The Central Region

Within the Heavenly Court Ruins, immortal mist veiled countless halls. Vast and sprawling, the place resembled a small world, its end nowhere in sight.

Slinging on the backpack containing the immortal gold, Lu Chen left the hall where he had obtained the Nine-Turn Immortal Pill and ventured deeper into the Immortal Palace.

"Oh no!"

He suddenly cried out as the jade avenue beneath his feet lit up, its radiance enveloping him in an instant.

Before his cry had even faded, before he could do anything else, he vanished from the Heavenly Court Ruins, teleported to some unknown corner of the world.

Light and shadow flickered as space and time shifted. Lu Chen felt as though an eternity had passed, yet also as though only an instant had elapsed, before he tumbled back into reality.

"I let my guard down!" he said in frustration. "Wang Ziwen was teleported to the Heavenly Soldier Ancient Star, and Zhou Yi and Lin Jia were sent into the depths of the universe. Where have I ended up?"

He looked around. Towering trees and luxuriant plants surrounded him, with vines as thick as buckets winding through the jungle. This was a primeval forest, and he had no way of telling where he was.

"I've only just gained a heaven-defying stroke of fortune. I'd better not die here."

Lu Chen drew the Vajra Pestle from his backpack and held it warily. Though this damaged ancient artifact had lost its divine power, the material used to forge it certainly could not be ordinary.

With his powerful physique, a swing of the precious pestle could deliver tens of thousands of jin of force. As long as he did not encounter a Great Demon with substantial cultivation, his tremendous brute strength should be enough to keep him safe.

He had not gone far before the faint cries of birds and beasts reached his ears. Clearly, this wild forest was no peaceful haven.

"Roar!"

After running twenty or thirty li through the primeval forest, he finally encountered danger. Ahead of him stood a black One-Horned Tiger, seven or eight meters long and three meters tall, glaring with blood-red eyes as it let out a furious roar.

"Shit, it's huge!"

Lu Chen's expression changed slightly. However thoroughly he had been remade, he was still a mortal. He did not know whether he could defeat that One-Horned Black Tiger. After all, he had never fought before and had no way to gauge its strength.

"Roar..."

The black tiger opened its gaping, blood-red maw and lunged at him. The savage gust it stirred flattened the surrounding plants, and a bloody stench struck him full in the face.

"Fuck it. All or nothing."

Lu Chen took a deep breath, forced down his panic, and focused as he gathered his strength. Gripping the Vajra Pestle tightly, he charged straight at the tiger and smashed it toward the beast's enormous head.

Bang!

The black tiger, seven or eight meters long, was hurled several zhang away by the blow. A large section of its forehead had visibly caved in. It twitched a few times in the grass, gave a few mournful howls, and died.

"Phew..." Lu Chen let out a long breath, scarcely able to believe it. He had actually killed such a monstrous creature with a single blow.

"Looks like I'm stronger than I thought. Even in a world of gods and demons, not every animal can become a spirit. Most are still just wild beasts without any cultivation."

After his first battle, Lu Chen gained some understanding of his own strength, and his fear of fierce birds and savage beasts diminished greatly.

The mindset of an ordinary city dweller began shifting toward a world where the strong devoured the weak and strength reigned supreme.

Though he still had no idea which direction to take, he continued through the primeval jungle with less fear and far more courage.

Over ten full days, Lu Chen traveled several hundred li and killed many ferocious beasts. He sustained injuries along the way, but none damaged his muscles or bones. With his unparalleled physical constitution, they were of little consequence.

As for food, wild fruit and animals abounded in the lush jungle. There was no chance of going hungry.

One day, after crossing a mountain peak, he finally spotted signs of human habitation and reached a small town.

The town had the social structure of an ancient society. Its people wore their hair long and dressed in strange robes-strange to an Earthling, at least.

To his surprise, Lu Chen could understand some of their speech through a mixture of guesswork and intuition.

