Potion System, Spirit-Refining System

In a small apartment in an ordinary residential complex in Yanan District,

Li Xijun, dressed in a Nano Integrated Suit with a Bionic Bird Drone perched on his shoulder, made his preparations.

"The stock market is dangerous. Recklessly jumping in is just giving people money. So I'd rather not make anything than lose money. Only when a sure opportunity appears should I place a bet!"

"The same goes for this!"

"Now that this great opportunity has fallen into my hands, I must not rush, be greedy, or charge ahead recklessly."

"I'd rather do nothing than act rashly. I'll wait for a certain opportunity before taking action!"

As Li Xijun kept setting rules for himself in his heart, he made up his mind.

After crossing over, he would find a safe, concealed place to lie low until the drone had thoroughly explored the situation. Only then would he make further plans.

"Whew—!"

After taking a deep breath, he slowly focused his thoughts on the now-lit Unifying the Heavens (100%).

The next moment,

within his Sea of Consciousness, the golden mark positioned at an immeasurable height and illuminating countless worlds bloomed with a profound radiance, both illusory and real. It gently swept him up, seeming to pass through world-seas like dreamlike bubbles.

At last, that flickering, profound radiance descended into a strange world.

Li Xijun's consciousness within the Grand Luo Mark remained clear, allowing him to see the appearance of this world distinctly.

Above was a curtain like an overturned oil painting, constantly twisting and distorting as it radiated degenerate filth.

Below was a dizzying foundation filled with void, chaos, and slumber, like an ocean formed from countless units of nuclear fuel.

At the center of this world seemed to be a starry universe similar to the one from Li Xijun's previous life, countless rivers of stars scattered across it. Yet all the life in every world was concentrated on a small planet within that galaxy.

As Li Xijun descended toward that world's planet along with the radiance,

he saw one grotesque existence after another. They exuded pollution and madness, somewhat resembling the powerful beings of the Mythical World, yet were especially nauseating and dizzying to behold.

There were moon-sized beings made of countless chunks of flesh and tentacles, endlessly squirming as they polluted everything; spheres formed from overlapping eyes; transparent wriggling worms; and a door radiating pollution and madness.

The sight of those entities made Li Xijun's scalp tingle. If not for the Grand Luo Mark's protection, the instant he saw them, he would already have become a madman suffering a mental collapse—a ball of flesh covered in tentacles.

Fortunately, all of that had happened in but an instant.

Moreover, those ancient, powerful entities seemed entirely unable to detect either Li Xijun or the Grand Luo Mark. They could only watch as he passed through their blockade and entered Earth.

When Li Xijun came back to his senses, he had already descended into a port city on the eastern of this world's two largest continents.

And at that very moment,

Li Xijun suddenly felt as though something was calling to him.

Especially as the Grand Luo Mark's radiance gradually descended above the city, that intense sensation immediately allowed him to lock onto its source.

It was a battlefield ruin that had just endured artillery bombardment, spell attacks, and strikes that had left fist marks and saber scars.

Western ironclad warships flying Tulip Banners were fleeing amid plumes of black smoke. The two groups of Eastern and Western powerhouses who had been confronting each other in the sky also retreated and dispersed.

All that remained were corpses scattered across the ravaged battlefield, along with survivors who had been buried alive, had their legs severed, or had their bodies pierced through.

Amid the hellish wails, a young newspaper boy who looked thirteen or fourteen had likewise been pierced through the heart by a flying steel bar. He was counting down to death.

Just as his fading consciousness was gradually entering the darkness of death, at the threshold between life and death, his unfocused, vacant eyes became incomparably bright, revealing a truth as though he had suddenly attained enlightenment.

"So... it was me."

A murmured whisper escaped him. He raised his face toward the sky, revealing features that Li Xijun found extraordinarily familiar.

It was unmistakably what he had looked like as a child!

The next moment,

Rumble!

A bolt of lightning struck beneath the clear sky. Thunder exploded, as though galaxies were being born and dying within it, illuminating a stretch of heaven and earth.

The "him" who should have died turned into a streak of light and flew into the sky, plunging toward Li Xijun within the radiance. In the end, it entered the mark within his Sea of Consciousness.

The golden Grand Luo Mark trembled, as though it had undergone some sort of change.

Li Xijun, wearing a Nano Protective Suit, landed solidly upon the ground amid the ruins.

He felt his spirit grow stronger, while the memories of that "him" played endlessly before his eyes like flowing water.

"This isn't a place to linger."

Li Xijun had no time to inspect his memories or Spirit Level. The moment he landed, he used the footwork from the True Martial Thirty-Six Forms and shot forward twelve meters. In just a few flashes, he arrived at a secluded corner of the city.

As the Bionic Bird Drone took off and linked with the Nanofiber Suit, the visor over Li Xijun's eyes displayed the city before him.

Crowds surged along the city's main avenues. Some wore suits, some rough cloth, some qipaos, and quite a few wore black cloaks or Daoist robes. No one found it unusual.

A railway ran down the middle of what had once been a bluestone road. As steam trains passed along it with drawn-out whistles, the advertisement lettering on their carriages—Jinmen people only smoke Da Jinmen cigarettes—looked remarkably similar to the traditional characters from his previous life.

But the most distinctive feature was that nearly every street in the entire city had a martial arts hall. They stood everywhere in dense rows.

After confirming the city's safety and surroundings,

Li Xijun relaxed slightly. As he studied and memorized map data such as roads and landmarks throughout the city, he also reviewed the memories of this world's "him."

Fortunately, this world's "him" had been a newspaper boy.

Since he could read, his years of delivering newspapers had allowed him to accumulate plenty of intelligence, giving Li Xijun an immediate and clear understanding of this world.

Thirty-eight years ago,

the fog that had always separated the two continents across the Central Sea suddenly dispersed, allowing the Eastern and Western continents to become aware of each other's existence.

Almost inevitably, a world war erupted between the two continents.

However, this was a world of the extraordinary. Although the West had already entered the Age of Steam at the time,

the true stage of battle belonged to the extraordinary individuals on both sides.

The West followed a cultivation system called the Potion System. By consuming Potions, they acquired Extraordinary Traits and extraordinary abilities, with ranks ranging from Sequence 9 to Sequence 1.

The East was more diverse, but overall it was divided into two parts: martial arts, which focused on developing the potential of the Physical Body, and the Spirit-Refining Path, which cultivated the soul and increased spiritual power.

"Wait!"

"Increase spiritual power?"

"Isn't that something that can only be raised in the Intent Realm of the Third Realm by comprehending Outer Scenery Moves?!"