Chapter 2: Wanxiang Star Pupil

“Hmm…”

Ji Xinghuo let out a groan and then regained consciousness: “I’m not dead!”

He shivered, turned over, and found himself sitting on the ground in his familiar bedroom. There was a patch of congealed blood where he had been lying.

Aside from some dizziness, he felt no other discomfort.

Ji Xinghuo felt a surge of fear.

Before losing consciousness, he truly thought he was going to die. At such a young age, he hadn’t yet enjoyed life. The vast Milky Way and Star Realm, countless breathtaking sceneries, and thrilling adventures he hadn’t embarked upon. It would have been too regretful to die like that.

“It’s good to be alive!”

Ji Xinghuo, relieved to have a second chance, tried to find the culprit of all this by looking around. Indeed, he didn’t find the gemstone.

“Is it an exotic kind that I successfully merged with?” He was both surprised and pleased, though unclear why the gemstone merged with his eye, but it was a good outcome nonetheless.

“What about superpowers?”

Getting up from the ground, Ji Xinghuo realized he didn’t seem to have gained any supernatural abilities.

He struggled to stand straight, holding his head, feeling increasingly dizzy.

His vision was also flickering.

Everything he saw was trembling as if the screen was receiving an unstable signal. Every few seconds, it would go black for an instant, blurring his sight, then quickly returning to clarity. This repeated non-stop, making him feel uncomfortable.

“There’s something wrong with my eyes!”

Ji Xinghuo realized that this might be his newly acquired ability.

Stumbling, he supported himself against the wall to the bathroom, stood in front of the washbasin, and got a fright from his reflection in the mirror.

His face was covered in blood. Blood was flowing from his eyes, nose, and ears, along with some unknown white and red fluids, mixed with fresh blood, caked over half of his face, looking as though his brain had burst, frightening to behold.

Whoosh…

Ji Xinghuo quickly washed the mess off his face, finding no wounds on his head nor any strange growths, which brought him some relief.

“Fortunately, my face is intact.” He touched his face.

Though not stunningly handsome, he was quite agreeable-looking with well-defined features and a bright and resolute demeanor. He had several admirers in school and was considered quite a catch. If things didn’t pan out, he could consider a career where looks mattered.

Ji Xinghuo glanced at the time; he had been unconscious for about half an hour.

The feeling of dizziness in his brain lessened a lot, and his vision was gradually stabilizing without blurring or flickering, seeming like everything was going back to normal.

Not quite!

Ji Xinghuo noticed something was still off. Absolutely not normal!

His vision was no longer flickering or blurring, seeming like his visual nerve signals had stabilized, but instead, they began to enhance.

The world through his eyes was becoming increasingly clear, revealing more and more detail.

In the bathroom air floated countless tiny water droplets; the floor, once spotless, was actually coated with a thin layer of dust, much of which was his skin flakes; lifting his hand, the back of his hand looked like cracked dry earth, grooves all over, the fine hairs showing distinct particles stuck on them.

The whole world had changed in Ji Xinghuo’s eyes.

“Eagle Eye?”

His first thought was “Eagle Eye,” an ability he had merged with, granting far greater long-distance vision and sharp dynamic vision, comparable to an eagle’s eyes, hence the name.

Eagle Eye was an exceptional ability, not very rare.

Ji Xinghuo felt disappointed.

If it was just the Eagle Eye ability, that would be too bad. The gap between exceptional and transcendental abilities was huge, no comparison.

“It should be something else.”

Ji Xinghuo quickly noticed the differences.

The most notable feature of Eagle Eye was long-distance vision, but he was seeing details up close, like magnifying glass effects.

“Is this… Microsight?” Ji Xinghuo was a bit puzzled.

Like Eagle Eye, Microsight was also an exceptional ability; one for distance, the other for close-ups, but Microsight was better, enhancing vision in short-range combat, more valuable than Eagle Eye.

How could two entirely opposite abilities manifest simultaneously?

Furthermore, how could an exotic kind have two abilities?

Ji Xinghuo went back to the bedroom.

His rented apartment was designed in a minimalist style, no living room, entering directly into a spacious bedroom of over sixty square meters, the remaining forty divided into two areas serving as a study and training room, interconnected, visible at a glance.

The apartment had very few furnishings, with two rows of sofas and a coffee table in the middle, and a simple bar counter doubling as a dining table, on which sat a kettle and a few other eating utensils.

There was also a virtual platform login pod in the corner.

That was pretty much it, the whole apartment appearing spacious and bare.

A large bed was placed near the balcony, and behind the bedhead was a piece of full-length dimming glass.

“Open the scenic window.”

Ji Xinghuo spoke softly.

