Reborn as a Tree, Blossoming and Bearing Fruit

I never expected that I would turn into a large tree, Cheng Jue sighed helplessly as he looked up at the sky. No matter how much he thought about it, Cheng Jue could not figure out how his reincarnation had resulted in him becoming a tree. Even if he had been reborn as a bug or an animal, that would have been fine, too. Cheng Jue felt extremely depressed.

Cheng Jue remembered his past life. Just like any other day, he had come home to play games. While he was playing, his chest suddenly felt tight, everything went black before his eyes, and he was reborn as a tree.

In his past life, his lung disease had probably flared up again. That was an old ailment he had suffered from since childhood. He truly never expected that after waking up from his rebirth, he would find himself transformed into a sapling.

Do not ask Cheng Jue how he knew. He only had to lower his head every day to look at his shadow and do a quick mental calculation in his heart to figure it out. Right now, Cheng Jue was just a tiny sapling a little over a meter tall.

When Cheng Jue woke up, his feet had already become tree roots penetrating deep into the earth, his hands had become branches, and his body had become a trunk. At present, Cheng Jue could only sense his own physical form; wanting to move around was simply wishful thinking.

Cheng Jue grew atop a boundless wasteland of endless yellow dirt. If not for the mountain piercing the heavens in the far distance on the horizon, Cheng Jue would have thought he was a desert tree growing in the wasteland.

Where on earth am I? Cheng Jue said helplessly.

Cheng Jue understood clearly in his heart that he had probably transmigrated and been reborn into another world, and that towering mountain in the distance was proof.

If this were the world of his past life, that mountain on the distant horizon would have nothing to do with the Himalayas. By visual estimation, this mountain stretched all the way into outer space, and that was no exaggeration.

As for the place where Cheng Jue grew, it was nothing but sand, utterly desolate, without a single flower, blade of grass, bird, or insect. Every day, Cheng Jue could only watch the sun rise and the moon set as time flowed by.

Strange to say, every day Cheng Jue could feel a nameless energy in the heaven-and-earth entering his body unconsciously.

What was it—carbon dioxide, or the Heaven-and-Earth Spiritual Energy from the novels of his past life? Cheng Jue no longer cared. He only felt that every time this nameless energy entered his body, it felt extremely comfortable.

If he did not know, he would not dwell on it. Anyway, it did no harm to him, Cheng Jue thought to himself.

Time flew like a white horse passing a crack, and just like that, a day passed. Well, calling a day "time flying like a white horse passing a crack"—author, was your Chinese taught by a physical education teacher? Don't rush; listen to me slowly explain.

Cheng Jue had also discovered that the time between sunrise and sunset every day was extremely long. In fact, Cheng Jue had noticed this as soon as he gained consciousness.

Once, Cheng Jue even kept count of the time in his mind. During a single daytime, Cheng Jue counted over thirty million seconds, and at night he counted another thirty million seconds.

Calculated this way, one day passing in the world Cheng Jue transmigrated to was equivalent to two years in his past life ($60 \times 60 \times 24 \times 365 = 31,536,000$ seconds). This made Cheng Jue's suspicion even clearer: he was not on the Earth of his past life, but in another world.

Until one day—which was also the hundredth day since Cheng Jue transmigrated to this world, equating to two hundred years passing in his past life.

On this day, Cheng Jue discovered that fifty flowers had blossomed on his crown. From this day onward, Cheng Jue also found that the energy he absorbed would involuntarily flow into those fifty flowers.

Perhaps because he had become a plant, Cheng Jue felt no fear of the unknown when he discovered he could actually bloom; instead, he felt the happiness of knowing someone might accompany him in the future.

Come to think of it, two hundred years of transmigrated time had passed, and he had spent it constantly looking at a boundless wasteland. Cheng Jue, who had only been an ordinary mortal in his past life, had actually not gone insane—even Cheng Jue himself found it incredible.

Cheng Jue also discovered that ever since he started blooming, he could actively absorb that peculiar energy on his own. Every time the energy entered his body, Cheng Jue felt as if his entire body relaxed and unfolded, feeling immensely comfortable.

With such divine wondrousness, could I have come to a world of immortal cultivation? Cheng Jue looked at the towering peak stabbing into the sky in the distance, and his conviction in his own thought grew stronger: I suppose that must be one of this world's great spiritual mountains and rivers.

