The Slacker Host

The bustling metropolis sparkled like a sea of stars.

In this city, towering skyscrapers stood in rows and traffic surged, overflowing with a modern atmosphere.

White doves flew across the horizon, bells chimed, and the evening rush hour arrived. Lin Xian politely declined a few female colleagues' invitations to walk together, standing in place while flipping through the medical book The Spiritual Pivot, watching his exquisitely dressed female colleagues get into cars with other male colleagues.

The few of them chatted and laughed happily, going for a drive, making no effort to conceal the ambiguity between them.

This was also one of the styles of a big city: carpe diem, uninhibited romanticism, and never wasting a good time.

Beneath the brightly lit night, civilization and desire walked hand in hand.

Yet Lin Xian, who simply wanted to live a peaceful life, was completely out of place in this fast-paced metropolis.

Talking about pure love in this day and age is like Master Ye going bare-handed to World War II and fighting airplanes and cannons with Wing Chun.

Unless Master Ye possesses the Desolate Ancient Sacred Body, there is not a sliver of chance of winning.

Therefore, I quit!

Lin Xian lazily stretched, his entire body exuding a Buddhist-like aura as he drifted into the dark like a salted fish.

In the big city at night, traffic flowed endlessly on the roads, and the sound of roaring cars echoed by his ears, brushing past him in extraordinary hustle and bustle.

Walking to a four-way intersection, Lin Xian put down his phone, shoved his hands into his pockets, and stared intently at the traffic light.

A wise man knows his own limitations; he, Lin Xian, was a medical student, not some steel-boned sports major. If he got hit by a car, let alone recovering from injuries in two days, he wouldn't be able to get up in two hundred years.

Obeying traffic rules was the primary secret to surviving in this steel jungle!

He, Lin Xian, had a house and a car, complete double mortgages, five social insurances and one housing fund, and a stable job.

His wish in life was to retire early, and his sole ambition was to fleece the company.

He only wanted to live an ordinary life and spend his days in peace and security.

Lying flat and slacking off, fishing in troubled waters—an eight-character mantra guided him forward.

You toil and I strive, the boss buys a Ferrari tomorrow.

Strive and toil? Totally impossible, alright.

"BOOM!!!"

A gigantic dump truck roared as it came crashing over, erupting with a massive sound like a thunderclap breaking, deafening to the ears.

On System 10086's cold face, a brilliant smile appeared, and its eyes were filled with relief.

The host dies, the system lives.

Respecting the law of transmigration was the primary rule for the System Race to survive across the myriad realms.

Oh host, break away from your mediocre and boring life!

Rise in decay, revive in extinction—the shackles of life were opened, and a brand-new world thus unveiled a mysterious corner...

System, initiate!

Over the ruins of burning gasoline, an icy mechanical voice sounded:

[Do you want to understand the meaning of life? Do you want to truly... live?]

Lin Xian, wrapped inside the sphere of light, remained unconscious and completely oblivious to the outside world.

"Ahem... got the wrong one, got the wrong one, this is the novice Main God manual from next door."

"Good thing the host didn't hear."

A flurry of flustered and chaotic noises rang out in the void. The system finally found its own novice system manual, operated according to the procedures on it, and restored that mechanical, icy voice:

[Timeline beginning to reset... Void barrier beginning to repair... Causality points beginning to be severed... System beginning to bind host, transmigration law initiated!]

[Coordinates: The Outcast]

Fortune gathers divine beauty, yin and yang sever dusk and dawn.

Mount Tai was towering, deep, and majestic in aura, revered as the foremost of the Five Great Mountains and hailed as the number one mountain under heaven.

Since ancient times, Mount Tai had been a symbol of the sacred. Located at the far east of the ancient Central Plains region, surrounded by the Yellow River and Wen River, in ancient times it was viewed as the place where the sun first rose and all things grew.

No mountain was greater than it, no history older than it!

Ancient emperors and sages all traveled to Mount Tai to perform the Fengchan sacrifices, hoping to draw near to the deities.

Having passed through two worlds, Lin Xian had never been to Mount Tai before, only understanding it slightly through essays and poetry.

When he arrived at this place in person, he was instantly overwhelmed by the grandeur and majesty of Mount Tai, finally understanding what it meant to touch an elephant while blind or view a leopard through a tube.

