The archives deep within the Seat of Divine Foresight were quiet, smelling faintly of old parchment and the metallic tang of jade abacuses. It was the perfect place to hide.
Yunyang, a young man with the striking yet subdued features of a Xianzhou Zhuming native, leisurely slotted a scroll detailing the Reignbow Arbiter's past victories into its designated shelf. He let out a content sigh, sinking into the comfortable librarian's chair. Somewhere in the Exalting Sanctum, Qingque was undoubtedly slacking off playing Celestial Jade, leaving her shifts to him.
He didn't mind. In fact, he preferred it this way.
"Do not do evil, do not be in debt, and do not be in the limelight." That was his life motto. It had to be.
Exactly seven years ago, Yunyang's world had turned upside down. A sudden, sharp migraine had unlocked memories that didn't belong to a long-life species of the Xianzhou, but to an ordinary human on a blue planet called Earth. He remembered playing a game called Honkai: Star Rail, pulling for characters, and then… nothing. Just a sudden, inexplicable death.
When he woke up as Yunyang, grandson of General Huaiyan, older brother to the sword-obsessed Yunli, he had panicked. This was a universe where stellarons destroyed planets and Aeons casually erased galaxies.
But then, the golden text had appeared in his vision:
[High-Dimensional Transformation & Miracle System Binding… 1%]
Like any good reincarnated protagonist, he had been thrilled. He waited for his golden finger to activate so he could punch out Lord Ravagers and ascend to the top. He waited a week. The bar hit 2%. He waited a month. 4%.
By the third year, it was stuck at 89%.
Gradually, the fiery ambition of a transmigrator cooled into the exhausted pragmatism of an NPC. Why fight cosmic horrors when he had a cushy, safe life? His grandfather was a General, his sister was a prodigy, and he was perfectly happy being a background character sorting books. He gave up on being powerful. He just wanted to survive.
Until today.
Miles and miles away, on a space station orbiting a blue planet, a young man with silver hair and a Stellaron in his chest suddenly opened his eyes.
At that exact, imperceptible cosmic moment, a chime echoed in Yunyang's mind.
[Ding! The anomaly 'The Trailblazer' has awakened.]
[System Activation Complete. 100%.]
[Welcome, Host Yunyang. System 888 is now online.]
Yunyang nearly dropped his teacup. He stared at the blue holographic screen floating in front of the ancient Xianzhou texts.
"Seven years," he whispered, his voice trembling with a mix of disbelief and sheer annoyance. "You made me wait seven years for a loading screen?"
[Apologies, Host. The delay was unavoidable,] the System's mechanical yet strangely gentle voice replied in his mind.
[Your soul is a foreign entity. The Imaginary Tree and the Will of this world have been passively rejecting your existence. It took seven years for this System to bypass the highest authorities to camouflage your soul.]
Yunyang frowned, the comfortable illusion of his safety shattering. "Rejecting me? You mean I could have just winked out of existence while eating my morning noodles?"
[Affirmative. And the camouflage is only temporary. To permanently anchor your existence in this universe, you require 'Influence.' You must alter fates, create miracles, and impact the world. If you do not gather enough Influence, you will be erased.]
Yunyang leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temples.
"Absolutely not. Do you know how dangerous this universe is? If I step out there and start changing the plot, the Garden of Recollection will peek into my memories, or Nous will calculate my existence. I'm not giving up my peaceful life to play hero."
[The Host's main body will remain completely hidden. System 888 utilizes Authority from the Higher Dimension. Even the Aeons of Finality, Remembrance, or Erudition cannot divine your true identity. To gather influence without risking the main body, the System suggests the 'Avatar' function.]
"Avatars?"
[You can construct alternate entities. You will project fabricated memories and experiences into them, controlling them remotely. The world will interact with the Avatars, believing them to be real. You reap the Influence; the Avatars take the spotlight. What kind of Avatars would the Host like to create?]
Yunyang blinked. He looked down at his hands, then out the window toward the bustling Luofu sky. If the highest powers of this universe could only read the Avatar's memories and never trace it back to the librarian Yunyang...
A slow, mischievous smile spread across his face.
He remembered the character designs of Honkai: Star Rail. He also remembered the game that came before it on Earth—Honkai Impact 3rd. Same faces, entirely different lives, different tragedies, different powers.
What if the universe was suddenly confronted with people who looked exactly like their most famous figures, but possessed entirely different, tragic, and unexplainable pasts? Let the Divination Commission fry their jade abacuses trying to calculate that.
"System," Yunyang said softly, his eyes gleaming with the Path of Enigmata. "How about we introduce this universe to some variants? Let's show them the faces of Honkai Impact."