197: Chapter 197: Level 4, That Near-God-Level Civilization

At this moment, inside Qingfeng Temple.

The scent of incense curled in the air, piquing Celestial Master Zhang's interest. "Haha, interesting!"

"Immeasurable Heavenly Venerable, if we follow this argument, then receiving a message in a dream is not the return of a soul, nor is it a manifestation of ghosts or deities. Rather, it is a response caused by the resonance of unbroken threads of causality vibrating within the web of space-time."

"This seems to align with some vague descriptions in the Daoist Canon that mention ['When Qi senses Qi, though Yin and Yang may be separated, sincerity can bridge the gap']."

"The remarks made by Xiao Yu under the influence of Xiaoyu's brother actually provide an explanation that is more hardcore and leans more towards the laws of heaven and earth rather than anthropomorphic deities."

"Our Daoist school seeks to explore the ultimate truths of heaven and earth; while this theory is strange, it is not necessarily a fallacy."

Wang Chongyang nodded repeatedly. "The I Ching speaks of ['Respond and thus penetrate the reasons of all under heaven'], and Confucianism also emphasizes the sincere heart of ['Sacrifice as if they are present; sacrifice to the spirits as if the spirits are present']."

"In the past, we would mostly interpret these from the perspectives of ethics and temperament."

"If we follow the theory of ['Causality Displacement'], then the intensity of ['sincerity'] and ['longing'] provides a hypothetical principle that might exist within natural laws. Attempting to steer metaphysical experiences toward explanations based on natural laws—this is a very bold step taken by Xiao Yu and Xiaoyu's brother, yet it is worth deep contemplation."

Zheng Ming watched the two—Professor Zhang and his teacher—behaving so uncharacteristically. He couldn't help but scratch his head and blurt out, "Then, does this count as science, or high-level metaphysics?"

"And the more he talked, the more mystical it became—reversing causality, infinite orchards, communicating with the dead; and things like the Mirror of Fate. He's basically chewed up the laws of conservation of mass and energy like snacks. This isn't science fiction anymore; it's fantasy!!!"

"Xiao Zheng!"

"Hm?" Zheng Ming turned his head to look at Professor Zhang Qinian.

Professor Zhang Qinian rarely shook his head. "Whether it is the Causality Sniper Rifle, the Mobius Orchard, or even the Pen of the Dead..."

"These applications described by Xiaoyu's brother, no matter how incredible they sound, cleverly bypass one of the ultimate problems in our current physics—infinite energy and perpetual motion machines."

Professor Zhang Qinian's eyes gradually grew sharp. "In his meaning, there is no creation from nothing. Instead, within a pre-set closed loop of causality, there is a ['cycle'] or ['spatial-temporal position swap'] of energy and matter."

"The apples in the orchard are infinite, but the ['existence'] history of each apple is within a closed loop."

"The information transmitted by the Pen of the Dead does not consume matter or violate the conservation of energy; rather, it consumes the user's intense emotional energy and the specific energy required to manipulate micro-causality, but it does not create matter on a large scale."

"The most critical point is that all these concepts from Xiaoyu's brother are firmly tied to one core concept: time. Or rather, what he mentioned earlier—the Time Stream."

Speaking up to this point, he scanned the three people. "Do you all remember? He previously used the Time Stream to negate Newton's law of universal gravitation; gravity is just a byproduct of time."

"He proposed that hypothesis of 'Causality Mechanics' that we found insane; and now, the 3rd-level Causality Technological Civilization he describes, even the cornerstone of its operation—the energy that drives all these miraculous creations—is not the spiritual energy that you all claim exists between heaven and earth, which in reality does not exist."

"Nor can it be the chemical energy, thermal energy, nuclear energy, or even dark energy as we understand them."

"It is the orderly manipulation and extraction of the Time Stream itself. He treats the time dimension as a resource that can be bent, cycled, truncated, and utilized."

"This is the most fundamental leap!"

Professor Zhang took a deep breath. "If the Time Stream is proven one day, then..."

