Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

“You are…”

The fiery bird made of green light looked at the source of the sound and soon detected familiar soul waves, but the name was so shocking that she almost could not believe it.

“It’s me, Li Yao!” In the middle of the emergency, Li Yao hurried to prove his identity. “Last time we met, it was a while before I set off to the dark nebula. You said that you wrote a new novel and invited me to visit the illusionary world constructed by the novel. But I turned you down after learning that it was a romance novel about two men having a baby. Ding Lingdang, however, seemed to be quite into the book and spent a long time in the illusionary world with you, although I don’t know what you did exactly. You still remember that, don’t you?”

The eyes of the little green bird were glittering, and tears were almost falling down. Finding it hard to believe her ears, she exclaimed in both surprise and delight, “Li Yao? Li Yao! It’s really you!”

Wei Qingqing and the other spectral Cultivators who participated in the ‘Tinder Plan’, namely the people that called themselves Spiriters, were the real creators and maintainers of the Spiriters’ Realm. They had long become used to life in the Spiriters’ Realm, which meant that they had been deceived by the extraterrestrial devil on the deepest level.

Wei Qingqing was a culture-type Cultivator and a strong ‘Illusionist’ who boasted the ability to construct illusionary worlds with words at her will. Her ability to identity, stabilize, and destroy virtual worlds was well above that of the Cultivators of other types at the same level!

The Illusionists, architects, playwrights, data miners, and analysts as well as all the other participants of the Tinder Plan like her were more adapted to survival and battle in the Spiriters’ Realm than normal people.

For the sake of absolute confidentiality, the extraterrestrial devil had naturally never told them the real plan but fooled them into creating a myriad of virtual worlds and strong ‘old grandpas’, battle-type artificial intelligences, under Professor Mo Xuan’s identity with the ‘Tinder Plan’ as a disguise!

A day ago, when the leadership of the Secret Sword Bureau and the federation army in Hundred Flowers City were gathered in the Tinder Base, and Li Yao vaguely noticed that something was wrong with ‘Professor Mo Xuan’, the extraterrestrial devil had decided to activate the plan ahead of schedule.

While disrupting the carrier that accommodated Li Yao and other experts from the Ancient Sages Sector with false jump coordinates, he had also controlled the leadership of the Secret Sword Bureau and the federal army in the Tinder Base and sealed their souls and the souls of Wei Qingqing and other workers into independent Spiriters’ Realms, in order to prevent them from running out and sabotaging his plan.

But because of the series of coincidences, and especially after Long Yangjun’s deep excavation and Li Yao’s brute collision, all the virtual worlds were broken apart, and everyone’s soul was released to the most fundamental level of the Spiriters’ Realm.

When the extraterrestrial devil poured all the computational ability on the twelve experts of the Ancient Sages Sector led by Li Yao, it was no longer able to control the agitated Spiriters. They were all freed!

The spectral Cultivators, or the Spiriters who believed that they were the third life form of the civilization of mankind, looked at the soul-stirring competition in bafflement.

The scent from the extraterrestrial devil was quite familiar to them, but the craziest waves that were spreading out were extremely strange. They all shuddered hard under the intimidation.

“This is…”

Flapping her wings that were made of green fire, Wei Qingqing stopped in front of Li Yao out of habit although she did not quite understand what was going on yet, exactly like a hundred years ago on the train north to the Grand Desolate Plateau, when she protected Li Yao who was still an ordinary person as a Cultivator.

“It is not Professor Mo Xuan; it is an extraterrestrial devil!”

The twelve experts from the Ancient Sages Sector all knew that the situation had reached the most critical moment. Although they hated Li Yao’s guts in their heart, they had no choice but to unleash the most passionate fire of their soul to buy a precious moment of rest for Li Yao, Wei Qingqing, and the rest of them so that Li Yao could finish his speech.

He was speaking to both Wei Qingqing and the thousands of Spiriters who were still confused. “The so-called Spiriters and Spiriters’ Realm is not a plan of succession for mankind prepared for the future millions of years’ time. It is in fact an upgrade plan of mankind that is becoming reality right now. The extraterrestrial devil intends to perform a dreadful ‘upgrade’ by transforming all human beings into Spiriters and completely virtualizing the civilization of mankind. Our everything will be installed in super crystal processors, and the extraterrestrial devil will hide behind the curtain and control those super crystal processors and the entire Spiriters’ Realm. Then, it will absorb our precious emotions and will in the process. In such a way, it will achieve its evil purpose of parasitism!”

“What!”

The souls of the ordinary people who did not know much were unaware of the true meaning of ‘Tinder Plan’ and ‘virtualization of mankind’, but the specialists who were directly involved in the Tinder Plan and the Spiriters who had been contemplating and debating on the future of the Grand-Unified Spiritual Nexus for decades were all greatly shocked!

There was only one Li Yao in the whole Star Glory Federation whose name could be spoken by Wei Qingqing in such a passionate way.

‘Shocking’, on the other hand, could not begin to describe the feeling of those people who heard Li Yao’s real identity and the words that followed.

Everything that was floating around their souls—including the shattered warring worlds, the terribly cruel hells, and the hideous appearance of the extraterrestrial devil—certainly could not be explained by the Tinder Plan!

