#1embark on a journeyAI Model: gemini-2.5-flash
Chapter 1: Embark on the Journey
Ethan massaged his throat, then took a small sip of water from the wooden spoon.
"There's only a little water left. If I don't see land or it doesn't rain again, I might become the first transmigrator to die of thirst." Looking at the nearly empty water bucket, Ethan felt that dying this way was too pathetic, completely shaming the entire transmigrator community.
Putting down the wooden spoon and covering the bucket, Ethan stood at the bow of the small boat again. While telling himself inwardly, 'Heaven never seals off all the exits!' and 'Everything will be alright!', he straightened his body and looked out at the boundless sea, hoping to see something at the edge of his vision—anything, as long as it wasn't just endless water.
Raising his left hand, he concentrated his mental energy. A faint blue light suddenly appeared in his upward-facing palm, and then a blue, translucent ball of light materialized in Ethan's hand.
There was nothing particularly special about the light ball, except for an arrow-like object in the center pointing in the direction the small boat was sailing.
"I firmly believe you are my cheat. Please don't screw me over..."
Recalling the years since he arrived in this strange world, Ethan suddenly felt that pinning his hopes on something he didn't even know what it was, was truly unreliable.
"In the future... I can't do such thoughtless things again... if there is a future..."
Ethan, who was also named Ethan in his previous life, the only difference being that his previous life's surname was Yi, while in this world he didn't even have a surname, just a simple name: Ethan.
In his previous life, Ethan was a very ordinary person. His studies were neither good nor bad, his personality was neither good nor bad, he found a job that neither made nor lost money, and his life was just passable.
He had thought he would live out his life so uneventfully, but an acute illness took his life, and when he woke up, he was already in this world.
Fortunately, he directly possessed the body of a seriously ill young man and fully inherited the young man's memories, learning the language and some basic knowledge of this world, which allowed him to quickly integrate into the new world without the young man's father noticing anything amiss.
He gradually grew up under the care of his new father, and over these years, he also learned what kind of world this was.
A world full of seawater, where land was extremely scarce and simply couldn't support too large a population, even though the ocean near the islands had pleasant climates and abundant seafood, there was ultimately a limit.
Over the years, Ethan had seen countless people leave everything to their children and then sail alone into the completely unknown ocean, searching for the legendary endless land—not a single person returned. Ethan himself had never seen one, nor had he heard of any returning examples from the few elders.
Therefore, Ethan came to a conclusion: this was a backward and ignorant small island, following the simplest rules to continue life, and those who sailed out were merely giving the chance to live to their descendants. The so-called endless land was perhaps just a regular continent, only difficult to reach with the ships from this island.
"They must have all died at sea."
Otherwise, there's no reason there wouldn't be a single example of someone returning. It's not like there wouldn't be anyone who wanted to bring their wife and children back, right?
Whether this was true or not, Ethan didn't know, but when he was sixteen, his father contracted a serious illness after returning from a fishing trip and passed away after half a month.
In the following days, after fulfilling the duties a son should, Ethan did not take over his father's work, 'filling the gap' in the most 'sought-after' fishing fleet on the island. Instead, he found the small boat his father had quietly prepared long ago, loaded it with supplies, and embarked on the journey to find the 'endless land'.
His choice was driven not only by his unwillingness to live another ordinary life on a 'backward and ignorant' small island, but also by the peculiar light ball pointer in his hand.
From being vague and unformed at first, to gradually taking shape but flickering as if interfered with, to now being able to stably maintain the light ball shape without any problems, Ethan had spent a full seven years.
In these seven years, from the moment Ethan could tell it was a pointer, the direction it indicated had never changed, pointing steadily in a fixed direction.
Having been influenced by numerous novels in his previous life, Ethan felt this was telling him, 'Leave that unpromising small island; a brighter future awaits you.'
Sailing, from being unfamiliar to gradually skilled, the theoretical knowledge learned from his father slowly transformed into practical skills. Although he occasionally fumbled and made mistakes, luckily this sea area was very gentle, without strong winds, storms, or huge waves, giving this novice enough time to improve his sailing proficiency.
Especially as the three arrows on the light cluster pointer in his hand turned into two, and now into one, some troubles encountered after setting sail seemed to disappear, and he became increasingly expectant of the treasure he was about to obtain.
