“No way.”
Long Ao’s attitude was firm. He turned his head to glance at that ominous patch of scorched earth, then turned back and fixed his eyes on An Changqing.
“What if you can’t jump back?”
Qin Wu walked over with a grim expression. He slapped Long Ao on the shoulder, signaling him to calm down, then looked toward An Changqing.
“Changqing, this isn’t the time for you to step up.”
His voice was not loud, but it carried an undeniable force.
“I’m the team captain. If someone has to scout ahead, it should be me, a senior in my fourth year.”
“Senior Qin Wu.” An Changqing still tried to argue.
“That’s an order.”
With one sentence, Qin Wu shut down all further objections. As the team captain, he was ashamed that his contribution this time was not even as great as that of his junior.
The atmosphere among the Huaqing team grew incredibly tense.
Everyone knew that whoever went in first would face the greatest danger, but no one was willing to make a companion bear that unknown risk.
“Ahem, ahem…”
A bout of coughing broke the stalemate. Su Yuehe stepped forward.
“I don’t think now is the time to argue over who should go.”
The moment she spoke, the men present all fell silent.
“We know nothing about what’s inside. Going in alone is far too dangerous.”
【Wifey Yuehe is right. Brother Ao and Bro An are typical hotheaded college guys. Only Wifey is keeping a cool head.】
【This is what a team looks like.】
【At a time like this, I guess the male lead will still step up.】
“I…I have an idea.”
Shan Heng adjusted his glasses and spoke from the back in a faint voice.
Everyone’s attention instantly focused on him, this first-year student who had just made a major contribution.
With so many people watching him, Shan Heng instinctively hunched his neck. But when he thought of the danger they had just faced, he still mustered his courage.
“Senior Bai Huanran said that it was the trace left behind after a black orb of light appeared.”
He pushed up his glasses. “And every object that approached it disappeared. That’s not something a physical attack could accomplish.”
“So?” Long Ao asked bluntly, having failed to understand.
“So…I think sending someone who specializes purely in physical attacks inside might…not work very well.”
By the end, Shan Heng’s voice had become as faint as the buzz of a mosquito.
But everyone understood what he meant.
Long Ao and Qin Wu were both top-tier enhancement-type fighters. Faced with such strange, rule-based power, they might truly suffer a serious disadvantage.
“You mean we should send someone from the mental or knowledge class?”
An Changqing immediately grasped the key point. He glanced at Su Yuehe, then shook his head at once.
“No. Yuehe’s condition makes it too risky for her.”
“Then…what do we do?”
Shan Heng had no answer either. He had only raised the problem, not solved it.
The square once again fell into absolute silence.
【Little Bro Shan’s analysis was so thorough, and then—oh, wow. Our knowledge-type expert is seriously injured.】
【Doesn’t that leave only Brother Coffin? Brother Coffin has a bit of every class. He’s basically a perfect all-rounder.】
【I feel like Brother Coffin is contemplating the meaning of life.】
Chen Guan was indeed thinking, but not about the meaning of life.
“I’ll go.”
After a moment, Chen Guan finally spoke.
“No.”
Long Ao was the first to object.
He stepped in front of Chen Guan, his tall body blocking the way like a wall. His eyes were filled with undisguised opposition.
An Changqing said nothing. Qin Wu remained silent as well.
“I’m more suited for this than any of you.”
Chen Guan left them with that one sentence, walked around Long Ao, and took two more steps forward. His gaze settled once more on the scorched black earth.
“You!”
Long Ao was choked off by the reply and was about to explode when An Changqing reached out to stop him.
“Let him speak.”
An Changqing looked at Chen Guan’s back and asked, “Why?”
【Here we go. Brother Coffin’s about to show off… I mean, analyze the situation.】
【Brother Ao: I’m getting angry! I failed to show off, and now you’re doing it again!】
【I knew it. The fake protagonist is An Changqing. The real protagonist is Chen Guan.】
With his back to everyone, Chen Guan said, “Senior Qin Wu and Long Ao are pure enhancement types. Just as Shan Heng said, pure strength is of limited use against things on the level of rules.”
He paused, then turned his gaze toward An Changqing and Su Yuehe.
“As for the two of you, you’re not as fast as I am. Besides, I have a little accessory that can teleport away at any time.”
Baobao wasn’t just there to eat without contributing. As long as she had marked Chen Guan, she could teleport at any time—whether teleporting Chen Guan or herself.
