A voice with an echo of its own.
Fang Zhiyi instinctively looked up. The next moment, he froze. Perched on the glittering throne before him was a... ghost?
The mist-like ghost swayed from side to side.
Suddenly, it shot toward Fang Zhiyi and began circling him again and again, as if utterly confused.
“You... know Fang Zhiyi?”
As Fang Zhiyi stared at the ghost, memories of the past came flooding back.
“Old Ghost.”
The ghost paused, its voice still echoing. “You—you recognize me?”
“What, you don’t recognize people anymore?” Fang Zhiyi was speechless as well. He had imagined every possibility, but he had never expected Old Ghost to be the Emperor.
Old Ghost looked Fang Zhiyi up and down, then from side to side, utterly perplexed. “No, seriously, who are you?”
“Your godfather!” Fang Zhiyi said, reaching out to grab it.
But Old Ghost shrank away with remarkable speed. Faced with this criminal’s provocation, it grew annoyed. “You... Hmm? You...”
It hesitated for a long while before finally saying, “Are you really Fang Zhiyi?”
“Hard to believe the Emperor still remembers me,” Fang Zhiyi replied sarcastically.
“Holy crap! Holy crap! You’re still alive!” Old Ghost instantly became excited. “You just went bang and disappeared back then. And now you’ve become a governor? No way, no way!”
It was practically beside itself with excitement.
“Enough, enough. What happened to you, anyway? I’m not surprised you’ve survived this long as a lingering soul, but you...”
A face appeared in the mist, its expression bitter enough to curdle milk. “It’s all your fault.”
“Huh?”
“Back then, you discovered all that stuff and destroyed that dynasty. Then you just dusted off your hands and left. At first, they developed according to your instructions, but eventually someone started thinking about using the war machines you described as industrial machinery. Then they discovered even greater ruins.”
Fang Zhiyi turned to Little Hei, who spread his hands. “You know we couldn’t possibly have found everything.”
“That was when things got out of hand. A technological explosion followed. They found some black substance and used it as an energy source. Later, Bold Li and Wu San both died, and the people who took over afterward were even less reliable. Technology kept advancing, but their way of thinking remained stuck in the past. Eventually, things turned into this... bizarre mess.” Old Ghost complained bitterly.
“So what happened to you?” Fang Zhiyi simply sat down. “I heard you’ve been Emperor for several hundred years.”
“Bullshit! Several hundred years? It’s been nearly a thousand!” Old Ghost’s voice was filled with resentment.
“I kept using the body you found for me and continued my research. It was much more interesting than studying those cultivation manuals. But eventually, the body broke down. Fortunately, I came up with a way to preserve my lingering soul. By then, I had become a scientist.” It glanced at Fang Zhiyi. “Wu San’s grandson was one of the councilors at the time. I don’t know how they came to the decision, but they pushed me into this position. They said the Emperor’s seat had always been vacant anyway, so it would be better if I took it.”
Old Ghost paused. “Later, I figured it out. The Second Council believed that no matter how much time passed, humanity would still turn on itself over power. So they decided to put someone who couldn’t die on the throne. And, unfortunately, I was the one they chose.”
It sounded deeply aggrieved. “See this wretched throne? In my five-hundredth year, I felt myself beginning to fade. I thought I was finally going to be free. But then those idiots developed a perpetual-energy device, and I recovered!”
Old Ghost pointed at itself again. “You probably don’t know this, but my mind contains the entire history of this empire’s development over the past thousand years! They say learning never ends, but I’m done learning!”
“You have a brain?” Fang Zhiyi asked curiously.
Old Ghost rolled its eyes. “What, you think I don’t?”
Its tone turned somber. “But now the human empire keeps expanding, and more and more problems are cropping up. The council you established has changed beyond recognition. Those nobles are just like the aristocratic clans of old—they spend all day fighting and scrambling for power. It’s exhausting!”
“But you’re the Emperor. Can’t you do something about it?” Fang Zhiyi asked.