Hearing about it a hundred times was not as good as seeing it once; seeing it once was not as good as walking it with one's feet.

The mountain body was divided into a three-tiered geological structure, resembling steps to the heavens. Sitting facing south with the entire mountain mass open, a ten-kilometer-long path to heaven led toward the vast mountain expanse, extending all the way to the peak.

Whether gazing from afar or viewing up close, one could feel that grand and imposing atmosphere, making one's heart heave and surge.

Before the magnificent Mount Tai, one had a strange illusion of being as minuscule as an ant, and even the sun, moon, and stars in the sky appeared insignificant.

This was a shocking sensation that made the soul tremble.

So much that even the mechanical sound of the system issuing the mission was somewhat hazy.

[Trial Mission: Alter any major plot of the The Outcast world and display the host's potential]

[Success: One of the Eight Extraordinary Skills]

[Failure: After the host's death, the system will automatically unbind]

[Side Mission: Seize first place in the Luotian Grand Ceremony]

[Main Mission: Defeat Old Celestial Master on Mount Longhu]

"System, hold on."

Lin Xian looked up at the sky, watching several black spots appear on the horizon, and could not help but twitch the corner of his mouth, his voice carrying a trace of trembling: "Are you fucking sure this is The Outcast world?!"

System 10086 skipped a beat in its heart. Could it be that its operation was flawed, the coordinate positioning was wrong, and he had transmigrated to another world?!

It was also its first time acting as a system and bringing along a host, so it lacked experience.

In the flash of a spark, the system steadied its mindset, feigned maturity, and replied in a cold, mechanical voice: "The heavens and myriad realms are full of wonders. The The Outcast world has countless timeline branches, and the appearance of minor deviations belongs to normal phenomena."

"System 10086 guarantees..."

"Guarantees my ass!"

Lin Xian was usually steady, but at this moment his psychological defense also broke. He pointed at the Nine Dragons Pulling a Coffin in the sky and cursed bitterly: "You call Mount Tai having Nine Dragons Pulling a Coffin a normal phenomenon, and you call The Outcast turning into Shrouding the Heavens a minor deviation?!"

The scale of The Outcast and that of Shrouding the Heavens differed by more than just a little bit.

The background of the The Outcast world was situated within Earth, belonging to urban superpowers combined with a little immortal cultivation element, plus some alien races, which could be considered rich and colorful.

The supreme powerhouse, Old Celestial Master Heaven-Connecting Daoist of Mount Longhu, was hailed as the One Pinnacle, invincible in the mortal world, and stood at the peak of outcasts. Yet ultimately he could not use his physical body to resist a nuclear bomb.

The outcasts and practitioners of The Outcast were likewise unable to contend with modern organized armies possessing thermal weapons.

Generally speaking, the The Outcast plane was a low-magic region suitable for ordinary people to survive in, where mortals and the extraordinary kept each other in check, forming a delicate balance.

The Shrouding the Heavens universe, however, was different. Its background was the starry cosmos, with myriad races rising together, immortal cultivation for longevity, the struggle for the Emperor Path, the law of the jungle, and a strict hierarchy.

The cultivation system possessed five major realms in total: Sea of Bitterness, Dao Palace, Four Extremes, Dragon Transformation, and Immortal Altar, ascending step by step.

They respectively corresponded to: the dantian, the five viscera, the four limbs, the spine, and the head—the five major human organs.

Therefore, the Shrouding Method was also called the Secret Realm Method or the Self-as-Seed method.

Instead of seeking the universe, one sought within oneself, focusing on pushing open the doors of human immortals one by one, stimulating infinite potentials, and reaching the state where the heaven and earth macrocosm and the human microcosm merged.

Ultimately, one would sit on equal footing with the macrocosm, residing within it while the Dao remained outside, tearing through the void and transcending the universe.

This cultivation system originated from the Desolate Heaven Emperor, growing so powerful that it was abnormal. Cultivating to the second realm, the Dao Palace, was enough to roughly evade nuclear bombs. Cultivating to the fifth realm, the Immortal Altar, where a single roar shattered mountains and rivers, plucking stars from the sky with a wave of the hand, and obliterating great suns, was merely ordinary.

The perfection and fusion of the five major realms condensed the Imperial Dao Laws, making one a Human Dao Supreme—a Great Emperor.