"Looks like I'm still on Big Dipper. I just don't know which region I was sent to."

The language of Big Dipper resembled ancient Chinese. When Ye Fan and the others first arrived on Big Dipper, they too had been able to understand some of the local speech after carefully puzzling it out.

Lu Chen walked around the town, observing closely and learning a few basic facts. For instance, the people here also used gold and silver as currency.

He soon left the town again and entered the mountain forest. Before long, he killed an animal resembling a deer, carried it back to town, and traded it for some gold and silver. Then he bought clothes and took a room at an inn.

Counting from his time on Mars, more than a month had passed since he entered this world. Every day, he had slept in the wilderness, eaten and drunk poorly, and kept his nerves stretched taut. Even with his outrageously powerful body, Lu Chen was mentally exhausted.

Thus, he slept at the inn for three whole days. Apart from eating and drinking, he neither went out nor thought about anything.

Only afterward did he begin considering his next steps. With his current talent, he would have no trouble even joining one of the foremost sacred lands.

The main problem was that he still did not know where he was, and he could neither speak the language properly nor read its script. Over the past few days, he had communicated through a mixture of words and gestures. Traveling far was clearly unrealistic.

So Lu Chen's first task was to learn the language and how to read. Otherwise, even if someone handed him an ancient scripture on immortal cultivation, he would not understand a word.

Once he had a plan, he naturally had to act. He returned to the primeval wilderness and hunted some unusual beasts that looked valuable, selling their meat and hides for a considerable amount of gold and silver.

With plenty of money, many things naturally became easier in the mortal world.

He found an elderly scholar in town and used money to open the way, hiring him to teach him reading, writing, and the language.

The Nine-Turn Immortal Pill had not merely cleansed and transformed Lu Chen's body; it had also elevated his soul. On top of that, he had consumed the Bodhi Leaf, which could awaken divine nature.

As a result, his mental power was exceptionally strong. His photographic memory, lightning-fast thinking, and other abilities had long since transcended the ordinary and could no longer be compared to what they had once been. Learning ordinary knowledge was effortless.

In less than a month, he completely mastered Big Dipper's language and script. He also borrowed a large number of books in town to deepen his understanding of the local culture.

"The Immortal Palace sent me to the Central Region of the Eastern Wasteland. What a blessing! If I'd been teleported to some other Ancient Life Star, my foreknowledge would have been almost useless."

Once he had learned the language and script, Lu Chen quickly established where he was.

Apart from its endless seas, the Big Dipper Ancient Star could be divided into five great regions: the Eastern Wasteland, the Western Desert, the Northern Plains, the Southern Ridge, and the Central Plains.

The Western Desert was ruled by Buddhism, whose dominance was absolute. The entire region followed Buddhism, and to the people of the other four regions, it was a place of considerable mystery.

Many powerful cultivators who traveled to the Western Desert inexplicably never returned. Rumor had it that they had all been converted and taken refuge in Buddhism.

Thus, the powerful cultivators of the other four regions regarded it with deep apprehension and would not enter the Western Desert unless necessary.

The Northern Plains were the weakest of the Five Regions. Sparsely populated, they often stretched for millions of li without a trace of human habitation, consisting mostly of boundless wilderness.

The Southern Ridge was primarily the territory of the demon race, filled with endless chains of steep mountains, where countless demon kings roared between heaven and earth.

The Central Plains were the most prosperous of the Five Regions, dominated by the four great immortal dynasties and the hundred schools of thought. They built cities to nurture dragon veins and mostly existed in the form of dynasties and kingdoms.

In the Eastern Wasteland, numerous sacred lands of cultivation and Desolate Ancient Families ruled the realm. It could roughly be divided into the Southern Region, the Central Region, and the Northern Region.

Lu Chen was in the Central Region of the Eastern Wasteland, in a small town on the southern border wasteland of a nation called the Flowing Cloud Dynasty.