Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition - Chapter 520 : Story 520: Shadows in the Fog

After suffering from a heat stroke while working under the scorching heat of summer, Lu Zhou, a hardworking but poor university student, somehow becomes the owner of an advanced technological system. With the cheat given by the system, his university life changes overnight.

A Master’s degree? Easy.

PhD? Not a problem.

From a nobody, he quickly becomes a huge celebrity in the world of science. With the missions given by the system, he is on his way to winning a Nobel Prize.

“System, can points be exchanged for money?”

“No.”

“F**k, what use are you then!?”

“This system will make you the ultimate scholar, the kind that lords over all of humanity. What use will money be to you?”

- Description from Novelupdates

This year, Ji Jingqiu is 16 years old.To survive, he envisions the Fire House Buddha Prison, plants a bodhi treasure tree, and embarks on the path of martial arts.Many years later,A brilliant light arises, illuminating endless darkness.A towering ancient tree, with emerald green leaves and a canopy like a pavilion, rises with glass-like clarity into the sky, supporting a divine realm of pure land, spanning countless ages, illuminating the three realms and ten directions.On this day,All martial artists under heaven look up to it, like mayflies seeing the blue sky.......“Within there is a bodhi tree, which I planted when I set foot in martial arts, and now it has grown to provide a canopy.”“I see everything in the world, and nothing is like me.”“That year, I scoured history books, this history without era, I looked horizontally and vertically, and saw those characters – ‘The world’s storms come from us.’”...— Excerpt from the autobiography of Ji Jingqiu, the proud sun of the martial arts world of today.

Author, God or Plaything?Zar had just finished writing the prologue of his magnum opus—The Nexus Verse—a boundless verse of multiverses, godlike beings, and an elite academy meant to shape the strongest entities in existence. Years of meticulous world-building, complex power systems, and lore so deep it could drown a god… and yet, it was all just fiction.Until it wasn’t.On the night of his 22nd birthday, reality itself fractured. In an instant, he was torn from his world—only to awaken within the Nexus Verse as one of its rulers.There was just one problem.He had only written the prologue.Everything beyond that? Scattered notes. Unfinished ideas. Incomplete power systems. The vast, living, breathing multiverse around him was full of gaps he never filled. The beings he once considered mere characters now had wills of their own, and some of them were already far beyond his control.To make matters worse, the Nexus Academy—his ultimate creation, the battleground where gods and devils alike trained to surpass reality—had just started its entrance exam. And somehow, he was now part of it.Armed with only a mysterious system, fragmented knowledge of his own lore, and the terrifying realization that he may have made this world far too overpowered, Zar has only one goal:Survive.Because in a world where destroying a multiverse is just a Tuesday challenge, where ancient beings lurk in the void waiting for a single mistake, and where the strongest warriors wield power beyond his comprehension...Being the author doesn’t mean he’s the one in control.After all, if this verse was created… what destroyed the others?*****For fans of: Overpowered protagonists, cosmic-level world-building, reality-defying battles, eldritch horrors, and gods who fear greater forces.Additional tags#Gods #Devil #Ancient beings #Creators #Monarchs #OverpoweredBeings

Unite the Clans? Create an Empire?Atrox Soryu thought he was destined for greatness… until he wasn’t.Born into the smaller Soryu Clan, Atrox was a prodigy, praised for his unparalleled swordsmanship and relentless ambition. He vowed to become Emperor of the Eternal Skies, a title that hadn't been claimed in centuries. But on the day he was to manifest his Order Mark—the source of every knight’s power—everything went wrong.Instead of the revered Holy, Elemental, or Mystic Orders, Atrox was branded with a Forbidden Order: Something twisted and wrong. A death sentence in the eyes of the world. Branded a monster and exiled by his own father, Atrox was cast into a brutal labor camp where the weak are crushed, and the strong are barely tolerated.But exile isn’t the end—it’s the beginning. In the harshest of conditions, Atrox awakens the full potential of his forbidden powers, powers that could rival even the strongest Knights. He will forge alliances with the forgotten, turn his enemies into allies, and rise from the shadows to build an empire from nothing.Betrayed, exiled, and broken? No. Atrox Soryu is building an empire—and the Eternal Skies will bow to him.