Chapter Seven: The Miniature Human Project 2.1

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My god! My god! I am the god!

Luozu was quite angry, yet he did not directly interfere with their rituals. He could only slowly change their perception of him. Otherwise, correcting them too forcefully might deepen their misunderstanding. Patience was necessary; he was in no rush. As for whether he should respond to their worship with a miracle, Luozu had no intention to do so. The human tribe was already capable of self-reliance, and any intervention on his part might hinder the progress of his breathing technique. The fundamental reason he performed such actions in the World-in-the-Jar was for the sake of his own breathing method. Although a recent accident had shown him a new path forward, the journey was still long, and exploration was essential. The experiments could not cease.

Harboring these thoughts, Luozu began urging them toward progress. To start, he drove monsters to attack the tribe. But this, too, took time. One or two monsters could not overcome this human tribe, nor could ten, for the small tribe now numbered three hundred people. It would require thousands upon thousands of monsters.

On the tenth day after the ritual, Luozu finally gathered a large horde of monsters and sent them charging toward the tribe. Sharp whistles, following Luozu’s prompt to the tribal chief, echoed throughout the camp.

“Enemies! Enemies are attacking!”

Men and women, strong and weak, young and old, all seized their stone-tipped spears, responded zealously, climbed the walls, and prepared to defend their people.

Battle erupted in an instant, raging for three days. The frenzied monsters fought to the death, while the human tribe resisted desperately. In the end, under the chief’s leadership and Luozu’s subtle guidance, the monster tide finally receded.

This battle cost the small tribe thirty-eight lives, and internal divisions soon followed. Some wished to migrate elsewhere, while others were reluctant to abandon their homeland. On the fifth day after the battle, following a tribal assembly, sixty people left to settle in a more defensible place.

Of course, Luozu had a hand in this as well. He suddenly began to understand why humanity, after leaving the protection of the Mother Nuwa, ventured into the vast wilderness, multiplying and expanding their territory. To remain forever in one place was to risk perishing in comfort and losing the will to strive.

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Yet even with a new tribe splitting off, Luozu was still dissatisfied; progress remained sluggish. Their exploration into breathing methods lagged behind his own. But there was no time to waste—time in the World-in-the-Jar flowed at the same rate as in the primordial world. The World-in-the-Jar’s light, too, came from the outside, and the spiritual energy in the land was all carried in by Luozu. Yet a single breath of spiritual energy from him was enough to sustain all life there; such was the disparity in scale.

How, then, to accelerate time? Of course, Luozu had no power over time. He couldn’t even grasp the time slipping away from himself, let alone manipulate it within the jar. After much contemplation, an idea dawned upon him: if he could not speed up time, perhaps he could accelerate their cell division and metabolism. Moreover, he could increase the speed of all life in the jar, especially their mental perception. By making their minds perceive “accelerated time,” he could, in a sense, truly hasten its passage.

The idea was promising, but Luozu decided to experiment first on a small scale, trying it on the multicellular organisms that had evolved from microbes and fungi. After a month of tests and adjustments, he launched the Small Human Tribe 2.1 Project.

With the acceleration of cellular division, Luozu now had to infuse nine times more spiritual energy into the World-in-the-Jar each day, totaling ten breaths. Thus, time flew by like an arrow; in the blink of an eye, ten years passed within the jar, while only a month elapsed in the outside world—a difference of more than a hundredfold.

By now, the small human tribe had split into three, venturing further into the land of the jar. Their exploration of breathing techniques finally bore fruit. Through expansion and conflict with monsters, they developed “martial arts”—methods of physical training and manipulating spiritual energy.

They called their technique the Circulation of Vital Energy and Blood. They diverged from Luozu’s path, focusing not on the mind or spirit, but on the strength of the body. By channeling spiritual energy into the bloodstream, their blood could be roused during combat, and this energy would seep out through the capillaries, forming a mist of blood—a mere phenomenon, yet telling.

When a tribe member’s blood mist was thick and enveloped the entire body, it meant they had cultivated their vital energy to an extraordinary degree. They classified their progress into three stages: the hands or feet, the four limbs, and finally the entire body.

“At last, there is progress,” Luozu exclaimed in the cave.

He wasn’t afraid of turbulence—what he feared was stagnation. That was how he now regarded the world within his jar.

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What Luozu now anticipated most was the surprises these ‘descendants’ might bring him. Perhaps he could invest even more spiritual energy, further accelerating the flow of “time.” But before this, Luozu wished to personally experience the marvels of vital energy and blood.

He fashioned for himself a body like those of the small human tribe and projected his spirit into it. Luozu had now mastered the art of spiritual possession—possession! The tribe’s ceaseless worship had enabled him to “descend” into the body of their most devoted member. In this way, Luozu developed autonomous spiritual possession.

However, this possession was limited to the minuscule bodies of the small human tribe; anything larger was beyond his reach.

In a remote wilderness, Luozu leapt and landed atop a mountain peak—a leap spanning a thousand zhang, according to the tribe’s measurement. This new body was robust, stronger than any in the World-in-the-Jar, though its vital energy had yet to be activated.

First, Luozu set aside his own breathing method and began practicing the vital energy breathing technique common among the tribe.

Rumble!

He heard the fusion and surging of blood and spiritual energy within himself, coursing through his veins. Instantly, a dense mist of blood enveloped his entire body.

Five centimeters—this was the current distance his spirit could extend from the body. But in the scale of the small human tribe’s world, those five centimeters became more than five hundred meters.

Thus, not only did his body roar with power, but the mountain itself echoed with thunderous sound. Thick clouds and white mist were pushed aside by his vital energy, and the crimson hue reflected upon the fog, casting a red glow over a ten-li radius.