"Heh." Ye Fan chuckled and followed Lu Mingfei's lead. "You weren't among the first batch to join the group, so you don't know."
"This guy's a transmigrator too."
Everyone paused with their chopsticks in hand and looked at Su Lin in surprise. They had assumed he was a native of this world, but then again, how could a world with almost no supernatural power have such a massive Floating Mountain?
"Could it be that the world Su Lin came from before transmigrating was a world of Immortal Cultivation?" Lu Mingfei immediately became interested. "Did you transmigrate physically, or was it soul transmigration?"
"Soul transmigration." Su Lin had nothing to hide about that. He had mentioned it long ago.
"So this isn't your original body, then?"
"It still counts as my own body." Su Lin explained, "I transmigrated into myself in a parallel world. Before transmigrating, I was nearly thirty. Afterward, I returned to when I was twenty-three."
"Then isn't that just plain reincarnation?"
"No, it was transmigration."
There were some differences between Su Lin's memories from before and after transmigrating.
"In this world, I majored in civil engineering in college. After graduating, I worked for only a short while before quitting and leaving."
Lu Mingfei nodded. Everyone in the group had complicated experiences.
"I heard you used a watch to take Luffy back two years ago. Could I take a look?" Xiao Yan asked.
Su Lin took [Zochet's Linear Pocket Watch] from the System Inventory and handed it to Xiao Yan. Everyone curiously examined this item connected to time travel.
"It's just an ordinary watch." Xiao Yan turned it over and over in his hands, unable to make sense of it, then passed it to the others.
"A single-use item."
"This thing doesn't match the style of your sect at all." Ye Fan's meaning was obvious.
"Heh heh." Su Lin smiled and shook his head.
"Just treat these as the golden fingers I got from transmigrating. Xiao Yan has an old grandpa in his ring, Han Li has a Little Green Bottle, and Klein has Sefirah Castle."
"Doesn't Lu Mingfei also have a good little brother who grants wishes?"
"Damn, your golden finger setup is a little too complicated." The meat in Lu Mingfei's mouth suddenly did not taste as good. He abruptly wanted to transmigrate once himself. Maybe he would get some kind of beginner's gift package.
"Speaking of which, Lu Mingfei." Su Lin changed the subject and redirected everyone's attention. If a newcomer ever uploaded a work related to him in the future, the others would naturally find out.
For now, there was no rush.
"Have you made up your mind? What plans do you have for the future?"
Over the past month or so, Lu Mingfei had spent every day either cultivating or thinking about what to do next. It was not as though he had not considered cultivating to the Nascent Soul stage before returning, then wandering through the heavens and worlds in the meantime, drifting through the worlds of the group members.
But that idea was clearly unrealistic.
"After I go back, I plan to come clean with that damn little brother of mine first. I don't think he'd hurt me." Lu Mingfei ran a hand through his hair. "Then... I'll find a way to save Erii first."
Well, that was basically no plan at all.
"When one knows what is destined to happen, one should cherish the opportunities already at hand and leave no regrets." Zhongli spoke slowly. He pinched a flower petal from the table between his fingers. Many years ago, he and the comrades who had fought alongside him had also gathered like this, drinking fine wine and sharing good food.
"The Great Dao has fifty paths, while Heaven evolves forty-nine; one escapes, leaving all things a sliver of hope. There is no need to rush."
Shirou Emiya nodded and offered Lu Mingfei some reassurance. "With the Chat Group's help, and with a general understanding of where the future is headed, there's no reason we should fare worse than the story in the book."
Shirou Emiya had long made up his mind that he would bring about an ending where everyone could be happy.
He had no ability to save all the many different timelines of Type-Moon, but at least in the timeline where he was...
"I will protect everything on this Worldline!"
Illya clapped from the side.
Ye Fan nodded in approval, his smile brimming with confidence. "I shall suppress every enemy in the world. This time, there will absolutely be no Dark Turmoil!"
"Well said!" Xiao Yan strongly agreed. In the original timeline, he had become the Flame Emperor. Now that he knew the future in advance, he should set his sights on the more distant Great Thousand World.
"My every moment is spent preparing to revive my teacher, cleanse my sect, quell the Soul Clan's chaos, and battle through the heavens!"
Klein thought about it. The logic made sense, but would putting it into practice make the future even worse? For instance, he might originally have become the Fool of Sequence 0, then taken down Amon and collected the Uniqueness. But because of some move he made, would he suddenly wake up one day wearing a Monocle?
"Surviving the Apocalypse would count as success."
"..."
"..."
"..."
"Ahem."
The atmosphere suddenly fell quiet. Su Lin coughed and picked up the conversation.
"Anyway, Lu Mingfei, work hard. First, strive to reach Foundation Establishment as soon as possible."
Su Lin clinked his drink against Lu Mingfei's. "I'm looking forward to a live broadcast of Tokyo Love Story."
"Stop messing with me..." Lu Mingfei gave a smile uglier than crying. "It's not like you don't know. That was all just my bastard little brother's weird hobby."
"Besides Herzog, there are also slippery old bastards like Mr. McCannon. It's too hard."
"If only our group had a Doraemon. I'd borrow an If Phone Booth from him." Lu Mingfei drank his cola and muttered to himself.
"Doraemon? If Phone Booth? What are those?" Zhongli asked curiously.
"A cartoon character from many children's childhoods in this era..." Most of the people present knew it.
There was no need to mention Shirou Emiya; it was a pillar industry in his island nation.
Ye Fan, Xiao Yan, Su Lin, Lu Mingfei, and Zhou Mingrui were all born in the eighties or nineties. They had watched that cartoon on television as children.
"Mm..." Han Li and Zhongli felt that human imagination truly was remarkable.
"But among the myriad heavens and worlds, who can say whether a Doraemon might truly join one day? Just like us—aren't we also beings of fantasy to people from other worlds?" Zhongli said slowly.
"Indeed. Planets are like the countless grains of sand in a river compared to the universe. Perhaps the many worlds are much the same." Han Li sighed softly, but at present, he was merely a Late Golden Core Stage cultivator.
"Who wouldn't want a Doraemon?" Su Lin wanted one himself. When he made birthday wishes in elementary school, he had wished for one.
"Chomp chomp, Time Machine." Luffy bit into several chunks of meat. The Sea Kings roasted with Heavenly Flames had crisp skin and tender meat, and the mixed spices gave them a unique flavor.
"Now that you mention it, isn't Su Lin basically Doraemon?"
"He took me back into the past before."
Su Lin said helplessly, "Yeah, except it was single-use."
Thanks to "Yuandao Star" for the 300-point donation!
(End of chapter)