Chapter 1: The Great Explosion

Boom!

A massive explosion shook the sky, brighter than the sun, a crimson fireball appeared instantly. The shockwave swept thousands of square kilometers, with flames, strong winds, earthquakes, and dust roaring mercilessly, toppling countless trees as if heralding the end of the world.

“Ah…”

Ji Xinghuo suddenly woke up, sitting upright in the darkness.

Echoes of the explosion lingered in his mind, the booming unsettling his gaze with confusion and horror until he calmed down minutes later.

“This nightmare again, damn it!”

Cursing, Ji Xinghuo shook his head helplessly and glanced at the luminous clock—it was 1 AM.

For the past week, he’d had the same nightmare every night. In the dream, his perspective was locked. It began in outer space, like a meteor hurtling towards the Earth’s atmosphere, ending with an explosion over a vast forest.

Each dream explosion woke Ji Xinghuo, feeling as if his brain had indeed exploded.

And the culprit of it all…

“Turn on the light.”

With a gentle command, the bedroom gradually lit up.

Before adjusting to the light, Ji Xinghuo swung out of bed and staggered into the bathroom. The mirror reflected his weary face marked by visible bloodshot eyes—signs of his dire mental state.

A week of poor sleep would exhaust anyone.

“Time to deal with this.”

Muttering, Ji Xinghuo opened the cabinet behind the mirror and took out a beautifully braided necklace, its pendant an intricately netted gemstone, exuding elegance.

His gaze complex as he looked at the gem pendant.

Ten days ago, he and some classmates went on a graduation trip to the Lake Baikal area. On the last day, he bought this necklace from a Sami tribe’s stall for 20 Asiatic Yuan as a souvenir.

There were hundreds of similar braided necklaces at the stall, each with a different pendant.

Ji Xinghuo didn’t notice anything unusual when he chose it—he simply found it attractive and wore it back to Chang’an that night.

Then the nightmares began.

After several days of the same nightmare, Ji Xinghuo pinpointed the cause to the necklace’s pendant, a gem resembling a glass marble.

The gem’s outer shell was clear, with a vibrant nebula-like pattern inside, resembling an eye but with a hollow center as if the pupil had been carved out. Tiny cracks spread from the center, giving it a strangely incomplete beauty.

Clearly, the gem wasn’t natural but manmade, and not particularly valuable.

Out of curiosity, Ji Xinghuo did some research on it.

The gem’s hardness was astonishingly beyond the upper limit of a hardness tester; its brittleness, melting point, solubility, and electrical resistance were indeterminate. Its composition was unknown, surpassing his understanding.

Despite much effort, he left no mark on the gem.

He even immersed it in his blood once, to no avail.

Failing to glean anything from studying the gem, Ji Xinghuo turned to his nightmares for clues.

The first thing that came to mind was the “Tunguska event.”

The explosion scenes in his dreams matched several aspects of the Tunguska explosion, such as its occurrence in the sky, absence of meteorite craters and celestial debris, and the extent of forest destruction—all consistent with historical research data.

However, the Tunguska event happened in 1908, and now it was 2223—a gap of over three centuries.

Moreover, the explosion site was nearly 800 kilometers away from Lake Baikal, where he had vacationed.

Both the time and space dimensions had gaps.

Nonetheless, Ji Xinghuo suspected that the gemstone might be linked to the Tunguska explosion, and might even have caused that mysterious blast.

“Too bad I have no other evidence apart from these dreams.”

“Otherwise, I could unravel a century-old unsolved mystery.”

Ji Xinghuo chuckled self-deprecatingly. Now, the problem was how to stop the nightmares.

He had tried everything. Whether or not he carried the gem, even if he left it thousands of kilometers away in another city, he would still have the nightmares as if they were bound to him.

Holding the necklace, he returned to the bedroom, unfastened the cord, and extracted the gem from its net. He observed it carefully in his palm.

“Could this really be an alien species?”

This wasn’t the first time Ji Xinghuo had this thought.

At first, he suspected the gem might be an alien species, but it didn’t match any known characteristics of alien species either from the databases of the Astral Defense Council or the official website of the national ‘Stellar Affairs Department’.

An alien species is essentially an anomaly that contains ‘alien abilities.’

All alien species on Earth originate from the ‘stellar realms.’

In 2033, thirteen stargates suddenly appeared across continents on Earth. Passing through these gates allowed entry into the stellar realms.

The vast, mysterious stellar realms shocked the world, overturning scientists’ understanding and defying known laws of physics. These realms connected the entire Milky Way, serving as bridges to every planet and spatial coordinate within the galaxy!

