John ignored those looking at him as he began to use parkour to climb up the side of a building that had yet to collapse.

He imbued Qi in his feet as he directly ran up the wall.

His use of Qi was extremely precise and he was able to create a suction from it.

Once he got to the top of the building he looked down on the city. He imbued Qi into his eyes and ears as he stretched his senses and located the portals.

Why was he doing this? He was calculating a safe space! It seemed that the monsters weren't appearing completely randomly and followed a certain pattern.

He cranked his processing speed up thousands of times as he calculated an area unaffected by the chaos. He noticed something a little weird.

It seemed that there was an area that was completely untouched. A safe haven!

John jumped off the building and landed on the ground creating cracks. He circulated Qi to protect himself.

He had shocked the people following him time and time again. They couldn't help but wonder who he was before the apocalypse.

"I know of a safe space. Follow me!"

John began to run as others struggled to keep up with him.

He then fell down into the ground as he smashed into a barrier.

"So that's why this area was safe. It is the new territory of some sort of entity."

John in his prime was capable of creating formations in the air by vibration using his forbidden dao pillar. He currently lacked this. So he could only make due with creating formations using actual materials. The feats of him messing with the entire realm using formations were currently out of his reach.

John created a knife using Qi with his hand and cut a hole in the barrier. John held the barrier open using Qi... but there were a lot of people that followed him. His Qi was starting to run low. Everyone rushed in as the barrier closed.

"We are saved!"

John was in a rush, he took out more monster cores and started to create bombs with formations.

"Not yet!"

Whatever was capable of sealing off this area had noticed his intrusion. He took a bite of monster meat and readied his bombs.

Soon he felt as if something was watching him.

"Everyone, scatter!"

Nobody knew why they were told to scatter, but this man seemed to know what he was doing, so they listened.

But it was too late! Everyone entered a daze and then started to move like puppets.

A giant brain flew over to John.

"How did you break past my shield?"

"I used Qi."

"Qi? What is that?"

John laughed.

"Are you from the abyss?"

"Abyss? I don't know. I only woke up recentl-"

John threw some monster cores at the creature. But they got stuck in the mid air. They then were shot at John.

They blew up sending John flying. He coughed up blood as the weird brain analyzed him.

"Are you truly a human? You seem quite a bit stronger then those I have captured. You'd make a fine addition to my hivemind."

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John felt something try to invade his mind.

John was extremely happy, this person dared to browse his mind! Not just anyone was capable of comprehending his mind.

The backlash alone was enough to throw this floating brain into a daze.

John watched as the brain started to shake and shout telepathically.

The word it repeated was

"EMFLOWCREAGEN!!!"

It had been assimilated by his concept.

John felt a weird feeling he had never felt before. It was as if he could tap into a separate reality. This was different then his Infinite Maze. He held off acting on this feeling for now.

The weird brain...

It bowed to John.

John began to use its body as material for a formation and reinforced the shield covering this area. No weak creatures would be able to disturb him.

It had become basically braindead.

All of the humans in the area that had become part of its Hivemind woke up.

They were terribly confused.

John's group told them what had happened. How the whole world had faced a calamity for a unknown reason.

John now had a safe space to grow. He began to set-up components into the ground as he inscribed a formation that would cast immortalize on him.

Everyone tried to ask him what he was doing. A kid that had managed to survive asked him:

"Can we get stronger as well?"

"That's tricky. I'm a bit special."

"Special? How so?"

"That's hard to explain."

Everyone watched in awe at the 'art' he had made in the ground. It looked like something straight out of fantasy. Someone who was an avid reader of webnovels commented it that it looked like a formation!

"It is a formation!"

They were shocked.

"Those are real?"

"Why not? Haven't you see more fantastical things recently?"

"But how do you know how to make it?"

"Talent."

"..."

"What does this formation do?"

"Immortality."

"What!?"

John worked on the formation for a week. During this time he had made formations that could generate water and food for those that had followed him.

The formation lit up as a blue light covered John.

He had successfully used Immortalize.

His internal injuries instantly recovered.

The formation and its components collapsed and turned to dust.

Everyone gathered around him out of boredom. It had taken him almost an entire week to set up the formation. During this week, he hadn't slept. He could feel that his body could hardly handle the stress even at Qi Condensation.

Especially since he was doing something as mentally tiring as inscribing formations, even without his soul field or a forbidden dao pillar.

He couldn't afford to have the spell fail.

He only had this one body right now! He didn't know what would happen to him after death. He realized that he was just a public consciousness. He wasn't the main private consciousness, but that didn't mean he wouldn't try his best.

This existence he was experiencing was the closest to a connection he had with the cosmic order. He would be a fool to throw that away.

Normally his body wouldn't have such a shred of his will upon being disconnected. It would essentially be no different from artificial intelligence.

But his existence was special. It once had a nascent soul as well as true immortal body. So it kept John's original awareness even when disconnected.

Although it had lost all of its power.

Even the soul was just the average soul of the person he had taken over. It was barely strong enough to handle his consciousness.

It was getting tempered by his powerful consciousness. But it definitely wasn't unbreakable or eternal like his original soul.

Now that John was 'immortal'. He had the spell target his heart.

As long as his heart wasn't completely destroyed. He could recover from any injuries. He of course couldn't shape his body to his will like with his original immortality. It would heal against his will.

John looked up at the barrier as he started to condense a dao pillar in his upper dantian.

This was taboo! He normally would put it in his middle dantian.

Why was he constructing a forbidden dao pillar? It was to quickly recover his ability to create formations. It would allow his Qi to synchronize with his formations, greatly increasing his efficiency.

Not to mention he would acquire the ability to truly use his knowledge of formations then.

It also would allow him to become a foundation establishment cultivator.

Clouds started to gather.

He naturally formed a perfect forbidden dao pillar.

Lightning started to strike him.

He survived all nine strikes and had developed a soul field and spiritual sense!

"Finally..."

He felt like he was blind up until this moment. He had regained his vision!

The people had distanced themselves from him when he started to randomly start to get struck by lightning.

The lightning had destroyed the barrier and monsters began to invade the area.

John could exert his full strength as a foundation establishment cultivator. He also had movement techniques memorized. He could take to the skies.

He could hit with a 1000 tons of force now. This would of course damage his muscles and bones. But he had immortality to instantly recover him. This couldn't however recover his Qi.

Now that John had a forbidden dao pillar, he could turn anything into a formation and now that he had a soul field. His processing power was far higher.

Before it was as if his mind was an ocean and his soul could only handle a cup at a time.

Now it was as if it could handle waves at a time!

He could even turn the air itself into a formation. He was just that skilled! He had been limited without his soul field, but that limit had been erased.

He stared at the monsters invading his area.

They seemed far stronger then the monsters he had taken out.

"I brought you all into existence. I can take you out of it!"