When I opened my eyes, I immediately checked my hands.

  White. Long elegant fingers. Glowing with the same brilliance as the hands of a cultivator.

  Ke Yin’s hands.

  With relief pouring over me so fast, I needed a moment to catch my breath.

  I breathed in and out deeply. My chest rose and fell in its usual rhythmic motion; the same motion I knew in this world, in this cultivation sect where people ride on swords, and make universes inside of their souls.

  I was back.

  I was alive.

  "Master?" Azure’s voice whispered into my mind, worried and unsure.

  "Yeah," I replied, then instantly felt silly for talking out loud, so continued in my mind. "Yeah, I’m fine. How ‘bout you?"

  "I’m… trying to process what just happened," Azure said. “That was scary.”

  Scary didn’t even begin to cover it.

  I sat up in my small bed and ran my fingers through my hair. It felt natural; felt right. This was my body. At least, this was the body I currently inhabited, and that raised a lot of questions that I couldn’t answer.

  “Azure,” I began slowly. “What happened to me?”

  “I don’t know, Master,” Azure said, hesitating. “One minute you were achieving Qi Condensation Stage 2 and celebrating your success…” He stopped. “And then your soul was ripped from your body.”

  I remember that sensation. The tugging started off as a gentle touch before it turned violent.

  “And then I was in that other world,” I said slowly as I tried to put everything together.

  “In Tomas’s body. With the two suns and raiders and that... that creature at the end.”

  The Skybound. The robed figure who killed me with a flick of their wrist, as easily as I would swat a fly.

  “Do you think it’s related to how you originally came to this world?” Azure asked.

  “It could be,” I said. “But the mechanisms seem different. The first time, I died. Hit by a truck, very dead, and then I woke up here in a body that had just died. That made a twisted kind of sense. Soul transmigration at the moment of death, body swap, whatever you want to call it."

  “But this time you didn’t die,” Azure finished. “You were alive and cultivating. Yet, you were still pulled away.”

  “Exactly,” I said. “And in that other world, the two suns world, I took control of Tomas’s body right as he died from a blow to his head.” I rubbed my temples, a headache starting to build. “So, the pattern appears to be that I arrive in bodies at the moment of their death. But what causes the jump? That’s the big mystery.”

  “The first jump occurred when you died on Earth,” Azure stated thoughtfully. “The second jump occurred shortly after you broke through to Stage 2.”

  “So, does every breakthrough mean I’ll be sent to another world?” The thought was making my stomach flip-flop. “If that’s the case, that would be a nightmare. I’d never be able to cultivate safely.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “Maybe it’s not every breakthrough,” Azure speculated. “Maybe it was something unique about this one. Or maybe… maybe it has to do with your extremely high Soul Essence.”

  That was a possibility. My Soul Essence was at 100 when the average for Qi Condensation Stage 1 was 8. Even after breaking through to Stage 2, where the average would be 9, I still possessed that huge advantage. Perhaps that was why my soul could travel between worlds in the first place.

  “Whatever the cause,” I said, “we need to figure out how to survive it.”

  Because that was the biggest issue. I could speculate all day about the metaphysics of soul transmigration, but it wouldn’t matter if I died in one of those other worlds. And I had died. That Skybound killed me with what looked like nothing. If I hadn’t jumped back to this body, that would have been it. Game over.

  “Master,” Azure said hesitantly. “I have an idea.”

  “What is it?”

  “In the two suns world, there was no spiritual energy,” Azure explained. “Your cultivation advantage didn’t count since there was no cultivation to begin with.”

  He paused.

  “But what if you could transform your Soul Essence into Physical Essence in the new world? Or even Spiritual Energy if that world uses some sort of energy system?”

  I thought about that. Soul Essence was based on the strength and resilience of the soul. Physical Essence represented the body’s potential. They’re both connected but separate stat categories, each providing different functions.

  “You’re suggesting I find a way to transfer my soul’s strength into physical ability?”

  “Yes. If you land in a world with no cultivation but with a stronger body, you’ll have a greater chance of surviving.”

  It wasn’t a terrible idea. Actually, it was a pretty good idea. The problem was, I had absolutely no clue how to accomplish it.

  “The sect library,” I said, sitting upright. “They must have some techniques for soul cultivation. Maybe one of those techniques will give us some information on transferring soul energy into physical ability.”

  “It’s worth researching,” Azure agreed. “However, you’ll have to be careful about what questions you ask. Soul cultivation is rare, and asking too many questions may attract the wrong type of attention.”

  Right. Because I still have to keep reminding myself that I’m an imposter wearing a dead kid’s face. If anyone found out who I really was, things would go horribly wrong very quickly.

  I looked out the window of my cell. The courtyard outside was dark except for the faint glow of moonlight. Nighttime. I didn’t know how long I’d been away, how much time had passed in this world while I was fighting for my life in another.

  “Azure, do you believe that time moves at the same rate across worlds?”

  “No,” he said. “It doesn’t appear to.”

  “How long was I gone for in this world?”

  “A few minutes,” Azure said. “You achieved Qi Condensation, your soul was pulled away, and then a few minutes later, you returned.”

  A few minutes.

  But in the two suns world, I experienced what seemed like a full day of battle.

  Time really did move differently.

  “At least my body didn’t die while I was gone,” I said jokingly. “That would have been embarrassing. Break through to Stage 2 and die for no reason whatsoever.”

  I yawned, suddenly exhausted from the mental fatigue of everything that happened, plus the actual breakthrough to Qi Condensation, and I needed rest.

  “We should sleep,” I said. “Tomorrow, we pick our cultivation methods.”

  “Cultivation method?” Azure’s eyes lit up. “That’s a major decision!”

  “Yeah. Senior Sister Liu told us to spend the first week establishing a solid base before choosing our method. She said too many students got excited and rushed their decisions, and chose methods that either didn’t fit them, or couldn’t be practiced properly.”

  It made sense. A cultivation method would determine how your internal world develops. It would define which elements you added, how you structured your space, and what type of power you would ultimately have.

  Making that decision in haste would be dumb.

  Especially considering all the other problems I had to worry about, such as being randomly yanked into other worlds where I could die at any moment, the cultivation method seemed almost minor.

  Almost.

  I laid back down on the mattress, covering myself with the thin blanket. The nighttime air was cool but not uncomfortable. I could see the stars in the sky through the window. Not the two suns of that other world, just regular stars in a regular sky.

  Well, normal for a cultivation world where people could fly, and create pocket universes in their minds.

  “Master,” Azure said softly, “I’m glad you’re safe.”

  “Me too, Azure. Me too.”

  I closed my eyes and allowed myself to drift into sleep.