Chosen: Beyond Fate

Ye Chun was having a nightmare.

It felt as though a dog was chasing after her in the pitch-black night. The dog was foaming at the mouth and lolling its tongue as it ran after her, refusing to let up. Halfway through, it seemed she ran into her aunt, but before she could cry out, “Auntie, save me!”, she heard her aunt say something to the dog.

And then, that damn thing’s eyes turned red. It charged at her like its life depended on it, shouting something about wanting to eat hot dogs as it came barreling after her. It refused to stop no matter how much she screamed or begged for mercy.

It’s freaking terrifying!

Ye Chun suddenly opened her eyes, gasping for breath. Only after jolting awake from the dream did she realize she was drenched in sweat.

Rain pattered endlessly outside the window. She climbed out of bed, carried a cup to the kitchen, and gulped down several cups of cold water before finally calming down a little. She couldn’t help gritting her teeth and stomping her feet. Just you wait, you bastard! I’ve been going too easy on you! Don’t even think about having dinner with us at the table tomorrow!

But when she turned around, intending to go back to sleep, she noticed light shining through the crack in the door. The living room light was still on, and faint voices could be heard. The conversation was nearing its end.

“Very well. Since you’ve agreed so readily, Master Ye, the Association certainly won’t be stingy with its reward. Of course, I knew someone like you doesn’t care about such things, but it’s a token of our appreciation all the same. Please, do not refuse.”

The late-night visitor bid a polite farewell, stood up, and left without glancing at the slightly ajar door. The footsteps faded into the distance.

Professor Ye, seated on the sofa, turned her head back. “Chun?”

“Mm.” Ye Chun pushed the door open and rubbed her eyes. “Auntie, are you still busy?”

“Go back to sleep. That was someone from the Association.”

“Oh.” Ye Chun nodded in understanding, glancing away from the front door, sounding somewhat relieved. “I thought you were leaving.”

“Not yet.” Professor Ye lowered her eyes. “Go get some rest.”

“Mmm...” Ye Chun thought for a moment, then turned back with a smile. “Will do, Auntie.”

Professor Ye said nothing. She simply watched the drizzling rain outside the window, the distant sound of the tide faintly audible.

The footsteps faded away as the night passed in a hurry.

The next morning, at the first light of dawn, Ji Jue arrived at work carrying his toolbox, his eyes bloodshot. Clearly, he had spent most of the night wrestling with the pocket watch in his hands. Though his spirit matter was abundant, it still seemed somewhat unstable since a faint trace leaked uncontrollably.

He was far from fully recovered.

“How’s the progress?” Professor Ye asked, holding a teacup. She sounded concerned for her student, but she almost seemed to be taking pleasure in his suffering. Perhaps that was exactly what she was doing.

She hadn’t realized before that there was a certain amusement in watching a student scratch their head helplessly before an impossible problem. There was a peculiar beauty in seeing someone repeatedly fall into a ditch, climb out, and then fall right back in again.

“I think... I may have found a trick to it?” Ji Jue replied, somewhat uncertain. Professor Ye paused as she lowered her head to sip on the tea, though that hesitancy lasted less than a second.

Her movements returned to normal. Maintaining her composed posture, she took a light sip before setting down the teacup and raising her eyes toward her student. “Oh?”

For some reason, that gaze alone made Ji Jue feel immense pressure. “I’m not sure if it’s just my imagination. Take a look.”

Ji Jue raised his hand and once again invoked Deus Ex Machina upon the pocket watch in his grasp. A thread of spirit light, as faint as the last flicker of a candle in the wind, emerged from within the watch and began to glow. This time, he took a deep breath and slowly extended his hand. The fluctuations of his spirit matter visibly dissipated and slowed. The spirit matter gathered around his five fingers became as thin as a single thread, frozen motionless, without the slightest ripple or tremor.

This was an application of the Dissociation Technique. No, rather, it was the most rudimentary and superficial of its foundational skills—being able to halt the operation of all spirit matter and preserving it exactly where it was.

As the creator of Dissociation Technique, no one understood this better than Ye Xian. The inspiration behind this state of suspension came from one of the most profound and exalted applications of the Static Zone.

If the soul was as fleeting as fireworks, then what the essence of spirit matter pointed toward was known as eternity. True masters of the Static Zone, people like Wen Wen, could employ this technique effortlessly. With it, she had once completely halted all spirit matter fluctuations within Mercy Hospital, protecting the victims to the greatest extent possible.

