PGVCW 9

 

Playing God in Various Catastrophic Worlds

By

siofra

Translator’s Note:

Welcome back to the chaos! Chapter 9 brings us peak comedy as our little “immortal cultivator” meets actual, dirt-caked post-apocalyptic martial wanderers (xiáke). Enjoy!

— Siofra

Chapter 9: The Discrepancy Between Cultivators and Wanderers

Before her transmigrations, Xia Wang’an had already excelled as a top-tier academic prodigy. After a decade of surviving across perilous realms, she had evolved into an absolute master of supreme mental focus.

This was specifically manifested in her ability to plunge instantly into a state of hyper-concentration whenever she set her mind to learning or doing something, immersing herself body and soul. And right now, acting in her capacity as an immortal cultivator—yes, she had fully convinced herself she was one—Xia Wang’an had completely lost track of time while meditating. Upon finally concluding her session, although her dantian remained utterly hollow without a shred of genuine spiritual qi (língqì) circulating within her, she felt immensely satisfied, operating under the firm self-delusion that she had worked exceptionally hard.

Maintaining her buoyant mood, the black-haired maiden opened her eyes to find a throng of people standing at the base of the roof, staring up at her with undisguised shock.

Seeing her look down, quite a few individuals instinctively took a step back, their faces etched with awe and reverence.

Xia Wang’an felt absolutely nothing in response; after all, across the past decade, the vast majority of people she encountered had looked at her with precisely this expression.

Picking up her ceremonial sword, she rose to her feet, completely ignoring the wooden ladder off to the side, and drifted gracefully down to the earth with a light touch of her toes.

“Ooh…”

A collective gasp rippled through the crowd, triggering yet another wave of nervous retreats.

007 was ecstatic on behalf of its host: [Host! You looked so effortlessly cool just then!]

Its triumph fading into confusion, it added: [Why are you just standing there instead of walking over? Aren’t you trying to go inside?]

Xia Wang’an maintained a deadpan expression: [My legs are completely numb. I can’t walk.]

007: [……]

While Xia Wang’an’s physical vessel possessed autonomous regenerative healing capable of rapidly knitting together any degree of trauma, [leg numbness] was evidently not classified as a physical injury.

She began clinically analyzing the root cause of her affliction: [As a standard daily routine for an immortal cultivator, meditation should never induce numbness in the lower extremities.]

[It must be because I haven’t successfully condensed my spiritual qi yet, leaving my limbs devoid of circulating energy currents. I clearly need to grind much harder at my cultivation in the future.]

007 choked back a retort multiple times. Though it wanted to argue, her logic sounded annoyingly rigorous and scientific, leaving it with only one constructive recommendation: [Next time you meditate, host, you could try shifting your posture every half-hour or so. That should probably prevent your legs from falling asleep.]

[Splendid idea.] Xia Wang’an mentally gave her system a glowing thumbs-up while cautiously attempting to test a single step forward.

Finding her balance holding steady, she turned to face the sea of staring spectators: “Why are you all staring at me?”

It was a literal crowd—judging by the turnout, practically the entire village had assembled, including Grandpa Ga, who had previously been escorted back inside to rest after crying so hard his hands shook. Holding umbrellas or wearing traditional woven straw raincapes (suōyī), the villagers gazed at Xia Wang’an with the unfiltered expressions one might reserve for a descending deity.

If she were a complete stranger, they would likely have dropped to their knees by now. Instead, this particular “deity” happened to be the Ga family’s newly reclaimed great-auntie.

“S-Sister… little sister…” Grandpa Ga barely dared address her directly anymore; his hands had stopped shaking merely to let his entire body take over the tremors. “Just now… you were literally glowing…”

“Oh.” Xia Wang’an nodded with absolute casualness, “And?”

Grandpa Ga was completely thrown for a loop. And?! She was literally glowing with ethereal light!