Instantly, the glass wall turned transparent, revealing the scene outside. The brilliant neon lights entered the apartment, and looking out, the glow from skyscrapers in the night sky resembled mountains scattered at different elevations, obscuring the night sky.

The residential lights of hundreds of floors in the skyscrapers were bright, while massive screens outside looped advertisements, hues of lights intertwining, creating a dreamlike illusion.

Looking down, one could see multilevel superconducting highways built between buildings.

Maglev cars sped along them, tail lights stretching long and converging to form unending streams of light weaving between the skyscrapers, much like the arteries of this supercity, intertwining and ceaselessly flowing.

Ji Xinghuo was used to this scene.

He stood before the glass, looking into the distance, his gaze quickly locking onto a building three thousand meters away.

The night was clear, no clouds obscuring the view.

Ji Xinghuo clearly saw the four illuminated characters atop the building: Super Ascend Group.

Previously, he could barely make out there were four characters there, but now he could not only see the characters clearly but also a smaller slogan beneath them: Super Ascend Group strives to serve you, helping you break through your limits and achieve a transcended life!

“Heh heh…”

Ji Xinghuo couldn’t help but laugh.

The Super Ascend Group was quite renowned, one of the top companies in the nation aiding eccentrics in breaking through their training ceilings, listed on the stock market for decades with a market value long exceeding a trillion.

However, due to its name’s homophony with “extra birth,” contrasting sharply with the national population status and fertility policies, it was quite ironic and often became the subject of jokes.

“It is indeed Eagle Eye, but more than just Eagle Eye.”

Ji Xinghuo withdrew his gaze, looking at his hand, feeling an intricately subtle sense of touch, and even seemed to think a bit faster, saying to himself, “This is clearly the effect of ‘Microsight.'”

Eagle Eye and Microsight, two abilities combined.

And there was more!

After feeling this for a while, Ji Xinghuo discovered that when he focused his gaze on a target, there was a kind of mental lock-on effect, intuitively feeling that if he had something to throw, as long as the target was within range, he could definitely hit it.

“Indeed ‘Precise’!”

Ji Xinghuo was quite surprised.

The effect of Precision significantly enhanced the hit rate of shooting and throwing objects.

After training, shooting stationary targets could even reach a perfect hit rate and accurately control the magnitude of his own strength. Any precision-related bodily movement would be more accurate.

Although Precision was just a high-quality ability, below exceptional, Eagle Eye added to Microsight, and then with Precision, the effects of three visual abilities stacked could definitely be on par with transcendental abilities, even surpassing them.

“Seems there’s more than three abilities…”

Ji Xinghuo closed the scenic window and continued exploring his abilities.

Indeed, he soon found he could see in the dark with no light sources in the room, the images formed were peculiar, indescribable in colors, dimly lit but the outlines and movements of objects very clear, nearly indistinguishable from normal vision.

“Must be Infrared Vision!” Ji Xinghuo was excited, “This is another exceptional ability, also sensory.”

“What on earth is this gemstone?”

Following this, Ji Xinghuo became increasingly astonished, discovering other effects.

Even with his eyes closed, as long as he thought about it, he could still “see” the surroundings clearly.

And in his mind, he felt as if he had an unseen eye constantly monitoring everything around him, allowing him to react correctly under any circumstances.

For the former, Ji Xinghuo had never heard of a similar ability, nor could he find it in the exotic database.

While the latter, though somewhat similar to the high-quality ability “Intuitive Reflex,” was clearly a bit stronger!

Five abilities, all related to eyes.

Ji Xinghuo immediately had a guess: could it be originally one ability, but of a quality so high that it simultaneously had the functions of multiple lower-level abilities?

It’s common knowledge that an exotic kind contains only one ability.

He leaned close to the mirror to examine his eyes.

His black eyes looked no different from before, the iris shape normal, not showing any signs of anomalies and unable to find any traces of the gemstone.

“Eh?”

Suddenly, Ji Xinghuo noticed a faint anomaly.

His right eye’s pupil, the small round hole at the center of the black iris where light enters, suddenly flickered, revealing a thin ring of light!

The edge of this light ring was very narrow, less than half a millimeter wide, virtually invisible to the naked eye, but it appeared clearly before him.

The light ring was dim yet still colorfully vibrant, perfectly fitting around his pupil, enclosing it.

Several barely visible cracks emerged deep within the pupil.

Ji Xinghuo was all too familiar with this nebula shape; over the past week, he had observed the gemstone countless times, every detail etched in his memory.

“It’s merged with my right eye!”

Just as Ji Xinghuo was about to continue investigating, the pupil light ring suddenly flashed, and an image of a human figure appeared in his vision for an instant, composed of pale dashed lines, showing both the internal and external structures, the facial features exactly like his own.

“What’s this?”

