Lightning Is the Only Way - Chapter 3 - 3 – Heaven's Problem

I had nothing left to live for.No family. No friends. No future.Just a shattered soul wandering through a world that had already taken everything.Then I died.And that’s when everything changed.I woke in a world of light. A void between realms. A place where gods whisper and broken souls wait to be judged. There, I met Ashen Crimson—a man who had once been worshipped, then feared, and finally cursed by the very gods he had defied. A tyrant who had destroyed his own world.But now, he’s offering me something terrifying:His life. His past. His power. His chance to make things right.The catch?The world of Zerawell is fractured.Ashen’s name is soaked in blood.His fate is sealed—exile, ruin, and eternal hatred.And now, it’s my name.Because I’ve been reborn as Ashen Crimson, heir to a house that both reveres and reviles me. A noble with dormant shadow magic, a shattered reputation, and a cursed destiny I never asked for.But I’ve lived a life of pain. I’ve walked alone through hell already.And I won’t follow his footsteps into madness.With a divine system familiar in my soul, a second chance burning in my chest, and the memories of a monster as my burden—I will rewrite this fate.Let them call me villain, disgrace, or traitor.I didn’t choose this story.But I’ll finish it.Even if it kills me.

Joseph Sullivan is at an all-time low. He lost his job, his fiancée dumped him, he moved back to the Midwest and currently lives in his parent’s basement—oh, and his workout was just interrupted with the arrival of the System.Earth has become a playing field in a contest amongst the gods, where mortals are the pawns. The winning god gets the glory, and their chosen champion gets a single wish. The first stage of this game: Tutorial – Class Selection.Provided the ideal stat array for a physical, combat-focused class, the choice for Joe is obvious. Until he fat thumbs the selection screen and ends up selecting Spellcaster. His starting Intelligence stat? 1.With a useless class selection and only his raw testosterone-fueled strength to back him up, Joe decides class optimization is for dummies. Pumping all stat points in Strength, he hopes to not only survive the contest of the gods, but to win the whole damned thing.After all, a real wizard should be measured by how much they can bench!

When the system warned the world that it was coming a week in advance, Alex couldn’t have been more excited. In college for a degree he didn’t care about to get a job he didn’t want, the promise of a world where magic and challenge awaited — even at the potential cost of death — was the best news he possibly could have imagined. Alex was ready for a new life. He ready for his only friend to shove him through a portal into hell the moment the apocalypse started. Instead of getting to punt rabbits and farm wolves, Alex finds himself stranded in a warped world where even the bugs are stronger than he is. Even with a summoner class that gains the powers of its monsters, most people would have died. Alex didn’t get the memo. He might have liked challenge a little bit too much. Where others saw certain death, he found something else. Opportunity.

“Nine Heavens cast down the Undying Tree, from the tomb the Immortal's bones were fetched;Taoist Venerable tut-tutted as they drank blood plasma, Old Buddha relished in the chew of meat;Beasts and livestock rang the Dharma Drum, city foxes and hole-dwelling rats boiled in the pot;In the Immortality Wine, the resentful spirits were fishy, at the Killing Banquet, the Dao Fruit was bitter!”In this world where Daoist Skill manifested, countless Sect Cultivators, Side Door Magicians, princes and scholars, officials of high rank and nobles all coveted immortality!Owl God Tomb, stealing heavenly secrets, Pearl Gathering Skill, Holy Infant Pill, bone effigies, Yin God Shrine, human-transformed monsters, Undying Elixir, Red Line Poison, Blood Immortal insects, Mermaid Meat, gold-threaded robes, Five Poisons Primordial Spirit, Seven Star Life Extension...They killed and harmed life only to steal the “Killing Dao Fruit” borne upon that Undying Tree!Until... a sly “Fishing Man” came to this world.Wang Yuan, born with the Small Book of Life and Death, had but a simple and unadorned dream:Amid bustling strings and smoky vistas, on a night bathed in moonlight, in peace and quiet did I lean on the rail, savoring the wind, toasting to the stars.With his “Bride in bridal clothes,” watching the sunrise at Taishan in the morning, admiring Qionghua in Luoyang at noon, and drinking under the aurora by the North Sea in the evening.“But you all smell so incredibly fragrant!No more, none shall escape, for today I shall crowdfund Cultivating Immortality! Please... my treasure, turn around!”The blood-red veil of the Bride abruptly fluttered to the ground.