Looking at the glaring crimson prompt box that appeared in his vision, Yan Xiao's hunger vanished completely.
With the System's intensity...
Who would still think about cooking?
He looked around the kitchen carefully.
Nothing.
He looked again.
Still nothing.
Then he looked down.
There, on the cracked linoleum floor beside the kitchen counter, was a cockroach.
It was moving fast — darting toward the gap beneath the refrigerator.
The System prompt box pulsed red.
"SCARLET FLAME BEAST — LATE STAGE QI REFINING. EXTREMELY FEROCIOUS. FIRE POISON LETHAL. EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY."
Yan Xiao stared at the cockroach.
The cockroach, sensing danger, changed direction.
Yan Xiao's body moved before his brain did.
He threw himself sideways toward the door — one hand grabbing the doorframe, one foot pushing off the counter — and in the chaos of his panicked scramble, his right foot came down.
Directly on the cockroach.
The crunch was very small.
Yan Xiao froze with one hand still on the doorframe, half-in and half-out of the kitchen, his heart hammering.
Silence.
"Ding! Retreat quickly!"
"Huh... Ding! Holy crap, detecting the host's ultimate counter-kill of a Late Stage Qi Refining Demon Beast—the Scarlet Flame Beast!"
"Reward:
100 years of Qi Refining Stage One energy
One Cultivation Manual - Scarlet Flame World Destroyer!"
"The host's Divine Might is unparalleled, but please do not engage in such dangerous behavior next time!"
Hearing the voice in his mind and looking at the corpse of the "Late Stage Qi Refining Demon Beast" on the ground,
Yan Xiao raised an eyebrow.
What the hell!
There is something wrong with this System!
The "Late Stage Qi Refining Demon Beast" that he had just stomped to death.
In reality, it was just a cockroach.
Yes!
It was the most common, ordinary kind of pest.
Let alone him, a beginner Martial Artist.
Even an ordinary person with no strength could easily stomp it to death.
At this moment, that cockroach had already been flattened.
And to be safe, Yan Xiao even ground it twice, crushing it into dust.
However, on the other hand,
although there is something wrong with this System, it truly gives out rewards!
Especially that Qi Refining stage energy and that cultivation manual!
Yan Xiao opened the manual and started reading it.
Hmm...
It looked extraordinary.
But what kind of manual is this? The text was foreign. Not a single character he recognized.
Just based on the cover quality, it should not be inferior to what his master gave him.
He looked carefully and asked:
"System. What kind of language is this? How do I use this?"
"That's easy, Host. Just shout LEARN."
Hearing this, Yan Xiao frowned. And he asked again:
"System. What about this Qi Refining Energy?"
"That's easy, Host. Just shout ACCEPT."
With doubt, Yan Xiao said in his heart:
"ACCEPT. LEARN."
Both arrived at once.
The moment the Qi Refining energy descended, it moved through Yan Xiao's meridians like fire through dry grass — fast, indiscriminate, burning everything in its path.
It felt as though invisible hands had reached inside his chest, seized his ribcage, and were attempting to tear it open from the inside.
Breathe, some distant part of his mind said. Breathe through it. He couldn't breathe. He could only scream.
The energy carved through his dantian — the sea of energy located three fingers below his navel — and then split, branching outward through twelve major meridian pathways simultaneously. Every branch point felt like a knot being forced loose with a dull blade. Yan Xiao's fingers dug into the floor. His teeth bit his lip. He tasted copper.
And then the manual hit him.
The book trembled once in his hands — and dissolved. It came apart like morning mist and poured through the space between his eyes, and ten thousand words arrived at the same instant the Qi was still tearing him open. Diagrams of meridian pathways burned themselves into his memory while his body screamed. Breathing sequences arrived while his lungs refused to work. The exact spiral through which Scarlet Flame Qi must circulate through the dantian before it can be refined. Yan Xiao understood it completely in the same moment he could not feel his hands.
Two catastrophes. One body. No mercy.
Then the impurities began to move. He felt it first as a crawling heat beneath his skin — as though every pore had become a tiny mouth forced open against its will. Then the smell hit him. Rotten and sour. The accumulated waste of fifteen years of breathing ordinary air, eating ordinary food, living as an ordinary person — all of it was being forced to the surface at once.
