The people of Earth learned they were not alone in the galaxy. Not the hard way, where an invading alien species overruns the world. Not through an easy way, where aliens came bearing messages of peace. And not even a way where the people of Earth were the discoverers of another race.
Instead it was with a single man, nearly human looking, appearing in the United Nations building during the height of discussions about great hurricanes, earthquakes, and other natural disasters ravaging the world. The discussion of relief and its cost, who would get it, and other facts trailed off as a nearly seven foot tall man stood in front of the podium. It was not that he had walked up and demanded attention, but that suddenly he was there where no one was previously. Cropped black hair faded into his dark, nearly black skin as he looked out over the delegates for a moment.
“Representatives of your world’s Empires and Sects, I am Lei Zhaohui and per the Rite of Ragnarok, I have come to challenge your greatest Masters over the right to the cultivation of your world’s soul. Bar my way and retain your right to ascend to the Heavens. Fail, and your world will only support my own Divine cultivation.” Everyone there heard his words in their own language, though he did not speak. Instead, the strength of his presence alone forced concepts to take root in their minds that translated to understanding.
The man did not receive an answer from the room, and so looked around at them. Men and women were mostly unconscious and the few that stayed aware were failing to raise themselves from the floor or the tables they had fallen against. “Mortals? Mortals at a Conclave of Portents? Surely your masters jest, trying my patience in this manner!” A scowl appeared.
The feeling of presence flowed heavy, crushing those around him as it reached out further into the world. The scowl on his face deepened for a moment, before slowly turning to confusion and then dismay. His presence, holding the people down, faded as he deigned to finally speak. “Hundreds of thousands of mortals fly above the land in mockery of a Heaven cultivation. Nothing on this planet even ranks as an Initiate. What world is this?” Zhaohui looked at the barely recovering mortals in the gathering. “How long ago was it your ancestors gave up cultivating their strength and that of this world?” His words were in an unknown language, but still carried hints of concept behind them that allowed them to be understood.
“F-Fuck yo-you,” one man stated, arm holding down a button of some kind. A door opened and several men shakily entered, guns held in wavering grasps, silent alarm flashing behind them. Seeing an unknown man standing, with everyone else unconscious or barely moving themselves, they opened fire.
“Interesting.” Zhaohui held up a hand, looking at the first of the bullets, plucked in flight. The rest slid off his body, kinetic energy completely removed instead of just ricocheting away. “Even with no cultivation behind it, I believe this would require at least a Profound realm cultivator to react to these in flight. Though, even against Initiates at the third body meridian they wouldn’t leave much more than bruises.” The handful of spent bullets fall. “No matter.”
Zhaohui’s presence flowed throughout the room again and beyond, but only a light touch this time instead of the crushing power of his anger. “Rejoice mortals, for this Lei Zhaohui came to your world to conquer your Heavenly realm for his own. In finding none, I will take on the trouble of cultivating your world’s soul until the Heavenly realm is accessible. By the Rite of Ragnarok, should one of your own stand in my way when your Heaven realm matures, I will stand aside, defeated in my challenge. Should none be there, your Heaven will bow to me.”
As the alien man calmly sat in a lotus position, his voice echoed through his presence one last time, “You may address my august presence at any time, and I will answer to the strength of your world’s soul.”
All this may have been hidden by those in charge, as are many other things, except for two reasons. The first being: the original seeking presence looking for Heaven had bowed the head of every mortal, causing the crashing of every plane and jet, with near total death of their passengers. The second: the concept of voice and challenge that flowed through Zhaohui’s presence spoke directly to every mortal on Earth.
~~~
February 8th, 20XX
Cultivation Era Year 1
Nicole Firen, twenty-year-old college freshman, stared at the computer screen for a long moment, a swirling mass of greens and blues showing a storm off the coast of Alaska. A second monitor contained a spreadsheet of numbers. "Three standard deviations off the last fifty years. Better, warmer. I'd probably have to go back to the late 1900s before this looked normal." Notes were written down on a separate tablet, words transcribed into typed text. I paused, sighing and grabbing a long braid of my hair, fraying the red ends. "How does one being do this?"