Xia Wang’an evidently failed to comprehend the internal panic of the mortals around her. Looking up at the sky, she offered a thoroughly justified defense: “It’s not even dark yet. Me glowing during broad daylight shouldn’t inconvenience anyone, should it?”

The crowd: “……” Is this really a matter of whether it inconveniences anyone?! You are glowing right now!!

Ultimately, it was the oldest clan elder in the village—whose eyesight was failing but whose wits remained remarkably sharp—who seized upon the crux of the matter: “Wang’an… little sister.” “How on earth do you manage to emit light from your body?”

Xia Wang’an flicked her sleeve, taking a deliberate moment to display the exquisite embroidered patterns adorning the fabric before responding in an unruffled tone: “Can you people not glow?”

The clan elder: “……” The crowd: “……” Ga Dayu: That tone feels entirely too familiar.

Unable to hold his tongue, he blurted out, “Great-Auntie, none of us can glow. Besides, not only were you glowing earlier, but the rain actively avoided touching you as well.”

“Oh, that’s just my protective spiritual force (hùtǐ línglì).” Xia Wang’an extended a hand. The torrential downpour had tapered off into a fine, misty drizzle; as she raised her palm, descending raindrops naturally glanced off an invisible barrier, leaving her clothing entirely free of moisture.

Witnessing this firsthand, the onlookers experienced another wave of profound shock.

Ga Dayu struggled to maintain his cognitive equilibrium: “Protective spiritual force… what on earth is that?”

Xia Wang’an gave him a look of profound bewilderment, as though he had just asked an utterly elementary question: “How can you possibly not know something so basic? Did your master not teach you Foundational Cultivation Theory?”

Ga Dayu: What in the world is Foundational Cultivation Theory??

Master? Does that refer to a senior instructor within a martial sect?

Could the sects in the major cities out there have advanced to such terrifying heights already?

Even as his mind raced, he heard his great-auntie continue: “Practitioners engage in diligent ascetic cultivation, circulating their mental cultivation manuals (xīnfǎ), multiplying ambient heavenly and earthly spiritual qi by the speed of light to compute an actionable spiritual energy output. This energy then undergoes a repulsive reaction with planetary magnetic fields, factoring in applied mechanics, optics, and condensed-matter physics.” “And finally, you successfully generate your own sovereign protective spiritual force.”

Ga Dayu: “……” Everyone else: “……”

With his eyes glazed over, Ga Dayu managed to scrape together a shred of coherence: “Great-Auntie… where on earth did you learn all of this??”

Xia Wang’an blinked: “From my sect, obviously.”

A sect… finally, a familiar term everyone could recognize.

Though Ming County was small and isolated, tales of martial wanderers (xiáke) and grand sects frequently trickled across its borders. Ever since the botanical mutations began, the imperial court had collapsed within a few short years, giving rise to dominant martial sects. Possessing superior capabilities compared to ordinary citizens when dealing with mutated flora, these sects frequently adopted “saving the common people” as their sacred mandate, dispatching disciples to traverse the realm and render aid.

These roaming champions were affectionately dubbed xiáke by the populace.

“So Great-Auntie is a disciple of a formal sect.” The Ga family members, having never laid eyes on a genuine martial hero before, instantly erupted with exuberant excitement. They had always heard that sect disciples were unfathomably powerful, carrying hereditary martial lineages capable of handling monstrosities beyond ordinary civilian comprehension.

Little did they know that these paragons possessed not only peerless martial prowess, but could also glow in the dark and walk through rainstorms completely unblemished.

Ga Dayu caught the infectious enthusiasm, asking eagerly: “Great-Auntie, which sect do you belong to?”

The black-haired maiden smiled brightly: “The Heaven-Saving Sect (Jiùtiān Zōng).”

Back in the modern primary world—

“The Heaven-Saving Sect is a verified reality. Once the [Salvation] project officially initiated, every single citizen of Great Xia became a proud disciple of the Heaven-Saving Sect.”

