Chapter 3: Earth
The gigantic vortex the young man flew into was actually a gate connecting different planes.
He was instantly transported to the upper atmosphere of a strange planet, plunging into a violent free-fall.
The surrounding temperature skyrocketed, turning him into an indestructible miniature meteor that pierced through the layers of clouds, heading straight toward an open area near the city.
Even though he was about to crash into the ground, he wasn’t paying attention to that at all. Instead, he was sensing the strangeness of the space around him.
"The rules are still the rules, but their connection to me..."
He frowned slightly for a moment before extending his spiritual sense to sweep across the nearby galaxies.
No matter where his spiritual sense reached, he discovered that the rules of this universe no longer had a close connection with him.
Of course, his terrifying power was still there. Even without that passive effect where the rules of the universe became chaotic wherever he went, he could still actively use his power.
"It feels a little strange, but it doesn’t really matter."
The face that hadn’t stayed changed for long returned to its usual stone-like expression. He relaxed and let himself fall wherever he happened to land.
Suddenly, a missile shot straight up from the ground into the sky, then exploded and blasted him toward the massive lake beside the city.
Beneath the ground was an underground military base, and at this moment, everything inside was in complete chaos.
"Why was the air defense system activated?"
The hot-tempered officer glared at the screen displaying the warning signal, completely confused.
"Sir, the system just detected a flying object approaching us, so it automatically activated the defense mechanism."
"Show me the detailed images now. What country would dare invade our territory this openly?"
The officer had already prepared himself for the worst-case scenario of an all-out war when he saw the images that made his eyes widen.
His jaw nearly hit the floor in shock, his eyes glued to the screen as if he was afraid he had seen it wrong.
The images that came back showed a young man with short black hair free-falling from the sky, not flying in from somewhere else.
His clothes looked quite similar to ancient Eastern clothing, but with a strange touch, more like a movie costume than actual attire.
The resolution was limited, though, making it impossible to clearly see the face of the person in the image, which gave him a slight headache.
"Commander, how should we handle this? After taking a direct missile explosion like that, he’s definitely dead, right?"
No matter what, a civilian dying inside their country’s territory under these circumstances wasn’t good news for the military.
"Hmph, what’s there to handle? It’s already generous enough that we aren’t asking his family to compensate us. Whether by reason or by common sense, we’re the ones in the right, so there’s nothing to worry about. And did this hunter lose his mind? How dare he trespass into a government military base?"
The commander snorted. To him, all that had happened was the meaningless waste of a high-quality missile. He assumed the young man had been blown to pieces in the explosion, so he couldn’t be bothered with it anymore.
Based on the circumstances, anyone falling from that height could only be a hunter, not an ordinary person.
Even though hunters possessed extraordinary strength, very few of them could survive a direct missile explosion like that.
---
At an inconspicuous corner of the lake, the young man plunged headfirst into a shallow area and buried his head in the mud.
He wasn’t in any hurry as he slowly floated onto the shore and gave his body a slight shake. His body was like it had a perfect non-stick coating, causing all the water and mud to instantly fall away. Even the smell fell off with them, leaving him just as clean as before.
"It’s been a long time since I got hit by a missile."
Looking toward the military base, he swept it with his spiritual sense and immediately understood how chaotic everything was over there.
He had seen this familiar scene many times before, so he didn’t care much.
Retracting his spiritual sense, he looked toward the modern city before him with his normal vision and fell into thought for a few seconds.
"It looks like this planet belongs to a human civilization. They’ve developed science and technology, have some strange powers, but there’s no sign of cultivation in this plane. The rules here don’t allow intelligent life to absorb energy from the universe or use the power of the rules."
After analyzing the situation, he started thinking about what to do while looking around to see if anyone needed him.
"First, I need to blend into society. People here don’t fly or run that fast, so I should do the same."
Even though that was his intention, he had no intention of changing out of his black robe covered in extremely unusual patterns.
Fortunately, even in the cultivation world where many people had long hair, he had short hair that looked fairly modern. Otherwise, he would have looked even more out of place.
Walking from here would take quite a while, so he swept the city with his spiritual sense, teleported into an empty alley, then slowly walked out onto the main street.
As a cultivator, he wasn’t amazed by the modern architecture on Earth. If anything, he found it rather primitive.
Cultivators weren’t a bunch of backward idiots. During their free time, they still studied science and technology, and they even had a profound understanding of the universe because top cultivators researched the power of the rules.
On top of that, the lifespan of a peak cultivator was hundreds of thousands of times longer than the entire development of human civilization on Earth, so it was only natural that cultivators far surpassed them in science.
But he hadn’t come here to popularize science. There was no reason for him to hand over all kinds of era-defying inventions to the humans of this world.
Among the bustling crowd, many people glanced at him, but only with a bit of curiosity.
Cosplayers had existed since before the age of hunters. Now, many hunters also dressed in strange outfits as they came straight out of superhero movies or anime, so ordinary people didn’t react much when they saw someone wearing unusual clothes.