The being in question was the unmoving Lei Zhaohui, still sitting in the UN building in New York. Six months without a single movement, and there had been dozens if not hundreds of attempts to move him. From simple lifting to dismantling the stage below him—where he now floated in midair—to literally strapping him to increasingly larger vehicles to attempt to pull him away. Nothing affected him. They'd eventually vacuum sealed him in a box and were in the process of rebuilding the UN room to close him off. You would think he hadn't even noticed but…
"What is the strength of our world's soul?" I asked quietly, focusing on that light, ephemeral touch I couldn't explain inside me. The answer reverberated through my body, words unspoken but heard anyways.
Your world's soul has not even lit its dantian. It remains as mortal as you and your people, replied that damn voice, with a touch of patient amusement strung through it. The same voice that had echoed across the world six months prior. The same answer every time I voiced the question.
After that day, where millions died falling from the sky in airplanes worldwide, something had changed. The runaway climate change of the world—scientists screaming it would cause the end of human habitable life—had slowed within days, and now looked well on its way into a reversal. I had even seen on the web where some thought plants were actually getting stronger, crops providing heartier yields.
Thankfully, other than grounding human flight, nothing else seemed to have ended with Zhaohui's appearance. Satellites still flew in the sky, electricity still worked, zombies weren't running amok. For an apocalypse—for Ragnarok—it seemed pretty lowkey. Hand in hand with all those old apocalypse movies though, there were lots of religious people going crazy for one reason or another.
Lifting my head I looked past the little cubicle I'd ensconced myself in, I saw a small number of others in the library. A few dealing with the older books, most with a tablet of their own doing research or homework. A couple of guys off in the corner, tablets laid out with projected wireframes above them. Design students or just playing some mech game, I couldn't tell from my seat. It was quiet in the library, since all the religious studies classes had been cancelled and a lot of students had been told to argue theology off campus.
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Shifting back again, I pulled up a new browser window and typed ’What is a dantian?’ but didn't hit enter. I knew what was already out there. Thousands and thousands of pages, details to the nth degree on it. Six months ago, I'd known something about it being Chinese medicine and energy. If you didn't even know that, when you asked about the world's soul, supposedly you were told the soul wasn't awake.
But now? I hit search. Now, millions of words detailing a dantian in the extreme. Everyone knew what a dantian was. Video clips of people claiming 'meridians cleaned!' or 'dragon veins are the path to the dantian!' while knocking holes in walls and throwing each other around like they were in a movie. Some of them had to be fake, like the one titled "I'll be the next Goku!" and throwing beams of gold energy around. Every bit of old lore surrounding the concept had been taken, translated, and argued a million different ways.
Descriptions of surges of energy, thousands of different people claiming they had figured something out. Energy within used to do superhuman feats. Mystic 'masters' doing the impossible. And beyond the 'august presence' I could feel to ask about the world, I could almost taste the slightest whispering feather of something inside of me too, trying to course through me every time I thought of it. I pushed back against it once more, refusing to let it do anything. Keep it down, keep it not doing anything.
There were a lot of results of people killing themselves accidentally too. Falling over dead with no reason, losing control at the wrong time, the energy backlashing and crippling them. A lot of times caught on video, shared with warnings, but never a good explanation on what they did wrong. If anyone even knew what they did wrong.
Closing the browser, I looked at my homework still up and wrote a single line below it. "Climate science and weather projection is impossible when one person can put their finger on a global scale and determine what the climate is." Documentation saved and closed. I'd figure out what to argue with the professor later. I needed to stretch and move for a bit.
"What is the strength of the world's soul?" I asked quietly again, as I stood from the desk and began to make my way out of the library. And as always, the patiently amused answer, Your world's soul has not even lit its dantian. It remains as mortal as you and your people.