"Humanity's future in astronomy and interstellar travel will no longer be limited by traditional physical upper limits; instead, everything will come from ['time']!!!"

"This is the core of Quantum Mechanics—causality can be subverted, time can cease to exist, and time can even be utilized!!!"

"I must say, he is very crazy, and very bold!"

Previously, Professor Zhang Qinian felt that Jiang Zhe was nothing special, just showing off his knowledge; but as time passed and he understood more deeply...

He suddenly realized that while Jiang Zhe sometimes said shocking things, he was not like those academic frauds who claimed things that didn't exist to be real, or things that were real to be non-existent.

This is critical, this is very critical!

He is either a super scientific madman, or a very clever academic fraud!!!

Zheng Ming, along with Wang Chongyang and Celestial Master Zhang beside him, listened in astonishment.

Time as an energy source—this perspective completely transcended their cognitive scope regarding energy.

...

On the other side, at the Kyoto University of History faculty housing.

Professor Liu Guangyi muttered to himself, "If we could widely apply this level of causality technology in our field of ecology."

"Then why would it be so troublesome to manage the Sahara Desert? We could just lock onto the result of the Sahara Desert and operate in reverse. From the upstream of space-time, we could take the key ['causal fragments']—the climatic state, soil seed bank, and water distribution of the Sahara Desert from over ten thousand or even tens of thousands of years ago, when it was still in a wet and rainy or grassland period—and like cutting and pasting, overlay them onto the Sahara Desert region of 2026. In this way, we would have completely resolved land desertification!"

The more he spoke, the more excited he became. "It's not about changing the present, but using the good results of the past to directly replace the bad results of the modern era."

"Letting the desert be rewritten from the level of causality—this is simply a miraculous ecological restoration!"

"I can even imagine the future; the future will definitely be a brand-new world with greenery covering the globe. Of course, I am referring to a Level 3 technological civilization!"

Inside the big screen, in the living room.

Jiang Zhe's explanation had come to an end, and he was waiting for Xiao Yu to absorb these novel technologies of the causality technological civilization.

Xiao Yu was already immersed in a world of reversed causality, digesting everything her brother had described.

Every concept was challenging modern science and people's worldviews.

"Big brother, Level 3 causality technology is already so abnormal; it feels like it's almost touching the edge of mythology. Even Nüwa, Fuxi, or even the Anunnaki—I feel like they can't compare to the Level 3 causality technological civilization you described!"

Jiang Zhe smiled slightly. "That is natural. If Nüwa, Fuxi, and the Anunnaki were technological civilizations, they would be at most a Level 2.5 civilization."

Xiao Yu nodded repeatedly and asked with shining eyes, "Then, what about a Level 4 civilization?"

"What would they be like? I'm afraid it has completely exceeded my—no, the entire world's human imagination framework, right?"

As soon as these words were spoken, countless viewers in the livestream couldn't help but let their imaginations run wild.

"Level 3 can already mold causality like playdough; I'm afraid Level 4 isn't just cutting causality short, right?"

"I guess a Level 4 causality technological civilization doesn't have people anymore; they might be living directly in the past, present, and future of time; wanting to turn into whatever they want?"

"Could it be that by Level 4, time and space are like Lego bricks in our hands to them, which can be taken apart and reassembled at will?"

"Following this upgrade logic, isn't a Level 4 causality technological civilization just ['gods']? Although they still can't create something from nothing, they can deeply edit things between cause and effect?"

"Big brother, hurry and tell us, I am already prepared to be cognitively crushed!"

"..."

You must know that the theories in this underdeveloped parallel world are all very weak!

It is rare to have a causality technology based on Quantum Mechanics as its bible; they feel famished if they don't listen to it for a meal!

Not only them, but even the teachers, experts, and the big shots of various industries hidden in the livestream were holding their breath and watching intently!

"Of course!" Jiang Zhe nodded affirmatively. "A Level 3 civilization can only change the causality of one thing; when a Level 4 causality technological civilization appears, they can make the outcome of event A not equal to B."

"An example, big brother, an example!!!"

"Then listen well!"