Chapter 4: Chapter 4 – And still… A mortal?

James sat with his legs crossed, eyes closed, and hands pinched like he was a shaolin monk. He wore a fancy set of robes that felt more expensive than the biggest name brands. If he wasn’t wrong, these gold lines that ran on the soft white fabrics were actual gold lines.

As in… lines filled with real gold.

How rich did someone have to get to start wearing something so pretentious? James could only dream of such a reality. He wasn’t sure any emperor could afford to wear a kingdom's ransom worth on his clothes. Worse yet, he matched it all with solid wooden sandals that clinked like he was in Samurai Jack.

Foolish Samurai Warrior!

Aku’s famous one liner. That was the only thing he ever remembered the cartoon character to ever have said on repeat… but it was the most important one line in the entire story. Without Aku’s insistence and unrelenting desire to fuck over that samurai in particular–not considering the only weapon that could kill him–he might have really conquered the world in its entirety.

Maybe if he went in a more economic direction instead of the genocidal…

James tisked.

Focus.

Focus.

Focus.

Be like a tree… or a boulder, or is a mountain a more apt example? Strong winds tore trees out of the ground all the…

Focus.

It had been hard going, but James could confidently say he could sit there and actually meditate. Just sitting there unwilling to let his thoughts stray had been the only reason he hadn’t jumped off the island's edge already.

It allowed him a moment to ground himself and reset his mind. Insanity was just a step away, and this was its prescription. So, he struggled for ages to finally be able to sit and do nothing, think nothing, feel nothing but still be awake for long stretches of time.

James knew he was nearing the outer limit of what he could accomplish so far. The progress was very slow, needing so much time before he could finally see a difference in time he could let everything go. Good thing was, he had more of that than he could get his hands on.

It must have been decades–at least it felt like it–since the first day here. James had also recognized that time did move on the island, but it was so slow it might as well not even change.

James now sported a long willowy beard to his chest and long hair he let grow. It was his way to track time. Kinda…

He knew that it took years before his hair even showed signs of growing, and decades for it to turn into a small nicely kept one. James shivered at the thought of having been here for centuries.

Maybe he should shave or at least cut his hair. Maybe turn into an actual shaolin monk? Go fully bald, but last he remembered, it had been ages since he had last been bald, his head had too many bumps and weird knots from falling down so many times.

As a relatively average guy, that was quite a big problem. He wasn’t dashing to begin with, adding any extra disadvantage could only make his prospects worse. The beard hid his thin chin and gave him a mysterious look he enjoyed. He considered it a boost.

Congratulations on exceeding your limit!

Reward 12,922 exp

Reward 78 Superior Mana stones

Reward Ancient Primordial Destruction Dao - Evil 30% completion

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Reward DragonsWrath - Spear Weapon

James stared at the rewards. He had gotten numb to the amazing things that kept appearing. A long black spear stabbed into the earth like butter, only stopping after reaching a foot deep. Red serpentine dragons were locked in battle around the shaft. They looked so real, he could have been fooled to believe.

A bag clinked next to him. He sighed. With a wave of his hand it disappeared into the dusty and haggard rice bag.

Mana Stones. The Dao. Cultivation techniques. Spells. Magic. These had been common rewards lately, but they might as well have not shown up in the first place. They were all locked with the system interface.

He felt light headed for a quick second as the new Dao appeared around him, it warped the entire space–a stronger reaction than anything so far–all points of the island seemed to groan as though they were about to collapse. Then it stopped and everything was normal.

Ancient Primordial Destruction Dao - System has fully integrated

James stared at his hands, he knew more than should be possible every time one appeared, but he could never really touch them. No practice, no getting used to what could possibly be his one way card to an isekai cheat life.

He could feel its power just bubbling under the surface. Standing up, he stood in a boxing pose. Elbows tucked, orthodox stance, fists not fully closed, and started throwing punches. He could feel a quantified increase in strength this time with the new Dao, but the ultimate test was not too far away.

James leisurely walked to the big tree near the hut, the other two were quite far away, and stared up at his eternal nemesis. How many years had he tried the stupidest, most mortifying moves he could think up of, and yet it stood there unchanged.

His last level upgrade needed nearly seven hundred thousand experience points, considering that some, even a few points per ten levels had been allocated all this time. James should be able to leave a fist print, or make the tree wobble a bit at minimum.

James took a deep breath. Closed his eyes. He imagined all the power he kept reserved in his system. All the Daos and upgrades to his attributes. Every single ounce he could muster with his Qi, magic, and soul into a single fist.

He imagined he was Mike Tyson and prepared himself to throw the strongest counter right hook his enhanced body could launch. With all the practice he had gotten, maybe he was like mike…

Mike would probably still eat him alive just on ferociousness.

He let his breath out and threw his world shaking punch.

Unbeknownst to him, the world behind him froze. The clouds stopped moving, the sky turned a black. Eyes that contained the galaxies glared at the tree, affronted it would dare stand before its master.

A mouth appeared, filled with an endless abyss, and opened. It gave a silent roar channeling into the punch James had thrown. Cracks like a spiderweb rushed across the reality on the island all behind his back. The fabric of space tearing itself apart.

James fist landed on the tree. The exorbitant power rushed into the trunk filled with the relish of destroying an enemy.

And nothing happened.

The cracks sealed up, the fabric of space fully repaired, and the skies turned back to normal. All before James Anderson could notice anything was amiss. The tree absorbed the power and used it to continue to power the islands functions, it struggled to keep up with the destruction that came with every fully power punch he launched, but the amount of Qi, mana, and spiritual energy he used every time did enough to supplement all the repairs and save a tiny bit on top.

On the other hand, James was quite disappointed. Nothing happened. Was the rush of power and that indomitable feeling all fake? Was this really a dream? Why did he keep going through this every so often?

Existential crises are meant to be once in a lifetime type of thing, right?

Or maybe his mind needed to create fake images of progress and rewards to keep him sane. Did hallucinations happen in extreme conditions to keep people’s brains from frying? His shoulders couldn't help but sag a bit at feeling like a normal person after all this time.

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