Unlike the lonely expanses of space, the stellar realms were teeming with life.

They nurtured countless species—more numerous and varied than any single ecological planet on Earth; the evolutionary rate and intensity of stellar realm species also far exceeded those of Earth’s biosphere!

The stellar realms also gave rise to many intelligent civilizations far more advanced than Earth.

The emergence of the stargates caused unprecedented calamity for unprepared humanity: alien invasions, nuclear wars, and the third and fourth world wars nearly led to two centuries of global upheaval and an existential crisis, completely altering the fate and trajectory of human civilization.

Now in the 23rd century, Earth had reshaped its order and structure.

Humanity had long adapted to the existence of the stellar realms and leveraged their unique resources to spur rapid technological advancement and dramatically increase productivity.

However, the most significant impact on humanity came from the supernatural abilities from the stellar realms.

These were commonly referred to as ‘alien abilities.’

Whether intelligent civilizations or beast-like lower beings, all could give rise to powerful individuals with varying abilities.

Their powers differed: controlling lightning, immense strength, changing forms, invisible leaps, and these were only the most common abilities. Many more bizarre and miraculous powers existed, the farther one went on the evolutionary path, the stronger the abilities, and even lifespan increased!

Killing a being from the stellar realms sometimes rewarded one with their alien abilities.

And the carriers of alien abilities were alien species!

Humans inherently lacked supernatural powers, but through merging with alien species, they could acquire alien abilities, thereby evolving.

During the “Stargate Era,” humanity managed to repel the invasions from the stellar realms not just by resorting to nuclear weapons but also because pioneers had mastered alien abilities, gradually evolving to match the power of strong beings from the stellar realms.

Today, with a global population of over forty billion, more than two billion ‘altered humans’ possessed alien abilities.

Ji Xinghuo was not an altered human, but he was very knowledgeable about alien species.

In this century, everyone had, to some extent, learned about alien species and encountered them in reality.

Alien species not only originated within the bodies of stellar realm beings but also formed naturally in the environment of the stellar realms in various shapes—like fruits, roots, minerals, gems, energy crystals, and many other strange forms, making them difficult to identify.

The ‘Stellar Defense Council,’ with its branches in every country, had created Earth’s largest database of alien species.

Ji Xinghuo had painstakingly reviewed over twelve thousand alien species in the database, especially comparing several hundred gem-shaped ones.

But none matched the gem in his hands. Neither its appearance nor common features of alien species corresponded.

All alien species exhibited ‘activity.’

Ji Xinghuo had encountered alien species several times. Regardless of their form, holding an alien species made its ‘activity’ obvious, resembling an egg about to hatch, its vitality palpable without any need for special identification.

However, he felt no such activity from the gem—it was clearly an inert object.

So he initially dismissed the idea that it was an alien species.

But now…

“Nothing is absolute.” Ji Xinghuo now suspected he might be wrong. Staring intently at the gem in his palm, he mused, “Perhaps it is one in a million, appearing inert yet actually a very rare alien species.”

If it was an alien species, then it could be merged.

Whether a human could merge with an alien species had no clear standard. Generally, the better one’s physical condition, the higher the success rate of merging.

Ji Xinghuo stood up.

He looked towards the training room connected to the bedroom. The mirror on the opposite wall reflected his figure.

Standing at exactly 1.8 meters, his height was average among adult men, only a few centimeters above the average. However, his body was balanced and toned, the upper and lower body nearly in the golden ratio, his shoulders broad and his arm span almost two meters, his long arms and legs complemented by robust muscles filled with explosive strength.

This was the result of years of training.

In pursuit of power to become an altered human, everyone on Earth exercised.

Particularly hopeful young people were extremely motivated, many from their teens spending days in gyms, undergoing various physical training to prepare for merging with alien species.

Ji Xinghuo was no exception.

He had been training since he was fifteen, almost never slacking off, and now it had been seven years.

Although he hadn’t become an altered human yet, Ji Xinghuo had strong confidence that as long as the alien species he merged with wasn’t of an exceptionally high level or had peculiar abilities, his chance of a successful merge was at least 80%.

“I planned to continue training for another year or two after the graduation trip then take the fitness test to apply for a super-limit level alien species.”

“Now I have to merge with an unknown alien species instead…”

Ji Xinghuo looked slightly hesitant.

As a citizen of the ‘Asia-Pacific People’s Community,’ participating in four physical fitness tests after reaching adulthood, passing any one would grant a free alien species for trial merging.

This was a benefit for every citizen of the ‘Asia-Pacific Community;’ the state gave everyone an equal opportunity.