Pure waiting was agonizingly dull, so the analytical team was currently reviewing their macro-strategy: “Based on Wang’an’s psychological profile, we engineered a behavioral background tailored to her operational instincts: an ascetic cultivation disciple who left home in her youth to apprentice under a sect, maturing in isolation with zero exposure to mainstream mundane society.”

Qiuzhuang raised his hand: “But why not just have Wang’an openly state that her school is focused on immortal cultivation rather than traditional martial arts?”

“For the exact same reason as before: a truth is only impactful when people piece it together through their own deductions,” the Chief Analyst explained. “Through empirical testing, we’ve confirmed that the Faith Power (xìn lì) generated by Wang’an correlates directly with the emotional volatility of her observers.”

“For instance, if she casually informs someone that she is an immortal cultivator and they subsequently verify it, their shock might yield a baseline of 1 Faith Power unit.” “However, if she approaches them under the guise of an ordinary mortal, casually knocks out a mutant fiend with a single punch, lets them register shock, systematically dismantles an entire horde of anomalies, maintains their sustained astonishment, and then suddenly launches into the air with sweeping celestial wings to soar away—that same subject will generate 3, or potentially even 5 units of Faith Power.”

The Chief Analyst spoke with fluid professional confidence, summarizing: “Therefore, our strategic mandate is to engineer escalating vectors that allow Wang’an to harvest Faith Power continuously through progressive reveals.” “Naturally, this incremental pacing is necessitated by our current resource limitations; once our operational baseline scales up, we will naturally pivot toward alternate harvesting frameworks.”

Qiuzhuang found the phrasing increasingly familiar: “Wait a minute… your terminology sounds suspiciously like setting up a minor face-slap, escalating to a major face-slap, and ultimately flipping the entire game board.” “Why does this sound uncomfortably like a web novel face-slapping power-fantasy plot??”

The Chief Analyst remained entirely unflustered: “Strictly speaking, that is a valid interpretation. The sole distinction is that in classmate Wang’an’s previous web novel adventures, she performed the face-slaps entirely on her own accord.” “Whereas now, the entire nation of Great Xia is engaging in a synchronized face-slapping campaign alongside her.”

Xia Wang’an remained blissfully unaware that she was currently starring in an empire-backed face-slapping production.

Yet as the protagonist of a power-fantasy narrative, she was undeniably having the time of her life.

[Ding! Host Faith Power +13]

[Ding! Host Faith Power +25]

Maintaining her ethereal, transcendent posture, Xia Wang’an swept her sword downward, cleaving through an entire wave of aggressive wheat stalks lunging toward her in a synchronized charge. A gentle breeze swept past, accentuating her flowing, pristine grace.

[Almost there. Once I stockpile a thousand units of Faith Power, I can make my trip home.]

This marked the very first instance she would return home after executing a [World Transmigration], filling Xia Wang’an with unbridled elation that bubbled up into mental laughter: [Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh!]

007: [……Host, please refrain from mimicking the villain laughter from I Desire to Consume the Heavens; it sounds genuinely horrifying.]

Xia Wang’an proved remarkably receptive to feedback: [Does it sound bad? Strange, I feel intimately nostalgic toward that particular laugh layout. Let me cycle through an alternative delivery.]

[Heh-heh! Heh-heh-heh! Heh-heh-heh-heh!]

007: [……]

Though the laughter still carried an inexplicably greasy undertone, considering how long it had been since her host had experienced such unadulterated joy—to the point of temporarily misplacing baseline social acoustics—the system ultimately chose to match her wavelength.

007: [Heh-heh! Heh-heh-heh!]

Xia Wang’an’s laughter terminated abruptly: [Never mind, this one sounds terrible too.]

The system, currently engaged in enthusiastic giggling: [……]

Xia Wang’an: [How do ordinary people usually laugh again?]

007 deliberated briefly: [Ha-ha?]

Consequently, a few seconds later, human and system initiated a synchronized internal chorus: [Hahahahaahahaha!]

