I Transmigrated Again?

Boundless darkness stretched around a towering platform.

Looking at the imposing book before him, Wang Ping felt a storm of emotions. "So my cheat only activates after I die? Couldn't it have given me a hint?"

If it had told me sooner, wouldn't I have died sooner?

But delight soon broke across his face.

After all, who transmigrated into a world like this without a cheat? Sentiment could wait. First, he needed to see what his cheat did. This was his means of staying alive.

"Let me see..."

Wang Ping stepped forward and looked at the words on the page. Then he could no longer look away. A flood of information was forced into his mind.

It was a wondrous experience. The information pouring into his mind organized and sorted itself, as though this knowledge had never been unfamiliar to him. He had mastered it long, long ago and merely been forced to forget. Now he was only remembering it again.

"Huff... hah!"

A moment later, Wang Ping braced himself against the ground with both hands and gasped for air. Sweat rolled down his forehead, and the onrush of memories and emotions made his head feel ready to split.

Thanks to them, though, he remembered.

This was the inner space of the Peace Scripture. To put it more plainly, it was a morgue—an apt place for someone who was, in a sense, "dead."

In short, the scripture's power was to settle events. When its holder personally lived through an [event] involving people's hearts, destiny, and popular support, the scripture could take in the corpse of the [event's protagonist] and turn it into a usable [scroll] that empowered its holder.

Take the current [Scroll One: Otherworldly Celestial Demon], for instance.

"My transmigration counted as the [event], which produced the [Otherworldly Celestial Demon] scroll... Does that mean I swallowed my own corpse from before I transmigrated?"

The scroll produced by that settlement had an excellent effect, too.

"One resurrection after death, with a seven-day cooldown, and I can choose different worlds... So this thing was what made me transmigrate in the first place?"

Understanding dawned on Wang Ping.

Judging by its effect, he might have acquired this cheat back on Earth. After dying, he had randomly transmigrated and ended up in this wretched place called Great Shun.

Wang Ping grew excited at once.

He had been here for twenty years, drifting through half his life without accomplishing anything. No one knew better than he did that the idea of a transmigrator being destined for greatness was complete nonsense.

If you could not get ahead on Earth, why would transmigrating make you soar?

If he could go back, why would he stay in this wretched place?

His belated cheat had finally activated and could resurrect him after death, but the cooldown took some of the shine off that ability.

"Seven days? The daylilies will have gone cold!"

"And once is nowhere near enough. A hundred times, maybe. It'd be even better if resurrection could rewind time... I'd have so much more room to maneuver."

"If it can't do that, at least give me a plus button."

Wang Ping grumbled for quite a while, his gaze fixed on the Peace Scripture as he read the [Otherworldly Celestial Demon] scroll word by word.

"...Earth isn't there." Wang Ping sighed deeply.

Under the [Otherworldly Celestial Demon]'s rules, Earth apparently did not count as a "world he had visited." His options were therefore limited.

"I can only take a gamble and transmigrate to a new world at random."

Wang Ping's expression darkened. "If I'm lucky, I'll land in a safe world, lie low for seven days, and wait for the cooldown to end."

If he was unlucky and landed in a disaster zone or on a battlefield, he would be dead on arrival.

Wang Ping hated entrusting his life to luck.

There was, of course, another option: resurrect and remain in the Great Shun Dynasty. But that raised an unavoidable problem:

"I only just died. Who knows how this resurrection works? If I come back in the same spot, won't I run straight into the soldiers who killed me?"

"Huff..."

Wang Ping let out a long breath, then gritted his teeth and walked up to the imposing book. He looked at [Scroll One: Otherworldly Celestial Demon]. Two lines were written upon it:

[Chisel through primordial chaos; open the ancestral aperture to reach the Mysterious Female]

[Light is born in the empty chamber; pass through this gate to enter the Grotto-Heaven]

The golden words gleamed like dragon script and phoenix seals, arraying themselves to either side before becoming a towering doorway, as though inviting him in.

"...Fuck."

Wang Ping gritted his teeth and stamped his foot, then paced around for a full half hour. Only when his stomach began to growl did he finally make up his mind.

He had no choice. This morgue clearly did not serve meals.

If he kept this up, he would either starve here or gamble that he would not die the moment he landed. Wang Ping soon abandoned his pointless hesitation.

"...Here goes!"

Wang Ping strode forward and pushed through the door.

The next instant, golden light flooded his vision. Something brushed over him like a gentle palm, or perhaps a soft breeze.

Then an indescribable sensation swept through his body, as though he had sunk into a hot spring. It was so warm that he could not help losing himself in it. Sound, touch, and each of his innate five senses slipped away, one by one, as though he had returned to the womb.

He did not know how long it was before he jolted awake.

He still could not make anything out. Everything was a haze of shimmering gold, indistinct and illusory, but voices seemed to come from very close by:

"Something big happened in the sect recently. Did you hear?"

"Of course. At the Immortal Formula Institute, right? Apparently something went wrong with the Divine Farmer Cauldron. A spirit pill ran out of control, nearly blew up the furnace, and got quite a few people punished."

"Exactly."

"If you ask me, the Immortal Formula Institute was too ambitious. They wanted to refine a supreme immortal pill, but they couldn't keep it under control, and that caused the accident."

"That was nothing. For a real accident, what beats the one at the Divine Weapons Institute? Back then, the sect master poured who knows how much manpower and material into refining that supreme treasure. It left the whole sect in a foul mess, and fixing it took tremendous effort."

"Shh... Watch what you say!"

Wang Ping listened silently and committed every word to memory. At the same time, he began to realize that this transmigration might have landed him the grand prize.

"A world of immortal cultivation?"

