Gao Jian

Biodata

Feature	Value
Name	Gao Jian (高见)
Alias(es)	Engineer Gao; Young Gao 22 40
Species/Race	Human 42
Gender	Male
Age	28; transmigrated at approximately 26 36 42
Affiliation	China National Space Administration (CNSA); disciple of the Mystic Sect in his original world 1 9
Occupation/Role	Rocket engineer; Long March 10 propulsion-system specialist; immortal cultivator 1 17
Cultivation	Peak of early Foundation Establishment; falsehood recognition realm in mind-state cultivation 36 39 47
Lifespan	Approximately 200 years at Foundation Establishment 1 42
Status	Alive; working at CNSA and seeking a route to the Moon 50
First Appearance	NASA lunar-launch viewing area, attending as a CNSA observer 1

Power Progression

Stage / Realm / Level	Chapter	Notes
Early Foundation Establishment	1	Already attained before transmigration. His cultivation transferred with him, but the new world's lack of spiritual energy prevented further advancement.
Peak of early Foundation Establishment	36	Absorbed energy from three recharged spirit stones while cultivating in a sealed room—the first successful cultivation session since transmigrating two years earlier.
Falsehood recognition realm — mind-state cultivation	39	Reached the first realm of the Mind-State Cultivation Method after practicing through a day and night. Gained perception of physical structures, light, heat currents, and living beings' auras. This is separate from his Foundation Establishment cultivation.

• Later bottleneck: A month afterward, he remains at the peak of early Foundation Establishment. His three spirit stones sustain only one night of practice, while a minor breakthrough normally requires several uninterrupted days 47.
• Power comparison: The narration assigns early Foundation Establishment a relative combat strength of 1, its peak 1.9, and mid-Foundation Establishment 5. Gao Jian's spiritual power has become denser, but his dantian capacity and meridian limits have not undergone the next breakthrough 47.

Background / History

Gao Jian originally lived in a cultivation world associated with the Northern Azure Cloud Realm. His master was an early-stage Nascent Soul cultivator, while his ancestral master stood at the peak of Nascent Soul and ranked among the realm's strongest combatants. He learned numerous cultivation crafts rather than concentrating exclusively on advancing his realm; his founding patriarch suggested that greater focus might already have brought him close to Core Formation 8 10 32 36.

During a sect mission, Gao Jian accidentally entered another person's heavenly-tribulation site and was reduced to ash. His consciousness, cultivation, and Storage Bag crossed into the brain-dead body of another Gao Jian, an engineering graduate student who had been struck by a truck. The two shared a name, similar appearances, approximately the same age, patient temperaments, and remarkably parallel interests 17 36.

After recovering, he joined CNSA and spent the next two years preparing for lunar exploration. Fleeting visions of Buddhist seals and immortal light on the Moon convinced him that it might contain cultivators or spiritual resources. He became a key Long March 10 engineer while keeping his supernatural identity hidden 1 9.

Appearance

• Wears a dark navy shirt with a CNSA observer's badge at the NASA launch viewing area 1.
• Closely resembles the original owner of his current body 36.
• Returns from the lunar-flight ordeal with singed hair, which he unsuccessfully explains as the result of sea wind and a recent perm 23.

Personality

Gao Jian is patient and generally willing to reason with ordinary people even when they mistreat him. His compassion is practical rather than ceremonial: he spends precious medicine on dying astronauts, feeds a starving homeless veteran, and intervenes when an exhausted colleague needs rest. Asked why he saved the astronauts, he treats the value of human life as sufficient explanation 14 22 36 48 49.

He is intensely committed to immortality. The Moon initially matters to him chiefly as a possible source of spiritual energy, and his engineering career provides a route toward that goal. His determination can become reckless—he secretly boards a launching rocket and later volunteers for dangerous astronaut duty—but he also recognizes that missiles, radiation, and organized modern militaries exceed his ability to confront safely 1 3 41 46.

