Chapter 503: The Terrifying Synergistic Effect of Ley Line Information Identification Art
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 503: The Terrifying Synergistic Effect of Ley Line Information Identification Art
Night.
There weren't many public facilities around the smaller islands of the Bobapus Archipelago; most of the area was preserved in its most natural state, with the surrounding environment carefully maintained.
Outside the seaside villa I had chosen, the only light in the night was the glow from the villa itself, spilling through the floor-to-ceiling windows and onto the distant surface of the sea.
Standing here, one could hear the sound of the rising tide.
"Xiao Han~ are you done washing up?"
"Mm... yeah, almost." I was wrapped in a bath towel, using a hair towel with both hands to dry my long, silver-white hair.
Finally feeling it was dry enough, I tossed the hair towel aside and snapped my fingers. The remaining moisture in my long hair instantly vanished.
"Still not used to washing such long hair, Xiao Han?" Sister Bai walked over, dressed in a loose bathrobe. She picked up the towel I’d left on the sofa, instinctively brought it to her nose for a light sniff, and then held onto it, intending to put it back later.
"Well, drying it like that is such a hassle. Why waste a perfectly good shortcut when I have one?" I immediately tightened my grip on my bath towel with one hand and leaned into Sister Bai’s side, acting spoiled.
"Then you can just ask me to help. Why wouldn't I help you if you just said the word? Xiao Han, given our relationship, you still haven't adapted to relying on me, have you?" Sister Bai played along, reaching out to pull me into her arms. She could feel the faint dampness radiating from my body, carrying a hint of my personal scent.
"Mhm! Next time for sure—or should I go wash again?" I nodded, realizing I had been too hasty. Otherwise, I could have enjoyed Sister Bai giving me a hair treatment.
"Wash again? I think not. I saw you soaking in there just now; who knows how long another soak would take? Didn't you say earlier that you had a bit of inspiration? Don't tell me it vanished after your bath? Or was that just an excuse to beg for mercy?"
"It wasn't an excuse! Your skills aren't enough to make me beg for mercy yet, Sister Bai!" I huffed in mock anger, reaching out to tug at the sash of her bathrobe.
However... back when Sister Bai was "massaging" inspiration out of me, I really did have... well, a bit of an idea. Even though it was just a flash of insight, I had instinctively recorded it within the Tree of Great Knowledge.
Later, when Sister Bai saw me soaking in the tub, it was because my mind had entered my consciousness space to put that inspiration into practice.
I have to say... I now have a new plan for the Knowledge Seed.
If inspiration is a macro-level guiding philosophy, then achieving the desired effect requires an absolutely solid foundation and a massive amount of experimental trial and error.
But overall, it’s just a matter of developing the [Transcendent Knowledge] within the Tree of Great Knowledge that hasn't been fully utilized. The spell effects of any Great Spellbook are permanent, but my Tree of Great Knowledge has been subject to limitations. That can only be blamed on my incomplete development of this spellbook.
After all, this isn't a game. Everything is a gradual process. There isn't some threshold where, once you click past it and it's defined as a Great Spellbook, it can suddenly do everything a conventional Great Spellbook can do.
The Tree of Great Knowledge is a unique "Great Spellbook." Its birth was a massive stroke of luck, but it also represents an opportunity for me—a chance to thoroughly understand the operating mechanisms of a Great Spellbook.
Because of this, I know the Tree of Great Knowledge inside and out. So, even though it is technically weaker than the Great Wisdom Enlightenment Art, my mastery over its application is far superior.
Currently, my use of the Great Wisdom Enlightenment Art is stuck at the "release" level, making no further progress.
To use an analogy, my current level is similar to how the new students use ordinary spellbooks—shallow, inflexible, and with no idea how to derive new effects.
"Is that so? Then shall we try again tonight?" Sister Bai suddenly spoke, her tone carrying a hint of lingering desire.
"Eh? No! I... I mean, doing that too much is bad for the health..." My expression shifted as I hurriedly waved my hands, one hand instinctively clutching my bath towel tighter.
Sister Bai watched me with a smile, suppressing the natural surge of instinctive impulse.
However, Bai Yu had to admit that the current Xiao Han possessed a... "ready-to-eat" kind of beauty.
The snow-white towel wrapped around her body, and as she moved, her fair, smooth legs were visible through the slit in the towel, creating a flickering glimpse that made Bai Yu want to reach out and play with them.
