When Immortal Ascension Fails Time Travel to Try Again

AFS (2) - I Will be the First Cultivator!

AFS (2) - I Will be the First Cultivator!

I used a movement technique and intercepted the damn flying crab with my little, cold knife. My mech slid across the campus yard. Metal screeched. I could practically feel the joint in my left ankle crack. Part of the armor on my right arm popped off from deforming so much. Fuck.

I needed to end this quickly. More flying crabs were heading this way.

The bug flew back then way high up. It seemed like it was going in for another dive. As soon as it hit me again, I blocked with my knife and took out my plasma sword. I put it right up against its little neck and turned it on. That worked.

I jumped back and intercepted another flying crab.

My brother intercepted the other.

One of the mech fighters who had already taken shelter threw out her own mech and got inside.

I could tell that this mech had already been significantly damaged and was on its last legs. But she risked it to come help us defend the people leaving the car. She brought out her chipped cold sword and plasma knife and intercepted another of the flying bugs.

Since her mech was only slightly less damaged than my own, (which was only being held together through my sheer will power and spiritual manipulation) I figured we could help each other. I jumped back to line up next to her

The Bug that had attacked me flew back up for another dive attack.

At least that was what I thought. Instead, it spit acid at us.

Shit.

I grabbed her mech and helped her to dodge both an attack from her flying crab and the acid.

Then, when her bug attacked again, while she defended against it, I cut off its weird crab head.

Of course the one still flying wasn’t doing anything during this. It kept spitting at us with acid. The acid that hit, dug into the mech’s armor, weakening it significantly. And, unfortunately, even when it missed entirely, its spit created potholes in the ground, making it harder to move around.

I blamed the original owner who got her flight system destroyed during the first few seconds of battle.

Whatever. I’d deal. But seriously, why didn’t the original owner have a strap made for her rifle? Or a spot on the mech to hold it? I’d only been in three minor scuffles, and I already had to drop it three fucking times.

I seriously needed to look at this mech engineering stuff later so I could make mine just the way I wanted. Maybe I was missing something from her memories. Or maybe because it was just a training rifle, she didn’t bother with it.

I jumped to where I’d dropped the nearly useless rifle and picked it up. Then I looked at the last bug that was flying around and avoiding the anti-aircraft lasers that the school’s defensive turrets were shooting at it. Turrets that were unable to point down for ‘the students’ safety’ and that couldn’t keep up with the tougher and faster Space Bugs. Yeah, whatever.

Well, since I was destroying shit anyway, may as well overload this rifle and shoot a hidden arrow of spiritual energy at the monster.

First, I fired the weapon sending weak shot after weak shot toward the swerving enemy. I could practically feel the sneer of this bug.

As I continued to dodge its acid, my mech screamed at me. Warnings popped up at the edges of my view screen. Then, just as I was about to overload my weapon and hide a spiritual arrow in one of these weak-ass laser beams, I sensed my brother raise his cold pistol and heard a loud blast. A hole appeared in the monster crab’s head. It dropped to the ground like a soft, squishy boulder.

Ew.

I threw my nominal brother a thumbs up with my mech.

“Let’s hurry inside,” I said.

Wang MingRen’s mech vanished around him, and he dropped to the ground.

Wait, I could put this mech into a spacial item? Or maybe they became one?

I had to look through the original’s memories to find it. Right. There was a spiritual switch the owner could press to turn the mech into a tiny piece of jewelry. This one was made to be a pretty necklace, perfect for a fancy girl like Victoria. I mean, she didn’t have bad taste, exactly. But I didn’t think a rose gold mech with pink lighting features was what anyone would call stealthy.

I flicked the switch and released my spiritual energy that was keeping the mech together. And the whole thing, aside from my cabin, fell apart around me. It did not go inside a cool spacial necklace.

Then my cabin tipped over, leaving me facing the ground.

“Well, shit.”

I tore off the equipment that was attached to my body and fell. I twisted so I stood on the metal panels that acted as a viewing screen when the mech was turned on. The cabin wasn’t big and it had handholds all over the place for antigravity maneuvering. This also helped in situations when the mech landed in a weird position… like now.

Fortunately, this body wasn’t weak.

I mean, how irksome would that be to land in a regular mortal body after being at the peak of the world?

That would drive me insane!

