Chapter 44: Embarking on the Journey

“The sun hangs high in the sky, the flowers smile at me, the little birds say, ‘Good morning, good morning, good morning...’”
From the bathroom next door came the exuberant singing of Little Teddy Xu Wangwang. Heartbroken yesterday, today he’s already back to full strength—this is his unique talent.
In the room, Wei Cheng sat cross-legged, quietly cultivating the second level of the Mountain-Moving Technique. Yesterday’s battle had cost him a third of his inner strength.
On Earth, that energy would be impossible to restore.
However, he could reforge his remaining reserves with the second level of the Mountain-Moving Technique.
Mastering this second level wasn’t easy, but with the current strength of Wei Cheng’s spiritual force, it took him barely half an hour to gain full command.
By now, the process of refining his inner strength had become second nature; in less than a night, he had purified most of it.
When a rough knock sounded once more at the door, he had already reforged the remaining two-thirds of his power, doubling its quality even though its quantity had shrunk by nearly two-thirds.
This puzzled Wei Cheng, and he could only surmise it was due to the impurities in his previous cultivation.
Fortunately, since the quality had risen, losing some quantity did little to diminish his overall strength. In fact, he was likely stronger than before.
Whether activating his Golden Bell Shield or cycling through the Mountain-Moving Visualization, the difference wasn’t simply that less energy was required; it was the chasm between 480p and 1080p—worlds apart.
For instance, now, when Wei Cheng ran his Mountain-Moving energy, the deeper details of the visualization appeared clearer and easier to perceive.
On Earth, there were no resources to enhance one’s foundation, but if there were, he believed that in fifteen days he could push his understanding of the deeper layers of the Mountain-Moving Visualization to forty percent.
He even found himself looking forward to the sixth trial.
A thousand thoughts flickered through his mind in an instant.
Wei Cheng stood up and opened the door. There, of course, was Little Teddy Xu Wangwang, looking him up and down with a mock-serious air, even poking him with a finger, but the intent to call the police—so present yesterday—was gone.
“So, Little Cheng, it really is you. You sure you didn’t get plastic surgery?”
Wei Cheng was speechless; he had no such relatives.
“Haha, don’t be mad, cousin! You’ve changed so much! So, you had some adventure yesterday morning, right?”
Xu Wangwang barged in, eager and with a lewd air, looking for all the world like a dog.
“You have no idea—everyone online and in the chat groups are talking about this. It’s all the rage! Some ‘Immortal’s Trial’ or whatever. Cousin, my future happiness depends on you now, you must carry me through the ranks—no, you must help me clear the levels! Come on, any tips, secret manuals, don’t hold back, share them all!”
“There’s not much to it, really. Fourteen days from now, between six and seven in the morning, just lie in bed and sleep in. If you can’t sleep, that’s fine, as long as your body’s in bed, you’ll trigger entry into the dream trial. The bed is the medium.”
Wei Cheng sighed and decided to be honest.
“I get it, I get it—like how walking down the stairs nonstop sends you to the Nightmare Realm...”
Wei Cheng was speechless. There was no reasoning with him.