Growing increasingly euphoric, Xia Wang’an’s combat efficiency spiked vertically. Transforming into a high-speed agricultural excavator, she tore through the dense wheat fields with escalating velocity, executing a textbook seven-in and seven-out routine across the terrain.

Admittedly, Xia Wang’an lacked the raw capacity to shatter mountains or overturn seas in her current depowered state.

However, a decade of frontline combat conditioning remained fully internalized.

Had she encountered Level-4 mutant flora or higher, she might have encountered friction; yet Ming County was a minor sector harboring unexceptional mutations, with its most persistent hazard being cooperative agricultural swarms like wheat and rice paddies.

Operating in isolated clusters, these botanical organisms presented an insurmountable nightmare to ordinary mortals. Ever since their mutation, they boasted exponential reproductive and regenerative cycles, occasionally spawning secondary seed-bursts upon initial eradication that rapidly carpeted the soil with fresh generations.

Ultimately, human combatants would exhaust their physical stamina and be consumed entirely by the expanding biomass.

Yet to Xia Wang’an, these botanical hazards presented zero systemic complications.

In her tactical cognitive framework, these wheat stalks weren’t hostile combatants; they were vats of raw flour, bowls of steaming noodles, and endless mountains of steamed buns.

Translated into peacetime economics, it was equivalent to an individual entering combat against solid blocks of gold, only to discover that defeating one unit caused it to spawn a litter of baby gold nuggets.

Who could possibly experience fatigue under such conditions? Joy was an understatement!

[Hahahahaahahaha! Another generation has sprouted!]

Xia Wang’an had already mentally rendered high-definition visualizations of steaming, freshly baked gugu-meat stuffed buns, fueling her momentum to unprecedented heights.

Pristine rows of wheat collapsed systematically to the earth, laden with heavy, swollen seed-heads desperately shedding fertile cargo to propagate the next batch.

Yet no sooner did a fresh green shoot breach the topsoil than a flash of steel severed it at the root. The terrifying human exterminator maintained strict perimeter surveillance, patiently camping the spawn zone to harvest subsequent waves as they attempted maturation.

Within minutes, the perimeter was entirely choked with flattened stalks. As the sun dipped toward the horizon, the final batch of severed vegetation exhausted its internal metabolic reserves, failing to regenerate further.

Scanning the horizon, Xia Wang’an stood entirely alone amidst rolling waves of harvested biomass.

Ga Dayu and a dozen robust young villagers immediately emerged from the treeline pushing wooden handcarts: “Great-Auntie, shall we load these stalks onto the carts and transport them back for village processing?”

Xia Wang’an nodded with serene satisfaction: “Indeed. I am requisitioning these materials for our sect’s inventory.”

“Right away!” Though completely baffled as to why she insisted on hauling away mountains of mundane wheat rather than burning them to ashes like standard agricultural refuse, the villagers enthusiastically deferred to the Gao family’s transcendent relative.

Initially, locals unfamiliar with martial wanderers had been pleasantly surprised, assuming the Gao household had simply acquired a conventional kin connection within the itinerant hero circuit. Word had circulated that this great-auntie had been apprenticed to the Heaven-Saving Sect since childhood, emerging only upon her father’s passing; consequently, her comprehension of mundane civilian structures was rudimentary, initially leading her to assume that everyone possessed sect affiliations and practiced internal cultivation.

The villagers had privately assumed the “Heaven-Saving Sect” was some obscure, backwater micro-sect, given the girl’s unfamiliarity with worldly affairs and remote origins.

Instead, Xia Wang’an proceeded to single-handedly sweep clean every single wheat and rice paddy across the entirety of Ming County right before their eyes.

What did that achievement actually represent?

Expressed in plain arithmetic, it meant that civilian casualties and mortality rates across Ming County would drop by a minimum of eighty percent over the coming year.

People would no longer live in mortal terror of being devoured the moment they stepped outside their doorsteps.