And that wasn’t even considering the issue of stuffing a massive Immortal Ascension soul into a tiny mortal frame.

Something like that might even kill a person a second time!

I laughed as I opened one of the hatches that allowed me to exit.

I stopped laughing when I saw the familiar, accursed face of my adopted brother.

I was about to gather my spiritual energy and attack him on reflex. I barely stopped myself. Because I sensed that the feel of this person wasn’t the same as that ignoramus tit llama, Bloodsword. Mostly, this guy was younger and missing the obvious blood thirst that had been part of him for almost a thousand years.

Also, now that I was taking a closer look, his face was only 85% percent similar. Though, proper cultivation could have accounted for most of those discrepancies.

Besides, it wasn’t like people who looked the same had the same soul. That only happened… in… books.

Fuck. I was in a book.

But that didn’t mean it was happening here!

Besides, what kind of shit luck would Bloodsword have to have to become an immortal, then die and reincarnate or get sent back to the mortal world for some kind of heavenly trial.

Wait, was that a thing in this world? I knew some Xianxia, when people became gods or immortals they would sometimes go through tribulations where they had to live life as a mortal again… for some fucking reason.

Was it possible that Bloodsword was going through a trial now? Or maybe he died after becoming an immortal and now he was stuck as some tertiary male lead in a shoujo novel who died to protect the female lead.

Just thinking about it made me all giddy inside. If there were any kind of revenge I could ask for, this! This would be it.

Oh, shit. I’d saved him.

Hmm. This was troubling. But I didn’t want my hard work to go to waste.

“Victoria! Is there something wrong with my face?”

I grimaced at the body’s name. “Call me Lin.”

I jumped out down from my cockpit and skillfully navigated the rubble from Victoria’s mech. This cheap, nominal brother of mine followed after.

Seriously, but what was I going to do with him? I had already risked my life to save his ass, so I couldn’t just allow him to die so easily. Right?

Well, maybe if he was a decent person and not a reprehensible shit snake, I would help him reach immortality. Then, if he remembered his past life and it was Bloodsword’s, I could kick his ass. And if I was feeling particularly vicious, I’d send him back into the cycle of reincarnation so I could finally achieve my long-awaited revenge! Muahahahaha!

I sighed. Then I sensed more bugs on their way over here. The shelter was likely one of their targets.

“Get into the shelter now!”

I started running while checking to see where everyone was. The girl who helped us had also put away her mech and was running to the shelter doors. Because we were all mech pilots going to the best military school on the Capital Star, our bodies’ physical abilities (something that was akin to natural body cultivation) were all at least rank A so it took us very little time to get into the shelter.

Immediately, the sounds of everyone rushing about hit my ears along with all the body warmth from these interstellar people.

Of course, body heat wasn’t the only thing warming the shelter.

In the middle of the room, several damaged mechs were hurriedly being worked on by mech repair and design students. There was even a famous mech design teacher here who had taught the female lead and helped her out in the book.

They had set up what was obviously a haphazard repair area. It also explained why there weren’t anyone protecting the shelters previously. They had been in the middle of repairing the mechs that were damaged in previous battles.

“We’re done here! Go Go Go!” Three of the mechs being worked on turned into spacial rings. Their mech pilots grabbed them and ran outside. A professor closed the shelter doors after them.

My brother handed his mech to one of the exhausted-looking design students. Meanwhile, I found a clean bench along the wall and made myself a seat.

I needed to cultivate… but I also couldn’t do so without understanding this new body.

As the building shook around me and as the crowd either screamed or hurriedly worked on improving the next mechs, I looked inward. This new body of mine had quite a few annoying impurities from the natural cultivation it had.

Instead of everything condensing down into a golden core, it was all bleh.

Natural spiritual energy also didn’t seem to return as fast as using a cultivation technique would have.

Actually, the structure of this body was very similar to the one from my past life. I mean, aside from the red hair, blue eyes, and a few freckles (the author did name this villain ‘Victoria’ after all), I’d say I looked a surprising 80% similar.

Hell, I even had the same goddamn Harem-Xianxia-Wife sized chest.

Well, at least I was used to it.

But all of this looking similar didn’t mean that my insides were the same… except that they were mostly the same. I could even feel a hint of a possible Phoenix Constitution! Though it was undeveloped due to the body’s original owner living in relative peace and never coming close to mortal danger.

