"Son of Niu Dali! Natural Ox Strength talent—this was the one!"
Su Yang's eyes immediately lit up. This was far more suitable than the second one.
Although it was only an ordinary white identity, nowhere near the rank of the first two.
The most crucial thing was that it had the "Natural Ox Strength" talent.
Upon reaching adulthood, one would possess the strength of an ox.
In this world, sixteen counted as adulthood, and he had just turned sixteen this month.
As long as he chose this talent, after the simulation ended—
Then exchanged it through the novice gift pack, he would possess the strength of an ox.
Even the most ordinary ox, once it went mad, could not be restrained by ten or twenty people.
With such strength, breaking open a coffin lid would definitely not be a problem.
That meant there was hope of escape.
Thinking this, Su Yang said solemnly, "System, choose the third identity!"
[You have selected Identity Three.] [Loading current world...] [Loading selected identity...] [Simulation begins.]
[At sixteen years old, you woke up to discover that you were trapped inside a nailed-shut coffin.]
[You struck the coffin lid. From the sound of the knocking, you discovered that the outside was solid—thick layers of earth. Clearly, you had already been buried.]
[You racked your memories and only recalled being kicked once by a disciple of the immortal cultivation sect, Huaye Sect, before breathing your last.]
[You were filled with hatred and swore to avenge this grievance. But for now, the most important thing was to leave the coffin.]
[At this, you gave an evil, enchanting smile. If an ordinary person were trapped here, they would surely die without a doubt. But you had possessed immense strength since childhood, and breaking open a coffin lid could not stump you.]
Immediately afterward, an image appeared before Su Yang's eyes.
In the image was himself, punching the coffin lid again and again with all his strength in the pitch-black coffin.
After only a few blows, a large hole was smashed through the coffin lid.
He crawled out through the hole, pushed through the thick earth, and saw the moon and sky once more.
[After much effort, you successfully escaped into the open sky.]
"Good."
Su Yang immediately felt as though a weight had been lifted from his heart.
With the simulator vouching for it, if he could escape in the simulation, then he would certainly be able to escape in reality as well.
That had been too close. At last, he no longer had to worry about dying right after transmigrating.
[After emerging, the surroundings were pitch-black. Yet through your extensive experience navigating while gathering herbs, you determined that this was the outskirts of Yellow Wind Ridge.]
[This was a wilderness several dozen kilometers from Qingye Market. Due to the presence of spiritual energy nodes, there were not only ferocious beasts comparable to mortal martial artists, but occasionally even ranked demon beasts appeared.]
[You cautiously left the area and returned to Qingye Market.]
[Fortunately, you did not encounter any ferocious beasts or demon beasts along the way.]
"My luck really is pretty good!" Su Yang exclaimed.
Su Yang was not afraid of encountering ordinary wild animals in the wilderness, but if he encountered ferocious beasts or demon beasts, he would have to tuck his tail between his legs.
Though he possessed the strength of an ox, before some powerful ferocious beasts, an ox was merely one of their meals.
As for demon beasts, there was even less need to mention them. Only immortal cultivators could resist them.
The simulation continued.
[You returned to the house you rented and discovered that it had been ransacked into complete disorder. All your food and money had vanished.]
[This had long been within your expectations. You glanced outside the back door, intending to dig up the spirit stones hidden beneath the second jujube tree behind the house. At that moment, however, you faintly heard breathing.]
[Please choose...]
[1. Follow the sound of the breathing, investigate it thoroughly, and drag out the person hiding in your house.]
[2. Turn a blind eye, dig up the spirit stones, and leave quickly.]
[3. Pretend to leave, but secretly observe from nearby.]
"A choice? It seemed the simulator did not leave me completely without room for independent action!
"But... which of these three choices should I pick?"
After thinking briefly, Su Yang decided on the third option.
If this were reality, he naturally would not take such a risk. He would not even dig up the spirit stones before leaving immediately.
After all, there might be ten thousand choices, but there was only one life.
But in a simulation, trying out a choice did no harm. After all, a major purpose of the simulation was to explore more information for reality and make mistakes in advance.
More importantly, this was not some absolutely fatal option.
Otherwise, even if it was merely a simulation, Su Yang would not choose it.
[You pretended to leave in a hurry, but actually hid outside and waited silently.]
[Half an hour later, sure enough, someone crept out of your house on tiptoe.]
[You discovered that you knew this person. He was Old Wang, the man who had brought you into the herb-gathering team when you first arrived at Qingye Market.]
"What was he doing at my house?"
"Could he have learned of my death and come to my house to loot it?"
"In the simulation, when I entered to inspect the place, he must have discovered that I had returned and was not dead, right?"
There was too little information for Su Yang to analyze much.
But... there was no need to analyze anything. He only needed to keep watching.
[Old Wang hurried away, and you secretly followed behind him.]
[In less than half an incense stick's time, he arrived at a small courtyard with a single entrance.]
[You recognized this place. It was the gathering place of the herb-gathering team you had once belonged to, and also the residence of Li Mingchang, one of the team's three Qi Refinement cultivators.]
