"A small world that can actually be developed… tsk, tsk. I really struck gold this time."
The corners of Xiao's lips curled upward, harder to suppress than the recoil of an AK.
Xiao understood perfectly well: the reason he defeated Siheyuan Xiao wasn't because he was overwhelmingly powerful—but because he was lucky.
With the potential of a small world, if Siheyuan Xiao had put in even a little effort into development, Sebastian Xiao would have had no chance of winning.
The power of a world—no matter how small—is terrifying. Even a small world less than six hundred meters across was enough to overpower Sebastian Xiao.
In truth, Siheyuan Xiao's biggest mistake was ignorance. He simply didn't understand the nature of the Daluo Arena, and that ignorance created a massive advantage—an information gap Sebastian Xiao fully exploited.
After all, who would ever imagine that after time-traveling, they wouldn't be the only "self" in the world?
Much less that they would have to fight all their other selves.
Besides, every Xiao carries a fragment of the Daluo after transmigrating, and almost all of them have some kind of golden finger. Naturally, all these alternate Xiaos lived lazily.
Before entering the Daluo Arena, they all lived nearly identical lifestyles:
either suffering but still indulging themselves, or relying on their cheats to drift through life without ambition.
Most of their "post-transmigration memories" involved nothing but eating, drinking, and killing time. Aside from their initial battlefield encounter, they'd spent the rest of their days in pure enjoyment.
In terms of Marvel-style mutant classifications, Sebastian Shaw's ability is Level 4.
Sebastian Xiao, after the bootleg enhancement of Compound V, had zero long-term potential—but even if his potential were high, the Black Emperor's genuine Energy Absorption was still only a peak Level 4 mutant ability.
By contrast, Siheyuan Xiao's small world might have been weak early on—far inferior to simple energy absorption—but its potential was infinite.
A small world was famous for its massive growth ceiling. If fully developed, even the weakest small world user could become a dimensional demon god. A strong one could possibly ascend to the rank of Creator God.
But because Siheyuan Xiao never bothered to develop his power,
despite having a small world with infinite potential,
he still ended up defeated by Sebastian Xiao—whose ability had no future at all.
Sebastian Xiao simply won because he awakened a strong combat ability from the very beginning.
Yes, after awakening it he was basically "finished"—he had no future growth.
But the future is the future.
Right now is right now.
For those who never developed their potential, no matter how infinite their future prospects, they could only lose to Sebastian Xiao, who had strength now, even if he had no future later.
After absorbing the small world's infinite potential, even Sebastian Xiao's fatal flaw—lack of growth—was finally patched.
…
…
Xiao wandered leisurely through the small world that now belonged entirely to him.
Maybe it was because of the era he came from… or maybe it was just a universal trait shared by every courtyard-transmigrator—
food always ended up being the most important thing in their hearts.
As a result, more than half of the small world's land had been devoted to crops.
Another fifth was taken up by precious medicinal herbs, and the remaining third was dedicated to livestock, poultry, and fish ponds.
Herbal plants grew in lush clusters. Short-term medicinal herbs were piled up everywhere to dry, while long-term ones—like ginseng—needed at least twenty years to mature.
Fortunately, time here flowed ten times faster. Grain ripened in half a month, and livestock matured in a single month. The world itself even offered auto-harvest and auto-packaging functions.
But what drew Xiao's curiosity the most was the wooden house standing in the exact center of the small world—a structure that had never existed before.
It had been deliberately hidden by Siheyuan Xiao, kept as the trump card meant for defeating Sebastian Xiao.
Inside the wooden house were all kinds of daily necessities and household furniture, piles of gold, silver, and jewels, and fully furnished kitchens, bedrooms, and bathrooms.
In the bedside drawer of the bedroom, Sebastian even discovered a thick stack of early-PRC banknotes—the so-called "Big Black Ten"—totaling tens of thousands.
There were also two special spatial storerooms.
One stored weapons, ammunition, clothing, tools, and every kind of practical item imaginable.
The other contained mountains of fresh food: fruits and vegetables, rice and grains, all kinds of meat, everything so fresh it looked like it had just been picked or butchered.
Clearly, time inside these warehouses stood completely still—nothing would rot as long as it was stored here.
Xiao grabbed a bright red apple, wiped it on his sleeve, and took a bite.
Ka-cha— ka-cha—
The crisp sound echoed delightfully in his ears. Sweet juice burst across his tongue—rich yet refreshing, without the slightest hint of greasiness.
A single apple tasted better than all the apples he'd eaten across two lifetimes combined.
One apple vanished immediately into his stomach, and with only a brief pause, Xiao grabbed more fruits and began devouring them without restraint.
When he finished, Xiao casually decomposed the leftover cores into nutrients—
one of the greatest conveniences of the small world. Anything could be broken down and returned to the soil to enrich it.
The more nutrients returned to the land, the faster crops grew, the larger the earth expanded, and the more the small world itself evolved.
Heading into the backyard, Xiao discovered yet another farmland area. But the plants here were different—every stalk radiated a faint glow.
Xiao froze only for a moment before the memories of "the other me" surfaced, and at last he understood their purpose.
Only then did Xiao realize that the small world's greatest power wasn't its land, nor its farming and livestock.
The true terror of the small world lay in its concept-planting law.
Anything—whether physical or not—as long as it belonged to Xiao, could be condensed into a concept seed.
Once planted in the soil, that conceptual seed would absorb nutrients, grow into a plant, and eventually bear fruit—producing several times the original value.
"Other-Me Xiao" had already experimented with planting metal ores, gold, silver, and gemstones. Every one of them grew into corresponding "crops."
Even things inseparable from the human body—physical strength, abilities, lifespan—could be planted.
Siheyuan Xiao's strength, several times beyond human limits, had come from harvesting these conceptual fruits.
Of course, planting such conceptual abilities wasn't free. To make them truly blossom and bear fruit, a tremendous amount of soil fertility was required.
The stronger the concept, the more fertility the seed consumed. If fertility wasn't sufficient, the fruit's maturation would be delayed.
Fertility could be replenished in various ways—by expending one's own stamina, by devouring large quantities of external substances, even by consuming the origin of the small world itself.
The small world also absorbed energy from the outside world on its own, but compared to directly consuming external objects, that naturally absorbed energy was nothing more than a drop in the ocean.