But, anyway. This body was close enough that maybe I could use my natural cultivation and quickly turn it into organized cultivation… Since it was already at Golden Core level, I likely would not experience any tribulation for that either… if there even was tribulation lightning anymore.

For the whole mortal realm to be left without spiritual energy for unknown millennia… some shit must have gone down in the immortal realm… Or maybe even the godly realm if this book universe had such a thing.

… And it was probably all Bloodsword’s fault. I opened my eyes and glared at my new little brother. He was staring at his mech, but a chill visibly ran down his spine, and he turned towards me.

I smiled at him and waved.

His face grew grim. Whatever. I closed my eyes and continued to contemplate my own situation. Since I was fairly certain that this was the shelter the protagonist and her male lead would end up in after the military showed up to clean up this mess, I wasn’t worried about it crashing down around me, despite the walls shaking from taking hits.

The good news was that I already had all of the energy inside me (aside from what I used to control my mech).

Unfortunately, this was neither the time or the place to spend days organizing my energy and cultivating. The most I could do was meditate to increase this body’s natural absorption of this word’s ridiculously thick spiritual energy. And wait to take a long vacation from school.

Ugh. I hadn’t been in school for a fucking thousand years. And now I had to go to class. Or did I?

I sifted through the memories of the original. Apparently, when students entered the school, they signed away 20 years of their life to the military. Considering that people lived to be between 200-300 years old, it wasn’t as bad as it sounded.

At least they would all become officers. The only way to get out of it was to die or have something happen to my spiritual energy.

The technology in this world was just too good. As long as my head was intact, they could recreate my body. The original owner even had a clone created for her for when she inevitably suffered an injury. This way she wouldn’t have to wait for an arm to regrow…

As someone who had created several copies of her own body in case of death, I approved!

It wasn’t like the clones in this world were sentient anyway.

Except that the clone facility was destroyed in this attack, one of the reasons Victoria was left severely scarred.

Well, 20 years wasn’t that long for someone reaching for immortality.

The door to the shelter opened and several more people entered, including the fighters who had gone out previously.

Three more mech pilots went out. My brother wasn’t one of them. If this raid was still going on, once his mech was finished getting recharged and having emergency repairs done, he would probably go out then.

That was when I noticed the blond Prince Chad walking in with a ruggedly beautiful girl. Her black hair was tied up in a messy bun, and she looked like she'd been through a minor bit of hell.

The power couple must have sensed my eyes on them because they turned my way and stiffened.

I waved to them happily. It was nice to be in a world where waving from across the room was normal… mostly. Oh, was I supposed to bow to Prince Chad? Eh, whatever. According to the original’s memories, the monarchy here was constitutional. As long as I didn’t flip off the prince and the royal family, I’d be fine. Probably.

Oh, great. They were coming over here.

And here I was without even a plan on how to handle these two.

I supposed I should follow Rule Number 4 of Transmigrated into a Novel Club: Always stay on the main character’s side, even if the odds seem bad.

But this was a different genre than I was used to. Did those same rules apply?

However, from the memories of my past life on Earth, this was a genre that was just as dangerous for the villain as it was for a young master inside a classic Xianxia.

For example, if they hated me enough, they could have me assigned to some far-off frontline where I would conveniently die ‘honorably in battle.’

Or they could have me poisoned by something that was supposed to increase my spiritual energy to SSS but was designed to cripple a cultivator on failure.

Frustrating as it was, I was no longer the Immortal Ascension Stage monster that could walk through the world as if I owned it.

I would have to be cautious from now on.

At least until I reached the Immortal Ascension Stage again.

Well, if I was going to clear things up, I should start by attacking. “If it isn’t His Highness, Prince Chad. Are you shocked to see me alive?”

“Lady Victoria. I received an emergency call I couldn’t ignore.”

I nodded. “Understandable, completely understandable. It was very dangerous outside.” I grinned, showing sharp teeth, “It sure is a pleasure to see you alive and well after you left me to die back there... you know, without saying anything.”

He crossed his arm and stared down at me arrogantly. “You’re an SS mecha fighter. You should be able to handle those few small insects by yourself.”

“Perhaps… if I had my flight pack intact and had something other than a training rifle. But let’s not get into this. Instead, I’d like to say that I’m going to be avoiding you and your girlfriend from now on. I’ve bumped my head and become a changed person, you see.”

