The world was bathed in silver light.
It wasn't the moon.
It was the Planetary Awakening Ceremony.
Every year, on the day a person turned sixteen, a mysterious altar would form beneath their feet. No one knew who built the altar or what rules dictated its existence. All they knew was that this day would determine the foundation of their life… and perhaps, their civilization.
Jiang Fan stood atop the awakening platform, his body surrounded by a glowing geometric circle etched with ancient runes. They flickered faintly, like static from a screen long lost in time. The crowd below watched, silent, breath held.
"Will he awaken a martial planet?"
"I heard his grades were average… probably a low-origin qi-type."
"No, didn't you hear? He's an orphan. No background. No resources. He'll be lucky to get a tiny rock."
Whispers, like insects at night, crawled through the crowd.
But Jiang Fan didn't care.
He wasn't from here.
Not originally.
Jiang Fan had once been a scientist—an aerospace engineer from a highly advanced Earth. He had worked on propulsion systems meant for interstellar travel. His life was a blur of research, endless coffee, and cold fluorescent laboratories. Then came the accident.
A test had gone wrong. He remembered screams, the sound of metal bending, and a blinding white light.
When he opened his eyes again, he was in a new body. In a new world.
A world where everyone… awakened planets.
At first, he had thought it was a joke. A kind of dream.
But he had lived here now for sixteen years. It was real. The sky was not blue but slightly violet. The stars moved in patterns unlike any known celestial formation. Magic was real. Qi was real. But most terrifying of all, civilizations were real—personal, living planets born from the very soul of each human being.
And today, it was his turn.
His turn to awaken a planet.
Jiang Fan closed his eyes.
He could feel something stirring inside him.
Something ancient.
Something… limitless.
Then, the voice came.
[Infinite Deduction System initializing…]
[Loading user's last known consciousness signature… complete.]
[Previous Civilization Data: Technological – Type IV trajectory recognized.]
[Adapting to current world's parameters… done.]
[Binding host Jiang Fan… 100% synchronization achieved.]
[Welcome back, Jiang Fan. Your Deduction Engine awaits.]
His heartbeat skipped.
Then a flood of information—like an entire library being downloaded into his brain—swept through him. Equations, formulas, blueprints, schematics of turbines, reactors, neural links, satellites… all buried deep within his subconscious now brought to the surface with terrifying clarity.
The platform beneath his feet began to tremble.
The air buzzed.
Everyone watching held their breath as the awakening projection began to form in the sky. For most, it would be a glowing orb—maybe dotted with clouds or wisps of qi, maybe filled with mana lakes or floating immortal mountains.
But what formed above Jiang Fan's head was not natural.
It was… alien.
A grey sphere appeared.
Cold. Unfeeling. Metallic.
No forests. No rivers. No mystic floating islands.
Instead… it had satellites.
It had rings made of steel.
And—just barely visible—an artificial sun tethered in orbit, pumping light into the dead world's surface.
The onlookers gasped.
"What the hell is that?"
"Why does it look… dead?"
"No! Wait! Look closer—those aren't continents, they're… facilities? Industrial belts? Are those power plants?"
"Is that a launch site?!"
Inside the sphere, Jiang Fan could see the spark of life.
Not human yet.
Not conscious.
But a tiny algorithm—an artificial embryo of thought—began to pulse within a reinforced data vault.
He named it: Core Zero.
His planet was not meant to imitate nature. It would not be ruled by qi, mana, or spirit energy. It would not grow trees, but turbines. It would not have rivers, but pipelines.
His world would not cultivate immortals.
It would build them.
[Primitive Stage of Civilization recognized. Initiating Deduction Sequence…]
[Objective: Spark Technological Growth]
[Query: Host, select one of the following paths to initiate evolution.]
Forge Fire and Tool Use – Accelerate primitive tool-making and metallurgy.
Construct Central Thinking Node – Bootstrap tribal communication and language processing.
Energy Principle Foundation – Begin experiments into electricity via friction, magnetism, and elemental heat differentials.
Jiang Fan smiled softly. The memory of his old life guided him like a lighthouse in fog.
"I choose Option 1," he murmured.
Inside the metallic crust of his newborn planet, deep within one of the facility chambers, a cluster of artificially simulated hominids began to take form. They were not born through biology but coded by his will—organisms with cognition, curiosity, and a thirst for progress.
Naked, they roamed the artificial terrain—rough fields made from engineered soil, under a manufactured sky.
One of them picked up a rock.
Another picked up a stick.
Jiang Fan watched, heart pounding, as the simulation began its slow crawl toward the technological singularity.
It would be slow.
But it would be unstoppable.
Down below, the people had fallen silent.
The teacher at the ceremony, an old cultivator with silver hair, stared up in disbelief.
"A… what kind of planet is that? I've never seen such a thing."
Jiang Fan stepped down from the platform, expression calm.
Inwardly, he could feel the System humming in his soul, generating deduction branches and simulations. Each second, hundreds of possibilities for the future of his civilization were analyzed. Slowly, he whispered:
"I'll show this world… a power beyond gods."