"Alright then~ go change into some clothes, or be careful that towel doesn't fall off." As Sister Bai spoke, she actually reached out and gave my towel a little tug.
"I know, I know~"
Urged on by Sister Bai, I returned to the guest room and changed into a nightgown made of very soft, breathable fabric. These clothes had been sitting in my storage equipment for a long time.
I finally understood why girls have so many clothes. Even I had accumulated so many without realizing it... there were even... even some X-rated ones...
But none of that mattered. I tidied my clothes slightly and then left the guest room to head back outside.
"Sister Bai, just like before, help me test some things out?"
"Test things?" Sitting on the sofa, Sister Bai looked up at me curiously.
"Yeah. Like that Leaf of Knowledge from before. I think... I should be able to try and refine it further."
"So soon?" Sister Bai asked in surprise.
"I have to keep trying, and my inspiration didn't come from nowhere. Well... I can't guarantee success, though."
After some discussion, Sister Bai ultimately chose to have the Leaf of Knowledge already imprinted on her chest modified rather than replacing it with a new one. After all, Sister Bai said it was the "first time" I had given her something, so it had extraordinary commemorative significance.
I didn't mind; it wasn't much more trouble anyway.
"Sister Bai, do you remember the Ley Line magic I mentioned to you before?"
"I remember. Was that really Ley Line magic?"
"Strictly speaking, no~ Ley Line magic is an innate talent exclusive to Ley Line lifeforms. Ordinary people basically can't use it. It's like how mana is a power exclusive to witches; other lifeforms can't use it, and trying to force it might even cause irreversible witchification." I explained carefully to Sister Bai.
After all, Sister Bai had only recently become a Transcendent Witch.
She didn't know everything. Even Teacher Ji Niang or the Academy Dean wouldn't dare claim to know everything, right?
So, I didn't mind giving Sister Bai a crash course in these common-sense facts.
"Then what is this of yours?"
"Hehe~ although it's not Ley Line magic, it's a spell I derived by utilizing the property of Ley Line energy to carry information. You could say it's a spell derived from the Tree of Knowledge. I call it... Ley Line Information Identification Art."
"Originally, I just made it as a simple spell inspired by the 'Appraisal' skill in games, but later I found its uses go far beyond that, so I've developed it to its current level. Oh, by the way, this Ley Line Identification Art can't interfere with Ley Line energy enough to be dominated by magic, so it doesn't fall under the category of Ley Line magic."
"Identification Art?!" Hearing this peculiar name, Sister Bai was quite surprised.
After all, it was her first time hearing of such a spell. Logically, it was just a common or outdated fantasy from games—a setting created simply for the sake of convenience.
Thinking of this, Bai Yu couldn't help but marvel at how leap-frogging my thinking was. And it wasn't just that my thoughts were unconventional; I actually had the ability to realize my ideas. That was what truly shocked her.
"Oh, it's just a simple process of Ley Line information extraction, conversion, reading, and output~ It's also a derivative ability built upon the rich cognitive reserves of my Tree of Great Knowledge. If something exceeds my cognition, the Identification Art becomes a bit limited."
Of course, the range of "exceeding cognition" was actually quite hard to reach. After all, for a person, when they encounter something beyond their cognition, they will most often use known things as metaphors or for analytical reasoning to figure out what the unknown thing is. None of that counts as "exceeding cognition."
True "exceeding cognition" refers to an independent existence that is completely detached from my original cognitive system.
For example, if there were a single character from an independent language with no social or communicative basis, I naturally wouldn't recognize it. But if the other party used those strange characters to express themselves continuously, in a systematic and meaningful way, those characters could still be cracked.
In this analogy, a single isolated character would be "beyond cognition," but the continuous expression provides a process and possibility for deduction based on existing cognition. That wouldn't count as "beyond cognition"; it would just be that analyzing this unknown requires more information for corroboration and auxiliary deduction, making the difficulty much higher.
But as long as it can be done, the Knowledge Shadow can use a carrier to complete such complex deductions.
"So that's how it is... you want to apply this Identification Art to the Leaf of Knowledge so that others can do it too, right?" Sister Bai asked, her tone carrying a hint of anticipation. After all, who wouldn't have the urge to try out such an ability?
"Exactly! And this can link with the Tree of Great Knowledge. The appraised information will be filtered and then recorded into the Tree of Great Knowledge, becoming nourishment for its growth and a reserve of knowledge!"
