Chapter 25
Chapter 25: Would You Believe It?
The player who brewed alcohol went by Fan Gu Zhou.
His family brewed for a living, and he’d grown up learning the craft at home. He knew his way around every step of the process.
It wasn’t just hard liquor, either—fruit wines were easy for him. In real life, he could even mix Western cocktails. If it involved alcohol, he could handle it.
When he realized the mortals here weren’t short on grain, his mind started racing.
Down at the foot of the mountain, people ate white flour like it was nothing. If grain wasn’t scarce, then making alcohol had to be even easier.
There was no way modern skills lost to the cultivation world’s methods.
And they didn’t.
Not even close.
Cultivators didn’t chase food and drink, and mortals were too busy chasing longevity. After basic survival, plenty of things had developed, but their ideas and techniques still couldn’t compare to how broad modern thinking was.
After he and Chen Miao Miao tested the roots and stems of blood pearl grass—and confirmed they weren’t poisoned—they started thinking beyond simple eating.
“Big Shot,” Chen Miao Miao said, “if this can be used in alchemy, what if we put it in wine? Would it have the same effect?”
“It might,” she added, then frowned. “But I don’t know how Medicine Sect disciples refine pills. If they use a different method, it might not translate to brewing.”
A Wu overheard and spoke up. “You can buy the basics. Intro alchemy books are cheap.”
Those were common texts across Yun Zhou Continent. Any cultivator with money could pick them up.
Only advanced alchemy and artifact-forging techniques were guarded. Every sect had its own signature methods, after all.
Chen Miao Miao’s eyes lit up. “Cheap?”
“Ten low-grade spirit stones,” A Wu said. “The furnace is the problem. An alchemy furnace costs at least one mid-grade spirit stone, and it’s easy to blow one up. I can’t afford that.”
Chen Miao Miao nodded without hesitation. “Then I’ll start with the books. I’ll go down the medicine path.”
She knew her direction had to be focused. Trying to master everything was a fantasy.
With so many players, someone else would chase the other routes.
While they were still talking, Song Jiu Lai had just stepped outside—then the sky phenomenon from earlier returned.
A tide of blazing pressure swept across Yun Zhou Continent. Every player still online froze, too scared to move.
It was hard to describe. It wasn’t just strength—it was dominance, absolute and suffocating.
Like the fear in an animal’s blood when it faces the king of beasts.
Then came a single phoenix cry, sharp enough to hook into every nerve.
When the aura finally dispersed, the players erupted.
“Holy shit—what was that?!”
“Which Big Shot moved?!”
“That’s insane. When can I cultivate to that level?”
“Did this game drop a boss early?”
A Wu looked shaken too, but he’d lived here for more than ten years. He’d seen sights like this before.
Chen Miao Miao asked, “Senior Brother, what was that?”
A Wu shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe a great expert cultivator passed by.”
If even he didn’t know, there was nothing to do but swallow the shock.
Everything they’d seen so far was only the edge of the world. As for the legendary Myriad Immortals Sect… who knew what kind of splendor that place held?
Fan Gu Zhou was set on brewing. This time, he and A Wu went down the mountain to check the market firsthand.
Chen Miao Miao had been in the game for a full day and night. Her body couldn’t take it anymore, so she logged off.
The moment she lifted the VR headset, her nose bridge throbbed from the pressure—but her mind felt strangely clear.
She checked the time. Other than a few hours of rest after logging in around midnight, she’d entered the game at eight in the morning.
Now it was already 1 p.m.
Even she startled at herself.
Had she really played that long?
She opened her phone. A pile of messages waited.
“Absurd,” Chen Miao Miao murmured, then hurried to reply to everyone.
She lived alone in a rented place near campus, so gaming wouldn’t bother anyone.
She was starving, so she made instant noodles first, eating fast like she was afraid time would slip away.
That afternoon, a friend invited her out for milk tea. Chen Miao Miao thought about it, then agreed.
Even during the meetup, she kept checking the game group chat. Even offline, everyone was still trading information.
All fifty people were in. So far, nobody had even talked about quitting.
Her friend watched her tapping away and frowned. “What are you so busy with? I messaged you this morning—you never replied.”
Chen Miao Miao said calmly, “I was playing a game.”
“A game?” Her friend stared. “You? And you got addicted like this?”
Chen Miao Miao never ignored messages because of a game. Not once.
But she nodded anyway. “It’s too good. It’s full-dive—so real it feels like I stepped into another world and started a second life. That’s why.”
Her friend looked at her like she’d grown a second head. “What are you talking about? Are you out of your mind? Full-dive? Our country hasn’t even broken through basic virtual tech!”
Chen Miao Miao took a sip of milk tea, thinking how impossible it sounded from the outside.
“How do I explain this…” She exhaled. “I’m not crazy. It’s real. The game’s called Start with a Broken Sect. You can only reserve it right now, and nobody knows when the next slots will open. Go search it.”
She glanced at the time again and stood. “I’m going back to keep playing. I’ve got school work next week, so I won’t have time like this. This milk tea’s on me. Bye.”
Her friend blinked. “Huh?!”
No. No way.
Chen Miao Miao—the big shot in their major—had gone completely insane.
For a game, she’d reached this level of obsession?
If their advisor found out, Chen Miao Miao would get scolded into the ground.
Half doubtful, half curious, the friend searched Start with a Broken Sect.
The result looked… pathetic.
One bare website. Nothing else.
No reservation button. No platform links. Nothing.
The only announcement said fifty slots had been released for a no-wipe beta test, and those slots were long gone. The test was ongoing.
How could Chen Miao Miao believe in something this fake?
Maybe she’d played too few games. Maybe that was why she fell for something this ridiculous.
Then the friend noticed the game had even hit a small trending topic.
A famous name in the gaming?—Jing Bao Tian—had praised it like crazy. Under his Weibo posts, his fans were tearing him apart: either he was shilling, or he’d played himself into a breakdown.
A perfect “bad example,” the kind parents loved to point at.
At the same time, another player was running into the same problem.
“Jiang Tian Ya, your dad finally came home for dinner today. Why are you so distracted?”
Jiang Tian Ya looked up at the man across from him—his father, always buried in research, rarely home—and hesitated before speaking.
“Dad… if I said our country has a game that can make you feel like you’ve fully traveled into another world… would you believe me?”