Black-gray slime seeped out from his arms first, then his neck, then his chest. It clung to him like a second skin.
The pain lasted one stick of incense. When it stopped, Yan Xiao sat motionless for a long moment. His lungs worked. His heart beat. He looked down at his hands — coated in dark, foul-smelling filth. Then Yan Xiao hurried to the washroom.
When he finally emerged from the washroom, skin scrubbed raw and hair still dripping, Yan Xiao stood in the middle of the room for a long moment.
The System had given him one hundred years of Qi Refining energy, a complete cultivation manual, and the most painful fifteen minutes of his life.
He was still hungry. He went back to the kitchen to cook the noodles. When he finally sat down and lifted the chopsticks, Yan Xiao stared at the bowl for a moment — steam rising, broth clear. He ate his first mouthful.
Yan Xiao set down his chopsticks.
He had been about to eat his second mouthful when the thought finally caught up with him.
One hundred years of Qi Refining energy.
He was at the First Stage of Qi Refining.
One hundred years of energy.
First Stage.
"System."
"Yes, Host!"
"One hundred years of energy. And I only reached the First Stage?"
A brief pause.
"That is correct, Host! Due to the host's exceptionally... unique physical constitution, one hundred years of Qi Refining energy was the precise amount required to bring the host to the First Stage of Qi Refining. The System congratulates the host on this achievement!"
Yan Xiao stared at the wall.
"Say that again. Slowly."
"Host's body is trash."
He stood up so fast he nearly knocked the noodles over.
"What did you just call me —"
"The host's physical constitution is below the baseline for cultivation in any known era. In a world where Qi still flows freely, most cultivators reach the First Stage within three to seven days using ambient spiritual energy alone. The host, by contrast, required one hundred years of concentrated Qi Refining energy to achieve the same result. This is a remarkable data point. The System is fascinated."
"Fascinated." Yan Xiao repeated the word.
"Yes! The host is statistically extraordinary. Most trash-constitution individuals never reach Qi Refining at all. The host has beaten the odds! Be happy, Host."
He sat back down and picked up his chopsticks. He stared at his noodles for a long time.
Outside, it was a Dharma Ending Era — a world where Qi had long since thinned to nothing, where cultivation was legend, where the path to immortality was considered a dead road walked only by fools and the desperate.
Yan Xiao ate his noodles.
He was, apparently, both.
---
Thump, thump, thump!
Just then, a series of knocks on the door interrupted Yan Xiao's plan to finish his noodles.
"Who is it?"
Yan Xiao went to open the door, a little curious.
He was a lone wolf and had no relatives or friends in this city.
He had submitted his dismissal letter to the school office himself, three hours ago. He genuinely could not imagine who would be standing outside his door and knocking at this hour.
He opened the door and saw.
Standing outside was actually his school principal, Mr. Wang Bengsun. Wang Bengsun wore two hats at Destiny No. 1 High School — principal by title, homeroom teacher by habit. He was the kind of man who couldn't stay behind a desk.
"Mr. Wang?"
"Why did you come, sir? Please come in."
Inside the house… Yan Xiao placed a cup of plain water in front of Wang Bengsun, looking at him with some curiosity.
"I just happened to be passing by, so I thought I'd come up and see you!"
Wang Bengsun smiled slightly at his words, then looked at Yan Xiao with concern: "How have you been lately? Are you doing well?"
Hearing this, Yan Xiao grinned.
"Thank you for your concern, Mr. Wang!"
"I've been doing great lately. I eat well and sleep soundly!"
As he spoke, he even raised a fly swatter and flattened a buzzing fly beside him.
Crack.
"Ding! Detecting the host's lightning-reflex assassination of a Low Stage Qi Refining Demon Beast — the Crimson Wing Fiend! Reward: 3 years of Qi Refining energy!"
Three years of Qi Refining energy. Small, but he would take it.
Yan Xiao's eye twitched once.
He kept smiling at Wang Bengsun.
Wang Bengsun saw Yan Xiao's appearance and couldn't help but sigh inwardly.
In his eyes, Yan Xiao's smile was completely forced, used to hide the bitterness in his heart.
"I say, Yan Xiao, are you... sure you're alright?"