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[His voice is lively and cheerful. He wears a grin as he gestures towards the screen. He's clearly holding it at selfie distance.]

Hello, fellow Heroes of this star! My name is Solus zos Galvus. It is plain to understand why they would employ my assistance in their time of crisis. Terribly inconvenient and inconsiderate of them to borrow me without asking...

[He catches a glimpse of something off screen, and sets the communicator down in a way that he can use it hands free. He spreads his hands out wide and shrugs his shoulders.]

But I can hardly blame them. I am a brilliant engineer, after all! Surely there must be other very talented individuals about.

I had just a short jaunt around town, and I must say that the technology is decent enough here, but I could not help but notice that it is not fully accessible to the common folk. Or should I say... The unpowered masses!

The government must not trust them very much to bar them from using the teleporters... Or, perhaps they simply don't have the capacity. Would it really be so difficult to build or distribute those lovely little nanites they were so keen on giving us?

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[He could feel the mockery, at least he assumed it was mockery. Even though... perhaps he actually was sort of important...? He had never actually thought of it like that.

...

He really was second in a large sect! That was quite....!!!

Not that it mattered, it had no bearing on this world and didn't even matter much in Proud Immortal Demon Way.]

We train with spiritual swords, thus discipline is in martial arts and sword arts. However, being a scholar my specialty is less of pure martial prowess and more of strategy and spell use.

[One day he should write a beginners guide to xanxia just to avoid this. It was a genre that existed in this world! Look it up!]

[Emet-Selch neglects to stifle his yawn.] Oh, that's my fault. I did ask.

Very fascinating. So what do you do for fun?

[He wonders if he's as stuffy as he seems. He must be. Discipline, ick. Meditation, terrible.]

[Maybe he should!]

Huh?

[What? How can you ask a question and then yawn? What kind of thing is that? Don't ask something and then be completely disinterested! (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻

And fun? What was he even supposed to say here? Of course, the things he did for fun was exploring a fantasy world and find different kinds of monsters to kill and try and get quest flags for side content. But, that wasn't something a peak lord would say so casually!

Tea? They did all sit around and drink tea a lot....

Fuck! No one had been like this yet! Did he just admit the truth...? This was so hard! It was so much easier when things weren't all mixed up! Genres should stay in their own categories! Multi crossovers like this always clashed, They were only good for the fanservice they offered, of pandering to character fan bases to buy and indulge in just to continue an obsession with a particular waifu or husbando!]

I enjoy reading....

[Not a lie!]

[A boring hobby for a boring person. He pulls a face, then relaxes it a bit. Maybe he read something interesting.]

And there are more types of books than people. I always like a nice drama or a tragedy.

[Did this boring meditating guy even know what either of those things are?]

[If only he knew all that was going on inside your head.]

I'm a gudgeon for a good romance, too. What sort of books do you read?

[If they have to do with his sect he's gonna scream]

[Alas the problem with Shen Qingqiu was that a lot happened inside his head, and little of that activity was displayed outwardly. The practiced special skill of a second son millennial shut-in? Who knows.]

Cultivation web novels.

[He froze and gripped his fan tightly, and then in an all too hurried voice added.]

That I have discovered while here on the devices that they have provided us with for communication that links the entire world together through the power of the....

...

wires.....

[He stopped, his recovery was lacking. He let the silence go on for far longer than was comfortable.

When in doubt, pretend you didn't say anything at all.]

I prefer stories with a good action pace, and a variety of creatures both interesting and fierce.

[Now what the fuck was all of that! Emet-Selch raises his chin to stare at him.]

No, no. Go back to that other part. It sounds more true.

[He understands what a network is. At least.]

Tell me about this "Cultivation". And leave out the boring parts, would you?

[Ug, let him pretend! Let him lie! He was crying internally, a modern setting really was hard to ignore!]

Cultivation... er, as a genre I suppose, is a type of story where the main character is a cultivator of spiritual power, who's goal is to become immortal or all-powerful, potentially ascend to godhood or some other such place of prestige or power. Staples in the genre are flying on swords, using spiritual powers to fight monsters, fight other cultivators, and do amazing and impossible things. It is common to follow the main character from young childhood when they first enter a cultivation sect up through their training and hundreds of years into the future when they get whatever the story offers as an ending.

There are subdivisions down, you have Stallion Cultivation novels which have the protagonist collect a harem, there are also mystery, romance, danmei and transmigration....

[Oh this was interesting now.]

The hero of your own tale then? [He chuckles, hand to lips.] A little self-indulgent, but what's the harm in a little fun, I say!

[A tale of ascending to godhood through one's own abilities. Curious.]

You claim that you discovered these stories that just happen to align with your own personage. Are you sure that you haven't just delved too deeply into your little acting role? I swear I saw your mask slip...

Edited 2020-03-09 07:51 (UTC)

[Don't call him out! It was hard alright? To be a modern-day transmigrator... transmigrating again into a similar modern world? If he were just in the world of Proud Immortal Demon Way it was easy to interact with everything as one should, but when put into a world with the internet and more advanced technology, how was he supposed to know what to do!?]

I am not the hero of any tale.

[If anything he was... the villain? He wasn't really sure what he was anymore, though this body definitely originally was the scum villain, he had changed so many plot points he wasn't sure he counted anymore.]

Sect elders are never the main characters anyway. They will either be cannon fodder while the hero seeks revenge or, a tragic loss to build the hero's backstory for revenge. The other option is to be the villain and thus wiped out, or the end boss.