Still, remembering that he’d once been just as ridiculous, and had even joined Wangwang in exploring an allegedly haunted, abandoned building... he almost wanted to silence him for good.
“Think what you like. Anyway, we call ourselves ‘Trial Takers’...”
“That’s so lame! Why not something cooler—like Reincarnators, Apostles, Virus Hunters... Fine, fine, please continue, great cousin.”
Wei Cheng took a deep breath, suppressing the urge to flatten this little teddy into a pancake.
“We probably won’t see each other in the trial. I’m already on the sixth level, you’ll have to start from the first...”
“Boss, please carry me!”
“Shut your dog mouth!”
“Woof woof!”
“Alright, there are three techniques...”
“I know, I know! Mountain-Moving, Spirit Swallow, and Purple Mist—defense tank, agile rogue, burst warrior. You have to balance all three, don’t favor one over the others. First level is spiders, second is vampire bats, third is white-bone demons, fourth is stone monsters, but you have to keep your voice down the whole time or the stone monsters will backstab you on any level. On the fifth, you must keep strong and weak balanced so the city defenses don’t get breached first...”
Wei Cheng: Door closed, guest dismissed!
Bang!
With the door shut, peace returned.
His phone rang—it was Xu Shan.
“Boss Wei, got a moment?”
“I’m friends with Liu Sui.”
“Brother Wei, what are you thinking? Do you want in on a mission to City C to hunt aberrant demons? It’s organized by the government, a million bonus for each participant.”
Xu Shan’s voice on the other end was coy.
“No thanks. And I suggest you don’t go either.”
Wei Cheng hung up, turned off his phone, opened the window, and slipped away.
What a joke—it was already midday, and they still wanted to hunt the demons that infiltrated at midnight yesterday? By now, the opportunity was long gone. Besides, he’d spent much of his power, and with the unknowns of the sixth trial ahead, it was crucial to keep a reserve for self-defense.
For the next fourteen days, he planned to keep a low profile.
—
Thirteen days later, Wei Cheng returned to his rented apartment. He wasn’t sure if switching beds might trigger a login bug or the like, unlikely as that was.
The room was empty; Little Teddy Xu Wangwang was nowhere to be seen, but it was clear his ex-goddess Song Feifei hadn’t returned in all this time.
Some instincts never die in a lifelong lapdog...

So be it; the past was better left forgotten. Who hasn’t been left with nothing before?
He opened his door—inside, slightly messy, clearly rifled through, but Wei Cheng paid it no mind. He lay down fully clothed, his mind calm as still water.
In these past thirteen days, he hadn’t just hidden away playing games, but had started from scratch, reviewing the first and second levels of the Mountain-Moving Technique, and the first to sixth levels of the Golden Bell Shield.
Limited by Earth’s environment, he couldn’t cultivate his energy, but his spirit faced no such restriction.
During the trial, he had focused mostly on increasing his power and clearing levels, with no time to ponder the techniques that had been force-fed into his mind.
Now, with some leisure, not using the chance to solidify his foundation would be foolish.
As expected, this review paid off. Wei Cheng’s understanding of the Mountain-Moving Technique rose to a new level.
What does it mean to move mountains?
At first, he thought it meant brute strength, the power to move mountains.
That’s not an incorrect reading, but it’s only the surface.
Later, as he grasped the Mountain-Moving Visualization, he realized it was about borrowing the form, energy, and spirit of mountains to strengthen one’s own meridians.
Now, seeing Earth’s scarcity of resources, he thought: moving mountains is more like moving other people’s mountains—to fill your own pockets.
In short, cultivation requires resources.
More broadly, immortality is built on a foundation of immense resources.
Without them, everything is empty talk.
Those who claim to mine the treasures within their own bodies and seek answers internally—if they can ever grow strong, they don’t walk the same path as us.
Time ticked by. Little Teddy Xu Wangwang still hadn’t returned, but the entire city of P was quieter than ever. Likely, except for those eliminated and stripped of their trial memories—who continued living as usual—everyone else was lying in bed, waiting.
Wei Cheng was certain that this new batch of initiates would compete fiercely, and that astonishing talents would emerge. For one, they’d avoid many missteps, and with the government now deeply involved, the whole nation was already part of this expedition against the world of cultivation.
As for the long, three-hundred-year crusade ahead, would humanity seize its destiny and save the world of cultivation?
No one knew the answer.
Not even the trial immortals, perhaps.
Lost in thought, Wei Cheng drifted into a deep, peaceful sleep, unaware that in some cities, strange figures were hungrily eyeing these sleeping people.
The moment a trial-taker entered the deepest slumber, those black shadows slipped into rooms, their murderous intent flashing as they plunged into the bodies of the sleeping.
In the blink of an eye, the trial-takers’ lives were snuffed out, evil power seeping in...