It was said that the ultimate form of the Static Zone could even freeze molecular motion, producing a terrifying effect akin to stopping time. Ji Jue’s display of stagnation could not even be considered a fraction of what Wen Wen had displayed. At best, it was merely a clumsy imitation, yet through this crude imitation, Ji Jue’s fingers had truly managed to grasp the fragile spirit intelligence within the pocket watch for a fleeting moment. He finally caught it!

Sadly, in the very next second, that fragile intelligence shattered from the slight movement of his hand, but it was still enough to plunge Ye Xian into silence. Ji Jue’s progress was fast, way faster than she had anticipated. It had only taken him one night to reach this level.

If one were to think about it using the same crude logic as shoving an elephant into a refrigerator, then extracting the spirit intelligence hidden within matter was a simple three-step process. First, one had to seize that tiny flicker of spirit light, then preserve the integrity of its structure, and finally take it out.

Every step sounded plausible in theory, but in practice, each was nothing short of fantasy. And yet, Ji Jue had already completed the first step. Without destroying the object’s inherent structure, he had used extraordinarily delicate control to grasp the spirit matter granted by Deus Ex Machina in his own hand. Moreover, without any instruction, he had intuitively comprehended the key to the second step, which was the way to preserve structural integrity.

Ji Jue’s method was simple. If it was too soft, too fragile, too weak to handle, then why not just freeze it? By using the fundamentals learned from practicing Dissociation Technique, he caused his spirit matter to enter a stagnant state, then gradually spread that state into the structure of the target. As long as the target’s structure could be completely fixed in place, wouldn’t extracting it afterward become effortless?

Unfortunately, his entire reasoning was wrong. He was not a Chosen One of the Ruins Path, nor did he possess one of its blessings. If he continued down this path in his current state, then even if he devoted his entire life to it, he might still never comprehend the eternal nature hidden within the essence of stagnation. Theoretically, it was possible. But Ji Jue was destined to never achieve it, or rather, continuing to stubbornly grind away at it simply wasn’t worth the cost.

Still, at the very least, he had already recognized where the problem lay and had begun trying to solve it. That was what mattered most. The hardest part of any troublesome matter was never how to do it, but identifying where the problem actually lay. Once the key issue was found, then even the most stubborn brute-force trial-and-error method would eventually yield some progress.

Professor Ye pointed out the flaw in his approach with pinpoint accuracy. “The fact that you thought of breaking down the fundamentals of Dissociation Technique and applying them separately shows some creativity. But you simply don’t possess the conditions necessary to put it into practice right now. If I were you, I’d start by looking for a solution using Spirit Primacy.”

Her tone was unusually gentle. As a student, for Ji Jue to identify the approach, make a judgment, and begin experimenting without even understanding the origins of the stagnation technique was already no easy feat, especially considering it had only been a single night.

She mused for a moment before asking, “Let me guess, your control and interference over created spirit intelligence is from the effect of Pacifier, isn’t it?”

Ji Jue nodded. “That’s right.”

More precisely, it should be credited to the Invisible Hand. For the first time outside the context of alchemical creation, Ji Jue had sensed that presence. When he fully concentrated on manipulating the pocket watch’s spirit matter, that illusion-like sensation of control resurfaced in his mind.

According to what he knew, this should have been merely an illusion. The Invisible Hand was supposed to be nothing more than a feeling produced during alchemical creation, a state in which every transformation was perfectly understood, with every development entirely under one’s control.

It was supposed to be a figure of speech, a metaphor implying that everything occurring within the furnace seemed to be manipulated effortlessly by some unseen hand. Under normal logic, that should have been all it was, but Ji Jue seemed to have genuinely felt a strange tactile sensation like a phantom limb, even stronger than before.

Unlike the familiar sensations of his ten fingers, this was a much vaguer and subtler sense of control. Within the range covered by his spirit matter, there existed such a “hand.” It was invisible and formless, yet as his spirit matter circulated, it could replace his own hands in carrying out every delicate operation and enabling all kinds of unbelievable feats, including carefully lifting that fragile spirit intelligence as though cradling a drop of dew in his palm.

After repeating the attempt dozens of times, he had already become thoroughly proficient. The most difficult step had already been completed through such a simple method.

