Humanity’s Great Sage

Chapter 1 – Mining Slave

            In the dim and damp mine tunnel, Lu Ye carried a basket of ore on his back and a mining pick in his hand as he walked forward, step by step.

　　 The boy’s expression was a little sad, with his eyes focused on the empty space in front of him as if he were staring at something.

　　 From an outsiders’ point of view, there was nothing in front of Lu Ye, but the young man himself could see a translucent shadow.

　　 It looked like the silhouette of a tree, grey and indistinct, with lush branches and leaves. The branches were separated from one-third of the tree’s body to the left and right, supporting a semi-circular canopy.

　 It had been more than a year since Lu Ye had come to this world called Kyushu and he still hadn’t yet figured out what the shadow tree was. He only knew that when his attention was concentrated enough, this shadow tree had a chance to appear in his field of vision and that others didn’t notice it at all.

　　 “It’s a sad life.” The boy sighed.

        A year ago, he woke up abruptly in this strange world. Before he was familiar with the environment, the organization he belonged to was overtaken by an enemy force. Many people were killed while he and some other young men and women became captives and were sent into this mining vein to work as lowly mining slaves.

　　 Afterwards, he learned from the scattered conversations of others that the organization he had belonged to was called Mysterious Heaven Sect and was a part of the Great Heaven League.

　　 The name of this sect sounded cool and tyrannical, but in fact it was just a little sect.

　　 It was the Evil Moon Valley under the command of the Myriad Magic Ridge that had defeated the Mysterious Heaven Sect.

　　The Great Heaven League and Myriad Magic Ridge were the two major umbrella organizations in this world, both of which were formed by the union of countless large and small forces. The two sides fought ceaselessly, each with the intention of completely destroying the other. It is said that their fighting had been going on for hundreds of years.

　　 In Lu Ye’s view, this kind of struggle was simply a conflict between the lawful factions of the world and the evil factions of the world. He had just accidentally gotten involved in one little clash of the larger confrontation.

　　 Throughout the years, the Kyushu continent had been raging in turmoil. Every year, small forces like Mysterious Heaven Sect were uprooted, only for more forces to spring up like mushrooms, occupying various places and making the situation even more chaotic.

　　‘Mining slaves are at least still mining slaves…’ Lu Ye comforted himself. Compared to those who were killed, he had at least managed to stay alive.

　　It’s not that he had any special survival skills, but that Evil Moon Valley needed some handymen to do things. Lu Ye, a young person with no cultivation base, was undoubtedly the best choice.

　　 In fact, the mining slaves of this vein did not consist of only captured members of the Mysterious Heaven Sect, but also captured disciples of other small families and sects.

　　 Evil Moon Valley was not weak in strength. It had captured many territories over the years, and the original organizations of those territories had naturally been destroyed, with some of the captured manpower being sent to various places by the Evil Moon Valley to work as slaves.

　　 These slaves, without exception, shared one characteristic: they had not yet opened up their spiritual apertures and thus had not cultivated, making them easy to control.

　　 There is a saying in the mainland of Kyushu: if a monster doesn’t open its aperture it is hard for it to assume human form; if a human doesn’t open their aperture it is hard for them to practice cultivation.

　　 If you want to cultivate, you need to open your spiritual aperture. Only when the spiritual aperture is opened can you be qualified to practice cultivation.

　　 But opening the spiritual aperture is not a simple matter. About one out of a hundred people can naturally open their apertures through systematic exercise, with the ratio for success being higher for those belonging to a family or sect and who have an elder to guide them.

　　 Lu Ye couldn’t open his own spiritual aperture, so his fate was that he could only earn a living by digging in this dim mine tunnel.

　　 But mining slaves were not without a way out. If they could successfully open their apertures and report this to someone in charge, they would have the opportunity to participate in an assessment. If they passed this assessment, they would become a disciple of Evil Moon Valley.

　　 However, there were very few mining slaves who managed to open their apertures. The slaves worked all day in a dim environment and barely had enough to eat. Under such conditions, how could they possibly open their apertures? 

As a result, around 99% of the mining slaves accepted their fate, working hard every day just for a full meal.

　　 Lu Ye didn’t have any sense of belonging to the Mysterious Heaven Sect. After all, as soon as he had come to this world the Mysterious Heaven Sect was being destroyed and he didn’t even know who the people in the sect were.

　　 That being said, he also didn’t want to be a disciple of Evil Moon Valley as it was not a decent sect. The name alone gave off a sense of nefariousness, and Lu Ye felt that joining it would sooner or later not end well for him.

　　 But he also couldn’t live here as a mining slave for the rest of his days. Just what kind of a life would that be? Despite his current circumstances, Lu Ye was determined to be an elite figure in this new era. He believed that without dreams there is no difference between being a man and a salted fish.