That's right, with things this way, based on my understanding from my past life, wouldn't I be able to cultivate into an immortal and take human form? Cheng Jue was extremely excited by this conjecture.

Come to think of it, whoever was locked in one place for a century would be doing quite well just not having their mind snap.

From then on, every day Cheng Jue absorbed the energy between heaven and earth to strengthen himself. Although he did not know how to cultivate, Cheng Jue carefully groped his way forward, trying his best to circulate this heaven-and-earth energy through his body to strengthen it.

Right now, Cheng Jue was developing a cultivation technique. Perhaps due to good luck, Cheng Jue actually managed to grope out a few methods of meridian circulation within his plant body. Although the current cultivation method could only be called a breathing technique, at least having something was better than nothing.

What Cheng Jue did not know was that the reason his body suffered no mishaps despite all this reckless tossing about was because, within Cheng Jue's primordial spirit sea of consciousness, a vast expanse of Heaven-Opening Merit was protecting him. Only with this could Cheng Jue safely toss himself about the first time and so smoothly develop a basic cultivation technique.

Otherwise, since Cheng Jue had not read Daoist canon scriptures in his past life, how could he have developed a cultivation technique so smoothly? Even though it was a very basic breathing technique without the slightest divine wonder, going from zero to one was, after all, the hardest part.

Time passed quickly. After finishing each cultivation session, Cheng Jue would check the condition of the flowers on top of his head, watching the initial flower buds slowly bloom and wither, followed by the formation of white fruits.

At the exact moment the fruits formed, an inexplicable thought appeared in Cheng Jue's mind: if he channeled more energy during the flowering period, perhaps they would bear better fruits.

Another long day ended. At present, Cheng Jue's tree body was estimated to have reached a height of several hundred meters, and his crown could cover nearly a thousand square meters.

A surge of heaven-and-earth energy rippled forth. Cheng Jue shook his tree body and ended today's cultivation. After cultivating for all this time, Cheng Jue could already control his body to make some slight movements, even though he still could not move around.

The first thing Cheng Jue did upon snapping out of his cultivation was to look at the white fruits growing on his crown. According to the thought in his mind, today was the ripening time for the fruits.

Just as Cheng Jue thought this, a flash of spiritual light flickered across the crown, and the fifty fruits on it ripened one after another. Every single fruit was as exquisite as if it had been formed from the finest mutton-fat white jade.

Are these the fruits I grew myself? Looking at the fruits hanging from his crown, Cheng Jue was extremely happy. Since he could grow fruits that looked so extraordinary, he must surely be an extraordinary spiritual root, too.

I wonder if my fruits can sprout. Otherwise, staring every day at a wasteland without a single blade of grass is simply far too lonely, Cheng Jue thought in his heart.

Yet what Cheng Jue never expected was that the moment he thought this, a white fruit fell from his crown before he could even react.

That white fruit instantly turned into specks of starlight and vanished right before Cheng Jue's eyes.

Before any feeling of heartache could well up in Cheng Jue, an incredible scene unfolded before him: right where the white fruit had fallen, a clump of Knotweed Grass grew. It was Knotweed Grass—the very same kind of lawn grass we usually see in parks.

The instant the Knotweed Grass sprouted, a mysterious yellow light descended from the heavens. Divided unequally, one-third landed on the Knotweed Grass, while two-thirds melted into Cheng Jue's body.

Could that be the legendary Merit? Cheng Jue instantly grew nervous. Knowing that this was an advanced world possessing Merit, the very first thing Cheng Jue thought of was the Primordial World.

Don't scare yourself, Cheng Jue immediately steadied his mind. Still, one could not entirely blame him for making such a fuss.

After all, if things were truly as Cheng Jue imagined in his heart and this really was the Primordial World, then that was truly a hellish opening. Any random lifeform passing by might be an immortal, and who knew when Cheng Jue himself might be chopped down by a passing immortal to refine pills or forge magical treasures.

Calm down, calm down. Maybe I'm just located in a high-level immortal-hero world, and that's all, Cheng Jue hastily cast those terrifying thoughts away.

Right at the moment that strand of Merit entered Cheng Jue's body.

A voice appeared within Cheng Jue's sea of consciousness: Ah, there's finally electricity; I've come back to life.

...