After receiving the blessing of Spirit Primacy, Pacifier’s effectiveness in spirit manipulation had increased once more. The matrix, which was now one step closer to completeness than before, had also become increasingly compatible with Ji Jue. It was almost as if the matrix was also adapting to Ji Jue, adjusting itself to suit his habits and methods of use, as though it were only natural to do so.

“So this is the legacy of a sage...” Professor Ye murmured.

As far as she knew, at least three Pacifier matrices were still circulating in the modern age. One was carefully preserved within the collection of the Taiyi Ring, another had appeared decades ago at an auction in the Thousand Islands, where it had been purchased by a mysterious buyer, and the last should have been in the custody of the Security Bureau of Huangzhou in the Federation.

Among those three, not a single one could compare to the Pacifier in Ji Jue’s possession. There was nothing more tightly bound than a matrix fused with its Chosen One wielder. Such a creation was forged through the wielder’s soul.

Likewise, over the course of long years of use, the matrix would inevitably retain traces of its user’s habits and experience. By the end, enormous differences would emerge between them, as distinct as rivers and wells, not to mention the disparity between users.

For the sages of old, even reversing time had been theoretically possible. What advanced techniques had they not experimented with? Compared to that, adapting to cooperate with Ji Jue’s methods was hardly difficult.

And that was without even considering the astonishing compatibility between Ji Jue and Pacifier to begin with. In ordinary everyday use, it was not especially apparent, but when confronting goals beyond one’s own limits, even the slightest additional support became unmistakably clear.

Snapping out of her thoughts, Professor Ye could not help but sigh. “It seems Mercury truly likes you.”

“Mommy really likes Mr. Ji!” The metallic hummingbird, having grown bored of playing atop the chandelier in the living room, fluttered down and rolled around in Ji Jue’s hair. It flapped its wings excitedly as it shouted, practically wanting to announce to the entire world, “All mommies like him!”

Ji Jue’s face twitched as he grabbed the bird by the beak. She was clearly complimenting him, so how come the praise had suddenly taken such a weird turn? Apparently, after being used as a tool by the Seer, somehow he was being described like some pretty gigolo who specialized in deceiving older women? People only saw him when he came out on top, but he clearly got the short end of the stick way more often than not. This was basically just his compensation, alright!

Ye Xian could no longer be bothered watching Ji Jue show off. If this continued any longer, she might find it hard not to make him wear lovely pink shoes[1]. “Enough. Since you know you have talent in this area, don’t waste it. Go back and keep practicing on your own. I’m done looking through this. Take it back.”

What Professor Ye placed on the table was an ancient-looking bell. It radiated subtle fluctuations of spirit matter, distant and elusive. Merely looking at it made one hear an illusory ringing. It was strangely captivating.

This was the final intact item Ji Jue had found after scavenging the battlefield after the fight with that lightning old geezer. Everything except for this thing had turned to ash. This bell had survived the Sword of Minerva without so much as a dent.

Who wouldn’t be able to tell it was valuable?

It was just that, according to the nearly unspoken rule among craftsmen of the classical era, the better the item, the more likely it was for its creator to have secretly added hidden backdoors or malicious surprises. The less informed the user was, the worse the consequences for using it would be. This eventually led to the absurd situation where the better an alchemical item was, the worse it tended to be.

Without Professor Ye examining it first, Ji Jue would not have dared to casually use something he had picked up off the battlefield. Otherwise, while using it, he could unknowingly end up being the one used.

Upon hearing his professor’s words, Ji Jue’s expression immediately brightened. “You’ve finished checking it?”

“Mhm. In a sense, this is the most sophisticated thing you’ve brought back in quite some time.” Professor Ye pinched the bell lightly and gave it a gentle shake. A clear and melodious chime rang out from within, as if it was echoing from the underworld.

An invisible chill, far stronger than when that old geezer had used it before, spread out. It nearly froze Ji Jue, who was standing so close by, solid, leaving behind an eerie silence.

Unable to help himself, he turned to look out the window. Beneath the dark clouds, amid the drizzling rain and hazy mist beyond the workshop gates, one blurry figure after another slowly emerged, resembling the lingering ghosts of the dead. The crimson eyes of the figures turned back, staring in their direction. There were perhaps hundreds, no, thousands of them.

1. "给别人穿小鞋" literally translates as "to make someone wear small shoes," meaning to secretly make things difficult for someone, exclude them, or suppress them. It usually refers to using one's authority, position, or personal connections to undermine someone behind the scenes, create obstacles for them, and put them in a situation where they have no way to complain or fight back. ☜