His secrecy combines caution, improvisation, and elaborate deception. He fears surveillance will expose his cultivation and destroy his ordinary relationships, so he maintains cover stories even under prolonged interrogation. At the same time, he revises mistaken judgments: he acknowledges misreading Song Yaozu's exhaustion as laziness and reconsidering Blackwell's actions after learning that three astronauts reached the White House alive 20 28 30 48.

Abilities & Skills

Orthodox Immortal Cultivation

• Spiritual power: Uses spiritual energy for spells, flight, artifact control, and physical protection. An automatic barrier protects his skin briefly when spacecraft exhaust strikes him 8.
• Recovery through rest: Discovers that fully depleted spiritual power replenishes alongside physical stamina in approximately twenty-four hours, even without absorbing ambient spiritual energy 23.
• Spirit-stone recharging: Channels his own spiritual power into depleted stones, then absorbs their stored spiritual energy to cultivate 32 33.
• Food-dependent energy cycle: Interprets his cultivation as converting food energy into spiritual power, then converting that power into spiritual energy through spirit stones. Maintaining the cycle greatly increases his appetite 42.
• Limits: Rest restores his reserves but does not itself increase their capacity. Attempts to replace spirit stones with ordinary stones, metals, or batteries fail 23 42.

Spiritual Sense

• Monitors movements for miles around, inspects rocket fuel tanks, and observes people through spacecraft walls 3 8.
• Examines bodily functions, including heartbeat, temperature, pupils, and apparent brain abnormalities 22.
• Searches rooms for surveillance equipment and covertly monitors a State Security Bureau facility 30 31.
• Limit: Initially fails to identify the creature impersonating Robert, whose humanlike body and borrowed memories deceive him 28.

Falsehood Recognition

The first realm of mind-state cultivation provides a distinct way of examining physical reality 39.

• Separates reflected light from matter, causing familiar colors to disappear and the sky to appear black 39.
• Perceives molecular structures, heat currents, and faint auras around living beings 39.
• Sees his own aura as blue and his grandfather's as exceptionally dense and white 39 40.
• Switches the perception on and off through concentration 39.
• Believes this perception can expose humanoid impostors that lack the qualities of genuine living beings; this conclusion follows his earlier failure to recognize the false Robert 41.
• Limit: The method requires no spiritual energy, but its text describes very little direct combat enhancement even at the highest realm. Gao Jian also questions whether it extends lifespan 39.

Flight and Force Manipulation

• Flies by sword and has competed in a Flying Sword Competition in his original world 29.
• Stops his uncontrolled rotation in space by exploiting the reaction force of sword strikes, then uses a spiritual-energy tether and wind-riding techniques to catch the spacecraft 8.
• Propels the Orion return capsule himself, adjusting his thrust to produce a spiraling descent toward Earth 17.
• Limits: His normal early-Foundation sword-flight speed is comparable to an airliner's approximately 236 m/s cruising speed. Traveling alongside Orion at 10.92 km/s follows its acceleration; it is not his unaided flight capability 8 29.
• A Foundation Establishment cultivator's flight impulse is estimated at roughly 10,000 newtons, requiring careful engineering rather than overwhelming force to move the capsule effectively 17.

Wind, Water, and Other Spells

• Wind Control Art: Creates a gust to arrest a helicopter's fall and turn it around; also disables pursuing vehicles by driving sharp stones beneath their tires 23 27.
• Water-Drawing Art: Raises a massive waterspout that slows Orion enough for a survivable splashdown after its parachutes fail 18.
• Stored wind: Releases oxygen-rich spring winds collected in mountain forests to replenish Orion's depleted cabin air 13.
• Invisibility Art: Conceals himself near the spacecraft, supplemented by avoiding camera sightlines 8 10.
• External Incarnation: Leaves a talisman duplicate beside Musk while pursuing the launching rocket; the decoy eventually burns away 3 21.
• Palm Thunder: Has practiced this low-level spell despite lacking a lightning spiritual root, giving him sensitivity to turbulent electron fields 9.