Granted, seasonal winds would undoubtedly redeposit dormant spores next spring, sparking new vegetation cycles; but the aggregate scale would be reduced to manageable fractions, enabling local agrarian communities to police the perimeters independently.

Presently, the entire populace of Ming County was practically prepared to enshrine Xia Wang’an in a domestic altar, elevating the Gao family’s social standing to unprecedented heights of regional authority.

The moment Xia Wang’an requested logistical assistance to transport her harvested crops, despite the cargo’s dubious utilitarian value, local volunteers eagerly thumped their chests declaring, “Leave it to us, handling carts is our specialty!” eagerly dispatching a dozen able-bodied pushcart operators to haul her bounty.

At present, they had initiated their routine daily logistical convoy with practiced efficiency.

Xia Wang’an turned her gaze toward Ga Dayu: “Are there any remaining agricultural sectors exhibiting active hostility?”

Ga Dayu replied promptly: “Great-Auntie, Ming County proper is entirely pacified. Even the massive paddy field you’re targeting sits just outside the county demarcation boundary.”

Mental images of steaming, fragrant white rice danced across Xia Wang’an’s consciousness, prompting an involuntary swallow as she inquired: “What about the rice paddies?”

“There remains a single wetland sector notorious for swallowing multiple patrols, though it’s situated at a considerable distance. Shall we schedule the expedition for tomorrow morning?”

Xia Wang’an shook her head: “Negative. We march immediately.”

Ga Dayu immediately launched into a cascade of unbridled praise, his face beaming with raw admiration: “Our Great-Auntie is truly a legendary martial hero! Even under the cover of night, she willingly undertakes a forced night-march across the wilderness to purge rogue agriculture for the common good!”

Lacking formal literary education, his vocabulary occasionally lacked precise nuance, leading him to casually deploy military terminology like [encirclement and suppression] (wéijiǎo).

Naturally, even if someone corrected his lexicon, Ga Dayu would have dismissed the feedback entirely. What of it? Was a transcendent great-auntie not permitted to unilaterally encircle and suppress an entire wetland rice paddy?

“Many thanks to the martial hero! Endless blessings upon the martial hero!”

Mid-conversation, illuminated by the amber glow of twilight, a family of destitute farmers stumbled out of the brush, flinging themselves desperately at Xia Wang’an’s feet and kowtowing with frenzied gratitude: “Those wheat fields were demonic—they swallowed half our village whole, leaving us refugees with nowhere to flee! Your intervention has literally preserved our family line from extinction, martial hero!”

[Ding! Host Faith Power +10]

Xia Wang’an—who had been vigorously carving through agricultural threats moments prior—blinked. Despite experiencing the phenomenon repeatedly over recent days, she still struggled with graceful execution, waving her hands awkwardly: “Please, rise.”

[007, the people of this world are genuinely wonderful.]

A warm wave of happiness washed over the young girl—memories of past lives where locals invariably tracked her movements with suspicion and hostility receding as she realized these expressions carried infinitely more emotional weight than a generic 1,000-point Faith payout. [Every single one of them actually takes the time to thank me.]

007 shared in its host’s elation: [That’s because the host performed a righteous deed! You earned every bit of this appreciation!]

A flicker of lingering grievance surfaced in Xia Wang’an’s tone: [Yet I performed good deeds in my previous lives as well; why did those people never offer a word of gratitude?]

She added, sounding genuinely aggrieved: [They actively attempted to drive me away, screaming and branding me a monster.]

007 radiated righteous indignation: [Hmph! A bunch of blind, ungrateful wretches! The host shouldn’t waste emotional bandwidth on them! You’ve finally returned home now, surrounded by legions of individuals who genuinely cherish you!]

Reflecting on this reality, Xia Wang’an’s spirits rebounded instantly: [True enough! Our Faith reserves have already surpassed 800 units; we’ll be heading home in no time!]