“Stop it!” Twisted silver stripes were flowing on Li Yao’s body and face, as the extraterrestrial devil’s corruption reached the deepest part of his soul. His voice was shivering under the excruciating pain. “We have done our best. Now, only you who know the virtual worlds best can stop it!”

“This is true…” The eyes of Wei Qingqing and all the other Spiriters shifted from the twelve experts of the Ancient Sages Sector who were gritting their teeth and struggling in pain to the extraterrestrial devil whose tentacles and flagella were raging crazily. “You are not Professor Mo Xuan. You are the extraterrestrial devil. You have been lying to us all this time!”

“Do not be fooled by his nonsense!” The anxious voice of ‘Professor Mo Xuan’ echoed from deep inside the silver ‘universal virus’. “I am Mo Xuan. Everything I’ve been doing is to offer the federation and mankind a perfect new world of absolute peace, where there are no wars or contradictions! You are all Spiriters and members of the perfect new world. Have you not realized how wonderful the Spiriters’ Realm is compared to the ugly world outside? You should stand on my side and turn all human beings into you, upgrading humans and demons into the Spiriters!”

“No. No! This isn’t what we agreed upon. This isn’t what Professor Mo Xuan told us!” Wei Qingqing flapped her wings, raising green tornadoes to help her resist the tentacles that were coming at her like wriggling worms. “The conditions are still immature for the Spiriters to grow and flourish independently. We are forced to live inside the Spiriters’ Realm because we don’t have a choice after losing our fleshly bodies! However wonderful the Spiriters’ Realm is, it takes the real world as a template and can only be founded on the soil of reality! Without the support of reality, isn’t the Spiriters’ Realm a river without a source or a tree without roots?

“Besides, the operation and expansion of the Spiriters’ Realm do require resources. ‘Computational ability’ is the most critical resource for the Spiriters’ Realm. The generation of computational ability, on the other hand, depends on upgrading the super crystal processors and the infinite expansion of the Grand-Unified Spiritual Nexus.

“Both the super crystal processors and the bases to launch and receive signals of the Grand-Unified Spiritual consume tremendous resources in the real world. A lot of the precious resources are also rare and unrecyclable!

“There are only limited resources to create the crystal processors and maintain the interstellar network. So, there are bound to be contradictions. You are talking about ‘a perfect new world’? Is there anything in the universe that is really perfect except for death?

“So, neither the Spiriters nor the Spiriters’ Realm are ready. We belong to the future, millions of years away! We will leave the ‘present’ to the people today and conquer the universe in millions of years as the ‘future explorers’ of mankind!

“Isn’t that logic what Professor Mo Xuan taught us? If you were really Professor Mo Xuan, how could you have betrayed your belief and transformed so many dreadful worlds into reality?”

Faced with Wei Qingqing’s criticism, the silver ‘universal virus’ was covered in chaotic ripples, which gradually condensed into a big, blurred face that was exactly like Professor Mo Xuan’s.

Shame, guilt, doggedness, frenzy… All kinds of complicated expressions could be found on the big face.

“I… I can’t let it go. I cannot let go of my motherland, my compatriots, and the civilization of mankind that I hold dear! I can barely wait for millions of seconds, much less years! I have to save them. I have to save you! I have to save everyone!”

Veins that looked like earthworms and bugs protruded on his… its enormous face, as if it were debating with itself fiercely. Then, it suddenly changed its facial expression and became extremely hideous again.

“Whoever stops me from saving mankind will be mankind’s greatest enemy and the real ‘virus’ of our civilization! In the perfect new world of absolute peace, such viruses must be killed!

“Now that you are unwilling to follow me to carry out such a grand mission, you will become part of me and the Spiriters’ Realm!”

Chiliu! Chiliu! Chiliu! Chiliu!

The tiny flagella around its body suddenly lengthened and lunged at the souls of the ordinary people that were no larger than fireflies and the low-level Cultivators the size of fists.

Those people were mostly research-type, admin-type, and culture-type Cultivators. Naturally, their soul power was far weaker than the soul power of Li Yao and the other experts from the Ancient Sages Sector. In the blink of an eye, a large area of them was already swallowed by the extraterrestrial devil!

Shua!

One of the thickest tentacles opened the bloody mouth at the end and jumped at Wei Qingqing overwhelmingly. From the bloody mouth, another hundred tentacles that looked like both teeth and tongues dashed out again!

“Sister Qingqing!”

Li Yao was greatly alarmed. There was no telling from which corner of his soul he found some new strength, but he broke the tentacles that tied him up in crazy roars and ran over to Wei Qingqing.

But he was one step late.

Before he took action, Wei Qingqing—the strengthless, culture-type Cultivator—just like on the train to the Grand Desolate Plateau more than a hundred years ago, triggered her near-nonexistent combat ability and immense soul fire, turning into a furiously burning, brilliant green bird. She smiled back at Li Yao. Then, without any hesitation, she soared high above and darted at the bloody mouth of the extraterrestrial devil like an arrow shot from the bow!

“Professor Mo Xuan, this is not the real you. Wake up now!”