I'm a Baby Immortal

A fireball hovered above my palm.

It looked for all the world like a burning soccer ball, floating weightlessly over my hand.

The face of the man who had been about to throw a punch an instant earlier drained into pure horror.

"A m… mage?"

That hulking brute took a stumbling step back, then snapped into a perfect ninety-degree bow of apology.

"I had no idea you held such a rare profession. I behaved disgracefully. I'm sorry!"

A rare profession?

I'd heard that mages were scarce, sure. They called them the only royalty among the DPS classes.

Was that why this guy's attitude had flipped a full hundred and eighty degrees?

He fumbled out a business card and offered it with both hands, looking for all the world like a door-to-door salesman.

"If you contact us, we promise to give you the absolute best treatment we can offer."

Then he fled, walking ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠backward the entire way so I never even saw his back.

What is wrong with him?

I still couldn't make sense of any of this. I looked from the fireball floating over my hand to the business card and back again.

"And you're still telling me I'm not a hunter?"

They'd said it was a Delusional Awakening, right?

But I could feel the heat.

And that massive hunter had clearly seen it too — he'd run away.

So it couldn't be a Delusional Awakening… could it?

Should I go back in and demand a re-examination?

No! They said re-tests cost money!

I hurried back to my one-room apartment.

The second I got home I fired up my PC and tore through the internet.

Delusional Awakening, fireball on right hand, status window glitch

I mashed every combination of keywords I could think of. Nothing useful came up.

No matter how deep I dug, every post was empty calories. Most of them said the same tired thing: even if it feels completely real, a few days of rest and it all disappears.

"But mine is real."

Just in case, I focused my mind on my right hand the way I had before.

"^$#@!#!"

— Fwoooosh!!

The fireball bloomed into existence again.

The moment I wished it gone, it vanished. The moment I wished it back, it reappeared. Curious whether it was actual fire, I held a scrap of paper to it — and the paper incinerated so completely that not even ash remained.

There is no way this is a Delusional Awakening.

Searching clearly wasn't going to give me answers.

"Which means all I've got left is this status window."

I called it up again.

"Status Window!"

The text was still completely corrupted. I still couldn't make out a single word of it. Weird as hell.

Even so, I squinted at every corner of the window, hoping something — anything — might give me a hint.

"There's gotta be something hidden in here."

"I can feel it."

"There's no way there's nothing."

And then, suddenly, I found it.

"Got it!"

In the corner of the status window sat a strange little button, so tiny it looked like a speck of dust. You would never notice it unless you were deliberately hunting for it.

I carefully pressed it.

And then a bizarre website flooded my entire field of vision… wait, what?

It was insanely complicated. Even a quick scan showed menus for streaming services, galleries, a secondhand marketplace — the works.

But something was off.

For all those services, there were only two channels currently live?

"Is the user base just that small?"

I clicked into the broadcasts.

One showed a man in old-fashioned robes boiling something in a cauldron. The other showed a woman in celestial robes swaying through a languid dance.

But the real problem was the viewer counts.

The man had one viewer. The woman had three.

Was this a dead platform? Having no audience was one thing, but this was absurd.

Clearly I wasn't going to find answers here. I headed for the place that seemed most likely to yield something useful.

The name sitting at the very top when I opened the community tab. The layout looked a lot like the Hunter Aspirants Gallery.

What did "Great Dao" even mean? A grand path, maybe?

The post titles were more alarming than the name.

This gallery was a complete den of roleplayers.

"Have these people been completely consumed by their roleplay?"

The other posts were no better — nothing but incomprehensible babble about cultivators, Qi Condensation Stage, Foundation Establishment Stage. I couldn't understand a word of it, so I checked the featured posts and clicked the one at the very top.

Great-granddaughter? No father or mother? That sounded exactly like me.

But why did all these fixed-nickname users have such ridiculous names?

In the end, the only way to find out was to ask directly. I carefully hit the new post button.

The second the post went up, comments flooded in at a terrifying speed.

What on earth were they talking about? Cultivation method? Mixed Spiritual Root? Qi Condensation Stage?

Nothing but gibberish I couldn't parse at all.

While I was still reading, Taehyun Jinin and Hyeolha Nojo had already launched into a full-blown flame war.

Does this place not even have mods?

I had no choice but to make another new post.

A comment appeared almost instantly.

I clicked the link he sent and was taken back to the streaming site I'd seen earlier — specifically, to a VOD page sitting on the main screen.

The moment I saw the thumbnail, I knew something had gone catastrophically wrong.

The thumbnail was a still frame of my own face, tears and snot streaming down it. The profile picture was the same. And what the hell was that nickname, "WaaaahImCrying"?

With trembling hands, I pressed play.

The contents were devastating.

On-screen me was recounting every miserable story from yesterday, starting with getting fired from my part-time job, pouring them out one by one.

"Waaaah. I wanna be a hunter! Please make me a hunter!"

Now a different version of on-screen me was thrashing on the floor, wailing at the top of my lungs.

My face burned so hot it felt like it was about to explode.

Was this a doppelgänger? I had never done anything like that in my life.

I'd heard stories about doppelgängers coming out of the Tower, but… lying on the floor thrashing around like a toddler throwing a tantrum because someone wouldn't buy them a toy?

And now there was video evidence, permanently preserved for anyone to access. My black history, stored in full for an indefinite public audience.

"Ah… nooo!"

I flopped onto the floor in the exact same pose as the video.

But that wasn't even the end of it.

On-screen me suddenly scrambled up and started dancing — a twitchy, show-off little dance — and singing.

I've seen this clip… the one of the dog that dances when its ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠owner claps…

The shift in the viewers' mood came the moment they spotted something visible in the room.

After the frenzied dance number ended, the atmosphere in the chat had completely changed.

While on-screen me sat there flustered by the sudden quiet, Taehyun Jinin spoke up.

"What's a cultivation method?"

"I'll learn it! Aing~ Please teach me! Pretty please!"

On-screen me was batting sparkling eyes and laying on the aegyo thick.

This is so embarrassing.

This was a full year of blanket-kicks' worth of cringe.

On-screen me launched into an enthusiastic explanation — hunting monsters, using skills, getting items — dumping every scrap of secondhand knowledge I'd ever picked up.

The audience listened calmly, and they all seemed to get the idea.

Meanwhile, on-screen me sat cross-legged on the floor exactly as Taehyun Jinin instructed through the chat, then set the pretty little rock I'd picked up off the street yesterday on top of my belly.

After that, I simply followed Taehyun Jinin's lead. Nothing complicated — just matching his breathing. After a long while of that, the Heaven-Mending Stone began to glow with a soft light… and then sank into my belly as if dissolving into me.

After that I learned a Mind Method, the Fireball Technique, and more.

Near the end of the video, on-screen me yawned and waved.

"Haaahm. I'm sleepy. See you tomorrow."

Then I crawled under the blanket and fell asleep, and the stream ended.

"Haa. How did I even stream without a camera?"

I stared blankly at the monitor for a long time.

Now I understood what had happened.

The Heaven-Mending Stone…

The rock I'd picked up was a stone that turned mortals into cultivators.