She mentally recalibrated her logistical priorities: [I am going to pack all of this wheat into spatial transit and bring it back for everyone to feast upon!]

“Pardon us, hero—which specific sect do you hail from?” A cluster of farmers residing near the peripheral fields stepped forward, gazing at Xia Wang’an with boundless veneration.

Mentioning her affiliation instantly straightened Xia Wang’an’s posture, infusing her tone with the effortless self-assurance of someone backed by an institutional superpower: “I am a direct disciple of the Heaven-Saving Sect.”

Completely ignorant of major martial sects, the family took Xia Wang’an’s radiant pride as absolute confirmation of an apex-tier institution, prompting an immediate secondary wave of prostrations while permanently etching the name [Heaven-Saving Sect] into their collective memory.

Having successfully harvested both agricultural threats and emotional validation, Xia Wang’an maintained her stellar disposition, battling through the nocturnal hours to successfully annihilate Ming County’s final remaining rogue rice paddy.

As dawn broke casting pristine morning light across the landscape, her unhurried footsteps echoed through the village streets as she returned to base camp, greeted by continuous bows of gratitude from passing citizens.

The narrative concerning “the Gao family’s great-auntie, who apprenticed at a legendary sect in her youth and returned as a martial hero to uphold cosmic justice” had officially saturated every corner of Ming County.

Experiencing genuine martial champions for the very first time, the locals channeled their organic appreciation directly into her legend. Within a matter of days, civilian emulation led numerous households to adopt the “great-auntie” moniker as a regional honorific.

To the local populace, the young girl from the Gao household functioned essentially as a living deity.

Culinary offerings began arriving unprompted. A soot-smudged young girl, roughly eleven or twelve years old with kitchen ash dusting her cheeks, approached Xia Wang’an with shy reverence, extending a steaming porcelain bowl filled to the brim with noodles: “Great-Auntie, I heard you have a fondness for noodles. I prepared this myself—thank you for eradicating the paddy fields adjacent to our homestead. Mother says I no longer need to fear being consumed when stepping outside.”

Radiating residual heat, the bowl warmed Xia Wang’an’s hands. Struggling to articulate the sudden pressure building behind her sternum, she felt an immense surge of raw, explosive energy course through her chest—an empowerment so absolute that she felt entirely capable of uprooting a mountain range if handed a sword at that precise instant.

“Thank you.” Xia Wang’an offered the young girl a deeply earnest acknowledgment.

Observing the sixteen-or-seventeen-year-old maiden clad in exquisite attire unknown to Ming County standing unassumingly on the public thoroughfare, holding a humble bowl and consuming clear-broth noodles down to the final drop, the surrounding onlookers whispered amongst themselves:

“So the great-auntie genuinely enjoys noodles.” “Clearly you haven’t been paying attention; didn’t Gao Xiao-er mention that she consumed five bowls of noodles on her very first day in the village?” “In that case, I shall prepare a massive cauldron of noodles and deliver it to her courtyard daily!” An energetic matron rubbed her palms together with the triumphant expression of someone who had unlocked a profound life secret.

“I’ve heard older generations claim that true martial heroes roam the realm dispensing justice impartially, but I always assumed those were fabricated fairy tales. Who would have guessed they are genuinely this formidable?”

Immediately, local pride swelled within the collective consciousness: “Naturally! Besides, this is our Ming County hero—our very own blood-related Gao family daughter. From this day forward, our entire county possesses official backing.”

“I heard from the great-auntie that entering their sect requires rigorous bone-structure screening. I wonder if my daughter qualifies? If she achieves sect initiation, she could glow in the dark when walking outside at night—saving on lantern oil alone makes it worthwhile!” “Do martial heroes actually possess luminescent attributes?” An informed neighbor eagerly stepped forward to enlighten the uninitiated: “Indeed! During her cultivation sessions, the great-auntie literally radiates luminosity, causing rainwater to deflect entirely without requiring an umbrella!”