[You lingered outside for a long time, not daring to approach. You had no confidence in eavesdropping beneath the nose of a Qi Refinement cultivator.]
[But neither did you leave.]
[After a long while, Old Wang appeared again. You continued following him, and before long, he arrived at a secluded place. You felt this was a good place to make a move.]
[You choose...]
[1. Strike directly, seize Old Wang, give him a thorough beating, and force everything out of him.]
[2. Continue following him and see where his next destination is.]
[3. Quietly leave, taking not a single cloud with you.]
"Another choice?"
Su Yang frowned slightly, searching through the memories in his mind.
"The secluded place in the simulation was not far from Li Mingchang's residence. That should be Wooden Man Alley!"
"That was one of the three routes Old Wang could take home, so was he going home?"
"No, he wasn't."
"Although Old Wang could return home by that route, it was neither the closest nor the safest!"
"So either he was passing through Wooden Man Alley to another place, or... he was trying to lure me out here. He had already noticed that I was following him."
"Wooden Man Alley was secluded, suitable for me to attack him—and equally suitable for him to attack me!"
Su Yang's mind instantly cleared, and he felt that his guess was likely eight or nine parts out of ten correct.
In Qingye Market, whether in the market district or the residential district, one was not allowed to make a move openly.
Unless one was a great Foundation Establishment cultivator, or a member of one of the factions that controlled Qingye Market.
The person who had attacked the original Su Yang before had been an outer sect disciple of Huaye Sect.
And Qingye Market itself had been established single-handedly by Huaye Sect, with several other factions only joining as investors later.
"Choose three."
Having thought it through, Su Yang naturally would not take the risk.
The life of a simulated character was still a life. Moreover, whether the simulated character lived or died also affected the acquisition of Simulation Points.
Although he had a thousand-point Simulation Points voucher—
He did not want to use it on the ordinary white identity in this current simulation.
Su Yang estimated that the value of an ordinary white identity was certainly far less than one thousand Simulation Points.
[You quietly departed. But what you did not know was that not long after you left, a martial artist secretly met up with Old Wang.]
[You escaped a calamity.]
"Just as expected!"
Su Yang's heart chilled.
Fortunately, he had thought it through carefully. Otherwise, this simulation might very well have ended here.
[One night, Old Wang was engaged in vigorous exercise with Old Li's wife next door when the sound of a door being pushed open suddenly came.]
[Old Wang was shocked and terrified, thinking Old Li had returned. He hurriedly jumped out through the window.]
[Just as he heaved a sigh of relief, a blade was placed against his neck.]
[You stood behind the blade.]
[You interrogated Old Wang, and only then did you learn the whole story.]
[It turned out that ever since you arrived in Qingye Market, you had fallen into the Medicine Gang's scheme.]
[On the surface, the Medicine Gang recruited a large number of peripheral members. By taking them into the wilderness to gather herbs, clear out and drive away nearby demon beasts and ferocious beasts, they earned money by taking a cut of the peripheral members' herb harvests.]
[In truth, however, this was not their primary source of income.]
[Most mortals who came to Qingye Market had their own goals. Either they wanted to earn spirit stones like you, participate in a spiritual root test, join an immortal cultivator faction, and soar to the heavens in a single bound as an immortal cultivator.]
[Or they wanted to earn some spirit stones, exchange them for a great amount of mortal money, return to some small place, become a wealthy landlord, and happily enjoy the rest of their lives.]
[Generally, they would stop or leave once they had earned a fixed amount of spirit stones.]
[What the Medicine Gang did was discover their respective goals, squeeze every last spirit stone out of peripheral members before they reached those goals, and as for the people themselves, they would naturally vanish directly from the world.]
[You had originally still been some distance from your goal, not enough for the Medicine Gang to act. But the spirit herb you dug up was too valuable, enough to fulfill your predetermined goal in one stroke.]
[In order not to lose out on a considerable sum of spirit stones, they had no choice but to act urgently and use an outer sect disciple of Qingye Market to get you killed.]
[Afterward, in order to promote the Medicine Gang's reputation, they even gave you a proper burial!]
"So that was it."
Su Yang understood the beginning and end of the matter. Everything was suddenly linked together in one chain.
The original owner had merely been an ordinary young man who wanted to defy fate and change his destiny. In truth, he did not possess the potential to do so, and he had been played like a fiddle all along.
It was not just the original owner. Most of Qingye Market's mortals were the same.
An organization like the Medicine Gang was merely an insignificant member of Qingye Market.
If nothing unexpected happened, this pattern at the bottom of Qingye Market would continue for a long time.
They used a vast number of mortals to develop the cultivation resources in the surrounding area, yet gave mortals almost nothing in return.
In order to keep such a system running forever, mortals were kept in the dark, and mortals who had lost their usefulness would simply be made to vanish.
"However, since you ran into me and dared scheme against me, that is your misfortune." Su Yang's gaze turned cold.