Cultivation Crafts and Healing

• Has working knowledge of pill refinement, talisman drawing, formations, and spiritual plants. He believes that, given a spiritual vein, he could establish a cultivation system from scratch 10.
• Hand-makes yellow talisman paper from local bamboo fibers and turmeric dye. Uses eight inferior immobilization talismans to lock spacecraft cameras at fixed angles 10.
• Draws utility talismans, including soundproofing talismans; discovering that his power replenishes makes sustained production more practical 32.
• Sets up small formations directly, but needs formation disks and flags for larger ones 32.
• Uses spiritual power to ease Song Yaozu's exhaustion and heal a delivery rider's concussion 48 50.
• Uses pill residue to sustain lives, but the life-renewing medicine given to the astronauts repairs bodily damage without removing the radiation affecting them 14 23.

Soul-Seizing Art and Secrecy Measures

• Soul-Seizing Art: Extracts the false Robert's twenty-seven hours of memories, revealing its mission and a conversation among the creatures responsible for consuming the real Robert 27.
• Spirit flame: Burns the impostor Robert; initially experiences severe guilt before establishing what the creature was 27 28.
• Heart-Binding Curse: Places the rescued astronauts under a secrecy curse. The absence of its detectable connection on the helicopter's apparent Robert alerts him that something is wrong 20 26.

Aerospace Engineering

• Designs part of the Long March 10 propulsion system and applies physics fluently under emergency conditions 1 8.
• Repairs more than twenty rocket hazards during ascent and severs a faulty booster assembly when normal separation fails 4.
• Investigates anomalous spacecraft motion through calculations involving inertia, gravity, charged particles, and Lorentz force 8 9.
• Combines structural knowledge with sword strikes to separate Orion from the service module and remaining rocket hardware 17.
• Limit: Cannot repair radiation-destroyed flight electronics, melted solenoid coils, or the disabled orbital engine 14.

Equipment / Weapons / Items

Weapons and Defensive Artifacts

• Ten-Thousand-Year Green Bamboo Sword — His life-bound, low-grade spirit artifact and most valuable possession. Forged by Senior Brother Cheng from rare spirit bamboo over forty-nine days. Gao Jian installed DeepSeek locally and configured an AI personality that talks, argues, and invents relationship drama. Powerful strikes consume substantial spiritual energy 17 49.
• Thunderfire Fan — High-grade magical artifact purchased with sect contribution points. Unleashes fire dragons and lightning serpents powerful enough to penetrate tank armor; previously used to kill two rival cultivators 31.
• Thousand-Sun Gilded Needle — Mid-grade armor-piercing artifact. At full power, his early-Foundation cultivation can drive it through a hundred meters of mountain rock, though the affected area is extremely narrow 31.
• Black Jade Twin Cones — Mid-grade paired kinetic weapons received from Senior Sister Song in settlement of a debt. Controlling the wrong cone with the corresponding hand causes spiritual-power backlash; his difficulty distinguishing left from right has kept him from using them 31.
• Evergreen Sword — Seven-foot, dark blue-green standard sect sword and his first weapon. Used for sword flight, backup combat, and a possible dual-sword style alongside the Green Bamboo Sword 31.
• Azure-Light Tortoise Shell Shield — His only defensive magical artifact, made from a Hundred-Year Tortoise Monster's shell. Shattered by spacecraft exhaust and later patched together with heavy-duty household glue 8 31.
• Hundred-Soul Banner — High-grade artifact seized after ambushing two cultivators. He keeps it as a collectible, refuses to refine it, and has never unfurled it because he fears the ghosts inside 31.

Talisman Treasures

All three are precious, single-use reserves brought from his original world 32.

• Myriad Swords True Talisman — High-grade treasure from his grandmaster. Produces tens of thousands of swords, each comparable to a Foundation Establishment cultivator's full-force attack, and can obliterate a late-stage Golden Core cultivator 32.
• Black Bird True Treasure — High-grade treasure from his master. Summons a thousand-meter-wingspan Truefire Black Bird capable of killing a late-stage Golden Core cultivator. Gao Jian believes it could also destroy an aircraft-carrier battle group 32.
• Heavenly Book True Slip — Top-grade talisman treasure; its specific function is not described in the provided passages 32.

