The business in The Mummy’s world came to an end at long last. It had been three days since team China returned to God’s dimension. They brought Imhotep and Anck-Su-Namun along with them. Those with the most points chipped in for the items needed to bring the movie characters out of their world. The team ended up with less points than before they entered the movie since the body repairs expended a good fraction of their remaining points. Though they did obtain ranked rewards due to the bonus mission. No one exchanged any items as they were waiting for points from the next movie to make use of these ranked rewards.
“Now, the next movie is… I don’t know.” Zheng said. “God stripped the leader privileges. Probably because I died. Haha… Feels strange to speak so lightly of my own death, but that’s the situation. We won’t be able to know what comes next until the another Guide comes and selects a new leader. We may not even be able to know of the next team battle in advance.”
The team gathered inside Zheng’s room. Since Zheng died in the previous main mission, the leader status bestowed by Jie was taken away. This in turn prevented them from getting the name of the next movie. It might be extremely dangerous because they couldn’t prepare.
“However…” Heng said. “If you get selected again by the Guide, wouldn’t you go directly into the fifth stage? We are going to hit the jackpot if it works. We would get enough points to exchange everything in doubles and throw one into the trash.”
Zheng gave a bitter laughter. “That’s basically impossible. God isn’t omnipotent. I can tell from Yin… ahem, the experience in the dream. The first three stages are achievable through technology because the changes happen in a person’s genes. The beginning of the fourth stage can be achieved. However, anything beyond that reaches into a person’s domain. The heart’s devil is the obstacle that stands before the mid-fourth stage, the first step of the domain. You either overcome it or die. Then there are the obstacles in front the late-fourth stage and fifth stage that we have no information on. God’s limit is probably the third stage so it won’t unlock my genetic constraint any further if I become the leader again.”
Everyone was surprised. WangXia immediately got what Zheng was getting to. “You mean we should give the leader status to someone else and let him gain one stage?”
Zheng nodded. However, he said with a sigh. “That’s what I want but no one knows how things will go. We don’t even know who the next Guide will be or when he will appear. Not to mention we won’t know who he will select. There are too many uncertainties in this situation so we can only leave the leader selection to fate. This aside, how do you feel, Imhotep? Doing fine in this realm?”
Imhotep appeared to be in a trance. God’s dimension presented a great shock to him and Anck-Su-Namun. This realm was completely different from their world, just like how it differed from the real world where the players came from. Fortunately, the rooms in the dimension could change according to a person’s imagination. Imhotep and Anck-Su-Namun selected a room and altered it to an ancient Egyptian palace.
Imhotep picked up a glass and sipped the light-yellow liquor. He asked Zheng to exchange this liquor, a secret Egyptian brew that was difficult to obtain even for the Pharaoh. The liquor costed more than Moutai and other similarly well-known brands. The taste was indeed palatable. It quickly became the drink of choice for the team.
Imhotep finished his glass then said. “I was at a loss when I first arrived. However, this world isn’t too exotic. You can figure out most things easily. It’s much more convenient than what we have in our time. To be honest, I kind of want to see your world, which should be more interesting than this world.”
The bald guy had the makings of an Egyptian aristocrat. This feeling that he gave off wasn’t prominent when he was an enemy but after they became teammates, everyone discovered the elegance carried with each of Imhotep’s movements. Furthermore, he was attractive. No wonder he successfully seduced the queen thousands of years ago. He was only second to the Pharaoh at the time.
“Our world…” The rest of team China gave off a bitter laughter.
They had almost forgotten about their world after the countless life and death trials they went through in the numerous worlds. Thinking back to the life in the real world almost felt like the reminiscence of their former lives.
LiuYu said. “The real world. It’s quite monotonous. As boring as a thick dictionary compared to this realm. It has a lot of contents but those contents are dull… Hoho. This realm is much better. You have a future completely unknown to you. There are the things you can exchange. You can grow strong or even become Superman. Once we return to the real world, we can fulfill so many of our dreams, and make up for our regrets.” There was a hint of sadness on the boy’s face but he quickly returned normal, hiding the sadness deep down inside.
“Hoho. We will eventually return to the real world. The exchange system is simply massive. I could search for what I want when I had the leader privileges but the only way to find anything now is to go through each choice one by one.” Zheng said to Imhotep. “Have you found the immortality elixir?”
Imhotep also smiled. He glanced over Anck-Su-Namun who was helping in the kitchen and said. “Judging by the descriptions of the exchanges, there are several enhancements and elixirs with immortality effects, though the prices in points and ranked rewards are costly. I won’t die anyway, so I think I can gather the points once I go through a few movies with you. The only thing I am worried about is Anck-Su-Namun. She might be put in danger if she must enter the movies with us.”
Zheng nodded. “There’s no avoiding danger. Everyone here, including me, has encountered countless dangers. So, you must think of yourselves as members of the team and enhance yourselves while saving up. It will take longer to get what you want but your safety will have a guarantee. There’s also one chance for a revival. Don’t waste it… Speaking of enhancements, where is Xuan? Couldn’t be still studying the Cultivation items, right?”
A chilling expression crept up each person’s face. The moment God completed the repair on Xuan, he leaped out from his death bed with a face of fanaticism and headed to his room with the glowing stones and Cultivation items. Before he closed the door, he warned the team not to interrupt him without a good reason.
“I am going to study a science different from natural science. This process might come with danger. If… you want to die, come find me at any time.”