Old Ghost stared blankly at him. “Brother, I never wanted to rule the world in the first place! I just wanted a body so I could cultivate! They want to rule the universe? Do you have any idea how much work that is? I did consider learning from you and killing them all, but what would I do afterward? I’d have to handle everything myself! I’m not you! You’re smart enough to deal with it all. I’ve had enough! Now that you’re here, I quit. I absolutely quit!”
“I’m just waiting for this thing to run out of energy so I can finally disappear.” It pointed at the throne. “Power, technology—all of it can go to hell!”
Fang Zhiyi suddenly understood. “So your creation of the Imperial Guard was...”
“That’s right. It was to stop some idiot from recharging me!” Old Ghost said, entirely without shame. “If I hadn’t suddenly seen your name, I wouldn’t have sent the Imperial Guard out at all. It would have been better if they’d forgotten about me! I’ve been quietly hiding here for hundreds of years!”
It paused, then muttered under its breath, “Their greed is too great. If I hadn’t established the Imperial Guard, I might have ended up as a research specimen the next time around. They’d be studying how to achieve immortality.”
Little Hei and Fang Zhiyi exchanged a glance. Who knew what those people had been thinking when they made this fellow Emperor? Still, it was no small feat to torment a mere lingering soul into longing for death.
Old Ghost continued rambling. “It happened in my five-hundredth year. Half the council members at the time wanted to take advantage of the situation and control me. Fortunately, their abnormal behavior was discovered. From that moment on, I knew I wasn’t safe anymore. That was why I established the Imperial Guard to protect me, then stopped appearing in public. If I couldn’t afford to provoke them, I could at least hide from them, couldn’t I?”
Fang Zhiyi looked at it for a long while.
“I have an idea.”
Old Ghost answered without the slightest hesitation. “Tell me! As long as it can kill me, I’m willing to do anything!”
“It won’t come to that. All you need to do is cooperate with me and endure it a little longer. I can get you out of here.”
The commander of the Imperial Guard was very curious. No one had ever stayed inside the Emperor’s palace for so long. He had been there long enough that the commander was beginning to wonder whether the governor intended to assassinate the Emperor.
But the Emperor was immortal and indestructible.
Since its establishment, the Imperial Guard had followed a single principle: protect the Emperor and carry out every order he gave. Yet ever since the commander had taken over, the Emperor had never issued a single order.
Then the door opened, and Fang Zhiyi waved to him.
The commander felt as if he were in a daze.
The next day, news spread throughout the empire that the Emperor had pardoned all of Fang Zhiyi’s crimes. The decision shocked the council, as well as every noble in the empire.
It was the first time they had ever received an order from the Emperor—the same Emperor who had remained in existence for over a thousand years.
Some people wanted to raise objections. But when they saw the Imperial Guard effortlessly pierce several Destroyer-model suits belonging to those who had shown disrespect toward Fang Zhiyi, they chose to keep their mouths shut.
ine. During your journey, you save an abandoned baby girl and become her elder brother】 【You rely on each other, becoming each other's support】 【At the end of the simulation, you shield the now-grown girl with your life, sacrificing yourself to block numerous demonic cultivators. You die, and the light in the girl's eyes fades】 …… 【Second Simulation: You are transported to a world where steam and magic coexist】 【You immerse yourself in the study of magic, obsessed with its research. One day, while out, you encounter a half-blooded demon girl wandering the streets. You take her in as your student】 【You teach the demoness what it means to be human, show her the beauty of the world, and nurture her into a miracle that surpasses even the gods】 【At the end of the simulation, you die of old age in front of the nearly immortal demoness due to your mortal lifespan】 …… One simulation after another, one encounter after another. Xu Xi suddenly felt something was off: "Wait, you said you're coming to the real world to find me?"
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
tions: attribute allocation, analysis, proficiency, and simulation. Specializing in mechanical alchemy, from crafting sorcerous battle armor to handcrafting mechanical maidens, his mechanical legion conquers endless realms... Relying on his wits, he begins with a student-teacher romance, wins over a female director, enslaves a female assassin and a underworld queen, becoming the husband of a Grand Duchess... He enslaves the Goddess of Magic from the divine realm, developing his power simultaneously in both the Wizard World and the Realm of Gods...
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