[He wasn't going to acknowledge the last point. It was... not exactly wrong. But, he had already lived this transmigrated life for over ten years! Well, he was perhaps dead for five of them... but, still.>/i>]

Edited 2020-03-09 08:05 (UTC)

[Oh delightful, he called it.]

Oh no, that's so sad. You're not even playing the main character? Are you even a "stallion"?

[He laughs raucously.]

You've cast yourself in such terrible roles... Why?

[So this modern man, dressed so immaculately like a storybook character.]

I have a theater in Nonah, if you'd like someone else to cast you.

[He couldn't help but sigh.]

Of course not, such a thing, I would never want. That kind of thing, so many girls, I could care less.

[He had even skipped the sex scenes from the book....]

Do not misunderstand, your assumptions are wrong. I am indeed a cultivator and can prove that much.

[Well, he supposed he could explain the truth of it. It was almost relieving to finally tell someone who wasn't just simply in the same position.]

What you are missing in your theory is the concept of a transmigrator.

You don't care for girls? Well, neither do most of the men in my troupe. [He sips his drink through a straw before he sets it all down.]

There are pleasures to be gained from both, so to speak. [He lobs a devilish grin towards his unfortunate new acquaintance.]

Alright, tell me what a transmigrator is. Remember, don't bore me. [His voracious mind was already trying to figure out what that meant in his fellow's context.]

I did not say I don't like girls! Of course, I do, but who wants to actually be a harem protagonist? The ideal is a cute girl who will dote on you, one is enough. You need a proper connection, and time together.

[He was a romantic after all.]

Hmph.

Transmigration novels are where the protagonist dies and then is reborn in a fictional world, a novel they read, a video game they played, or even back in time to a historical setting. You can either be reborn as yourself, but most of the time you are reborn as a character or person that lived during that time or as part of that story or game.

Essentially a transmigrator wakes up in someone else's body and then has to live the life of that person, generally while trying to stay alive or change the original story. Some can be about trying to adhere to the original story as best they can as well.

Hmm... I suppose. But you don't seem like a man who has even that.

[Oh, eerie. He felt some similarities in that.]

You said transmigration novels. How much further down this rabbit hole are you?

[He punctuates this with a jabbing point towards the screen.]

Well... I have a cute disciple, that's good enough.

[Don't call him out! So what if he didn't have a cute girl to dote on him, that's fine! He didn't need it.]

I suppose if I were to say it plainly... my origins are that of a transmigrator into a Stallion Cultivation novel....

[He laughs, because it is absurd, and he doesn't believe him, but it's a lot more fun if he at least pretends to halfway.]

Ooohhh? Tell me about your "cute disciple". [He shifts to get more comfortable. He is just totally stretched out over his loveseat now. He rearranges his pillow.]

So you died, in some manner, and became this... This story book character. Sorry, this "Stallion Cultivator". Well, you aren't in a novel anymore... Are you adjusting well to a life without narration and rising or falling action? [He laughs at his own joke.]

So how did you die?

I am not a stallion cultivator, I'm the scum villain.

[This was... so annoying. All of his pretense was shattered at his feet.]

My disciple is the protagonist... but, some things may have changed. Once upon a time, they were very pure and adorable.

[Like accidentally turning the Stallion Novel into a BL novel and the harem protagonist into a male lead....]

I...

...

I died of food poisoning....

[He would not share that he had died from expired instant noodles, because he had been so mad about the ending of Proud Immortal Demon Way that he hadn't noticed the date!]

[Emet-Selch throws his head back and laughs.]

Food poisoning! Oh how cruel life can be... And crueler still, it seems. "Once upon a time"?

[He wipes away a tear with his gloved hand as he quiets his chuckling.]

You're familiar, then, with your own life's novel? I suppose the drama would be entirely missing were it a book you hadn't read... You wouldn't even know it was a book at all!

Of course, I am familiar, I have read all of its hundreds and hundreds of chapters.

[He did not like being laughed at, especially when he had been backed into a corner like this.]

If I am sharing so much, why not share a little of your life story as well?

Hmm, I think not! 'Tis but a dreary little story. Maybe one day.

[He doesn't feel bad at all for denying him.]

You have my name already... [lol] So why not tell me yours?

Shen Qingqiu.

[Of course he was denied.]

And I find that doubtful, no doubt a man such as yourself as nothing but interesting stories to share.

Ah, ah, ah! [He wags his finger at him.] Flattery will not loosen my lips, Shen.

[A beat]

Is that your name, or your villain's name?

That is my name, you need not worry about that.

[There was no escape, but, at least Shen truly was his family name, just, his personal name was Yuan, but that was fine, Qingqiu was a name of stature anyway, so it didn't matter.]

Can you not at least share things of your world? We all come from different places here.

Weeeell.... [ His voice draws out, the high-pitch part of it raising.] Alright. Who am I to deny such an avid lover of stories?

I’m from Garlemald, a fairly successful northern nation of a continent called Eorzea. It is populated with all manner of people and beasts. You really only see one sort of person here, wherever here is, exactly. I really haven’t seen any tails or pointed ears yet. I don’t know if they all just live someplace else...

I'm not too familiar, most people I have run across are rather normal I suppose.

There is some sort of AI robot and some aliens however.

[Now he actually was suprised that the ratio of traits represented were so similar.]

Perhaps those traits are more unique than not?

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