The midwife's weathered hands trembled slightly as she presented the squalling infant. Old Man Li, the village elder and self-proclaimed 'seer' (though his visions rarely extended beyond predicting the next harvest), squinted at the babe. A hush fell over the small, mud-brick dwelling, the anxious faces of Lin Mu's parents illuminated by the flickering oil lamp.
"Let me see the Spirit Root," Old Man Li croaked, his voice raspy from years of shouting at stubborn oxen and offering cryptic pronouncements.
With a sigh, Lin Mu's mother, her face pale and etched with exhaustion, gently pushed aside the swaddling cloth, revealing the smooth skin of his chest. Old Man Li placed a gnarled finger upon it, his eyes closed in concentration. A moment stretched into an eternity, punctuated only by the baby's indignant cries.
Finally, the elder opened his eyes, a deep frown creasing his brow. The expectant silence in the room thickened with apprehension.
"Dust Root," he declared, his tone flat and devoid of any comforting inflection. "A Jade Root of Dust. Barely perceptible. This child…" He trailed off, shaking his head slowly. "His connection to the spiritual energies of this world… it is thinner than a spider's silk in a hurricane."
A collective sigh of disappointment swept through the small gathering of relatives. In the Xuanling Continent, a person's Spirit Root determined their potential for cultivation, the path to strength, longevity, and even immortality. A Jade Root of Dust was as close to having no talent as one could get. It was a sentence to a life of toil, obscurity, and an early grave.
Lin Mu, the newborn in question, was blissfully unaware of the damning pronouncement. His tiny fists flailed, his lungs protesting the sudden chill. Yet, somewhere deep within his nascent consciousness, a flicker of something alien stirred. It was the faint echo of another life, a life spent under the pale glow of artificial lights, amidst towering structures of steel and glass, a life where 'Spirit Root' was a term confined to the pages of fantastical novels.
He remembered the hum of computers, the endless lines of code, the taste of synthetic coffee, the glow of a monitor reflecting in his tired eyes. He remembered the jolt, the sudden darkness, and then… this. This world of vibrant green mountains, the scent of woodsmoke and damp earth, and the crushing weight of a predetermined, talentless destiny.
As the years crawled by, Old Man Li's initial assessment proved tragically accurate. While the other children in the village, even those with mediocre Spirit Roots, began to show faint signs of Qi Sensing by the age of five or six, Lin Mu felt nothing. He diligently followed his parents' instructions, mimicking their simple breathing exercises, trying to feel the elusive spiritual energy the village elders spoke of with such reverence. But it was like trying to grasp smoke.
He watched, a quiet ache in his young heart, as his peers progressed. Little Tao, with his 'Common Wood Root', could already gather a faint wisp of green energy in his palms. Young Hua, blessed with a 'Decent Fire Root', could feel a warm tingling sensation within her. Lin Mu felt only the cold indifference of the world's spiritual currents.
He became the object of pity, the standard by which others measured their own (comparatively superior) fortune. "At least you're not as useless as Lin Mu," parents would chide their children. The words, though not always malicious, stung nonetheless.
By the time he reached sixteen, the reality of his situation was stark. He was strong enough from years of helping his father in the fields, his hands calloused and his back sturdy. But the path of cultivation, the path to a life beyond the limitations of a mortal, was firmly closed to him. He was destined to remain a farmer, to live and die within the confines of their small village, swallowed by the relentless march of time.
He tried to resign himself to it. He helped his parents with their work, learned the rhythms of the seasons, the secrets of the soil. But in the quiet moments, under the vast, star-dusted sky, a persistent yearning would surface. A yearning for something more, a stubborn refusal to accept this predetermined fate.
One sweltering afternoon, tasked with cleaning the dusty archives of the village's small ancestral hall – a task usually reserved for the least promising – Lin Mu found himself surrounded by brittle scrolls and forgotten relics. Most were mundane records of births, deaths, and harvests. But tucked away in a dark corner, beneath a pile of moth-eaten tapestries, lay a small, unassuming jade pendant.
It was unremarkable in appearance, a simple oval of dull green stone, cool to the touch. Intrigued by its lack of any apparent significance, Lin Mu picked it up. As his fingers closed around it, a faint tremor ran through him, a subtle vibration that seemed to resonate deep within his very being.
Then, the world dissolved.
The musty smell of the archives vanished, replaced by the vibrant aroma of a thousand blooming flowers. The dim light of the hall exploded into a dazzling brilliance, painting the air with hues he had never witnessed. He was no longer in the dusty archive. He stood in a miniature world, a verdant paradise teeming with life and an almost palpable density of spiritual energy, so thick it felt like a physical pressure against his skin. Towering trees with glowing leaves reached towards a sky filled with swirling, multicolored clouds. Strange, luminous plants pulsed with energy, and the air hummed with an unseen vitality.
Panic warred with awe. Where was he? What had happened?
Then, a voice, clear and resonant, echoed in his mind, banishing his fear with a jolt of understanding:
[The Eternal Earthling System has been activated.]
[Mission Type: Embrace Seclusion.]
[Reward: For every year spent in secluded cultivation, gain 100 cultivation points and a random attribute boost.]
[New Feature Unlocked: Dao Companion Affinity.]
[Description: The vast Dao is lonely. Forming deep bonds with destined individuals will unlock powerful synergistic abilities and accelerate your cultivation journey. Discover your fated companions and nurture your relationships.]
Lin Mu stood there, a sixteen-year-old boy deemed utterly talentless, in a hidden world overflowing with spiritual energy, a world where time itself seemed to bend. The crushing weight of his 'Dust Root' lifted, replaced by a spark of hope, fierce and determined.
He looked around at the vibrant, miniature world, a secret realm hidden within a seemingly ordinary jade pendant. A slow smile spread across his face. Old Man Li and the rest of the village could believe what they wanted. They could write him off as a useless mortal.
They had no idea the verdant heaven he had just discovered, and the millennia of cultivation that awaited him within its hidden embrace. His journey had just begun, a journey hidden from the eyes of the world, a journey that would one day make the 'Jade Root of Dust' a legend no one ever saw coming.