1: Chapter 1: Lord Ye really would run away if he saw a dragon!

Xie Feng was dead.

Cause of death: Brain hemorrhage during a TRPG session.

As a seven-year fan of the cthulhu mythos and a veteran KP who knew the COC rules by heart, his last words before dying were: "This ruling is unreasonable, I request..."

Requesting anything was useless; it was a sudden brain hemorrhage.

The dice rolled. Fumble.

His life was gone.

When he opened his eyes again, Xie Feng found himself lying on a hard wooden bed.

The ceiling was made of wood. The air was filled with the scent of herbs and ink. Shouts from martial arts practice came from outside the window, full of vigor, making the window paper rattle.

A flood of unfamiliar memories rushed into his mind.

This body was also named Xie Feng, nineteen years old, a major good-for-nothing of the direct line of the Cangyun City's Xie Family.

Three years ago, during his martial Awakening, his bone structure was tested to be: Low-Low Grade. When others had their Awakening, they opened three or five meridians, but he only opened one.

Just one meridian.

The Xie Family couldn't afford to lose face like this, so they threw him into a side courtyard to fend for himself.

Tomorrow was the triennial Sect selection day.

The original owner of the body, overwhelmed by anxiety and anger, suffered a sudden arrest and died.

And then, he arrived.

"..."

Xie Feng stared at the ceiling, digested the memories, and slowly spat out a single word:

"Fuck."

Transmigration.

Transmigrated into a useless nobody in a high-martial world.

This world had Martial Artists, Sects, Cultivation Techniques, and Spirit Medicines. The Cultivation of Martial Artists was divided into Nine Realms, each with Nine Heavens.

"So the highest cultivation is 99% pure, a rare commodity?" Xie Feng's head was full of terrible memes.

The head of his own Family, the Xie Family Head Xie Tianxiong, was at the Seventh Heaven of the Fifth Realm, capable of shattering a small mountain with a single punch.

Him?

The Zero Heaven of the First Realm—and that was putting it nicely; in truth, he was just a Mortal.

He hadn't even figured out how to Cultivate.

"I suppose this is fine." Xie Feng sat up and stretched his unfamiliar body. "A high-martial world. Fortunately, it's not a Cthulhu world. At least the monsters here can be killed, and they follow some logic."

What he feared were things that defied all logic.

Tentacles, slime, going mad at a single glance... That kind of stuff was fine to read about in novels or play with in TRPGs, but if he actually encountered them...

Forget it, better not think about it.

A high-martial world was pretty good.

Being a useless nobody was also pretty good.

As long as he could stay alive, it was better than being dead.

"As for tomorrow? Who cares. Even as a waste, I'm a waste of a great Family. Lying around for the rest of my life without having to work is practically the ultimate dream!"

That night, Xie Feng lay in bed as his consciousness gradually blurred.

He had a dream.

In the dream, there was light.

Endless, infinite light.

The light had no temperature, was not dazzling, and was not even "bright"; it simply existed in a way that humans could not comprehend. Xie Feng saw the light spinning, or rather, countless spheres spinning within the light.

Between the spheres, geometric patterns were splitting, recombining, collapsing, and expanding.

Then, he saw the center of those spheres.

Something was there—not a human, not any living creature.

It was an "existence."

It existed in every sphere simultaneously, yet also existed outside of all spheres. It was the light itself, and also the darkness behind the light.

Xie Feng wanted to look away.

He couldn't.

He had played Cthulhu for seven years, reading all the lore books and running dozens of modules.

He recognized it.

The All-in-One.

The Key and the Gate.

The Ruler of Time and Space.

Yog-Sothoth.

"..."

Xie Feng opened his mouth in the dream.

It did not look at him.

It was looking at "everything" in "all places" simultaneously. Xie Feng was merely one of them, like a grain of sand on a beach, like a drop of water in the ocean.

Xie Feng realized one thing.

It existed in this world.

Not as a myth, not as a legend, not as a story.

That being truly existed.

Yog-Sothoth existed in this world. It existed at the beginning and end of all time. It existed in every crack of space. It existed within his own body.

His Transmigration was the result of Its gaze.

Or vice versa.

His Transmigration had drawn Its gaze.

It didn't matter anymore.

Because Xie Feng also realized another thing: he had been noticed. Not the kind of notice where "a deity occasionally glances at a Mortal." But the kind where "this thing is somewhat interesting, let me take a closer look."

"..."

The dream ended.

Xie Feng opened his eyes.

Dawn had broken. Sunlight filtered through the worn window paper, casting over his face. The shouts of martial arts practice outside continued as usual, accompanied by the chirping of birds.

