‘Ugh... what’s going on…’

‘Where am I?’

Zhang Dong slowly opened up his eyes, his vision was blurry and he could feel himself getting dragged by someone. His arms were spread and two people were supporting him from each side while treading towards some destination.

He tried to remember what happened after he crossed into that interworld tunnel once more. Slowly it started to come back to him. The moment he jumped through that fissure he was flung into it once more. Not much had changed since the first time he came there with one tiny difference, this time he knew of Bob’s existence.

During his stay in the previous world, he gathered up many cubes which he used as energy sources. These he used to triangulate his home world’s location. His Ai activated and the search started while he tumbled through the tunnel.

This place was bright and from time to time he could see flashes of other worlds. Some were similar to the one he came from with knights and wizards, others on the other hand seemed bizarre with strange creatures living in them.

Bob finally came through and was able to find the way back home. This would use up all of the conserved energy that he had stored behind. The moment he gave Bob he okay he felt a strange pulling sensation yanking him in one direction.

It wasn’t anything pleasant as he was flung through this tunnel just in the opposite direction than before. The speed kept increasing and the worlds that he was able to see before became just a blurry mess.

He could barely stay awake as he slammed into some kind of wall. Instead of another fissure opening up, he felt like a piece of meat getting pushed through the grinder. It seemed he was forced here by Bob’s triangulation, the rest was just a flash. He felt his flesh and soul being ripped apart and he was unable to keep himself awake as he passed out.

‘Did I make it back? … Why do I feel so weak…’

While trying to ascertain his location he felt a cool breeze and some light hitting his face. There was a sound of a gate sliding open before the walk forward continued. He was soon let down to the ground by the people that were carrying him. Soon shouts of many people made his hurting ears ring.

‘Bob… what’s happening…’

‘System rebooting please wait…’

His inquiry was ignored and when focusing on his system screen he only saw a small pixelated hourglass slowly moving around. It seemed that while passing through the world’s barrier the system used up almost all of its energy. It might have even saved his life from the way he felt. He was barely alive and there was another big problem, he couldn’t feel his cultivation.

‘It’s gone… it’s all gone?’

Nascent soul, core formation, foundation establishment, and then Qi condensation were the realms he was familiar with. Now on the other hand he could not feel an inkling of Qi in his body, it was totally dry as if it was used up during his journey back here.

“Uff…”

He felt his face hitting some dirt, the people that were helping him previously moved away. Zhang Dong could feel that there was a small group around him. They were standing close to each other while the shouts of the audience continued.

‘Is this some kind of arena?... why would they carry me here…’

Not knowing where he was and why he was here he started to panic. Without his cultivation, he wouldn’t be able to handle even a teenager that had some Qi in him. The only thing bringing him back to reality was the small hourglass on his system window.

‘Wait… maybe it's not fully gone…’

He realized that his system was still there, it was just rebooting. When it came back on he might be able to recover all of his cultivation or at least some. With a plan in mind, he stopped squirming and tried to assess the situation.

His body was in a world of hurt, it was burning up due to many small cuts that have not yet healed. Someone had clearly mended him somewhat back to health. There were cloth bandages around his chest, arms, and legs.

Soon he could also see that they were all quite dirty and dark from his blood. When his vision became less blurry he could finally see his surroundings. He was indeed in some sort of large arena, there were many people looking at them.

‘... the clothes… they are similar…’

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The first thing that he noticed is that the people were wearing robes. The dress sense was identical to what he was used to in his old world. He was also not getting any warning signs about not being tethered to this world so it was probable that he had returned.

“Xia Yanmei, you should have taken my proposal, now you will die like a dog!”

He heard a haughty voice from the distance, it was backed by cultivation so he could hear it clearly. This tone, this way of speaking, it was something that he was familiar with. When glancing up at the person that was speaking out, one thing sprung to his mind.

‘A young master… I did make it back! Now I just need to make it out of here alive… what is this about anyway...’

It was time to listen in, maybe he was even in his own territory. I this was one of his subservient clans they would surely help him out. The biggest problem was his cultivation level though, if he said that he was the United Element Sect’s Patriarch while having no power to back it up they could just slice his head off.