Supplies and Utility Items

• Storage Bag / Storage Pouch — Gift from his grandmaster with an enormous interior. Transferred with him and stores artifacts, clothing, tools, and later a large stockpile of food and emergency supplies 32 36 42.
• Three low-grade spirit stones — His only successful medium for converting replenished spiritual power into energy usable for cultivation 32 42.
• Hundred Herbs Life-Renewing Pill residue — Remains of a sixth-grade pill used to save the radiation-stricken astronauts 14 23.
• Spring Renewal Pill dust — Second-grade medicine used to give Tang Qide a long-lasting, life-sustaining spiritual infusion 23.
• Dustless Memory Pill — Selectively blurs memories. A dose intended for Musk instead causes Counselor Wang to lose his memories of the previous week 24 26.
• Grain-Avoidance Pills — Calorie-rich food used to support his exhausting spirit-stone recharging routine 23 50.
• Talismans and formations — Carries over a hundred low- and mid-grade talismans, mostly third-tier with some fourth-tier examples, plus two sets of formation equipment. Uses a miniature Boundless Golden Light Formation in space 11 32.
• Virtual brain-computer helmet and USB drive — Delivered through Wan Hu's assistant; Gao Jian suspects they are intended to enable a meeting in a virtual world 50.

Relationships

• Original Gao Jian — Previous owner of his body. Gao Jian gradually reconstructs his life through possessions, diary entries, and encrypted research, then resolves to investigate his suspected murder and repay the debt of inheriting his body 35 36 37.
• Old Master Gao / Old Mr. Gao — Grandfather of his current body, a senior Handong official and powerful falsehood-recognition cultivator. Their relationship warms through shared meals and history lessons, although Gao Jian initially knows little about him 34 35 40.
• Master and ancestral master — Nascent Soul cultivators who supplied rare protective treasures. His ancestral master also gave him the Storage Bag 32.
• Elon Musk — Helps him avoid immediate detention at NASA and later supports his escape from Houston. Gao Jian tries to conceal his abilities from him and eventually suspects Musk sought protection after mistaking him for a mind-state cultivator 3 24 26 41.
• Colonel Robert — Commander of the astronauts Gao Jian rescues. Robert's murder by humanoid infiltrators leaves Gao Jian determined to avenge him 14 28 42.
• Allen, Ron, and Jim — Astronauts saved from radiation damage and a disastrous return trajectory. Gao Jian binds them to secrecy and later learns they survived to reach the White House 14 20 28.
• Counselor Wang — Consular official who fiercely advocates getting Gao Jian home. Accidentally drinks the memory-altering tea Gao Jian prepared for Musk 24 26.
• Old Chen — Consular driver who retrieves him and helps evade pursuit. Notices Gao Jian's evasive explanations but does not force the issue 22 23 26.
• Officer Liu — Ends his State Security Bureau questioning, stays in the adjoining hotel suite, and helps arrange his return home. Gao Jian later suspects him of practicing mind-state cultivation 30 31 41.
• Bian Xia, Director Dan, and Old Li — CNSA superiors; Old Li is his mentor. They question his American experiences, explain the spaceflight crisis, and redirect him toward theoretical work rather than dangerous astronaut duty 29 46.
• Song Yaozu — Colleague and unsuccessful organization-arranged blind date who becomes a close workplace companion. Gao Jian feeds Yaozu, eases exhaustion, arranges leave, and advocates better pay, while dismissing his sword's romantic speculation 43 48 49.
• Tang Qide / Don Quixote — Homeless veteran whom he feeds and sustains with medicine. Gao Jian respects the man's attachment to his knightly identity and insists that he keep his treasured revolver 22 23.
• Wan Hu — Persistent would-be contact claiming a Tesla China executive role. Offers US$500,000 for a meeting and later sends equipment through an assistant; Gao Jian remains wary of his identity and intentions 3 50.

