The air outside the ceremony ground was thin and cold.
Jiang Fan walked down the mountain path alone, his school uniform lightly dusted with the silver pollen that always floated down during Awakening Day. But he didn't notice it. His mind was already inside his planet—his world.
The Deduction System was operating silently in the background, like a supercomputer processing infinite timelines.
Every second, it scanned through countless simulations, calculating success rates, failure points, evolutionary dead ends.
He could feel it like a second heartbeat.
Primitive stage initiated…
Tool development: 2% progress…
Fire ignition chance: 0.003%... recalibrating environmental oxygen balance.
Inside the planet, his artificial proto-humanoids wandered under neon-lit moons, their leathery feet scraping against metal-coated ground. They didn't yet know language. But instinct and behavior trees had been coded into them.
They would learn.
Jiang Fan sat on a smooth rock beside a stream. The violet sun above cast elongated shadows of strange trees—bioluminescent, they glowed faintly in twilight. This world was beautiful in ways Earth never was. But he didn't belong here. Not truly.
His memories were too deep.
He remembered fire—not the one born from kindling and flint, but the one driven by combustion chambers and engines. He remembered flight—not the feathered wings of beasts, but the roar of reactors tearing through the sky.
And now, it was his to recreate.
[Deduction Alert: Civilization Tool Creation achieved.]
[Primitive humanoid Unit 07 has sharpened a stone against rock. Tool registered: Stone Blade.]
[Cultural spark detected. Sharing behavior initiated.]
Jiang Fan's eyes widened slightly.
They've started…
Inside the simulation, Unit 07—a creature only vaguely humanoid, with sloping foreheads and thick fingers—held the stone proudly. It screeched, waving the blade in front of its tribe-mates. Curiosity spread. One copied. Then another.
It wasn't beautiful.
They were ugly, drooling things that waddled on two legs.
But it was the first spark.
The most important one.
"Jiang Fan!"
He turned his head.
A girl ran toward him—black hair tied into a loose ponytail, eyes bright with energy. Lin Miaomiao, his only real friend in this world. While others chased after martial arts rankings or spirit root awakenings, she had always been a bit… different.
"You didn't even wait for the results board!" she huffed, placing her hands on her hips. "You skipped your own Awakening rating!"
Jiang Fan blinked. "I did?"
"You did! Do you even care what level you got?"
"No."
"…you're impossible."
She flopped down beside him on the rock, arms crossed. But after a moment, her tone softened.
"I saw your planet," she said quietly. "It looked like… a machine. A cold one."
Jiang Fan was silent for a while.
Then, with a hint of warmth, he said: "It's not cold. It's just not alive yet."
Far inside his consciousness, Jiang Fan dove deeper into the Deduction System. The simulation was advancing rapidly. The humanoids—now dubbed Proto-Units—had begun forming groups.
Each cluster gathered around the strongest tool-makers. Social structure was forming.
But there was a problem.
Too many variables.
The current rate of technological progression was slow—projected to take decades to reach fire.
He needed to accelerate it.
[Requesting Intervention? Y/N]
"...Yes," Jiang Fan whispered.
[Select Primitive Technological Gift to Introduce:]
Friction Drum Firekit – Accelerates ignition discovery by 60%. Cost: 2 Core Energy.
Schematic Wall Carving – Introduces memory transfer through images. Increases learning rate of group. Cost: 5 Core Energy.
Basic Shelter Blueprint – Teaches use of environment for protective construction. Reduces death rate. Cost: 1 Core Energy.
Jiang Fan narrowed his eyes.
Every "gift" was a cheat—but also a resource cost. He only had 10 Core Energy to begin with.
"I'll go with… Option 2. The schematic carving."
Knowledge must be shared.
And memory was the first step to civilization.
Inside the simulation, Unit 09 awoke from a strange dream. It didn't understand it—but it saw something new.
An image. A shape on the wall of the cave. Hands holding a blade. Another showing how to grind two rocks together.
With shaking fingers, it mimicked the shapes.
Others watched.
Curious. Confused. But intrigued.
They began carving too.
Soon, the cave was filled with etched memories.
And for the first time, they stopped being beasts.
They were becoming something else.
Back in reality, Jiang Fan's body trembled slightly. It wasn't from fatigue—but emotion.
He felt it again. The birth of knowledge.
It reminded him of the first time he held a soldering iron in his past life. How he had pieced together circuits late into the night, not knowing that years later, those very fingers would design propulsion systems that reached other stars.
This was that feeling again.
Only now… on a planetary scale.
"Hey." Lin Miaomiao leaned her head against his shoulder. "You're crying."
He touched his cheek. Just a drop.
He hadn't realized.
"I'm happy," he murmured. "They're learning."
"…You're a little weird, you know that?"
"I know."
They sat in silence for a while. Then she asked:
"Do you… think your planet will become strong?"
Jiang Fan didn't answer immediately.
He was watching the Proto-Units again. One had begun combining the sharpened blade with a stick—creating the first spear. Others started following. Tools were evolving. They were now hunting the synthetic beasts that wandered the planet's fields.
Hunger was no longer just endured. It was conquered.
"I don't want them to become strong," he said slowly. "Not just strong. I want them to become… enlightened."
[Deduction System Milestone Reached!]
[Primitive Age -> Tool Age Complete.]
[New Age Unlocked: Early Tribal Formation]
[Achievement: Firekindle Civilization – You are the first to reach tribal consciousness in your peer generation. Soul Potential Score +200!]
[Bonus Reward: Unlock 1 Cultural Focus Path]
The Path of Order (Early Governance)
The Path of Curiosity (Innovation Speed Bonus)
The Path of Unity (Cooperative Structures and Morale Boost)
Jiang Fan smiled.
This was it.
The beginning of everything.
He chose: The Path of Curiosity.
Because curiosity was the spark behind every machine. Every discovery. Every step forward.
The sun had fully set. Stars blinked to life overhead—some natural, some not. In this world, even the stars obeyed cultivation laws. But Jiang Fan's star—the one he had awakened—was different.
Its glow was cold.
Sharp.
Forged from logic and data.
It did not shimmer with spirit, but pulsed with intention.
Someday, the others would understand.
Someday, they would look up… and see machines orbiting their dreams.
And when that day came, they would remember the boy who awakened the coldest, smallest planet…
And made it into a civilization that rivaled gods.