Speedrun Trial

Late Warring States Period, Zhao State, Handan.

On a winter night in the first month, the cold wind swept fine snowflakes against Handan's blue-gray brick walls.

Inside a spacious courtyard in the city, a well-dressed man paced anxiously back and forth, occasionally raising his head to glance at the tightly shut bedroom door ahead.

From behind the door came a woman's intermittent moans and cries of pain.

Every cry seemed to stab into his heart, filling him with anguish.

Until, at one moment, the tense atmosphere inside and outside the courtyard was shattered by an infant's cry.

The brocade-clothed man abruptly looked up and rushed through the door in wild delight.

"Young Master, it's a male infant!"

The midwife handed over the swaddled baby with a broad smile.

Before he could even take him, a strange odor mixed with the scent of blood rushed into his nostrils.

Yet Ying Zichu paid it no mind and accepted him with joy.

Zhao Ji, who had just given birth to the male infant, weakly raised her head and revealed a delighted smile as well.

"Young Master, have you decided on a name?"

"Of course. Since he was born in the first month, why not call him..."

Before he could finish, Ying Zichu suddenly froze and stared strangely at the infant in his arms.

"Why did he stop crying?"

The moment those words left his mouth, everyone in the bedroom froze.

The next second, the sky above Handan changed dramatically. Thick black clouds rolled in from every direction, Shrouding the Heavens and blotting out the sun.

"Rumble!"

Thunder roared. Everyone in Handan stopped what they were doing and looked toward the sky in fear and shock.

Within the clouds, thick blue-white lightning flickered and leaped, like Lightning Dragons endlessly tumbling through a sea of clouds.

...Had God become enraged?

The people of Zhao State in Handan had never seen such violent lightning. For a moment, they stood rooted to the spot, unsure how to react.

Just then, the dancing lightning within the clouds rapidly converged, as if brewing an even more terrifying power.

"Boom!"

In the next instant, accompanied by deafening thunder, Deep Purple Lightning as thick as a house descended from the heavens, crashing toward the blood-scented courtyard in Handan.

For a moment, the entire city of Handan could see that deep purple pillar of light connecting heaven and earth.

Yet Ying Zichu and the others in the courtyard remained utterly unaware, having no idea that death was about to descend.

Only when the Deep Purple Lightning struck the roof did the male infant in Ying Zichu's arms suddenly open his eyes.

What kind of eyes were those?

Black as night, Deep as Abyss, as if they could swallow everything in this world...

And that was indeed the case. The instant the male infant opened his eyes, an incomparably terrifying consciousness spread from his body, directly meeting the descending lightning in the sky and devouring the entire deep purple pillar of light.

At the same time, Purple Electric Arcs burst from the male infant's body.

Caught off guard while holding the male infant, Ying Zichu was struck directly by the purple lightning and instantly turned into charred coke.

Nor did it stop there. The violent purple lightning continued spreading, reducing everyone in the room to ashes.

The entire house shattered amid purple Lightning Bolts, turning into countless pieces of crushed stone crackling with Purple Electric Arcs as they shot in every direction.

In a single instant, the entire courtyard was destroyed by the rampaging purple lightning.

Unlucky passersby nearby were also caught in the lightning's wake and lost their lives in moments.

Amid the charred ruins, the tiny male infant floated upward, his body glowing with lightning like a Heavenly God.

Purple lightning danced over his skin, continuously washing his body and gradually making his flesh plumper and his frame taller.

In just a few seconds, the male infant whose umbilical cord had only just been cut grew into a boy around 1.2 meters tall.

That wrinkled little face finally displayed a clearer, more vivid expression—

"Sigh..."

The boy let out a faint sigh and looked gloomily at the ruins beneath his feet.

He had only wanted to properly experience this trial. How had so many hiccups happened right from the start?

Could it be that his Main Body Consciousness had entered this world and triggered the World Consciousness's resistance?

That wasn't right!

Did a mere Virtual World even qualify to develop a World Consciousness?

At that thought, the boy—or rather, Lin Yu—raised his head in surprise and looked toward the sky above, where lightning was gathering.

Just as Lin Yu had suspected, this world did not truly exist.

From the very beginning of his transmigration, he had discovered that everyone living in this world, whether his nominal parents or those expressive people of Zhao State outside, were not real living beings.

