While I Slept

Took longer than I thought.

That was the first thing that crossed my mind the moment I opened my eyes inside the Golden Core.

I'd figured a few days would be plenty. Subjectively, though, it felt like I'd been in here for well over a month. Fair enough — I'd cleanly swallowed the spiritual energy of a secret realm that had once been the cave-dwelling of an early Eternal-realm cultivator and used it to expand my Golden Core, but the whole thing had become wildly unstable in the process.

Even scattering spiritual energy across the Sea of Slaughter had looked precarious, so I'd decided to just climb into the Golden Core itself and handle the stabilization personally. My thinking was that simply being inside it would fuse the core with my soul and settle everything down.

Along the way, rather than waste the time, I'd farmed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠out map grinding to the Humanity Clones — but that was fine. I trusted them. Our thoughts were shared anyway.

First order of business: tear down the toy fortress slapped together out of cardboard and spiritual energy, and put up a proper house. Even without any particular talent for spiritual energy, this was the interior of my Golden Core, and after the assimilation work I'd done to stabilize it, the energy obediently followed my will and constructed a house straight out of my memories.

Specifically, the two-story rental from my previous life.

I'd worked a factory job out in the sticks — not the capital region, not even a major metro — so getting out of the company dorm and into a rental hadn't taken more than a few years. I'd even pulled a jeonse loan for it.

I stepped into the house that had stuck most clearly in my memory, flopped onto the sofa, and turned on the TV. The old memory of hooking up some garbage game and playing it on the big screen floated up, and I was grinning at the display when—

My body, currently being piloted by the Humanity Clones, was striking a ridiculous pose, spear leveled at a field boss.

Wait, field bosses can't be Auto-Battled— The thought barely formed before something happened.

The Humanity Clones were holding a transparent spear I had no memory of — and yet it felt weirdly familiar. Spiritual energy gathered along it like dawn light, shaping the weapon's form, racing to the tip until it hit a critical point and erupted in a burst of aurora.

The field boss — the kind with a revival-mechanic prefix — was carved into four pieces and obliterated in a single strike.

???!???!?

"What the hell was that?! What did you just do?!"

I scrambled for the phone rolling around under the sofa and barked into it like I was making a call. The Humanity Clones answered as if talking to themselves.

"Oh, you're already up."

"Already?! What, did you pick up a weapon skill? A spear skill? No — even a Master skill couldn't put out that kind of power! And you didn't even use slaughter energy just now!"

"This body is ours now. We can do whatever we want with it."

"Kyaaaah! Stop screwing around!!!!!! I went out of my way to build you guys a proper house in here!"

"Oh, for real? Then we're gonna go rest. We can just read the memories later anyway, right?"

"Well, yeah, but— wait a second!"

Ding-dong, ding-dong. The doorbell kept ringing as the Humanity Clones tried to come inside. I ignored it, bounced off the sofa, ran into the room, fired up ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the computer, and tried to play back the memory footage.

Would have worked fine — if the playback time hadn't been stamped at fifty thousand hours, and if a message about insufficient capacity hadn't popped up the second I hit play!

Even splitting the files and watching on fast-forward would take forever. Faced with that nightmare of a fact, I screamed into the phone still clutched in my hand.

"You went into the Training Ground, didn't you!!!!??!? Why didn't you wake me up?!!"

"The main body was sleeping so soundly…?"

"Gyaaaaah! My slaughter energy! My stats!"

I flung myself onto the bed and thrashed around in pure regret. The doorbell kept ding-donging at me like it was telling me to hurry up, so I finally hauled myself upright and shot out of the inner world.

No matter how much the Golden Core had stabilized and grown, as long as I was occupying it, there simply wasn't room for the Humanity Clones to come in.

They tossed out that one line in the Mental World — thick with familiar, almost comforting slaughter energy rather than spiritual energy — then bolted back into the inner world in a scramble. I reclaimed control of my body and opened my eyes.

"Status Window!!!!!"

What the hell happened while I was asleep in there!!!

A few new titles and a twelve-level jump were one thing — but my eyes locked onto the Mind stat, which had ballooned out of nowhere. What, did the Humanity Clones dump everything into Mind?

But how did they inflate stats for fifty thousand hours in the Training Ground with zero slaughter energy? Was I going to have to comb through every single memory?

"Skill Window!"

"How the hell did you max Digging in the Training Ground?"

The walls and floors in there were inviolable — no interaction allowed, right?!

I skimmed the memories for a second and saw the Humanity Clones using Digging as a charge skill to plow through the training dummies. What? I never even thought of that!

Wasn't that skill originally for making temporary bases?

Why were they using it as a charge skill — no, wait, how was it even usable as a charge skill?

I had a mountain of other questions, but the Humanity Clones had already piled into the inner world and were currently fighting over who got which wing or room of the mansion, so asking them felt a little awkward.

"Base Teleport!"

I'd head back to base first and figure out exactly how long I'd been gone. I had no sense of the time, and given how hard Double Speed Mod must have been cranking from the moment the clones entered the Training Ground, that was even more true.

So that's why only a month had passed inside! It was the Double Speed Mod!

"You said you were heading out, and you're already back. Did you forget something?"

"Elder Togo — how long has it been since I left?"

"About ten days, I'd say. This place is still your newborn sect grounds, child, and the spiritual energy here is weak enough that time doesn't crawl quite so slowly."

I already knew from Elder Togo's teachings and Cheon Nan-cho's lectures that time flowed differently between spirit-dense secret realms and the outside world — but twelve levels in ten days?

The shock was enough to wipe every impression of whatever the Humanity Clones had been up to before this clean out of my head.

If the levels went up that fast, who cares about the rest!

The Training Ground would show up again eventually!

Shut up! Turn off the local broadcast!

These little bastards.

Should I kill them? Should I?

Right. They're also me.

Goddammit.

"Still, for a newborn to show this much progress in ten days — your qi has settled nicely. Newborns really do shoot up the moment you take your eyes off them."

Elder Togo scooped me up with a smile, smoothing down my thoroughly sulky hair until it looked presentable. I let him, and used the free hands to poke through my Status Window, Skill Window, and mods.

By the time we reached the house at the base, Cheon Nan-cho had brewed something vaguely elixir-adjacent out of the tea leaves she'd been cultivating. The four of us sat together and sipped it.

Hm. Cheon Nan-cho made sense — but when had Yeona gotten here?

Surrounded by friendly NPCs, I felt my nerves unclench more than they probably should have. Then my attention snagged on Yeona, who somehow looked older than before.

"Yeona."

"Yes, Senior."

She'd recently broken past Qi Condensation into Foundation Establishment, and yet she still looked a touch aged — which meant her remaining lifespan was shorter than her appearance suggested.

Well, she'd stepped onto the cultivation path as what would have been a little old lady by mortal standards. She'd started late. Of course her lifespan was tight.

Nestled in Elder Togo's arms, I turned it over carefully.

What if a friendly NPC died of old age? I could eat Heavenly Tribulations all day, but lifespan death was something I couldn't interfere with. There was one method, though.

Mass-produce low-level Strange Candy and feed it to her until her lifespan stretched. Raising someone's realm automatically extended their life — that was just how it worked.

Materials were ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠scattered all over the map. Easy enough to gather.

So: capture a pile of prisoners, grind them down, boost her realm, and never have to watch a friendly NPC die. The idea surged up hard.

I could just do it without asking — but the rational part of my brain said I should explain it to Yeona first and get her thoughts.

Yeah. That was the right call.