278: Chapter 279 Deciphering the Code, Achieving Divine Status in One Month

The twelfth day of secluded meditation.

Lin Qi's progress was slower than he had anticipated.

It wasn't that his direction was wrong—he had already confirmed that the Breakthrough point for the Tongshen Realm lay in "reading the underlying rules of primitive source matter." His direction was correct.

The problem was that this "language" was simply too difficult.

Over the past twelve days, he had spent eighteen hours a day immersed in essence, letting that unprocessed energy flow through his body. He had recorded over two hundred "stuck" nodes and analyzed their patterns one by one.

He had found some of the patterns.

For instance, when primitive source matter flowed through the Five Elements cycle, it would vibrate every time it reached the "Fire generates Earth" phase—not because there was an issue with the connection between Fire and Earth, but because the concept of "Earth" itself, within the rule System of primitive source matter, did not correspond to "Stability," but to "Digestion."

This tiny semantic difference, once he adjusted the internal logic of the Five Elements cycle, immediately doubled his deconstruction efficiency.

But doubling it still wasn't enough.

The rule System of primitive source matter was a complete, self-consistent "language." He had only recognized a few "characters" so far; he was far from being able to read the "entire article."

"Brute force won't work."

Lin Qi opened his eyes and stood up to stretch his body.

After twelve days of not moving, his joints were a bit stiff.

He walked over to his backpack, picked up Zheng Wujiang's notebook, and flipped to the last few pages.

The first few times he read it, his attention had been focused on Zheng Wujiang's theoretical sections regarding essence. But this time, he carefully examined the other content on the final two pages.

The second-to-last page didn't record cultivation insights, but rather a somewhat scattered passage of text, like a diary entry.

"March 17th. Northern Border Military Camp.

During sparring today, I used a Chopping Fist to flatten a Second Transition Knight. He was in full plate armor, System-enhanced, with a defense value of over two thousand. With one punch from me, the plate armor cracked.

He climbed up and stared at me for a long time before asking: What is that move called?

I said: Chopping Fist.

He asked again: What Rank of skill is it?

I said: It's not a skill.

He didn't understand.

The people of this world have grown accustomed to using 'skills' to define all combat actions. They feel that every punch and every kick must have a name, a Rank, and a damage value.

But a true fist has no name.

Or rather, its name is the fist itself.

I wanted to explain to him what 'Jin' is, what 'structural power generation' is, and what it means to 'lead Qi with intent.' But I found myself tongue-tied, unable to explain it clearly.

Perhaps when I reach a higher Realm, I'll be able to explain it clearly."

Lin Qi looked at this passage, his expression unchanged.

He understood Zheng Wujiang's predicament all too well.

In a world where everyone only looks at data, explaining "martial arts" to someone is like explaining mental arithmetic to a group of people who only use calculators—it's not that they are stupid, but that there is simply no place for your concept within their cognitive framework.

He flipped to the last page.

Every time he had flipped here before, he had seen that sentence followed by blank space.

"The potential of primitive source matter is infinite. Because it has not yet been defined."

But this time, he noticed a detail he had previously overlooked.

The back of the last page.

There were several very faint indentations on the back of the paper, as if someone had written on another sheet of paper placed beneath this one; the pressure hadn't been enough, leaving only faint embossed marks.

Lin Qi's Martial Intent Insight captured the patterns of these marks.

He condensed internal True Qi at his fingertips and gently brushed over the surface of the paper, feeling the direction of those indentations.

He "read" it out, one character at a time.

It was a single sentence.

"Before I die, I have touched its edge. Not the edge of essence, but the edge of the cage. This world has walls. I have bumped into them."

Lin Qi's hand stopped.

Cage.

That word again.

Zheng Wujiang had used the word "cage" thirty years ago.

It was exactly the same as that mysterious person's description.

No, wait—

Lin Qi flipped back to the front and re-read the sentence: "The potential of primitive source matter is infinite."

If Zheng Wujiang had written the passage on the back immediately after writing the sentence on the front...

Then his final conclusion on essence research wasn't "the potential of essence is infinite."

It was "this world has boundaries."

Through his research into essence, he had touched the underlying structure of the world.

And then he died.

System Rejection.

Because he saw something he wasn't supposed to see.

Lin Qi closed the notebook and sat back down on the bluestone platform.

His train of thought suddenly cleared.

primitive source matter was difficult to deconstruct not because its "language" was too complex.

But because this set of language was itself part of the world's underlying code.

What he was trying to decipher wasn't an instruction manual for some kind of energy.

It was the operating System code of this world.

The ancient legacy code of the "martial arts era" in the chip, and the rule System of primitive source matter—

They were the same thing.

Different forms of expression, but the same underlying logic.

"Holy shit."

Lin Qi rarely used foul language.

But at this moment, he cursed softly.

What did this mean?

It meant that the game he had played for twelve years in his past life, and this world he was currently living in, shared the same underlying architecture.

The boundary between game and reality had blurred.

Or perhaps there was no boundary at all.

Lin Qi took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

He needed to reorganize his thoughts.

He now had several puzzle pieces in his hand.

First piece: This world is digitized; everyone has a status panel, and essence is processed by the System into standardized data to be distributed to everyone.

Second piece: primitive source matter is the physical manifestation of this world's underlying code, unprocessed by the System.

Third piece: There is ancient legacy code from the martial arts era in the chip's base layer, which is highly related to the rules of primitive source matter.

Fourth piece: The mysterious person said this world is a "cage," and Zheng Wujiang also touched the "walls" thirty years ago.

Fifth piece: He himself had transmigrated from the martial arts era to this world, carrying the memories of a max-level Martial Saint.

When these five puzzle pieces were put together—

"This world itself is a 'game-level' construct. The System is the management program, essence is the underlying energy source, and the status panel is the human-machine interface. And I..."

What was he?

A bug?

Legacy data from a previous version?

Or some kind of deliberately designed "anomaly"?

He didn't know.

But he knew one thing.

The Breakthrough point for the Tongshen Realm did not lie in "understanding essence."

It lay in "understanding this world itself."

He needed to use the underlying game knowledge he had accumulated over twelve years in his past life to decipher this world's underlying code.

Conversely, he would use this world's primitive source matter to verify the things from the game in his past life that he had thought were just "program settings."

Two lines, cross-verified.

"No wonder it took me seven years to break through to the Tongshen Realm in my past life."

Because in the game, you couldn't see the underlying code. You could only grope for patterns through countless deaths and attempts.

But now—

He had Zheng Wujiang's notebook in his hand, he had the ancient code in the chip, and he had primitive source matter that he could contact directly.

He could see the underlying layer.

"Seven years?"

The corner of Lin Qi's mouth twitched slightly.

"One month is enough."

He sat back down cross-legged, but this time he no longer used the Five Elements Law to deconstruct the essence.

He switched to a different method.

He began to remember.

He recalled the feeling at the moment of breaking through to the Tongshen Realm in the martial arts era of his past life.

It was the "feeling" he had finally found after dying over a thousand times in those twelve years.

A feeling of being completely at one with the world.

A feeling that you yourself were the rules.

In the game, he had thought it was a "reward" given to the player by the program.

But if this world and the game shared the same underlying layer...

Then that "feeling" wasn't a reward.

It was real.