1 PROLOGUE (1)

The Plot Twist​

I hadn't expected to wake up after I died.

There's no portal, no cute goddess cheerfully telling me I was dead, no office worker shuffling papers for my reincarnation, and definitely no voice of god speaking to me through the crowd. Instead, I simply woke up on an unfamiliar bed in an unfamiliar room after getting run over by a runaway truck.

It has been a month since then. More than enough time for me to fully accept that I had been reincarnated into the body of a mob character from a webnovel I once read.

For the first few days, I was terrified upon realising I wasn't the main character, but I quickly got over it once I realised the dense, virgin fool had yet to stumble upon the cheat item that carried him throughout the story. It took me three days to find it; a dull-looking storage ring containing a ten-foot tall marble wall with divine scriptures etched onto it and one Nirvana fruit that was supposed to refine my meridians and max out my affinity for cultivating Qi. Three days I spent wallowing about the northernmost secluded corner of the village's rice paddies much to the worry of my predecessor's parents and the mocking amusement of the rest of the villagers.

Fools, the lot of them.

Still, one could easily be forgiven for failing to understand how strange it was to wake up in a fantasy world. The village I awoke in, Baiyun, was nestled amidst the emerald folds of a region referred to in-story as the Eastern Hills. It was a small, prosperous, albeit mundane, haven with sloping terraces of rice paddies, fragrant tea plantations, and homes adorned with vibrant red lanterns that danced like fireflies in the moonlight.

My predecessor, like the main character, Li Shen, was born a humble son of the soil, destined to till the fields that had been his family's heritage for generations. At least, that was the plan until he got killed off along with the rest of the villagers when Li Shen somehow antagonised one young master of the White Orchid Sect a few months after being inducted into the sect.

Unlike the main character, however, my predecessor had little interest in the world of the Cultivators, preferring instead the simple life of a farmer. Li Shen had always been enchanted by tales of the world beyond his village, a world of wonders, where the ancient arts of cultivation were honed to perfection.

From passing travellers, he had heard stories of the sprawling port town of Jinqiao, a place where cultures converged, and dreams took flight like the kites that soared above the jade-green waters of the Xianhua River.

Today, I sat, crosslegged, under the shade of a small tree. The air in this world was clearer than anything I had ever experienced before, free of the pollutants I had gotten so used to from Earth. I inhaled its delicious fragrance, drawing in the ambient Qi as I fell into a meditative state described in scriptures etched within the spatial ring. It felt so easy; too easy. Cultivation was never meant to be this simple. From the original Dai Wei's memories, I could easily ascertain this. Qi was supposed to be this elusive thing that one sought out with little success; a task fraught with failure and peril. Ever since I consumed the Nirvana fruit the world had seemed ever more vibrant and clear, with the Qi it contained abundant. Still, somehow, that didn't make the act of cultivation itself a cakewalk. Cycling the energies, I tried to channel them into the strip of Chi paper resting in my palm. It shook a little but did little more than that. It didn't go up in flames, nor did it shrivel, turn wet, crumble into dirt, or any other number of things as expected.

Frustrated, I raised the piece of paper up, eyes narrowing into a glare as I examined it.

Did that old bastard scam me? I grumbled, suspicious that what I was holding was actually regular paper and not the Chi paper I had paid more than four times more for. Considering the thought for a moment, I shook my head before dismissing it.

Li Shen bought the Chi paper he used in-story from the same vendor. Am I doing something wrong? Though, the cultivation technique from the ring was said to be vastly different from the one taught in the village or any other in the world; maybe relying on my predecessor's experience to approach this problem wasn't such a great idea after all…

With that thought in mind, I closed my eyes to try again only to be distracted by a shout from behind me.

"Dai Wei!"

I turned around to see an average-looking teen—a sixteen-year-old if I remember correctly—waving as he jogged up the hill towards me. Trailing behind him was a similarly aged girl in a cream-coloured, simple, loose-fitting hemp dress. Her eyes were a soft brown colour and her pale cheeks were flushed with a mild blush. The crude wooden earrings on her ears jiggled adorably with her every move.

Ma Yili was a very pretty girl. The prettiest in the village.

I knew from the moment I laid eyes upon her that I wanted her.

I needed her.

My waifu…

There's no way I am letting this dense fool get her this time around, I swore to myself as a smile forced its way onto my face.

"Li Shen! Ma Yili!" I greeted without getting up. "What brings you two here?"

"Hmph!" the main character grumbled as he stopped in front of me, arms crossed in front of his chest.

"I heard you planned to leave for Jinqiao?"

"...Yes?" I replied hesitantly. He wasn't supposed to know that, I thought to myself. My narrowed gaze panned to Ma Yili who stood somewhat behind him. The girl shrunk back as she caught me staring at her, her face flushed red with guilt.

"Hey! Stop bullying Ma Yili!" Li Shen said interposing himself between the two of us. "And yes, she told me, but that was only because she was worried about you, stupid."

I stared at the tattletale for a moment longer before looking back at the dense fool in front of her. Of course, the stupid cuck misunderstood why she told him. Either way, it didn't matter in the end; if I played my cards right, it was nearly guaranteed she would be mine sooner rather than later

I turned my attention back to Li Shen. "Yes, I plan to head to leave for Jinqiao so I can participate in the Great Trials," I replied. "What of it?"

"I am coming with you!" the boy declared.

"...Why?" I asked. There was no reason for him to want to go to Jinqiao anymore. I had already snatched his cheat item; it was only because he found the cheat that he had the courage to attempt to participate in the Trials in the first place.

"Why not?" the fool replied. "If you a talentless hack like you dared to attempt the Great Trials, then why would I, Li Shen, take the coward's way out?"

A sigh escaped my lips. Of course, the fool just had to complicate matters further. Still, it mattered little in the end. My plans remained unchanged. I still had to win a slot on the Great Trials and get admitted into the White Orchid Sect. In comparison to that, separating Ma Yili from him afterwards would be a rather simple affair.

"Do what you want," I said, shooing him off as I returned my mediation. I still had to confirm my affinity before I could even think of leaving this village; no point wasting time on worthless people.

Once upon a time, Li Shen might have been destined for greatness, but now, he was nothing more than a mob character. And if I had learnt anything from reading all three thousand-odd chapters of Martial Kingdoms, it was that mob characters really ever lived past a couple of chapters…