Excitement surged through Wang Ping. Who did not dream of cultivating into an immortal and living forever? Had he transmigrated into the Immortal Sect as a disciple this time?

The very next moment, his fantasy was cruelly shattered.

A delighted voice cried out, "It finally worked! This batch of [Force Servitors] is out of the furnace. We can deliver them now."

Refined? Out of the furnace? Delivered?

While Wang Ping was still bewildered, the hazy colors before his eyes suddenly rippled. A sharp pain followed, and another flood of information and memories surfaced.

The good news was that he had indeed transmigrated into an immortal cultivation sect.

The bad news was that he had not become a disciple.

"I'm a [Force Servitor] of the Guardian Court."

In other words, he was a puppet, a servant specially refined by the Immortal Sect to serve its disciples. His standing in the sect was about the same as a robot vacuum's.

Just then, the voice sounded again:

"All right, hurry up and apply the talisman seal."

After a few brief words, Wang Ping felt a cooling sensation enter through the top of his head. It drove the heat from his body and spread through his limbs and bones.

It should have felt pleasant, but Wang Ping felt as though he had fallen into an icy abyss.

As the coolness spread through him, a desire to serve the Immortal Sect faithfully for life suddenly arose within him. There was nothing natural about that change.

"Is this... how the Immortal Sect controls Force Servitors?"

Horror gripped Wang Ping as memories surged into his mind:

"All Force Servitors are blank when they first come out of the furnace. This cooling sensation creates their personalities outright, even imprinting their minds."

"But I'm different. I'm a transmigrator. I already have my own memories and an established personality. The Immortal Sect obviously didn't anticipate that. It'll still shake my sense of self and muddle my thoughts, but if I have a moment to recover, I can tell them apart."

Only then did Wang Ping breathe a sigh of relief.

When the cooling sensation first struck, he had almost let out a delighted squeal. That clash within his mind was deeply unpleasant.

At the same time, he had a rather bad feeling.

Refining puppets, implanting memories, imprinting minds... How should he put it? Wang Ping could understand the rationale, but something about it felt wrong.

And there were the duties of a [Force Servitor]. Its implanted memories described it as a practical, durable tool. That description did little to ease Wang Ping's worries. No matter how he looked at it, a Force Servitor had a human body. Had they deliberately made it human-shaped, or had it been human to begin with?

"Is this Immortal Sect even legitimate?"

What if it's a demonic sect?

Wang Ping instinctively tried to contact the Peace Scripture. When he focused his mind, he could still see the boundless morgue.

But that was all.

He could see it, but he could not enter. That was the Peace Scripture's current state. To enter the morgue in person, he had to borrow a scroll's power.

Unfortunately, he only had one scroll.

[Otherworldly Celestial Demon].

Wang Ping forced himself to stay calm as he looked at the scroll. It was on cooldown, its color faded to gray and white, and could not light up again for seven days.

He immediately thought of another approach:

"How do I get more scrolls?"

If a scroll could get him into the morgue, then he could open another one while [Otherworldly Celestial Demon] was unavailable. It would at least give him a way to save his life.

As though sensing his thoughts, the imposing book in the morgue stirred again. Golden light gathered into words across its open pages.

[Common worldly objects, earth-nurtured essences, Heaven-Nurtured Divine Radiance, rare treasures of the universe, one-of-a-kind genuine articles]

[Collect objects of these types and absorb them into the book. Each object adds one scroll. Every object collected must be of a higher grade than the last.]

"...Ah."

Wang Ping immediately saw the difficulty. "Each object has to be of a higher grade than the last. I can't just feed it anything."

For example, if the first item he collected was an [earth-nurtured essence], then no number of [common worldly objects] he gathered afterward would matter. He would have forfeited that entire grade, even though either one would give him the same benefit.

Each added one scroll.

"So the best way to use it is to start with a [common worldly object] and work my way up, step by step. That'll keep me from wasting anything."

The ability had another use besides that.

[Appraisal].

"If I find something I can't identify later, I should be able to show it to the Peace Scripture and get an impartial judgment right away."

But all that could wait.

The future might hold promise, but that meant nothing if he had no future. Wang Ping knew it keenly, and his will to survive was nearly bursting out of him.

"At this point, even if there's a cure for regret, I'll have to wait seven days to take it."

"And if I survive this, I can collect materials, unlock more scrolls, and keep getting stronger. I just need time to grow."

"But... come to think of it." Wang Ping's thoughts suddenly turned.

If he set aside those deeply unsettling details, the Immortal Sect was actually quite good. Everywhere he looked, it taught him how to be a person.

I should be grateful.

Grateful to the Immortal Sect for giving me the chance to serve immortals.

Grateful to the Immortal Sect for giving me the chance to approach the Immortal Dao.

Grateful to the Immortal Sect for giving me the chance to be reborn.

"I'm a brick in the Immortal Sect's wall; wherever I'm needed, I'll—fuck!" Wang Ping shuddered and wrenched himself free of the thoughts that had inexplicably sprung into his mind.

Even so, he could not stop himself from feeling a measure of agreement with those thoughts of [gratitude].

For a [Force Servitor], the greatest happiness was earning the Immortal Sect's approval. The more approval he earned, the more valuable he was as a tool.

So this is what it means to be human livestock...

"...No!"

The next instant, Wang Ping came to his senses again, his scalp prickling. "As long as I'm a [Force Servitor], it'll keep influencing my mind?"

He could still hold out for now, but if it continued, he could not be sure he would stay clearheaded. By then, he might truly become the Immortal Sect's living weapon.

"You've got to be kidding me!"

At that thought, only one thing remained in Wang Ping's mind:

"Seven days. I just have to survive seven days. Once [Otherworldly Celestial Demon] finishes cooling down, everything will be fine. Until then, I have to lie low!"