Chapter 1 There Really is a World of Cultivation!

"Holy crap! There really is a world of cultivation! This game company is awesome! It was worth using up all my luck to win one of the limited spots to enter this game!"

Zhen Po stood on a mountain path that seemed to stretch endlessly, winding like a snake at the foot of a towering mountain that reached into the clouds. His loud voice was easily heard by Lu Xiao Yao and Lu Gui, who were more than ten meters away.

This game was said to be still in development by their company, and they originally didn't plan to release it yet.

Because of the insectoids, the game company said it was an emergency measure, so they made the rare decision to release access to the game, with a limit of five hundred players!

While everyone was shocked, the game company only said that this game world would only be open this one time, for five hundred players. Whether it was successful or not, there would be no second chance to enter the game.

Some students wondered, if they failed, what would happen to the insectoids in the game?

The game planners gave a simple answer: their failure would mean that the insectoids had once again escaped this game world.

The game's ending was that the insectoids would use the villains to shatter the game space and escape again.

Thus, all the military academy students from across the Federation and Empire who were participating in this operation began to face their moment of destiny!

A lottery!

This time, Lu Gui finally had a stroke of good luck and got in.

When he received the detailed and complex identity information, facing so much knowledge that completely contradicted common sense in the interstellar era, Lu Gui felt that this game was not simple.

"I'm telling you, Zhen Po, you're really noisy!" As brothers, the more Lu Xiao got to know Zhen Po, the more she realized he was a chatterbox with a loud voice!

Although Zhen Hu also had a loud voice, he wasn't like Zhen Po.

"Aren't you afraid of disturbing the cultivators? They'll kick you off the mountain, and then what will you do!"

On the way here, Lu Xiao Yao had already used her social skills to find out that today was the opening ceremony for the Jingyun Mountain sect to accept disciples.

It was said that Jingyun Mountain had been closed for a hundred years. It had only recently reopened a few years ago, and this year was the first time in a hundred years that Jingyun Mountain was recruiting disciples.

"Normally, shouldn't it be very lively after a hundred years?"

Although Zhen Po hadn't been in a real world of cultivation, he had read many novels!

"Shouldn't there be colorful auspicious clouds floating in the sky, with cultivators flying around everywhere? Or riding flying swords, riding cranes, that kind of thing..."

As Zhen Po spoke, a clear bird call came from above them. The three of them looked up and saw two white-robed immortals standing on cranes, flying towards the top of the mountain.

"Wow, you actually guessed it!"

Lu Xiao Yao was also seeing this kind of scene for the first time. The great figures in their physics textbooks would probably climb out of their urns to reassemble themselves if they saw this.

Oh, and the experts in biology would definitely be thinking about what kind of genes would produce such a large, beautiful, and rideable crane.

"What are you still standing around for? If we're any later, we'll miss the disciple acceptance ceremony."

At this time, a group of cultivation newbie NPCs wearing clothes similar to theirs also came up from behind. One of them couldn't help but laugh at the three who were standing at the foot of Jingyun Mountain in a daze:

"What? Are you already scared silly by Jingyun Mountain's ten thousand Heart-Questioning Steps?"

"What...ah, what are the 'Heart-Questioning Steps'?"

Lu Gui imitated the way people here spoke and began chatting with the NPC who had taken the initiative to talk to them.

"You dare to come to Jingyun Mountain without even knowing that?" The person was also surprised, looking at the three in front of him as if they were country bumpkins who had just come out of the mountains. A bad feeling suddenly arose in his heart.

Especially after he finished explaining the origin of the Heart-Questioning Steps, that bad feeling in his heart grew stronger.

Sure enough, the next second—

Lu Xiao Yao: "Wow! How amazing! Can you really tell if you're a good person by walking up these steps?"

NPC A: "Not a good person, but whether your xinxing (heart-nature, moral character) is firm or not."

Lu Xiao Yao: "It doesn't matter, people with wavering xinxing will eventually do bad things. It's the same thing!"

NPC A: "..." Whatever makes you happy.

Zhen Po: "This staircase is so long, is it really made of one piece of stone? Holy crap! Isn't this a meteorite!"

NPC A: "???"

Why does it feel like I don't understand what they're saying?

Lu Gui: "So, according to you, it's difficult for people with inner demons to finish the Heart-Questioning Steps?"

NPC A: "Yes, at worst, they'll roll down the mountain themselves, covered in...um, it's okay, it's said that Jingyun Mountain will send disciples to check. If that really happens, they won't ignore you, they'll heal you and send you down the mountain. At worst...your Dao heart will be damaged, and inner demons will plague your heart. Cultivation in the future...will be difficult!"

Lu Gui: "Would indirectly causing my mother's death count as an inner demon?"

NPC A: ??

Wait, he didn't hear wrong, did he?!

This person in front of him..."Did your mother have a difficult birth when she gave birth to you?" NPC A decided to gossip a little.

"No, it was after I grew up. She wanted me to die, so I angered her to death with my words."

NPC A: ????!

What kind of shocking gossip is this? And you dare to come here?!

……

On the same mountain, some people were struggling with the ten thousand Heart-Questioning Steps at the foot of the mountain, while others were already on the mountain, feeling as if they were in another world.

Mingmei stood in front of the cave dwelling on a mountain peak deep within Jingyun Mountain, blinked her eyes, and looked back at the thousand-year-old peach tree that had regained its vitality, as if confirming something.

"Guigui, am I...back?" Mingmei wasn't sure if everything in front of her was real.

[Host, this is the game. Please check your identity.]

"Ah...right, the game."

Mingmei stood absentmindedly in front of this familiar cave dwelling, not checking her character information as Guigui had told her to. Instead, she reached out her fair, delicate little hand and went familiarly to a clear spring next to the peach tree.

It seemed that what she knew from her memories hadn't changed much. This game was too detailed!

Thinking this, Mingmei lowered her head and glanced at the reflection in the spring water.

Sure enough, she had become smaller.

It was the round face of her four-year-old self.

Mingmei turned her head and looked at the tightly closed mountain cave. Standing under the peach tree at the edge of the mountain peak, Mingmei looked out and saw that her family lived on the highest peak of Jingyun Mountain.

From here, she could see the entire Jingyun Mountain. Looking at the busy figures flying back and forth on the various peaks from time to time, Mingmei suddenly remembered that this was the first time Jingyun Mountain had conducted a disciple acceptance ceremony since it reopened.

This time, Jingyun Mountain not only received many disciples with excellent talent and firm xinxing, but also received a bunch of young disciples sent by other righteous cultivation sects.

They called it mutual exchange, but in reality, they were all aiming for that divination from the Butian Sect...