Everything was perfectly normal.

Everything was exactly the same as yesterday.

Except for him.

Xie Feng slowly sat up.

And then, he began to bang his head against the wall.

His forehead slammed heavily against the dirt wall, one dull thud after another.

"Just let me die."

Thud.

"Let me die! Let me die! Let me die!"

Thud. Thud. Thud.

"I was just fucking playing a TRPG session, who did I piss off?!"

Thud!

Plaster fell from the wall in flakes.

A curse came from the neighboring courtyard: "What kind of madness is this so early in the morning?!"

Xie Feng didn't give a damn about him.

He banged his head a few more times, then stopped, resting his forehead against the cold wall, and began to seriously ponder a question.

Is it too late to commit suicide now?

Most likely, it was too late.

Because Xie Feng knew—or rather, It had made him realize in the dream—that Yog-Sothoth's gaze would not end with death.

It existed in all time. If he committed suicide, It would see him commit suicide. Before he even committed suicide, It had already seen what lay after his suicide.

There was no escape.

"..."

Xie Feng buried his face against the wall.

His greatest hobby in life was the cthulhu mythos. Buying sourcebooks, writing modules, and running TRPG sessions for newbies. Who in the group chat didn't know that Xie Feng was Cthulhu's number one fan?

But that was fake!

That was just like Lord Ye loving dragons!

Who the fuck actually wanted to meet Yog-Sothoth?!

He only dared to play horror games during the day. When watching a Cthulhu movie, he had to keep the live comments on to shield himself.

He didn't actually like Cthulhu; he just liked the feeling of "appreciating unspeakable horror from an absolutely safe distance."

Well, great.

Distance: Zero.

Safety: None.

"..."

Xie Feng lay back on the bed, staring blankly at the ceiling.

A high-martial world? A useless starting position? Abandoned by his Family?

He didn't care about any of that anymore.

What he cared about was that Yog-Sothoth was watching him.

Watching him constantly.

"I want to go home," Xie Feng muttered.

No one answered.

That feeling of being watched was becoming clearer and clearer.

Like someone was standing right behind him.

No.

Like someone was standing in every direction.

At noon, someone came knocking on the door.

"Xie Feng! Today is the last day of the Sect selection. If you don't go now..."

The person outside pushed the door open and froze upon seeing Xie Feng's state.

Xie Feng was curled up in the corner of the bed, wrapping himself tightly in his quilt. His face was deathly pale, his lips trembled, and his eyes were bloodshot.

"What's wrong with you?"

Xie Feng looked up, staring at the visitor with eyes devoid of any hope.

"Let me ask you a question."

"Huh?"

"If there is an existence that exists in all time and all space, capable of seeing all of the past, present, and future, and it is currently watching you..."

"What are you talking about?"

"...Do you think there is still any point to Cultivate?"

The visitor fell silent for a moment.

"Did you suffer a Qi Deviation from your Cultivation?"

Xie Feng pulled the quilt back over his head.

"Never mind. You wouldn't understand."

"No, are you going to the Sect selection or not? Today is the final day!"

Muffled words drifted out from under Xie Feng's quilt.

"Not going. I want to sleep."

"Sleep? At a time like this?!"

"I'm sleeping! It would be best if I just slept to death."

The visitor was left speechless.

"Fine, go or don't go, see if I care. I'm leaving."

The door closed.

Xie Feng curled up in the quilt, closing his eyes, trying to fall back asleep.

Perhaps if he fell asleep, he could forget.

Perhaps if he had another dream, It would stop watching him.

Perhaps...

Xie Feng found that he couldn't fall asleep.

Because every time he was about to drift off, he would see those lights.

Those spinning spheres.

That existence which existed in all time and space.

It was still watching him.

It was even "closer" now.

Xie Feng opened his eyes, stared at the ceiling, and let out his first despairing sigh since his Transmigration:

"I don't want to play anymore. Let me go back."

No one responded.

Only the sunlight filtered through the window paper, quietly falling upon his face.

Warm and peaceful.

Completely out of place in this world.

Yet Xie Feng knew that in the places where this sunlight could not reach, in those countless cracks of time and space...

The All-in-One was watching him.

With a hint of curiosity.

Like a human watching an oddly colored ant that had suddenly appeared in an ant colony.

Author's Note: (A fundamentalist Cthulhu novel. If you are interested, you can treat it as an educational piece on the cthulhu mythos. If there is anything you do not understand, please check the paragraph comments; the author will actively answer them.)