If the merge failed, not only was compensation unnecessary, but one could also enjoy free recovery medical services at the best public hospital.

If successful, there were corresponding obligations.

When needed in the future, altered humans must unconditionally respond to government conscription and serve the country until their service is completed.

Ji Xinghuo was confident of passing the fitness test at eighteen, but he hadn’t participated yet, aiming for a higher score in the tests.

The higher the score, the more alien abilities available for selection, and the higher their quality.

The alien ability levels provided by the state ranged from basic to premium, superior, and super-limit.

Most citizens who passed the test could only choose from the first three levels.

Citizens who passed all four tests—strength, speed, endurance, and willpower—and scored high, followed by several rounds of evaluation by the ‘Stellar Affairs Department,’ could apply for the highest tier of super-limit alien abilities and enter a queue sorted by time to receive that ability.

Ji Xinghuo’s original goal was a super-limit level alien ability, with roughly a thirty percent chance.

But now it was different.

“If this really is an alien species,” Ji Xinghuo murmured softly, “based on the gem’s hardness and the special phenomenon of causing nightmares, the alien ability it contains is at least at the super-limit level, possibly even higher, reaching the quality of a ‘stellar meteor level’ alien ability!”

Stellar meteor level!

Ji Xinghuo’s heart pounded fiercely.

Alien abilities of this level were incredibly formidable, their value incalculable with money. Historically, the few publicly known stellar meteor-level abilities were not sold but exchanged.

“Taking the chance on a stellar meteor-level ability, even if the merge fails, is worth it!”

“After recovery, I can just try again, only a few months delayed.”

Ji Xinghuo no longer hesitated.

But now, a question remained: how exactly should he merge it?

The most common methods for assimilating an alien species are two.

The first is ingestion, directly consuming the alien species.

The second is injection, where the alien is dissolved in a prepared solution and then injected into the bloodstream for absorption.

There are also less common methods such as transforming the alien into a gas for inhalation; achieving a mental resonance with it to incorporate it into the brain; or some rare aliens that can directly permeate through the skin into the body.

The most cumbersome method is implantation, generally suited for organ-shaped aliens extracted from biological bodies, akin to surgical insertion.

If he could choose, Ji Xinghuo would prefer assimilation through ingestion.

The gem isn’t large, about the size of a human eyeball, easily swallowable in one gulp. But he wondered if he could actually digest it given the gem’s hardness.

He feared implantation might be necessary.

Alien implantation isn’t as simple as inserting it anywhere in the body; preparatory research is required, along with considering immunological rejection. Sometimes drugs are necessary to counteract rejection, and there’s wound stitching and postoperative recovery to manage, all requiring a skilled surgeon.

Crucially, the alien implantation site is typically where it can best exert its effect.

For example, the “Thunder Hand” alien’s form is a segment of tendon capable of electricity discharge; it must be implanted into the palm and integrated with the host’s tendons to master this ability.

Ji Xinghuo looked into the gem and saw the eye-like nebula inside.

“Eyes!”

“Could it be implanted into my eye socket?”

The thought made Ji Xinghuo’s scalp tingle; the eye socket space is constrained, not enough for two eyeballs, so implantation would first require the removal of one of his own eyes.

The cost was too great.

Should it fail…

Although with current medical technology, re-implanting an eyeball is straightforward enough to restore sight quickly, the pain and psychological impact during surgery are not something anyone could easily endure.

Ji Xinghuo held the gem up to his eyelid.

“This gem really does resemble an eyeball!”

Suddenly, without much thought, he tried touching the gem lightly to his right eye.

The eyeball being one of the body’s most sensitive organs, Ji Xinghuo immediately felt a slight tingling pain and instinctively closed his eyes.

However, the tingling grew more intense, as if mixed with grains of sand, and tears streamed forth.

Not just the right eye, both eyes felt the pain.

“What’s happening?”

Ji Xinghuo, enduring the agony, forced his eyes open only to see a blurred vision as if obscured by thick mosaic; nothing was clear.

Touching his cheek, he felt a warm, sticky substance, vaguely seeing it was red.

“My eyes are bleeding…”

A tightness gripped Ji Xinghuo’s heart as he realized: “Where’s the gem?”

The gem he held just moments before had vanished. Before he could rejoice that his method seemed to work, a severe pain suddenly twisted through his brain, as if a drill was churning his brain matter, causing him to cry out and collapse, blood streaming from all orifices.

Boom!

In the pitch darkness, Ji Xinghuo saw once again the great explosion, like the scenes from his dreams. As his consciousness slipped into the dark, a thought flickered:

“Is my head really going to explode this time?”