I'd settle for at least attempting to harass the guy responsible for all the changes instead. There was always a subtle shift in ’spoken’ tone instead of sounding like a recorded message, so maybe it actually took a bit of his concentration away. Added a second or two onto however long it took.
~~~
Midwest Central College had a reasonable gym, though it was mostly filled with weights, weight machines, and various body builder equipment, rather than catering to a larger group that might want to do yoga, running, or anything else. It did have a single set of uneven bars and a balance beam, a bare nod to the gymnastics I preferred, but even if there was a clearing large enough for floor practice, it’d probably be half full of people using it for other things.
The room definitely wasn’t Olympic level or anything, but neither was my skill. Dropping my workout bag, I watched another girl, Melissa, spin around one of the uneven bars for a moment with our mutual friend Karen playing spotter for her. Melissa spun gracefully for a moment on the higher bar, arms fully stretched out as she went round a few times.
“Flying high today?” I asked, sitting next to Karen and beginning to stretch. The feather of something tried to push towards my muscles and once again I pushed it back down.
Karen nodded, keeping her eyes on Melissa on the bars. “Lotta energy going around today. I watched Tony throw an extra two hundred pounds on his weights earlier.” Karen glanced at me, and my confused look, before continuing to look back to the bars. “Claimed he’d hit the second Meridian or whatever. He pulled off twenty reps with eight hundred pounds though. Walked away staggering, but pretty damn impressive.”
“He added a third of his current lifting weight again? OK, color me impressed.” I watched as Melissa went twice more around the bars before letting go, rotating once in midair before landing with a small bounce on the mat safely. That was the most important part. No matter how good you made it look on the bars, a bad landing could cost you in a competition, or worse an ankle if you came down really badly. I gave a thumbs up as Melissa stepped off the mats. “Going up again, or need a rest?”
“One more.” Melissa nodded to me in answer. “I’ve had a good day today.”
“At least you did,” I grumbled quietly. “How am I supposed to put together a weather projection that isn’t a banner saying ‘Ask the idiot in the box.’”
Karen laughed as Melissa got back up on the uneven bars, swinging once more. I swear she cracked a smirk at me too. I decided to finish stretching, but added a light jab her way too. “Think he’s even got DNA?” The biology major twitched, but her smirk shifted to a half smile.
After a minute and another safe landing, Melissa finished and dropped down next to me, stretching to cool down. I stood up and prepped myself. I wished once more there was room for a floor routine, but there wasn’t.
Jump. Grab. Spin a few times for momentum. Release to the other bar. Spin. Turn.
It wasn’t zen, but the concentration on the bars let everything else fade away.
Spin. Spin. Hold. Turn.
Clamp down on the feathery thread as it tried to reach through to my arms. No.
Swap again. Short spins on the waist. Back to the higher bar. Start spinning backwards for the landing.
The thread again. Push down.
The moment crystalized as I began the last half spin to release. It wasn’t the same thread, the same feathery bit of power or whatever it was. It never had been. There were now dozens of threads I could feel now, all clamped together. And I could sense I’d just pushed something into a critical mass. No longer individual pieces, they all merged into a single pool that for just a heartbeat flooded through me.
My hands numbly released the bar, my body sent tumbling.
A second heartbeat, and it condensed back into a pool once more, but a pool of energy. Power. Fire. Light. I couldn’t describe it.
I landed, falling heavily onto the mats, nearly thirty feet away and crashing next to several weight machines. I didn’t feel hurt in the least as I sat up, people starting to react. I saw Karen already two steps closer to me.
“What is the strength of the world’s soul?” The words almost fell from my lips unbidden.
Your world’s soul has not even lit its dantian. It remains as mortal as your people. The voice echoed in me, and I could actually feel it vibrating against whatever the pool was inside me. The patient amusement faded, interest perking instead. Unlike your own dantian. You have taken the first step to Heaven, one of only four of your people to not tread a false path.
“What is a dantian?” I whispered even as several helped me up, checking me over and ready to rush me to a nurse or hospital.
I didn’t get an answer.