They were more like projections from another world, NPCs with false consciousness.

Otherwise, Lin Yu would not have chosen to clash head-on with the lightning descending from the sky. He would have used a safer method, such as moving everyone in the courtyard elsewhere...

Of course, even knowing this was a Virtual World similar to a realistic illusion, Lin Yu had not intended to flip the table from the start.

The reason this had happened was mainly because he had not expected that after the lightning was devoured by his consciousness, it could emerge from within his body!

This indicated that his current body was not true flesh and blood either, but a form of spiritual matter influenced by consciousness.

This had already been confirmed when Lin Yu tried tempering his body with lightning.

"Rumble!"

Amid deafening roars, the black clouds in the sky continued brewing lightning, showing no intention of giving up.

Lin Yu frowned, pondering why this was happening.

First, this was a trial, so the World Consciousness should count as the invigilator.

Then the question was, what kind of behavior by a test-taker would provoke such intense targeting from an invigilator?

The answer was obvious—cheating!

With that thought, Lin Yu spread out his consciousness, instantly covering the land of Huaxia. He discovered that every non-player character in the entire world was an ordinary person, and that no supernatural power existed at all.

So...was it because his consciousness was too powerful, powerful enough to easily interfere with the entire world, that the invigilator regarded it as cheating?

Lin Yu's face darkened. He immediately landed on the ground, reined in his consciousness, and looked up at the sky.

Sure enough, the lightning gathering in the black clouds weakened somewhat, but it still did not disappear.

After some thought, Lin Yu decided that because he had tempered his body with lightning, the situation was already beyond remedy.

"So there's no room for negotiation, huh..."

Lin Yu sighed.

The next instant, Deep Purple Lightning as thick as a house crashed down.

Lin Yu swept out his consciousness and instantly devoured the lightning. He glared at the sky and said, "You were the one who wanted to pull my Main Body Consciousness over here, and now you're the one saying my Main Body Consciousness is cheating—what, can't afford to play?!"

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

The black clouds gave no answer, only relentlessly struck down lightning.

Lin Yu laughed in fury as he endured the lightning crashing down above him.

"Fine, fine, fine. You won't let me play, is that it?"

"Then nobody gets to play!"

Before his words had even faded, lightning burst from Lin Yu's body as he shot into the sky. Terrifying consciousness surged from him like a tide, sweeping across the sky within a hundred li in an instant.

In a single moment, all black clouds were swept away, the deep purple lightning vanished inch by inch, and even space itself seemed unable to withstand the impact of Lin Yu's consciousness, cracking open into long, narrow fissures that were pitch-black.

And this was only the beginning, because Lin Yu had no intention of stopping.

Thus, the sky collapsed and tore apart beneath his gaze, while the earth trembled and roared beneath his will.

The entire world seemed to have fallen into Hell, with scenes of apocalyptic disaster everywhere.

"Rumble!!"

Amid deafening explosions, enormous canyon-like fissures split across the ground.

Seen from above, the entire land of Huaxia was covered in web-like black Abysses. Centered above Handan, spatial rifts spread rapidly in all directions, crushing through everything in their path and devouring all.

Palaces shattered, houses collapsed, rivers ran dry, and mountains crumbled.

Before the NPCs living on this land could even understand what had happened, their false bodies were erased by that terrifying wave of consciousness, returning once more to nothingness.

In merely three minutes, the entire world was utterly destroyed beneath Lin Yu's consciousness.

All matter vanished, leaving behind only an empty, deathly silent black void...

Lin Yu floated quietly in the void, looking at the vanished pop-up in his mind and sighing.

Just when he thought this trial had completely failed, a new pop-up suddenly sprang from the chat window—

"Obtained stage achievements [Defeat Zhao State] [Defeat Wei State] [Defeat Yan State]..."

"Obtained completion achievements [Unify the Realm] [Unity of the Four Seas]..."

"Obtained special achievements [Standardized Cart Tracks] [One Written Language] [Uniform Moral Standards]..."

"Obtained ultimate Easter egg achievement [Dominate Huanyu]!"

[Completion requirements detected. Rating: SSS]

[Congratulations, group member 'Lin Yu,' on being promoted to administrator!]