GA: Chapter 196 – Items Under [Mystery]'s Influence; Angel Yan and Yan's Exchange
"Then in the fate threads you've seen—has a cultivation method suitable for everyone appeared?"
If some people had already succeeded, surely future China would have discovered this and continued the research from there?
Bai Xuan didn't answer.
A cultivation method suitable for all practitioners did indeed emerge in the future—one that could accelerate everyone's cultivation speed. But it wasn't exclusive to humans. It was suitable for all living beings.
True, both Taoist and Buddhist traditions had already produced individuals favored by their respective lineage's fortune—people whose awakened abilities even aligned with the teachings of their traditions, allowing them to cultivate those ancient texts with relative ease.
But that they could didn't mean everyone could.
The methods created by those predecessors weren't what people imagined—accelerants for spiritual qi absorption, shortcuts for cultivation. The most critical factor enabling them to function in the first place was that this world had made them capable of it.
Spiritual qi was simply an energy. An energy applicable to all living things. The most fundamental reason for Earth's transformation was indeed the spiritual qi revival. But what would exert an even greater influence on this world in the future was something else entirely—Mystery.
Mystery was an expansive term. Immortal cultivation. Magic. Witchcraft. The fantastical. The uncanny. All of these fell under its banner—any system that current science could not explain could be considered a form of Mystery.
The spiritual qi revival had ensured Earth was no longer a purely technological world. And Mystery, with spiritual qi's emergence, had begun to reshape this world in turn. The process was inevitably slow—it required time to settle.
Cultivation methods were creations shaped by Mystery's influence. Perhaps in their original form they hadn't possessed the ability to enable cultivation at all—or perhaps their intended path of practice had never been meant to work this way. But because of Mystery's influence, their nature had changed. They had acquired the capabilities people hoped for.
Some cultivation methods today were genuinely functional—but the threshold for practicing them was far higher than it would be after Mystery fully descended in the future.
Only those truly favored by their respective tradition's fortune had any real capacity to cultivate these texts.
As for researching an entirely new method that anyone could practice—something to universally accelerate cultivation? How would that even be approached?
Did they have a deep understanding of the Dao?
Did they possess exceptional natural talent and insight in cultivation?
Could they independently create a cultivation method suited to all living beings?
And even if they could—it still wouldn't matter.
For it to have any real effect, it would first need to be acknowledged by Mystery.
The cultivation method that appeared in the future wasn't something the research institute had developed. It was something he had exchanged from Su Yunqing's world—a technique suited to universal practice—and then processed through the chat group's mechanisms to make it compatible with this world's life forms.
But that came after the third spiritual qi tide. He hadn't thought about it yet.
The second tide had already significantly increased Earth's spiritual qi. Technically, even starting everyone on cultivation now would still be sustainable until the third tide arrived. But something in him consistently felt that this would be unfavorable for Earth's long-term future.
Not a warning from the Earth consciousness—something deeper, more unknown.
And these unnamed promptings from the depths were precisely what had made him acutely aware: he had always been observed by certain presences.
Not only the Earth consciousness that had granted him [Natural Authority]—there were others. Just that at his current level, he had no standing to make contact.
Surprisingly, this didn't particularly unsettle him.
From the moment he joined the chat group, he had been aware of this possibility.
By now, every group member was from some creative work. Aside from him and Su Yunqing, everyone else was a character from anime or film or television.
But who could truly guarantee that he and Su Yunqing weren't also characters in some work? The word transmigrator itself was born from fiction, after all.
Su Yunqing's spiritual qi insulation. His own [Natural Authority]. Didn't those neatly represent two distinct genres?
The useless protagonist archetype and the prodigious genius archetype.
How else to explain why Su Yunqing couldn't cultivate at all and yet possessed the most exalted fortune in her entire world? The chat group's selection of members was based on fortune.
Though one thing puzzled him. If he was the protagonist of some work—without the chat group appearing and awakening the spiritual qi revival, he wouldn't have gained [Natural Authority] either. According to everything he'd known about himself before, he would simply have lived out a quiet, unremarkable life.
Even the chat group had been startled by his fortune when he first joined—he was clearly a transmigrator, yet his fortune was no different from anyone else's.
If he was a protagonist, what was the author trying to convey?
An urban setting. A protagonist with no ambition, no drive to struggle, planning to coast through life in comfortable ease. Would anyone actually read something like that?
Or was it that his current age wasn't the beginning of the story—that there was still a long stretch of time before the real plot began?
He had some uncertainty about all of this. But it hadn't reached the point where he felt compelled to find an answer. After thinking about it for a while, he let it settle to the back of his mind.
No matter how deeply he thought about it—this world was no longer what it had once been. And he was no longer the student sitting in school. Compared to all of this, what he should be thinking about was how to accelerate civilization's progress.
The Overman universe. Angel Civilization.
A secluded realm of birdsong and blooming flowers—like a paradise set apart from the world. Mountains. Rivers. Open sky. White clouds. Seas of blossoms. And at the heart of it all, two beautiful angels in quiet conversation.
Angel Yan extended her hand slightly. A vivid butterfly drifted down and settled on her index finger. A smile touched the corners of her mouth.
"Yan—when did you start receiving training from Queen Kesha and the master?"
Yan looked at her with curious eyes. She really did seem a little different than before—her bearing had taken on something that faintly resembled Queen Kesha's.
"About three days after you left."
Angel Yan heard the question and her expression became pained—chin propped in both hands, a look that was somewhere between resigned and wanting to cry.
She always felt like her animated counterpart had dug a trap for her. Being the Angel Queen was exhausting.
In the anime, because she had transitioned from warrior to queen without preparation, she'd been lacking in many respects—so to prevent problems from arising, Queen Kesha and the Heaven-Based King had personally guided her.
Guidance from two kings. That wasn't something ordinary people could adapt to.
"Enough about me—Heaven-Based King must have asked you all sorts of things about Bai Xuan, right?"
Angel Yan looked at Yan with amusement, teasing lightly.
"W-well, no, not exactly."
"She just asked some questions about the world White Emperor is from."
Yan's face flushed slightly as she replied.
Why did Leng, Yan, the Queen, and the master all keep asking about her and White Emperor?
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