Flying Raijin Pro Max.
Chen Guan had decided to name it the Purple Flash!
【I hereby declare this the best boast of the year.】
【Brother Coffin: I’m not saying you’re all trash. I’m saying everyone here has a weakness.】
【Brother Coffin really is a perfect all-rounder. The only ability he lacks—spatial movement—has even been supplied by Baobao. How are the others supposed to compete with that?】
“I…I also think Senior Chen Guan is the best choice.”
Shan Heng quietly added his opinion. He pushed up his glasses, and an almost worshipful light shone behind the lenses.
“Senior Chen Guan’s ability system is extremely…comprehensive. No matter what situation he encounters, he has a way to deal with it.”
The more Shan Heng spoke, the less timid his voice became. In its place was growing excitement. He looked every bit like a devoted little fanboy.
“Among all of us, he has the highest margin for error.”
“Margin for error…”
Qin Wu mulled over the phrase, his expression becoming increasingly complicated.
He looked at Chen Guan, this junior who had been bringing surprises ever since they first met—mysterious, yet reliable.
“Then we’ll leave it to you. Don’t get caught up fighting.”
Chen Guan nodded. His gaze swept over the faces filled with worry and trust, then he patted Baobao, who was rubbing her head against his trouser leg.
“I’m counting on you.”
Chen Guan did not look back again. He walked straight ahead.
The instant his foot landed on the scorched earth, the entire world before his eyes began to twist. The surrounding scenery was replaced, centered around him.
A moment later, Chen Guan had set foot in another world.
The stench of rotting flesh mixed with a nauseating odor rushed into his nostrils, making him feel sick.
Chen Guan looked up at the sky. It was a frozen dark red, like a gigantic piece of blood-colored amber. There was no sun and no cloud.
Beneath his feet was dark-brown, hardened ground. Broken weapons and enormous skeletons lay scattered everywhere. The skeletons were grotesque, their bones covered in strange patterns. Not one of them belonged to a human.
In the distance, the silhouette of a ruined black metropolis rose beneath the blood-red sky. At the center of the battlefield stood a black throne constructed from countless bones, already more than half collapsed.
Tattered war banners were stuck at angles in the ground. Their material was unknown, and though they had been eroded by the passage of time, the emblems embroidered in dark-gold thread were still visible.
They depicted twisted ram’s horns surrounding an inverted constellation.
Almost simultaneously, a vast will that regarded all things as dust awakened from every inch of this ancient battlefield and bore down upon him.
Chen Guan’s body did not even have time to react. There was only one command left in his mind.
Baobao, save me!
The next moment, the blood-red world before his eyes shattered with a crash.
…
Back in the square.
Qin Wu and the others remained on guard.
A circle of pale-violet ripples spread across the empty space in front of them.
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
. As long as he maintains the villain image and follows the plot to the grand finale, he can obtain generous rewards and return to the real world. So Gu Chen'an entered the role and began to act as a scumbag villain, but who would have expected that the female leads could hear his inner thoughts. Miss Su from the Su family was shocked: "I originally thought Gu Chen'an was a scumbag, but I didn't expect he turned out to be a gentleman! What? You said I have to call off the engagement? I definitely won't, I'll piss you off!" Bai Yuan Tian was dumbfounded: "Young Master Gu is usually unreasonable and a complete brat, but he actually calls me little sweetie in his heart? What, Young Master Gu even said he likes me?" As the female leads' images collapsed more and more, the plot also collapsed with it. Gu Chen'an looked at all this chaos. "Ladies, don't aggro me, if you keep this up the male lead really will stab me, I still need to survive to the grand finale!"
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
s + Rent Collection Wealth】 At the start, he inherited a rundown house in the urban village from his grandfather. The house had no tenants, but the moment he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, a self-proclaimed empress from the Tianxuan Continent arrived as his first tenant. Ye Chuan soon discovered that with every new tenant moving in, not only did he receive massive daily payments, but he also obtained unique items related to their backgrounds. 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Tiger Strength Pill—dramatically enhances physical power!】 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Deer Blood Pill—significantly boosts vitality!】 …… From that day on, all sorts of bizarre tenants began appearing in the house: the empress from Tianxuan Continent, an apocalyptic sorceress from the Magic Realm, a mysterious scientific girl who fell through a spacetime rift… Every single day, he received strange, powerful items and endless money. Then one day, he suddenly realized—he had become invincible. Enough, enough! Stop giving me more!
