Watching Evan Sutton’s figure gradually fade into the distance, the smile on Blake Langley’s face slowly disappeared. Looking up at the still gray sky, Blake Langley couldn’t understand at all why he had suddenly returned to twenty-one years ago. Because today was his birthday, and it was also on this day that he fell completely and utterly in love with Evan Sutton. But he knew very well in his heart that in this lifetime, he and Evan Sutton would never be husband and wife again.

The gray sky overhead wasn’t due to occasional fog, nor was it because of nightfall, but because the entire Earth was now polluted by industrial emissions. Even under the blazing sun, the sky still carried a lifeless, gloomy gray.

Once, Blake Langley thought this was the most terrifying thing. He even regretted studying medicine; he wished he had studied a field related to solving Earth’s pollution, hoping to help the planet recover little by little.

Later, Blake Langley realized this wasn’t the most terrifying thing. The most terrifying thing was the nuclear war seventeen years later...

After that nuclear war, humanity was enslaved, Earth was on the verge of destruction, and everything plunged into an endless abyss with no hope of escape. The air polluted by industry now? In a little over a decade, that would be a luxury—by then, all the air would be contaminated by nuclear fallout.

He would never forget that scene: he watched as Evan Sutton, mouth open, collapsed on the ruins tainted by nuclear pollution, tears streaming down her face as she looked at him in utter despair...

And all he could do was read her lips to know what Evan Sutton’s final words were before she left: I’m sorry, I have to go first...

He understood in his heart why Evan Sutton said sorry to him. It was because Evan Sutton had married him without truly loving him. Even though Evan Sutton ultimately died in the nuclear wasteland, she had never fallen in love with him, Blake Langley. Her apology was because he, Blake Langley, had given her his love at the cost of his own life, but even at the moment of her death, she had never loved him, Blake Langley. That’s why she felt sorry for Blake Langley.

Love is not something you can give just because you want to, nor is it something you can obtain just by giving.

Lightning once again split the smog-covered sky. After a long moment, a muffled thunder rolled in. The last scene from his previous life appeared before his eyes: he had been drowned at sea by someone. After Evan Sutton left, he was in a daze, then forcibly dragged away to treat someone of great importance. He had no interest and bluntly said it was incurable...

Blake Langley clenched his fists, staring at the distant, gray sky, and said word by word, “I absolutely will not allow it...”

In this life, he would never allow another nuclear war to break out on Earth, nor would he let Evan Sutton suffer through that life of hardship with him. He had to learn to let go.

This nuclear war could be avoided, because it wasn’t a war between nations on Earth, but a war waged by Earth to resist alien invaders.

Unfortunately, even in the face of outsiders, even after launching a nuclear war, Earth still couldn’t escape the fate of being enslaved by them.

Blake Langley took a deep breath, his gaze piercing through the gray, polluted city. Even though he couldn’t see anything clearly, he knew in his heart that to prevent a global nuclear war, he had to act now.

Chapter Two: The UFO That Landed on Earth

There was still one year left before the world’s spiritual energy would change, and at that time, ancient martial arts cultivation would no longer be a legend. Not just other martial arts techniques—even the Yijin Jing could be cultivated.

Although the Yijin Jing was described in novels as Shaolin’s supreme technique, after so many years of transmission, people saw it as nothing more than a health regimen.

But a year from now, the Yijin Jing would no longer be just a health practice, but truly a supreme technique capable of cultivating internal energy. Ordinary people could use the Yijin Jing to cultivate internal energy, and then, relying on that energy, practice all kinds of martial arts techniques.

So, a year later, all the martial arts manuals on the internet, whether real or fake, would disappear overnight. Those who downloaded them in advance were lucky; those who didn’t would have to seek out a master or find a top martial arts academy. As for top-level techniques like the Yijin Jing, anyone who dared to practice it—once discovered, it meant certain death.

Right now, if a student said they were dropping out to learn martial arts, it would be laughable and unbelievable. But a year from now, such things would become commonplace.

This world-shaking change was all because an intelligent UFO had crossed the atmosphere from outer space and landed in some corner of the Earth.

That UFO was the source of Earth’s ability to cultivate, and also the cause of the future nuclear war.

What good things were on that UFO, Blake Langley didn’t know. He didn’t even know exactly where it had landed. The only thing he was sure of was that it had fallen into a canyon somewhere in the Kunlun Mountains.

After the UFO landed in the Kunlun Mountains, it wasn’t discovered right away. There was no data at all about the UFO passing through the atmosphere and crashing to Earth.

It wasn’t until a year later, when the world’s spiritual energy suddenly grew dense, that many martial artists realized the half-real, half-fake internal energy they’d been practicing could actually be cultivated—and it wasn’t just one person who succeeded.

This discovery was like a bomb dropped into a calm lake, causing countless people to start practicing martial arts.