After I finished speaking, Sister Bai instinctively swallowed. What kind of terrifying thing was this? Just hearing about its function felt frightening...
But when she remembered that the underlying framework for all of this was a Great Spellbook, it all seemed to make sense.
This was Transcendent; this was also reality, yet it was so abstract that it defied human cognition.
It was like telling a primitive man who had just mastered fire that as long as he learned how to boil water, he would hold the key to the development of civilization. It would seem utterly absurd to them.
At this moment, Sister Bai once again felt the vast disparity in talent between different lives so clearly.
"Well then, I'm starting~"
As I spoke, I reached out in front of Sister Bai and pulled aside her collar, revealing the rune mark that the Leaf of Knowledge had transformed into.
...
The next morning.
When I woke up again, I was still being held in bed by Sister Bai.
In my daze, I recalled the events of last night.
Last night, I wanted to help Sister Bai update the Leaf of Knowledge, trying to load the Ley Line Identification Art onto it as well.
As long as the concept of the Leaf of Knowledge was fully realized, my progress would be one step further. Then, all that would be left was the construction of the "Knowledge Seed."
However, I had worked late into the night without a successful attempt, though I had accumulated several failed trials.
After all, this was a derivative effect that relied on the Tree of Knowledge as a whole to function. Relying solely on a single Leaf of Knowledge proved to be a bit too much for it. But after the repeated failures last night, it wasn't without gain.
My gain was proving through constant failure that my method was correct; the Leaf of Knowledge could carry the Ley Line Information Identification Art.
If the logic was sound, it could be done; it was just a matter of difficulty.
But the reason I had given up halfway last night was... I discovered that the conceptual design of the "Knowledge Seed" seemed more convenient for carrying derivative techniques like the Identification Art than the Leaf of Knowledge.
Plus, after the ordeal Sister Bai put me through before my bath last night, my energy was a bit depleted. Combined with Sister Bai's comfort after my final failure, I eventually drifted off to sleep in a daze.
This night’s sleep was quite comfortable, though, and I woke up feeling refreshed.
After performing my routine meditation, I began my Body Cultivation Five Senses perception training. The Ritual War Dance I had been practicing was gradually being phased out. Even an advanced Ritual War Dance had a limit to how much it could improve physical fitness. Rather than blindly spending time on these negligible improvements, it was better to switch to a more effective method.
Moreover, I had Sister Bai right there to teach me the Five Senses training personally. With that kind of treatment, what reason did I have not to do it?
"Sister Bai, how about... we go play on the beach? What do you think?"
After finishing the last of my Five Senses training, I suddenly made the suggestion.
"Go play on the beach? Hmm... how do you want to play?" Sister Bai was a bit surprised by my sudden suggestion, but she quickly followed up.
After all, going to the beach was mainly about relaxing or seeking excitement.
"Just... you know... um..." I stammered, not knowing how to say it. I couldn't exactly say I wanted to see Sister Bai in a bikini, could I?
Would that be too direct?
"If you don't say it, then I'll just ask the Knowledge Shadow~" Sister Bai said with a smile, seeing my hesitant look.
"Eh?!" I was shocked! According to my subconscious, wouldn't that thought be revealed without hesitation? Especially since Sister Bai was the one asking.
"I... I want to wear a bikini for... for you to see, Sister Bai..."
"Really?" Hearing my response, Sister Bai gave a knowing smile and then asked.
"Really~ If you don't want to see it, then I won't go..." I quickly changed my tune.
"In that case, Xiao Han, are you prepared to be seen like that by others?" Sister Bai suddenly asked from a different angle.
"Eh?"
Suddenly reminded of this, I froze for a moment.
I definitely didn't want to be seen by others... especially since there would be other men on the beach. Having once been a man myself, how could I not know exactly what kind of gazes those men would be casting...
"If you really want to do it, it's not a problem~" At this point, Sister Bai came up behind me and placed both hands on my shoulders. "Have you forgotten my ability? I'll make it so those people won't notice us... So... Xiao Han, feel free to be bold and try it. Life has many firsts, doesn't it? If you really can't get used to it, we can just stay near here. After all, the beach here belongs to this uninhabited area."
"I... I see... Then can you come with me, Sister Bai?" I turned my head to look at her, asking with expectant eyes.
"Of course~ How could I not know what you're plotting? Come on, let's pack our things. We'll go look for a bikini that suits you. Remember to pick out a few nice sets for yourself~"