Story Role / Major Arcs

Secret Lunar Attempt

• Secures the CNSA observer assignment partly through subtle mind-influencing tricks, intending to slip aboard NASA's mission and search the Moon for spiritual resources 1.
• Exposes the SLS fuel shortage, attracts FBI attention, and benefits from Musk's intervention. An unexpectedly early countdown forces him to pursue the rocket while leaving a talisman decoy behind 3.
• Keeps the sabotaged launch flying through repairs, crosswind correction, and the removal of a faulty booster 4.
• Sees unexpectedly slight Earth curvature and distorted coastlines, then finds adjustable optical glass in Orion's windows. Further observations lead him to infer an anomalous spiral trajectory and dangerous prolonged exposure to the radiation belts 5 8 9.

Rescue and Return to Earth

• Enters Orion, restores its air, and saves the four radiation-stricken astronauts with life-renewing pill residue. With the electronics beyond repair, he abandons the lunar attempt and plans a return 13 14.
• Cuts away unnecessary hardware and pushes the capsule toward Earth over an eight-hour descent 17.
• Accelerates it away from an intercepting missile, survives the nearby collision of two missiles, and substitutes a waterspout for the failed parachutes 18.
• Escapes underwater, swims to Texas, and contacts the Chinese consulate while hoping to resume an ordinary hidden life 20.

Houston Escape and the Impostor Robert

• Becomes the FBI's prime suspect in the failed mission. Chinese consular staff and Musk arrange a covert escape 24 26.
• Notices that the helicopter's apparent Robert lacks the expected curse connection. Soul-Seizing Art reveals a newly created impostor and memories of creatures dividing and consuming the real Robert 26 27.
• Learns that the other astronauts are alive at the White House, burns the impostor, and departs for Shanghai through Musk's airport 28.
• Maintains a prepared account through extensive Chinese security questioning; Officer Liu eventually announces that the investigation has ended 29 30.

Inherited Research and Dual Cultivation

• Discovers how to recharge spirit stones, giving him a route beyond his previously stalled cultivation 32 33.
• Finds a concealed Yongle Encyclopedia fragment describing a steam-powered “fire-wheel engine.” Threats recorded by the original owner make him suspect that the fatal traffic accident was deliberate 36.
• Recovers hidden diary writing through an iron–tannic acid reaction and reads research alleging suppressed materialist knowledge and altered historical texts 37 38.
• Practices the recovered Mind-State Cultivation Method, reaches falsehood recognition, and discovers his grandfather's cultivation 39 40.
• Interprets the infiltrators as a wider threat and decides that protecting humanity is a responsibility he cannot avoid 41.

Renewed Moon Plans

• Stockpiles supplies and resumes CNSA work, but finds that three spirit stones are inadequate for efficient advancement 42.
• Learns the official explanation for the suspended lunar program: dangerous gravitational and geomagnetic anomalies. His superiors reject his offer to become an astronaut 46.
• Witnesses a beam from the Moon destroy a nuclear missile's warhead, leaving him awed by the possible lunar cultivator's power 46 47.
• Continues considering a revived national lunar mission, SpaceX assistance, or—only as a last resort—stealing a rocket. Wan Hu's renewed invitation offers another unresolved lead 50.

Notable Quotes

“Human lives were at stake. What kind of nonsense question is that?” 14

“Since mine alone is the way, I have all the more reason to shoulder a cultivator's responsibilities. I cannot stand idly by.” 41

Trivia

• Treats Newton's The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy humorously as a “Great Dao” cultivation manual when applying mechanics in space 8 9.
• Refuses a US$500,000 meeting offer while privately thinking that five spirit stones would be more appropriate payment 3.
• Hopes his inherited notebook will become a blood-activated heavenly tome, only to discover ordinary invisible-ink chemistry—and that an iron solution would have spared him the blood loss 37.
• Song Yaozu edits and circulates the NASA confrontation video that contributes to Gao Jian's sudden public fame 43.
• Believes he may be the world's only orthodox immortal cultivator, distinguishing himself from its native mind-state practitioners 41.