Strictly speaking, the Medicine Gang had killed Su Yang's former body, and it had little to do with the current him.
But if the Medicine Gang had not buried him in a grave, why would he have wasted a simulation to choose an ordinary white identity?
He would have long since chosen a green identity, joined an immortal cultivation sect, or gone to Tianyun Kingdom's capital to live in luxury.
Collecting his thoughts, Su Yang knew that the most important thing now was to continue the simulation.
[After learning everything you wanted to know, you killed Old Wang with a single slash.]
[You returned to your lodgings and dug out the forty spirit stones beneath the jujube tree.]
[You wanted revenge, but you knew that you were far from being a match for the Medicine Gang. If they discovered you, you would instead place yourself in great danger. You decided to leave Qingye Market.]
[Two days later, you joined a merchant caravan and set off for a small Market Town called Niúmǎ Market, where you settled down.]
[At eighteen, you gathered the hundred spirit stones needed to participate in a spiritual root test. You successfully tested your spiritual root and possessed an inferior earth spiritual root.]
[Several Qi Refinement lineages came to recruit you. After carefully weighing your options, you joined the Sun Family.]
[According to the agreement, the Sun Family would provide you with an immortal cultivation technique and a certain reward. After becoming an immortal cultivator, you would need to serve the Sun Family for ten years, or marry a mortal woman of the Sun Family and have her bear descendants with at least three spiritual roots before gaining your freedom.]
[Of course, you chose to have it all.]
[At your insistent demand, you married three mortal women of the Sun Family. Though none of them were the most beautiful, each had at least one Qi Refinement cultivator of the Sun Family standing behind her.]
"Good, good, good. As expected of me! So steady and prudent!" Su Yang nodded in satisfaction.
What use was a beautiful woman? Once the lights were off, were they not all the same?
The key was to make women become aids to cultivation.
Women, I want you to aid my cultivation.
[At twenty-eight, you formally became a first-level Qi Refinement immortal cultivator. With the help of your several fathers-in-law and mothers-in-law, you became one of the Sun Family's managers of spirit fields.
You learned the Minor Rain Spell, Growth Spell, and Sharp Metal Spell.
You were assigned a magical hoe, a magical sickle, and spirit grain seeds.]
"Not bad, not bad. My choice back then truly paid off. Not only was I assigned safe work, I even learned several spells. What a huge profit!" Su Yang said happily.
One had to know that the circumstances of immortal cultivators who joined small Qi Refinement lineages were not necessarily good.
Either they followed hunting teams everywhere to hunt demon beasts, or they fought other immortal cultivators in life-or-death battles to seize resources.
Their days could be described as living from hand to mouth.
Otherwise, the Sun Family would not have offered such generous treatment to those with spiritual roots.
They gave cultivation techniques, spirit stones, and even assigned wives, only requiring ten years of service before granting freedom.
[At thirty, all of your spells had reached the beginner level.]
[At thirty-three, your first descendant with spiritual roots was born. They possessed a lower-grade water spiritual root and an inferior earth spiritual root. The Sun Family rewarded you with a Qi Boosting Pill.]
[At thirty-eight, the time agreed upon between you and the Sun Family arrived, but you did not choose to leave. You had already grown accustomed to your current life and no longer thought about revenge, because you knew that with your talent, revenge would remain forever out of reach.]
[At forty-two, you broke through to the second level of Qi Refinement.]
[At 45, your descendant began cultivating. In just five years, their cultivation reached Qi Refining Layer 3. Only then did you realize how vast the gap between spiritual roots was.]
"Qi Refining Layer 3 in five years? Then how long did Qi Refining Layer 2 take—three years, or two? And how long did I take in my simulation?" Su Yang clicked his tongue.
After doing a little math, he knew the answer.
He had begun cultivating at eighteen and only broke through at forty-two, taking a full twenty-four years.
Although his cultivation conditions had likely been inferior to those of his simulated descendant, the gap in their cultivation speeds was still at least fivefold!
And that was with their spiritual roots differing by only a single grade.
If the difference had been greater, the disparity in cultivation speed was easy to imagine.
Su Yang decided that in future simulations, he had to get himself a good spiritual root.
He continued reading.
[At 52, a terrifying earthquake struck Niúmǎ Market. All sides suffered devastating losses, and the Sun Family was no exception. Fortunately, the spiritual field area where you were located was broad and level, so the losses were comparatively small.]
[At 57, your Minor Rain Spell advanced to minor mastery.]
[At 68, you finally broke through to Qi Refining Layer 3. By then, your descendant had already reached Qi Refining Layer 6 and secured a place in the Sun Family. Your living conditions improved.]
[At 70, no matter how you cultivated, you made not the slightest progress. You began indulging in pleasure and took several beautiful concubines. Life on Earth only occasionally surfaced in your dreams.]
[At 118, you quietly passed away in your dreams...]
[Simulation ended.] [Generating evaluation.] [Calculating Simulation Points.]
If you think this book is good, remember to add it to your bookshelf so you can find it next time.
Before you continue