“Do you honestly expect us to believe that you’re suddenly a changed person after everything you put me through?” Liu YaoYao said.

“In the past, I was a terrible person. Extremely awful. But from now on, I will have nothing to do with you both.” I grinned.

They looked at me with even more skepticism.

Was it... was it this face?

That was when my cheap brother came along and stepped between me at Miss Liu. I had another urge to punch this guy’s face with a spiritual fist.

“Do you honestly expect anyone to believe you’re suddenly a changed person when in the last few years alone you put explosives near her torch, had someone take suggestive pictures of her meeting with me and several other men. You also nearly cost Miss Liu her scholarship when you sabotaged her final last year!”

Ah. Yeah, this is the feeling. Bloodsword also had a tendency to take anyone’s side except my own. Granted, Victoria was a bit of an evil bitch being too possessive of a man who wasn’t hers, but I refused to make her sins my own.

Yeah, the chances of me ever teaching this cheap brother of mine to cultivate dropped to zero.

But there was something off. Bloodsword would never be protective of a woman who already had a lover. Not unless...

I glanced between the two, similar nose and mouth. Same cheeks. Same color eyes.

“Ah, I see it now. The reason you’re so keen on defending Miss Liu here. It’s because she’s your biological sister, isn’t it?”

Three pairs of eyes grew wide then glanced at each other. Well, maybe they didn’t realize it. “You should go get tested to make sure... but I’ll give you an early congratulations on finding your blood related family, little brother.”

I bowed to his highness, passed them all, and left the shelter right before the doors closed.

Fuck dealing with those weird characters when I could focus on myself and cultivate.

Besides, I wouldn’t expect them to believe me right away. It was a shame their cultivation was too high or I might have been able to use my divine sense to manipulate them.

***

The first thing I did when I reached my rented apartment where I lived by myself, was check for damages. Fortunately, my apartment didn’t suffer any. Though a few other apartments had holes in them.

I then set up a few simple arrays that didn’t require any sticks and flags. This world had advanced technology but it really was lacking in a lot of the supplies that a cultivator needed.

After looking through various plant databases, I realized how lacking this future really was. Most of the plants I needed to make medicine had gone extinct. They were so lost to time that they weren’t even mentioned in any text.

I didn’t spend a lot of time being frustrated about that. If the spiritual plants I needed had gone extinct, then I would just have to research new plants and develop alchemy from scratch. Of course, there were already plenty of advanced medicines here. But not many for increasing spiritual energy after losing it. And none that helped purify the body.

While some things were better here in the future, other things were worse. And there was one thing that was terrifyingly missing.

Spirit stones.

They didn’t exist.

I assumed this was because they crumbled to dust then the spiritual energy vanished from the universe... and it hadn’t been long enough since the spiritual energy came back for the stones to return. This also made the thick spiritual energy that invaded every inch of this world make sense.

It had yet to settle. Yet to accumulate into the cracks of the worlds creating spirit stone mines.

But, a lack of spirit stones made cultivating here in a short amount of time... difficult.

So, I decided to do what I could. I used Victoria’s light brain, which was a device attached to her wrist that had similar functions as a smartphone, but was way cooler. First, I called the school and took a month off, claiming psychological problems.

Then I messaged Victoria’s parents, the Duke (her mother) and Duke consort (her father). I informed them that I would be unavailable for a month as I was taking time to mentally recover from the attack.

And then I sent her brother a few classic middle finger emojis before blocking him from contacting me.

It was time to focus on cultivating myself.

I looked inside and spent an excruciating three hours ordering each and every thread of this body’s Qi into a beautiful giant cube around my dantian. When I was finished with that, my whole body felt weak as fuck.

But I wasn’t done. This was just to make the process easier on me so I didn’t have to scour my body while I was in the middle of the fastest cultivation of my life.

First, I very carefully began the process. One-by-one, I took each thread and spun it, bringing it around my body in the exact form that I had deduced and put in my manual — Lin’s Fucking Kickass Cultivation Technique, No Peeking.

I was wary at first, testing every new location to make sure it worked with this different body. Surprisingly, it did. I could even feel the lock on my body’s special constitution loosen.

Muahahahaha!

This was going to be the easiest, fastest cultivation in history.