Ji Xinghuo was shocked, waved his hand in front of his eyes, the human figure unaffected by his motion, clearly not an illusion.

No matter which direction he turned, it remained fixed before his eyes.

He calmed his mind, carefully observed, and noticed several strange symbols next to the human figure, presumably a kind of writing, but unfamiliar to him.

Just as this thought emerged, all the characters blurred momentarily, and when his mind cleared, they had changed into Chinese characters.

【Wanxiang Star Pupil’s Master: Ji Xinghuo】

【Race: Earth Human】

【Tier: None】

【Ability: None】

【Psychic Energy: 0】

After reading the content, Ji Xinghuo gasped, utterly shocked, speechless for a long time. The information interface was simple, much like the attribute panel in games he had played, but its presentation completely overturned his understanding!

“Struck it rich!”

“Damn awesome, I really hit the jackpot this time!”

Ji Xinghuo almost jumped up, but luckily, he had always been more composed than his peers. His emotions settled down within a few minutes, and he seriously studied the information interface.

The most crucial information was in the first line of text: Master of the Wanxiang Star Pupil.

“So the gemstone is called the Wanxiang Star Pupil!”

Ji Xinghuo suddenly realized the name perfectly matched its form, similar to the abilities like Eagle Eye, Microsight, and Precision, probably all derived from the Wanxiang Star Pupil.

“Wanxiang,” in Chinese, means “all things and scenes in the universe.”

The moment the text changed earlier, causing dizziness, must have been the Wanxiang Star Pupil accessing his knowledge, presenting it in a way he could understand.

From this, one could deduce that the Wanxiang Star Pupil was an artificial creation.

It wasn’t an exotic!

Ji Xinghuo’s heart chilled, unable to imagine what kind of civilization or which race created the Wanxiang Star Pupil; it was clear their technology was far beyond Earth’s. Could it be one of the most powerful dominant civilizations in the Milky Way?

How did the Wanxiang Star Pupil come to Earth?

Will it bring disaster in the future?

“There shouldn’t be any trouble.” Ji Xinghuo was not too panicked. If real trouble were to come to Earth, it was beyond his ability to solve. Worrying was pointless.

He pushed aside the needless worries and continued to check the information interface.

Race needs no further discussion.

Rank probably refers to the stages of life evolution.

Among the various civilizations and states in the Milky Way and the Star Realm, strength classifications and level names vary, but a universal standard exists, based on the number of life evolutions. One evolution equals one tier, two evolutions equal two tiers, and so on.

I’m not yet a mutant, so of course, I don’t have a rank.

Likewise, I don’t have any special abilities yet.

Wanxiang Star Pupil is an artificial creation. It’s a tool, not a controlled ability. This means I can still merge with another ability!

However, I still don’t understand what that last entry ‘spiritual source energy’ means, Ji Xinghuo thought long but gained no clarity.

He was also confused about the function of the human silhouette in the interface.

Unknowingly, dawn was breaking.

Ji Xinghuo closed the information interface and quickly fell asleep upon lying down in bed.

This time, he finally had a night free from nightmares.

When he woke up at noon, Ji Xinghuo felt spiritually refreshed, his exhaustion from the past few days was gone, and his physical condition was unprecedentedly good. He got up cleanly, washed, ate a quick-service lunch, changed into clean clothes and left home.

After deep reflections overnight, Ji Xinghuo realized something: to understand the specific use of Wanxiang Star Pupil, he first had to become a mutant.

This wasn’t a difficult task for him.

Ji Xinghuo’s apartment was on the 45th floor. He rode the elevator down to the parking garage, where an autonomous maglev car was smoothly waiting for him. He opened the door, sat in the back seat, buckled up, and the car silently started, leaving the parking.

After leaving the building, the car traveled a few hundred meters on the ground and then swiftly ascended a ramp entry, soon entering a superconductive highway built many meters above the ground.

Cars whizzed by the window, disappearing in an instant.

Humm-hum-humm…

The electric engine lightly roared, and Ji Xinghuo felt a push against his back as the maglev car smoothly accelerated and continuously changed lanes to the left.

After a few seconds, when the car’s speed reached 350 kilometers per hour, the wheels retracted into the chassis, and the vehicle, now hovering, switched to the cruising lane.

Ji Xinghuo looked out of the window.

The buildings along the superconductive highway receded quickly. Even in daylight, the massive advertising screens and neon lights were still brightly dazzling. As the car sped forward, they formed colorful streams of light in his view, utterly spectacular and mesmerizing.

Before, at such high speeds, Ji Xinghuo could hardly make out the streetside scenes.

Now, with a casual glance, everything he saw was as clear as if captured by a high-definition camera!

“This feeling…”

Ji Xinghuo sincerely admired, “It’s really fantastic!”