The words felt like a threat and declaration of death no matter how the rest of the team interpreted it. Worse of all, Xuan said them with such enthusiasm over his face, a face that had come to be associated with the expressions of a corpse. The tone and expression alone were strong enough of a deterrant, he shouldn’t even have needed any words. The conclusion came from an instinctive sense of threat.
Zheng suddenly recalled the moment when Xuan made the announcement and the chill also crept up to his face. But he still said, “I will give him a call. We must know how the study is going with the Cultivation manuals and items. These things determine our future in the movie worlds, whether we can roll through the movies in easy difficulty… I probably won’t get killed, I suppose?”
Zheng walked out the room. As he came to the door of Xuan’s room, it suddenly opened. Xuan rushed out. His hair was messy. His clothes were wrinkled and torn, as if they had been pulled by a huge force. In addition, several burnt mark signified he might have experienced small explosions. Zheng could see pitch black linings around his eyes. He probably hadn’t slept the past few days studying the items and stones.
Zheng didn’t get a chance to speak because Xuan rushed the words. “Run! The fusion reactor in the basement is going to explode! Close the door and reset the basement! Hurry!”
(Fusion reactor? Isn’t that a hydrogen bomb?)
Zheng jumped. Roaring thunder were coming from the depth of the room. He grabbed Xuan at once and dragged him out then slammed the door shut. Xuan was as quick as Zheng. He grabbed the door handle at the next second. Time seemed to have stopped. The two people froze in their postures for several seconds. And then Xuan opened the door and walked in like nothing had happened. Zheng finally let out a sigh of relief. However, something didn’t feel right to him. He didn’t come here to close the door for Xuan.
“Hey! Xuan! How’s it going with the Cultivation items and stones? Any results?” He carefully peaked through the door but his feet lingered outside.
Xuan turned around and glanced over Zheng with a cold smile. “Come in if you want to know. Don’t worry. The fusion reactor is stable.”
(Stable? Lies! Was what happened just an illusion?)
Still, he slowly walked into the room and followed Xuan down to the basement. The sight that entered his eyes blew his mind away.
In a huge room spanning hundreds of meters wide lay numerous instruments that he couldn’t recognize. The technology contained within these instruments far surpassed what the technological advancement of the real world could achieve. One thing for sure was that no machine in the real world could project materialized energy or float in the air.
“Cultivation… simply amazing.” Xuan sighed with enthusiasm. “A science that reaches into the truth of the universe. A science different from natural science or really, it surpasses natural science.”
“The situation is…” Xuan walked to a big projected screen. As his hand touched the screen, the image changed accordingly. “The white stones are composed of a genetic code like material materialized by refined Qi. The black stones are materialized by Magic. To give you an analogy, human genetics is encoded in a spiral sequencing. Although genomes themselves are matter, they are merely carriers of information. This information encompasses the whole of mankind and is stored in an extremely tiny space. The composition of this stone is also genome like spiral sequences. However, these spirals are materialized by refined Qi and Magic, and the information contained inside are encoded Cultivation manuals. Judging by a fragment that I translated, a person will need fifty years to read through the information in a stone if it’s translated into words. Therefore, it’s impossible to translate the stones. One has to read this information using the mind. Of course, people without the basics of Cultivation like us will have to translate the codes.”
Xuan’s fingers pressed and flowed through the screen. Projected lines formed a huge three dimensional stone. The projection zoomed in until it came to spirals similar to the human genetic code. Energy formed into spirals and then decomposed into words. A small number of spirals were translated into countless words. This was merely minute fraction of one stone.
“As for the Cultivation items, the name of the bell has been translated. It’s the Bell of the East Emperor like you said.” Xuan continued.
“Bell of the East Emperor? Shit. We hit the lotto!” Zheng cried. However, a cold glance from Xuan shut him up at once.
Xuan breathed out and said. “The mirror is the Dish of Fortune. Don’t know why a mirror is called a dish but if the translation of the inscription isn’t wrong, then it’s this name.”
“Di- di- dish of Fortune?” Zheng swallowed. He couldn’t utter another word and fixed his wide opened eyes at Xuan.
Xuan ignored him. “I haven’t had the time to study the dish. Take a look at surface of the Bell of the East Emperor. It’s smooth to the touch but its engraved with countless rune words much smaller than a nanometer, about an attometer big. Despite the bell’s small size, it contained over a million rune word formations. See here…” He touched the screen. The projection showed a little bell and began to zoom in. The rune word engravings finally were finally revealed.
A pure white colored stream energy flowed across the surface of the engravings. The rune words began to consume this stream of energy as if they were alive. The white energy was then converted into a golden energy and was passed onto other rune words. In under a second, Zheng witnessed at least thousand million rune words converted energy from white to gold. Numerous variations happened in this timeframe that he couldn’t understand. When there was no longer any white energy left, the golden energy sunk into the bell and disappeared.
“The data from an initial analysis shows that the space near the surface of the bell warped as it absorbed energy. Time also passed at a different rate. There’s a seventy percent possibility the power of the Bell of the East Emperor touches into space and time, a level which I do not have the understanding. I won’t be able to obtain a thorough study of the bell in a short amount of time. Though if you want to simply activate it, increase your total refined Qi quantity by ten thousand times and you can activate it once.
“Cultivation… I translate it as a study of the truth. It’s an extremely advanced science! Any talk of profoundness is bullshit. Cultivation is science. It’s just that this science has reached a level beyond the scope of our imagination!”