“Martial prowess manifested in such a manner… that is utterly astonishing! What kind of internal manual achieves such heights? I certainly want my descendants enrolled!”

Ming County had never previously hosted an authentic martial wanderer, relying entirely on secondhand exaggerations regarding combat efficiency. With Xia Wang’an setting the operational benchmark, the collective populace permanently locked in their definition of a true martial hero, projecting intense aspirational reverence onto her archetype.

While the local community immersed themselves in culinary preparations and aspirational plotting, Xia Wang’an was simultaneously auditing temporal coordinates. According to historical baseline analytics, this compact mountain settlement was scheduled to receive a visiting delegation of genuine martial wanderers.

[The martial wanderers are scheduled to arrive in Ming County shortly. Have we nearly satisfied our Faith accumulation targets?]

[ Affirmative, host. Current Faith reserves stand at: 1,987 units.]

Though Ming County’s baseline census was modest, universal local compliance had enabled Xia Wang’an to eclipse the initial thousand-unit milestone swiftly, accumulating a substantial surplus.

Xia Wang’an felt intensely galvanized: [Magnificent! The target of ten billion is rapidly approaching!]

[Per our strategic roadmap, once I interface with these traveling wanderers, I am authorized to execute an interim return to home base.]

Anticipation bubbled within her consciousness. As for the operational imperative behind interacting with this world’s native wanderers, the Chief Analyst’s foundational briefing echoed in her memory: —”Because only true martial wanderers will clearly articulate the fundamental operational distinctions separating standard earthly combatants from authentic immortal cultivators.”

Meanwhile, several youthful martial wanderers were presently hauling themselves across a rugged mountain pass, covered from head to toe in thick layers of grime and dust.

Their disheveled state wasn’t a deliberate disregard for hygiene; rather, terrestrial transit had degraded into an active survival gauntlet. A traveler could advance barely two paces before encountering predatory turf-grass armed with prehensile claws, or stumble blindly into vivid flora engineered to project hyper-realistic cognitive illusions.

Infrastructure had completely disintegrated alongside the imperial collapse two centuries prior; reconstruction efforts proved utterly futile since aggressive botanical mutations could carpet cleared masonry overnight.

The cruelest operational reality facing itinerant wanderers was material attrition: superficial lacerations sustained during combat would eventually scar over, but textile integrity possessed no regenerative loop. Consequently, regardless of how intimidating or prestigious a wanderer’s title sounded, structural aesthetics mandated that every champion dedicated to saving humanity wore vestments sporting a minimum of ten visible patches.

If a wanderer’s hair failed to retain a caked crust of topsoil, or if their footwear remained structurally uncompromised, it simply served as empirical proof that the local mutant flora wasn’t pulling its weight.

Utilizing equestrian transit was entirely out of the question: primarily due to pervasive systemic poverty, and secondarily because wanderers intentionally gravitated toward active hazard zones. Lacking robust cavalry support, mounts invariably succumbed to botanical ambushes before reaching designated sector objectives.

Consequently, wanderers mapped the continent exclusively on foot.

Having conquered successive mountain ranges and weathered endless botanical skirmishes, the small cadre of genuine wanderers crested a final ridge, finally spotting distant plumes of civilian hearth smoke.

“That cluster ahead appears to be an established county settlement. Let us utilize this sector for rest and recuperation, and purge as many surrounding wheat and rice anomalies as possible before resuming our trek,” the senior senior martial brother instructed, flicking accumulated dust from his locks and spitting out a stray pebble of mutant soil introduced into his oral cavity during a recent tumble. Standing straight, he added:

“Given the regional profile, formal wanderer patrols have likely never serviced this sector. Our institutional responsibilities are heavy; we must execute our duties with absolute diligence, understood?”

“Understood!” chorused the remaining junior disciples, equally caked in environmental debris.

Yet as they approached the perimeter, a mounting sense of bewilderment overtook them: the immediate environs of the settlement were entirely devoid of hostile botanical signatures—even the ubiquitous agricultural swarms of wheat and rice paddies were completely absent.