So this year he had been working hard to open his aperture. Originally, he had thought that the shadow tree only he could see could provide him with some sort of miraculous help. But until now, the shadow tree had done nothing but occasionally obscure part of his vision. Lu Ye now seriously suspected whether there was something wrong with his eyes.

After taking a turn, the faint light of one of the mine tunnel’s exits appeared in the distance.

Lu Ye’s harvest today was good. If he turned in the ore in his basket, he would be able to obtain 3 contribution points. If he included the contribution points he had accumulated a few days ago, Lu Ye had twelve points total. He would use two points to get two steamed buns, and the remaining ten points would be just enough to exchange for a Qi and Blood pill.

　　 A Qi and Blood pill is a very low-level medicine that does not help with cultivation. But if you wanted to open your aperture, you needed to be filled with qi and blood energy. So although it is a bottom-tier pill, the Qi and Blood pill is suitable for people like Lu Ye who have yet to begin cultivating.

　　 The reason why Evil Moon Valley was willing to part with the Qi and Blood pills was not out of kindness, but because they had no qualms about preying on their slaves’ emotions to maximize their profits. This cheap and low-level pill could make hopeful slaves work harder in the mines.

　　Slaves such as Lu Ye…who was very hardworking every day.

　　While still a hundred feet away from the exit of the mine, Lu Ye’s gaze inadvertently glanced to his left at a huge boulder in a corner.

　　He kept walking forward for about 30 feet before putting down the basket he was carrying behind him, and tightened his grip on the mining pick in his hand. He then took out a medium-sized stone from the basket, weighing it slightly.

　　The next moment, he ran towards the boulder, slid sideways, and stepped against the rock wall of the mine tunnel. With the help of the rebounding force, he swooped down at the back of the boulder, like a lively cheetah.

　　 Two figures were squatting behind the boulder. They were using it as a cover to hide behind and they did not expect that someone would find them.

　　 Though they heard Lu Ye’s movement, it was too late for them to react.

　　 Under their horrified gazes, Lu Ye raised his hand and threw the ore. It landed in the middle of one of their noses. The man immediately screamed and fell on his back to the ground with blood flowing down his face.

　　 Lu Ye attacked again using the mining pick in his other hand, but failed to hit the second person. Unfortunately, they had responded well and turned their head to avoid his attack.

　　 However, Lu Ye had already rushed in front of him. He kicked and hit the other’s abdomen. The man felt sudden pain and fell on his knees, spitting out sour water.

　　 Lu Ye stepped forward, grabbed the other’s hair with one hand, saw the other’s face clearly, and sneered: “I wondered, ‘who could it be?’ And it turns out that it is you two brothers!”

　　He knew these two people. They were disciples of the Liu family. After the territory where the Liu family was located was captured by Evil Moon Valley, some young disciples of the Liu family were sent here to serve as slaves in the mine.

　　Strictly speaking, the two Liu brothers and Lu Ye shared the same fate.

　　”Didn’t I say, ‘don’t let me see you again, or I will kill you!’?” Lu Ye picked up a stone from the ground and smashed it down on the younger Liu brother.

　　The hit was not light, and the younger Liu brother directly fainted with a grunt.

　　Lu Ye walked towards the elder Liu sibling whom he had just injured.

　　As the elder Liu’s forehead had been hit, his own blood was blurring his vision. He vaguely saw Lu Ye approaching him, and he was so scared that he bawled: “Forgive me, my brother didn’t know it was you who came here. I thought it was someone else… Forgive me!”

　　 The two Liu brothers were sneakily lurking in front of the exit of the mine so it was obvious they had no good intentions.

         Before the two were captured, they were both spoiled and coddled. And now, even though they had become mining slaves, they did not want to endure hardship. However, the status of mining slaves was low. The people in Evil Moon Valley did not treat the mining slaves as human beings. Without contributing ore, you couldn’t get food at all.

　　 Therefore, the two brothers often squatted in front of a certain exit of the mine, robbing slaves who were leaving the mine tunnels by themselves. Many people were unlucky and were beaten half to death as they were robbed of the ore they had worked labouriously to mine.

　　 Previously, the Liu brothers had wanted to rob Lu Ye, but they weren’t his opponents and were taught a lesson.

　　Lu Ye never thought that only a few days later he would meet the two brothers again.

　　The same rice can feed all sorts of people; even under the same circumstances, people act and think differently. Among the mining slaves, there were people who acted like the Liu brothers and there were also dreamers like Lu Ye.

　 Over the past year, the contribution points Lu Ye earned through his work had been exchanged for Qi and Blood pills as well as his daily food and clothing needs.