Two supremes fighting a battle to the fringes of the universe, with chaotic energy permeating their every move as if the heavens and earth were newly opened, galaxies shattered, and the Dao itself was worn away.jpg

This was the Shrouding the Heavens painting style!

This was a high-risk universe where planets could explode at any moment, and a single glance could blow up the Milky Way.

Jumping abruptly from the urban superpowers channel to the Eastern fantasy channel caused not only Lin Xian to tremble, but even the system to shake, its root programs emitting fearful alarm sounds.

For the host Lin Xian, the current danger came from the Shrouding the Heavens universe; for the system, the Shrouding the Heavens universe was more than just Shrouding the Heavens.

Shrouding the Heavens had a trilogy: the present "Shrouding the Heavens", the past "Perfect World", and the future "Sacred Ruins".

Before "Perfect World" came out, the systems of the heavens and myriad realms thought this was merely a bland single universe of ordinary imperial ascension and commonplace immortal attainment.

The protagonist Ye Fan transformed into a Red Dust Immortal and fought his way into the Immortal Realm, with a very perfect ending.

Consequently, all sorts of reincarnators and transmigrators flew everywhere, and countless systems poured into the Shrouding the Heavens universe, regarding it as a blessed land and a treasured territory.

Once "Perfect World" came out, in an instant the systems were left dumbfounded and the transmigrators and reincarnators were stupefied. How was the Shrouding the Heavens universe any sort of blessed land? It was clearly a gigantic pit.

In "Perfect World", powerhouses at the Immortal King realm could manipulate the long river of time on a small scale and slightly alter history.

The protagonist Ye Fan proved the Dao as a Quasi-Immortal Emperor, traveling upstream against the long river of time to go to the past and help the Desolate Heaven Emperor resist darkness and rectify ancient history.

The worldview instantly sublimated from a single universe to the level of the heavens and myriad realms, strolling in and out of the river of time as if returning to his maternal home.

If it were merely this, some high-level systems could still barely manage.

However, what truly cheated people was when "Sacred Ruins" popped out, and the gigantic pit instantly transformed into a heavenly abyss.

The Red Dust Immortal was merely the beginning; the Immortal Emperor was not invincible, and above the Immortal Emperor, there still existed a realm of transcendence.

In the final installment "Sacred Ruins", Ye Fan successfully reached Beyond the Sacrificial Path, transcending everything, and alongside the Desolate Heaven Emperor and Chu Ultimate, they were jointly hailed as the Three Emperors.

For beings Beyond the Sacrificial Path, the Dao was like flowing water, and a single thought could steam it dry.

Destiny, Fortune, karma, Heavenly Dao, and the like were merely the frailest illusions that crumbled before one even reached out to touch them.

Transcending the so-called eternity, Dao, great chiliocosms, all time and space, outside the universe, outside the Chaos Sea, omnipresent, from ancient times down to the future, everything could be erased with a single thought of a living being standing in this realm, and wherever their gaze reached, everything withered and everything was reborn.

The past, present, and future had already lost meaning to Beyond the Sacrificial Path, holding no concept of time, as stepping in countless ages ago, stepping into the present realm, or arriving in the future all seemed visible, all seemed to exist in this very moment, capable of arbitrarily defining antiquity and the present.

A wisp of gloomy mist born from negative emotions could reshape an entire worldview, possessing infinite possibilities and changes, rewriting countless fates, subverting reality, and giving birth to infinitely diverging worldviews.

A single glance back could derive endless space-time and causal threads, and there was no need to care whether the future was disrupted, because on this plane, what met the eyes was inherently endless space-time and infinite possibilities; the Great Dao and space-time had both lost all meaning to him.

From then on, the Shrouding the Heavens trilogy universe became one of the rare forbidden zones in the Chaos Sea.

Few systems dared to run in and act wildly, and even if they did run in, it was only to bind native living beings, not daring to casually take people across worlds.

System 10086 felt that as a small system responsible for The Outcast plane, it probably couldn't play tricks against Beyond the Sacrificial Path.

"Host, do you have any opinions?" System 10086's voice sounded, still cold, yet lacking the previous dull, rigid, and mechanical feeling.

Lin Xian stirred a thought, spread his hands, and shrugged. "Doesn't matter, I'll just lie flat."

System: ???