Until... the fresh water on the boat was almost used up, and he finally realized he was on the vast, boundless sea, and no one would come to save him. All his reliance was on this small boat less than ten meters long. Without fresh water, he probably wouldn't survive three days.
"Indeed... I was just an ordinary person in my last life, how could I suddenly become the child of the plane and the center of the world?"
Looking at the bucket that had been dried out by the sun, Ethan instead became completely calm.
"Worrying is useless. Now, either hope for rain, or I can only place my hope in this pointer that I don't know where it's pointing."
Gambling everything, Ethan squeezed out almost all of his potential, not only sailing the small boat quickly but also using the remaining scarce watery fruits to sustain his body's needs.
He managed to hold on for another five days like this, and just when he was about to give up, Ethan noticed that the light cluster pointer in his hand finally changed.
It no longer pointed forward but pointed firmly downwards.
"Here? Is it here?"
Lowering the sail and dropping the anchor, Ethan looked around with a bewildered expression. The scenery in his eyes hadn't changed at all; it was still the endless sea.
"Could it be underwater?"
His face turned even paler. Ethan had lived on an island his whole life and made a living from the sea, so his swimming ability was naturally not bad. But he had been sailing on the sea for so many days without seeing land, who knew how deep the sea beneath him was?
The only color he could judge by—strangely, after sailing for so long, the color of the seawater was still light blue with a hint of green. Although it indicated it wasn't true deep sea, it wasn't a depth a person could dive to the bottom of without any equipment.
"I've been tricked..."
He sighed helplessly.
"And directly tricked to my death! I just wonder if I'll get another life this time?"
Ethan sat on the bow of the boat helplessly, wondering if he should just jump in and take his chances. Maybe drowning would be better than dying of thirst?
Lost in thought, he raised his left hand again. Ethan suddenly noticed a strange change in his hand.
Previously, other than concentrating his mental energy on his left hand to summon the light ball pointer, there was nothing special about it. But this time, he found that a complex pattern had appeared on the back of his left hand.
"This..."
As the pattern gradually became clearer, he could also gradually see what it was.
"Looks like a magic circle?"
Just as the magic circle finally formed and began to emit a soft blue light, a surge of mental energy suddenly flowed back into his brain from his left hand.
In an instant, Ethan suddenly understood what this thing was all about.
"Hahaha, as expected, heaven never... cough cough cough..."
One really shouldn't get too cocky. Ethan, who almost choked to death, no longer stood at the bow posing but honestly walked to the most stable spot in the middle of the boat. Then, he knelt on one knee and placed his left hand on the 'ground'.
"I need to mobilize all my mental energy... My current state isn't great, I don't know if it's enough."
Regardless, Ethan decided to try it once. If this attempt failed, he could perhaps try again with the little food he had left. If he rested, the mental energy he had gained from the surprise might dissipate, and he might die before he could even last until then.
"There's no choice, I have to go for it!"
Gambling everything, Ethan sent all his mental energy to his left hand. Years of practice made doing this effortless for him, with almost no difficulty at all.
And the magic circle, which received Ethan's concentrated mental energy, also became increasingly dazzling, finally erupting in a blinding light and displaying a magic circle pattern identical to the one on the back of his hand on the 'ground' as well.
"It worked!"
Seeing the magic circle appear, Ethan knew he had succeeded. The mental energy feedback from the magic circle to his mind not only told him how to use it but also showed him the state of a successfully activated magic circle, and even 'told' Ethan the function of this magic circle.
Plane Travel!
This was the function of this magic circle.
Ethan, steeped in web novels, didn't need to think much to know exactly what this meant. Although it still contained boundless risks, he was about to die of thirst anyway and had no room for choice.
"No matter what, it can't possibly send me to a place where I can't even get a sip of water, right..."
Just as the light of the magic circle gradually enveloped Ethan and the teleportation was about to begin, Ethan suddenly felt a dizzy spell, like the weakness he felt after staying up all night studying back in school, causing him to fall directly to the ground.
"To fall at the very last moment... I'm really unlucky..."
Before his consciousness disappeared, Ethan vaguely saw the surrounding light slowly dissipate. A group of people wearing long robes were staring at him with wide, vigilant eyes, and one bald woman in a yellow robe was slowly walking towards him, seemingly saying something?