I Died Inventing Cultivation, Now the Heavens Call Me Genius

The first thing Ethan Cole heard after being reborn was a woman screaming that the heavens were about to punish them.

“The laws are gathering around the child! Your Majesty, we must move him before they descend!”

Ethan struggled to open his eyes, but his eyelids felt impossibly heavy, and his body refused to respond. When he tried to speak, only a weak infant's cry escaped his throat.

What the hell is happening?

Moments earlier, he had been standing inside his sealed laboratory, studying a strand of silver energy suspended in a crystal container. Years of research had brought him to that breakthrough. If his theory was correct, the mysterious energy known as Si could change the fate of everyone born without the heavens' recognition.

He had reached for the energy, and then unbearable pain had torn through his body. His instruments shattered, his consciousness faded, and the last thing he remembered was the terrifying sensation of something looking back at him from inside the silver strand.

Now he was a newborn baby in a world where people apparently feared the heavens.

Wonderful. I died for science, and the universe rewarded me with another lifetime of helplessness.

“Your Majesty, look!”

A crushing pressure filled the chamber as golden lines appeared across the ceiling. The midwives dropped to their knees while the glowing patterns twisted into intricate symbols above the bed. Ethan recognized their mathematical structure immediately because they resembled the equations he had spent years trying to reproduce.

However, these markings were alive.

They flowed across the ceiling like golden rivers, converging above his crib as the air trembled and every candle in the chamber burned with a strange white flame.

A man wearing an embroidered black robe stepped forward, his expression filled with disbelief.

“Is this truly a heavenly manifestation?”

The woman beside him held Ethan against her chest. Although exhaustion had drained the color from her face, her sharp eyes remained fixed on the golden light.

“William,” she whispered, “if the entire palace witnesses this phenomenon, our enemies will hear about it before sunrise.”

Emperor William Cole glanced toward the windows, where golden radiance illuminated the night sky.

“Let them hear!” he declared proudly. “My son has been blessed by the heavens!”

Ethan nearly choked on his outrage.

Your son? I have research notes, a laboratory, and an entire life's work!

Unfortunately, none of those accomplishments could help him when he could barely control his neck.

“His name will be Ethan,” the woman announced with a faint smile.

The emperor nodded approvingly.

“At least I kept my name,” Ethan thought, trying to find comfort in that small victory.

Before he could gather his thoughts, another golden symbol descended from the ceiling and hovered above his forehead. It rotated slowly, as though examining him, while the midwives bowed lower in reverence.

“The heavens have chosen him!” one woman whispered through her tears. “The second prince will become a supreme cultivator!”

Ethan could not share their excitement because he recognized the symbol. He had drawn similar patterns thousands of times while investigating how Si interacted with the laws governing heaven and earth, but he had never managed to make his calculations work.

Yet the heavens were displaying his impossible equations above his crib as though they were common knowledge.

How is this possible?

An elderly midwife entered carrying a silver basin, interrupting his thoughts.

“Your Majesty, the child must be cleansed before the heavenly manifestation fades.”

With the emperor's permission, she dipped her fingers into the basin and murmured an incantation. Water gathered from the surrounding air, coiled around her hand, and formed a shining sphere that settled neatly into the basin.

Ethan stared in disbelief.

The spell was embarrassingly simple. He understood its structure and the sequence of laws that allowed spiritual energy to collect moisture and transform it into liquid.

More importantly, he understood the principle beneath it because he had invented that principle.

Perhaps the woman had never seen his exact equations, but the foundation of her spell was unmistakably his theory of using Si to imitate laws that ordinary people could not directly comprehend.

He had sacrificed his health, savings, and eventually his life to prove that cultivation did not need to be a gift from heaven. His final experiment had killed him before he could publish his findings.

Now an elderly woman was using his life's work to wash a newborn.

WHO STOLE MY IDEA?!

His tiny fists clenched as the midwife lifted him from the bed.

“Such a blessed child,” she murmured. “Even the water seems eager to touch him.”

Who took my research? Who published it? How did my impossible theory become a basic household spell?

Ethan desperately wanted answers. He needed to know whether someone had stolen his notebooks, raided his laboratory, or discovered Si independently. Above all, he needed to learn how much time had passed since his death.

If the cultivation world had adopted his research, someone might know what had killed him.

Suddenly, the golden symbol above his forehead stopped rotating.

Every candle went out, and the water inside the basin turned black.

“Your Majesty,” the midwife whispered, her face drained of color. “Something is wrong.”

Emperor William immediately stepped between the basin and his family, summoning golden energy that formed a protective barrier around his hands.

“Everyone, get away from the prince!”

The chamber shook violently as an icy sensation crept beneath Ethan's skin. Something vast and ancient seemed to be examining him from beyond the room, and the familiar pressure sent terror racing through his mind.

He had felt this presence before.

It was the same thing that had looked back at him from inside the Si during his final experiment.

A thin silver line appeared in the black water, twisting into a symbol Ethan recognized from the final pages of his research journal. He had discovered it moments before his death, circled it in red ink, and written a warning beneath it.

DO NOT ALLOW SI TO OBSERVE YOU.

The basin cracked as distant thunder rolled across the palace. Somewhere beyond the chamber, cultivators throughout the capital suddenly felt their connection to the heavens falter.

Then a voice spoke directly inside Ethan's mind.

“Original researcher identified.”

Ethan froze.

The voice carried neither anger nor curiosity, only the cold certainty of a mechanism executing an ancient command.

“Identity confirmed: Shen Yu.”

His previous life's name.

The name buried with his former body, which nobody in this world should have known.

Before Ethan could comprehend the revelation, the voice continued.

“Unauthorized reincarnation detected. Heavenly Registrar notified.”

The golden markings above the crib shattered into thousands of brilliant fragments. Emperor William shouted orders while Queen Victoria pulled Ethan tightly against her chest, shielding him from the falling light.

Yet the voice inside Ethan's mind drowned out everything else.

“Correction protocol initiated.”

Silver letters appeared across the darkness behind his eyes.

THE ORIGINAL RESEARCHER HAS RETURNED.

INITIATE ERASURE.

Far above the Great Zhou Empire, beyond the clouds and the countless layers of laws governing the mortal world, an enormous eye slowly opened.

For the first time in ten thousand years, the heavens became afraid.