“Please young master Dai Rong, show mercy, my clan members have not done anything wrong…”

“They have done nothing wrong, you say? They are related to your Snapping Turtle Clan, that’s enough to make them guilty!”

‘Snapping Turtle Clan?’

“Please, the White Tiger Clan and us can still coexist with each other it's not too late…”

'White Tiger Clan?'

While the young girl named Xia Yanmei pleaded for the lives of her people Zhang Dong noticed something strange. The clan names were not what he was used to. Normally they were run by families, so the clan named White Tiger Clan should have been the Dai clan instead. The Snapping Turtle would have normally been the Xia clan.

‘Did I end up in another cultivation world… or is it just some far away province…’

There were a few possibilities. One was that he was in a similar world to his old one but it wasn’t quite the same. Another option was that he just ended up in some faraway land where the naming sense was just different.

With that thought in mind he calmed down, the first thing was to get out of here. The conversation continued between the two sides. It looked like the girl refused to get married to this young master type and he saw to it that her clan collapsed. This was quite the overreaction but it was in alignment with what a young master would do in his old world.

“Enough, you had your chance, now someone else has taken your spot!”

The young man named Dai Rong was hugged from the side by a jade-like beauty while laughing. The girl called Xia Yanmei just dropped her shoulders as it seemed that there was no way of talking her way out of this.

“But, I’m a magnanimous lord, you will have your chance of surviving. You just need to stay alive and you may live as a slave for the rest of your life!”

The young master laughed while dropping back onto a large chair. The girl that was with him landed in his lap and also started laughing. The two were in some VIP booth with other people in it, some were old and some were young and no one felt familiar in any way.

“Begin!”

The signal was given but Zhang Dong still felt terrible. A large gate opened up in the distance and something walked out. It looked like a silverback gorilla with strange white stripes running over its dark fur. There were three of these beasts there while the group that Zhang Dong was part of consisted of about twenty people.

“Thunder apes? Aren’t those as strong as a middle stage Inner Aura practitioner?”

‘Inner Aura realm?’

A big question mark appeared above Zhang Dong’s head. He had never heard about a cultivation realm like this one before. The notion that he was pushed into another world altogether was a possibility and without his system going online he could not ask Bob to confirm this either.

“What will we do…”

“W-we must fight, it's the only way… look there are weapons there!”

The young lady called out to her people and pointed to a pile of weapons that was in the middle of the arena. It seemed that these people had left them some items to protect themselves with. Soon everyone from this clan rushed to the middle to pick up those items while also leaving him behind to his own devices.

He finally decided to get up as this was no time to play dead. Even then he felt like he was about to cross to the other side as standing up was already hard enough.

With all his strength that he could muster he forced himself to stand up. Now he was finally able to get a good look at everything and everyone. The group of twenty people was holding onto some rusty swords and spears. It was clear that these items would not do much to their opponents.

The trio of monsters beat their chests loudly while releasing small amounts of electricity. Soon a small skirmish between the cultivators and the beasts broke out. The people from the Snapping Turtle Clan used the old weapons but they snapped apart or didn’t have enough sharpness to do much damage to the monster apes.

“I’m scared…”

“Huh?”

Zhang Dong looked behind him. There he saw another group of people right up against the wall. It was composed of children, the elderly, and women. The group of twenty people that was fighting the monsters was clearly protecting this equally large group of non-combatants.

Then it happened one of the monsters spotted the people in the distance, him included. It broke out of the fight and started charging towards the people that could not protect themselves.

He found himself between a rock and a hard place. The monster was charging towards him but he was the only thing standing between these kids and their death.

Without thinking much he took up a battle stance, the monster charged quite fast and swung its large fist towards his position.

He knew that if he got hit, he would die. Even though his body was beaten up and tired, his eyes were still working. He predicted the trajectory of this hit and slipped to the side before it arrived there.

While the creature was confused about missing the weakling before him a fist descended towards its face. It burrowed itself into its cheek and did absolutely no damage. The monster didn’t even flinch while Zhang Dong felt his knuckles almost breaking apart.

The maddened monster raised its thick arms up into the air and started beating its chest like a drum. Electricity started shooting in all directions while hitting Zhang Dong straight on. He was sent flying by this small shockwave to the side, the monster snorting as if it just took care of some bug.

‘...External energy source detected… absorbing energy… system reboot complete…’