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"How many chances does a person get to fight for their future? If not today, then when?"
"Today's hard work is for the happiness we'll enjoy after becoming gods!"
"..."
Chen Changhe rubbed his head and slowly came to his senses. He was standing in the school's spacious auditorium.
Annoying!
So annoying!
This was really freaking annoying!
Happiness after becoming a god?
That wasn't meant for him!
"Easy for you to say."
"My entire following is mushrooms. What am I supposed to fight with, my head?"
"Do I win battles by making my opponents eat themselves to death?"
Standing with his class, Chen Changhe watched the principal appear in a virtual projection, delivering an impassioned speech full of encouragement.
He felt not the slightest bit excited. His heart was utterly cold.
Chen Changhe had been in this world for eighteen years and had come to understand it well.
People like him were divine beings whose followers were an ordinary fungal species. They had no future to speak of.
There was no point even discussing his college entrance exam results.
The best he could hope for was to provide some mushrooms and other fungi to a god on a regular basis in exchange for a little Divine Power.
A god-given wage slave.
"Still, I'm definitely better off than an ordinary person."
"But this is all my life will ever amount to..."
Chen Changhe sighed and stood among the other students, barely able to keep his eyes open.
Zhu Caigou, his homeroom teacher, glanced at Chen Changhe from the front of the line and frowned.
But he said nothing.
"The school's preliminary exam is in one week."
"It'll be an elimination-style assessment."
"That Chen Changhe will have to pack up and leave!"
"An orphan with no parents, who made it through high school thanks to the Federation government's support."
"What a lucky guy!"
"But that's as far as his luck goes..."
"There's no chance that kid will ever become a demigod."
Zhu Caigou had been Chen Changhe's homeroom teacher for three years.
During his first and second years, he had high hopes for Chen Changhe.
The kid was penniless and couldn't give him gifts like the other students, but he was clever, and his grades in every subject related to godhood had always been the best in the year.
For that reason, Zhu Caigou hadn't treated him badly.
Who could have guessed that after activating his Divine Domain in his third year, the kid's core followers would turn out to be nothing but mushrooms?
And ordinary mushrooms at that.
It had infuriated Zhu Caigou.
All his patience had gone to waste.
From then on, he'd targeted Chen Changhe at every turn.
He'd tried every which way to force him to drop out.
Yet the kid had shamelessly clung to his place in the class.
"No... I can't just let this go..."
"The students' assessment results affect my teaching evaluation."
"The other students might pass a round or two, but that useless Chen Changhe won't get through even the first round."
"Then I'll become the laughingstock of the whole school!"
"I have to find a way to make Chen Changhe drop out before the assessment..."
Zhu Caigou's eyes rolled as he came up with a plan.
"As a teacher, I obviously can't go after Chen Changhe directly."
"But it's different if it's a conflict between students."
"If students fight over a dispute and destroy a Divine Domain Core, that's not something a homeroom teacher like me can control."
"There's more than one person in this class who can't stand that kid..."
Don't blame me for being cruel!
Useless trash doesn't deserve to stay in my class!
In his previous life, Chen Changhe had also been named Chen Changhe.
He'd been a craftsman.
His Kirin Arm had been unmatched under heaven.
Then, by accident, he'd transmigrated to a parallel version of Earth known as Blue Star.
This was a world where everyone had the chance to become a god.
His parents had died when he was young, so he'd grown up with his grandfather. Three years ago, just before Chen Changhe started high school, his grandfather had passed away as well.
With the Blue Star Federation government's education subsidy, he'd entered Deity High School and received three years of education in godhood, awakening his own Divine Domain along the way.
"But... is this really all there is?"
Back home, Chen Changhe sighed.
He wasn't willing to accept it.
The frayed rope always snapped at its weakest point, and misfortune always found those already down on their luck.
"My start in life is basically set to hell difficulty."
For divine beings, the type of their core followers was extremely important.
After awakening a Divine Domain, a divine being could have certain creatures naturally come into existence within it.
These creatures were that divine being's core followers.
Compared to other followers, core followers developed faith in their divine being much faster.
They were also more likely to produce high-quality believers and to evolve into higher lifeforms.
Ordinary Lifeforms, Elite Lifeforms, Transcendent Lifeforms, Epic Lifeforms, Legendary Lifeforms, and Lord Lifeforms.
These were the stages of advancement for a follower's lifeform level.
The higher the level, the more powerful the lifeform.
By the Legendary Lifeform stage, followers had strength comparable to that of a demigod.
Lord Lifeforms were even on par with gods.
All of Chen Changhe's followers were mushrooms incapable of movement.
They didn't even possess basic intelligence.
As for combat ability, they had none at all.
"This is a useless species."
If he had a choice, Chen Changhe certainly wouldn't give up.
He'd gone to all the trouble of transmigrating. If he didn't try to make something of himself, it'd be disrespectful to the whole experience.
"But this lowly concubine just can't do it!"
If he had the backing of a family, Chen Changhe could have tried resetting his Divine Domain.
He might have managed to obtain a new core species of followers.
But Chen Changhe had nothing.
The one and only Sacred Relic he owned was something he'd bought with the money from selling his ancestral home.
He couldn't afford to reset his Divine Domain.
There was no true fairness in this world. Even before he'd transmigrated, the upper classes could use connections and money to smooth everything over, while those at the bottom could only accept their lot and let themselves be trampled.
And now?
There were actually a few other students in Chen Changhe's class who had also gotten useless followers.
But they'd already reset their Divine Domains and given themselves a new chance.
Without demigod parents, Chen Changhe had to rely on himself for everything. He didn't have the money to pay for another shot.
Once divine beings reached six points of Divinity, they could prepare for the ritual to become demigods.
After becoming a demigod, they could fuse with a Divine Authority, try to kindle their Divine Fire, and raise their God Throne to become true gods.
The resources needed to reset a Divine Domain were an astronomical sum to him, but for demigod families, they amounted to no more than a few materials.
A girl in his class had offered to help Chen Changhe reset his Divine Domain.
But Chen Changhe still wasn't used to living off a woman.
He'd refused.
"Want me for my body?"
"I'm a man of virtue. I can't!"
He didn't like being on the receiving end of pleasure.
That was the one line he wouldn't cross.
Chen Changhe walked over to the Divine Domain Login Pod in his room.
Divine beings below the demigod level weren't powerful enough to connect to their Divine Domains on their own, so they needed the help of a Divine Domain Login Pod.
From the outside, it looked like a futuristic spacecraft, with a bullet-shaped design that gave it a sleek, high-tech feel.
"Click!"
The Divine Domain Login Pod opened, and Chen Changhe lay down inside.
[Identity card and Divine Domain information perfectly matched. Genetic identification successful!]
[Name]: Chen Changhe
[Age]: 18
[Current Realm]: Divine Being (Divine Being, Demigod, True God, Main God, God King...)
[Core Followers]: Mushrooms
[Divine Name]: Mushroom God
[Godhead]: None
[Divinity]: 1
[Divine Domain Core]: Level 1
[Divine Domain Area]: 10 square kilometers (50% plains, 30% mountains, 20% lakes)
[Number of Followers]: 13 billion ordinary mushrooms, 2,300 Mushroom Men
[Faith Points]: 3,697
[Divine Power Balance]: 600
[Loaded Sacred Relic]: Humanoid Core (Mushrooms)—after loading, there is a one-in-a-hundred-million chance of mushroom followers becoming humanoid and turning into ordinary lifeforms known as Mushroom Men
[Divine Arts]: None
[Divine Artifacts]: None
[Divine Abilities]: Growth Acceleration, Life Sacrifice (Unique)
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