When I reached the first layer, a thin film of black impurities escaped my body.

I wanted to pause and go take a quick shower but there was something strange. As if the universe was fighting against my cultivation. I had a feeling that if I paused even for a second, bad things would happen. Was this a consequence of something that happened in the original plotline that affected the world later?

This might also be one of the things that was preventing the people of this world from discovering cultivation.

Well, fuck. I wasn’t going to stop at this point, so I dealt with the irritation of being gross and kept going. Slowly building up layer after layer.

By the time I reached the 12th layer, I was covered in filth. But there was no stopping. I moved onto building up my foundation. This required me to condense the layers into pillars.

This would be the point where I would have had to face a tribulation. But, this body was already at the equivalent of Golden Core, so either I didn’t need to go through a tribulation, or there was something wrong with the heavens. Whatever. I could only figure that out when I reached immortality.

I barely had any time to think and just created the same type of pillars I created in my past.

And it had only been 24 hours since I started and I was already building a foundation! It took me years to get to this point in my last life!

When I finished, my spiritual center looked like a pool of Qi with twelve pillars that represented aspects of myself. All of this rotated in my Dantian like a rotating clock with a pool in the center and a square of Qi with a chunk cut out and surrounding it.

And another bunch of black impurities exited through my pores.

But I wasn’t done yet! Now I had to complete all 144 pillars.

This took three more days of constant, intense cultivation. There was no time to rest.

I worked like a damn construction robot, following my cultivation method for foundation establishment precisely.

When I reached the peak, I desperately wanted to pause for a second… But that crushing sensation, like the universe denying my existence, weighed down on me. I wanted to laugh.

This bit of pressure was easy! Since when did cultivators ever need the approval of the universe?

This was the point at which I was supposed to experience a tribulation, but nothing happened besides an increase in the condemnation from the universe.

So, I squeezed all my pillars together and spun them. I tightened and tightened until they melted.

“Muahahahaha!”

Through the pressure and spin, the friction and energy, the melty pillars turned into a beautiful golden ball.

Now I just needed to carve symbols into my core representing aspects of myself. Using my experiences as a chisel.

Several were elegantly and speedily carved onto it to show the professions that I had mastered.

Eventually, I reached one of my remaining two symbols. The Phoenix, representing my Phoenix constitution. I carved the beautiful eye, the head with its crown of feathers, the curve of the wings, its massive claws that were able to attack any enemy and its fire to show that it would keep coming back even if it died. I was on the last line—

Bang!

The door to my room was thrown open.

In my shock, I barely finished the line… but I still had one more pattern to finish! But I’d lost focus.

Motherfucker!

The universe also decided that it had had enough of my shit. Pain shot through my abdomen. But my core was almost perfect, close enough that the energy of the condemnation of the universe could only rage within my body. A sick sensation tickled the back of my throat.

I didn’t know who the fuck interrupted me… but they were fucking dead!

I coughed. A metal taste filled my mouth, and I spat out several mouthfuls of blood, and turned to glare at the piece of shit who had interrupted my careful cultivation.

Of fucking course, it was that little shit eater, Bloodsword. Had he finally had enough of my existence and decided to kill me off directly?

Wait, no. I wasn’t in that time or place anymore. I was in a new world. With a man as my brother who might be, Bloodsword’s reincarnation.

Oh the irony that only a week after getting shoved into a new body, the reincarnation of that asshole would accidentally kill me again. Well, I wasn’t dead yet. What was worse was that my cultivation was interrupted!

Of course, I knew of a way to perfect a golden core… but the plants didn’t exist in this time. I would have to research new ones that could replace them.

Fuuuuck.

“Victoria! Don’t die!”

Who the fuck is dying, you bastard? “Don’t curse me!” I said but my voice was scratchy from a week spent not eating or drinking… or cleaning. And from coughing up all that blood. Fucker probably hadn’t heard me.

MingRen rushed over to me and picked me up in a princess carry.

I glared at him. If I wasn’t so injured, I would have used a technique to throw him out of my apartment.

“Jeeves, open the treatment cabin!” My dead-brother-walking said.

A wall opened and a glowing blue chamber pushed out into the apartment then went horizontal. The door opened and hissed.

He carried me over to it and laid me down inside it. I kept glaring at him as he closed the door.

Then it injected something into me that made me pass out.