　　 In total, he had taken no less than 30 Qi and Blood pills.

　　 This made Lu Ye’s physique stronger than most mining slaves. Although his stature was not that impressive, the power contained in his body was already better than ordinary people. Dealing with the two Liu brothers was only a matter of course.

　　 The older Liu sibling was pleading with him, but Lu Ye just pretended not to hear. He grabbed older Liu’s hair, raised the rock in his other hand, and slammed it down.

　　 After more than a year of life as a mining slave, Lu Ye had seen too many tragedies and he had long understood a truth. In this dog-eat-dog world, any mercy or sympathy was useless.

　　The mining slaves did not live in harmony with each other. As they originally came from different forces, they were unable to unite. For a good piece of ore, they would often engage in bloody combat.

　　 Every day people died in the mine tunnels. Every time you walked a certain distance, you could see dead slaves’ bones scattered on the ground. There were many slaves who starved to death because of being robbed.

　　 The older Liu brother fell down.

　　 Lu Ye picked up his mining pick, put his basket back on his back, and walked towards the exit. He didn’t kill the Liu brothers. It was not that he was soft-hearted, but that the injured mining slaves generally couldn’t live long here.

　　 As Lu Ye was only a few steps away from the mine tunnel’s exit, a person suddenly rushed in from outside.

　　 “Get away!” The man shouted as he moved towards Lu Ye, intending to slap him.

　　 At this moment, Lu Ye felt cold all over his body, because he saw a light blue light flowing through the palm of his opponent.

　　 That was the light of spiritual power, in other words, it was a cultivator who shot him!

　　 Only with an opened spiritual aperture can you be qualified to practice cultivation and be called a cultivator.

　　The spiritual power of a cultivator is an extremely magical thing. Lu Ye had once seen a cultivator of Evil Moon Valley use his spiritual power. Although he was not too powerful, the man smashed a piece of ore with just a light touch of his palm. After seeing that magical scene, Lu Ye made up his mind that he must open his spiritual aperture and become a cultivator.

　　 He also secretly assessed that even the lowest cultivator of Evil Moon Valley could easily slap ten of himself.

　　 So when he noticed that it was a cultivator who had attacked him, Lu Ye knew that he was about to face a catastrophe.

　　 At the critical moment of life and death, he halted in his steps and leapt back abruptly.

　　 His chest was numb and he heard the sound of a fracture. Lu Ye flew upside down and fell to the ground.

　　 The severe pain was sobering. After realizing that he was still alive, he immediately got up.

　　 “Huh!” The cultivator who shot was a little surprised. Although he didn’t use his full strength in the palm move just now and only shot it casually, it shouldn’t have been something a mining slave could bear.

　　 When the cultivator saw the face of the mining slave through the dim light he blurted out: “Lu Ye?”

　　 Lu Ye had already started turning around and running away. After hearing the voice, he was shocked: “Manager Yang?”

　　 This cultivator surnamed Yang was a small steward in the mine. Lu Ye would often deal with him because he was in charge of exchanging the Qi and Blood pills. They could be considered familiar with each other.

　　 Manager Yang was very optimistic about Lu Ye, after all, there were very few mining slaves who could bear the hardships and tolerate the grueling work like him.

　　 But optimistic as he was, he never gave special treatment to Lu Ye. In his mind, there was an insurmountable gap between mortals like Lu Ye and cultivators like him.

　　After recognizing Lu Ye, Manager Yang was relieved that he did not kill his opponent with his palm move. Lu Ye had exchanged a lot of Qi and Blood pills from him over the past year, and his physical fitness was better than that of ordinary mining slaves. Coupled with the fact that it had just been a casual blow that was not deliberately aiming to kill, and it was not surprising that the other party could survive.

　　 Opposite Manager Yang, Lu Ye could hear the pounding of his own heartbeat.

　　 The cultivators of Evil Moon Valley generally did not pay attention to the life and death of their mining slaves. They were aware that the slaves often fought and died in the mine tunnels but, unless they directly encountered them fighting, they ignored it.

　　 Lu Ye had only hit the Liu brothers on the head and left them fainted on the ground. As he went to leave the mine tunnels, Manager Yang had hit him with a palm move. From Lu Ye’s point of view, it appeared as though Manager Yang were punishing him for the state of the Liu brothers.

　　 But upon a quick reflection, he felt his initial assumption was wrong because when Manager Yang had rushed in he had looked panicked, not as if he were trying to help the Liu brothers.

　　 Just as he was thinking about it, Manager Yang was already showing a look of surprise, as if it were a good thing to meet Lu Ye here. He grabbed Lu Ye’s shoulder and said: “Follow me!”