Becoming a god starting from the weasel

Chen Yang, a recent agronomy graduate, never imagined his life would take such a sharp turn. After a sudden death, he awakens to find himself reborn as a lowly weasel in a crumbling Taoist temple, in a world teeming with immortals and monsters. As a wild beast with no spiritual roots to speak of, his prospects for cultivation are virtually nonexistent. Yet, fortune hides within despair. Chen Yang discovers a small jade bead fused with his new body—a mystical artifact that drips a single drop of spiritual liquid each month, perfect for nurturing plants, and grants a spiritual crystal every year to slowly refine his mortal essence. Armed with his agricultural expertise, this strange new "abbot" takes up a hoe, transforming the dilapidated shrine into a secret garden of mystical herbs. By day, he tirelessly tills the soil; by night, he absorbs the moon's essence, patiently building a hidden paradise and inching toward the path of immortality. While his days are filled with the humble rhythms of farming and patrolling the mountain woods, his nights are dedicated to the painstaking work of cultivating his spiritual roots and nurturing his sacred plot. For years, he labors in obscurity, a simple monster-master tending to his celestial garden, unaware of the monumental power he is accumulating. Then, one day, the heavens themselves shudder with strange phenomena, and the world finally lifts its gaze to the quiet mountains. A great sage had been growing in their midst all along, hidden behind the guise of a peaceful farmer. But as cosmic forces begin to stir, Chen Yang is left to wonder: did he choose the path of immortality, or was he simply the one chosen to endure it? "I never cared about becoming a sage," he would later muse, "I just wanted to see if my spiritual crops could survive the winter."