it.
Pain fueled it.
The alien physiology reacted to the stress with ferocity.
Cells began metabolizing sunlight differently.
Nuclear processes folded into new patterns.
Muscles grew denser.
Blood thickened, enriching itself.
But adaptation had a price.
Every improvement burned like molten lead.
Every refinement felt like being skinned and remade from the inside.
Lin Fan's jaw clenched hard enough that cracks spidered across his molars.
---
Pain, Death, Silence
A shadow fell across him.
A demon beast.
Drawn by the scent of blood.
Lin Fan didn't panic.
He expected this.
He welcomed this.
Let it come.
Let it tear him apart.
Let it force another adaptation.
He stood slowly, legs trembling.
The beast lunged.
Teeth clamped around his torso.
Ribs shattered.
Lungs collapsed.
Lin Fan didn't scream this time.
He didn't beg.
He didn't curse.
He simply whispered,
"…again…"
And the beast snapped him in half.
Darkness.
Then—
A heartbeat.
A second.
A third.
Ribs knitting.
Spine reforming.
Organs regrowing.
When he revived, he said nothing.
No screaming.
No struggling.
No outcry.
He simply endured.
Silently.
Patiently.
Waiting for the next thing that would kill him—
so he could learn from it.
---
The Quiet Monologue of a Man Becoming Something Else
Is this what I am now?
A thing that grows stronger only through catastrophe?
A creature that must die to live?
A being whose destiny is shaped by agony?
His lips trembled.
But he smiled.
A thin, cold smile.
"Then let this world throw everything it has," he whispered.
"If suffering is the forge…
I'll become something it can't break."
His bones thickened.
His muscles coiled like steel cables.
His senses sharpened.
The next predator approached.
Lin Fan stood tall.
Silent.
Resolute.
He no longer feared death.
He needed it.
Because every time he died—
He came back stronger.
And something in the abyss of his reborn soul—
Hungered for the next evolution.
---