What initially registered as an anomalous statistical coincidence quickly hardened into a definitive conclusion: this geographical sector had undergone systematic, artificial sanitization.

Arriving at an expansive tract of terrain bearing unmistakable topological indicators of a massive historical wheat cultivation zone, the wanderers surveyed the scene with dropped jaws:

“An agricultural expanse of this magnitude completely scrubbed clean? Could a rival wanderer contingent have preempted our route?” “Even our entire sect roster of seventy-eight practitioners operating in unison alongside our master couldn’t efficiently neutralize a harvest zone of this scale.”

Representing the [Wheat-Excision Sect]—a recognized institutional body of respectable dimensions—they found themselves confronting a logistical milestone entirely outside their operational capacity. How had a minor mountain county accomplished such a feat?

Following a brief, stunned consultation, the senior brother reached an executive decision: “We shall conduct inquiries directly with the local villagers.”

Stepping forward across the lane, he happened to intercept Grandpa Ga, who was out for a morning stroll, casually leaning on his cane while humming a folk tune.

The senior brother hastily marshaled his junior peers, clasping his fists in formal greeting: “Greetings, elder. We require brief assistance regarding regional intelligence.”

Surveying the patchwork composition of their garments and the structural failures in their footwear, Grandpa Ga radiated grandfatherly warmth, welcoming them enthusiastically: “No trouble at all, absolutely none! Bless your hearts, come along to my homestead—we have fresh well water available.”

Clearly accustomed to civilian wariness, the senior brother smoothly executed a defensive martial arts courtesy posture, navigating the interaction with practiced fluency: “Honored elder, please rest assured—we are not vagrants.”

Grandpa Ga blinked: “Oh? You aren’t?” The senior brother nodded with calm poise: “Indeed. We are martial wanderers.”

Grandpa Ga’s confusion deepened: “Eh? Xiáke? You lads?” Displaying mild skepticism regarding their credentials, he voiced his doubts: “Are you pulling my leg? True wanderers don’t look like ragamuffins. My little sister is a genuine martial wanderer.”

“Your esteemed younger sister is a martial wanderer?” The senior brother’s eyes brightened; sharing a professional lineage simplified intelligence gathering. Instantly visualizing an elderly, silver-haired matriarch sporting traditional patched outerwear, he inquired: “Would it be permissible to request an introduction?”

Grandpa Ga gestured vaguely toward the courtyard shade tree: “Certainly. My little sister is right over there, enjoying the swing.”

With expressions of eager anticipation, the delegation marched forward into the compound—only to halt abruptly.

Suspended upon a garden swing sat a radiant young maiden.

Her skin possessed an immaculate, porcelain clarity (contrasting sharply against their sun-baked, soot-stained complexions); her pristine white vestments radiated undeniable material luxury and ethereal grace (contrasting against their patchwork garments); and her dark, lustrous hair was secured neatly by a decorative hairpin (while their scalps remained caked in topsoil).

The junior martial brother stuttered uncontrollably: “M-Master brother… is that arboreal specimen standing directly behind her… a [Bone-Shattering Tree]??”

True to its nomenclature, a Bone-Shattering Tree possessed the terrifying biological capacity to liquefy human skeletal structures upon physical contact.

Encountering specimens along their route had routinely forced their entire unit to coordinate defensive maneuvers and tactical withdrawals to survive.

Yet presently, that exact botanical nightmare was serving as a casual playground accessory, utilized as a structural mount for a leisure swing.

“Is she entirely oblivious to that arboreal horror’s lethality? Should we issue a tactical warning??”

As the trunk flexed and whipped violently in an apparent attempt to sever its structural bindings, the young maiden casually backhanded the trunk with an open palm—causing the vegetative entity to freeze instantly into absolute, trembling compliance.

The junior brother: “……” The remaining delegation: “……”

Is this… supposed to be a fellow martial wanderer??