14: Chapter 14 Collective Enlightenment? Su Bai's Power!

The door to the Third Training Room was closed by Su Bai from the outside.

"So satisfying." Su Bai sighed with emotion.

He had just made a deal with Lin Weiwei; Lin Weiwei planned to publish a paper using some of her spatial theories, and naturally, she would include Su Bai's name.

And the deal Su Bai secured was... until the Monthly Exam, his budget would be unlimited!

Of course, calling it unlimited was a bit of an exaggeration; this "unlimited" was relative to ordinary people. After all, for an ordinary person making a Tier 1 card, spending a few hundred thousand was already the absolute, absolute limit.

But that didn't matter. Su Bai felt he had a thick enough skin, so reporting a little extra shouldn't be a big deal.

Furthermore, Lin Weiwei could be considered fair and just; she hadn't been taught the theory by Su Bai. It was just that she had gained some insights after seeing Su Bai's Spatial Circuit earlier. Although these insights were only a small fraction of the concepts revealed in Su Bai's magic card, they were immensely beneficial to Lin Weiwei.

Not to mention that Su Bai's name would be on the paper. All in all, the deal was perfect!

Meanwhile, on the other side.

Click.

The sound of the door lock engaging was exceptionally crisp in the quiet training room.

Then—the silence lasted for about five seconds.

Lin Weiwei was the first to move. She didn't speak, merely raising her right hand slowly to look at her fingertips, which were still trembling slightly.

It wasn't out of anger; it was because in that instant earlier, her Mental Power had touched something it shouldn't have.

A seven-axis rotational structure.

It wasn't the delusion of a pseudo-scientist.

It wasn't Jiahao's word association game.

It was a truly existing, smoothly operating, high-dimensional circuit capable of triggering spatial tides on a physical level.

As a Tier 4 spatial Card Creator, her Mental Power had only managed to capture the rough outlines of three of the axes—the three physical axes. The remaining four phase axes were like trying to see ultraviolet light with the naked eye; she knew it existed, but she couldn't capture it no matter what.

"...Sister?" Lin Xiao called out tentatively.

"Xiaoxiao." Lin Weiwei's voice was surprisingly calm. "Did you see it just now?"

"See what?"

"The circuit."

Lin Xiao opened her mouth, then closed it. In truth, she hadn't seen it clearly.

Her Mental Power was much weaker than her cousin's. Lin Weiwei had at least managed to capture the outlines of three physical axes, while Lin Xiao had only felt a vague impression of "something rotating." Yet, the amount of information contained within that vague impression—even just a sliver—had already made her scalp tingle.

It was like standing in front of a mathematician's chalkboard; you couldn't understand the formulas on it, but you could feel them glowing. Glowing on your retinas. Glowing on your nerve endings. Glowing in your bones.

Zhao Dahai's situation was even worse.

His Mental Power was the weakest of the three, so weak that in that instant earlier, he had only felt that "Su Bai's card emitted a very bright light" and "my stomach seems to have moved into my left leg."

But even with just that—

"Um..." Zhao Dahai raised his hand, like an elementary school student who wanted to speak in class but wasn't quite sure if their answer was correct. "I think I... understood a little bit just now."

Lin Weiwei and Lin Xiao both turned to look at him simultaneously.

"You? You understood?" Lin Xiao's eyes were full of disbelief.

"No, no, I didn't understand the circuit! It's, it's—" Zhao Dahai scratched his head, a conflicted expression appearing on his chubby face as he struggled to organize his words. "It's just that feeling. Do you get it? It's that kind of—the feeling that a circuit could actually be drawn like that. I used to always copy standard templates, horizontal and vertical, with the spacing of every node following the manual. But Su Bai's circuit wasn't drawn like that at all. His method was—was—it felt like jumping from three dimensions to four? It's just—"

"Dimensional Leap." Lin Weiwei said it for him.

"Yes, yes, yes! Dimensional Leap!"

Zhao Dahai nodded frantically, then froze. "...What is a Dimensional Leap?"

"When you design a circuit, you overlook the entire framework from a higher dimension." Lin Weiwei said slowly. "It's not drawing according to the node order prescribed by textbooks. Instead, you build the complete spatial framework first, then embed every node into the framework. This will cause a qualitative leap in the circuit's fluency. This is one of the core thought processes of high-level Card Creators, and it generally requires at least Tier 3 Mental Power to master."

She paused and looked at Lin Xiao.

"You were both forced to have your 'perspective' elevated by Su Bai's circuit just now."

The training room was quiet for a few more seconds.

Once things were put this way, even the dullest person would understand what it meant.

Zhao Dahai's eyes widened like copper bells. He stood up abruptly, his chubby face erupting with a kind of ecstasy that only someone who had been poor for twenty years and suddenly won the lottery would have.

"Does that mean—my vision now—is already different?!"

Lin Xiao didn't answer.

Because she had already rushed to the card creation table in the corner of the training room.

She pulled a sheet of blank draft paper from her card box, grabbed a card creation pen, and the moment the tip touched the paper—she froze.

It was wrong.

The feel was wrong.

In the past, when drawing circuits, her brain needed to recall templates from textbooks while simultaneously directing her fingers. There was always a veil separating her hand and her brain. Even though she knew how to draw it in her mind, her hand just wouldn't listen.

But now—that veil had disappeared.

It wasn't that her hand had become steadier. Her brain no longer needed to "recall" templates but could directly "imagine" the overall structure of the circuit.

The pen tip glided smoothly across the draft paper, like ice skating on paper. Every node was placed cleanly and decisively.

No hesitation.

No stuttering.

None of the slight trembling that used to start by the third stroke.

The prototype of a basic Spatial Circuit took shape under her pen at nearly twice her usual speed.

Lin Xiao put down the pen, looking at what she had drawn. Then, she took a deep breath.

"I've broken through."

When she said those three words, her voice was very soft.

But Lin Weiwei and Zhao Dahai both heard the weight in those three words.

Zhao Dahai practically lunged at another card creation table.

He clumsily pulled out draft paper, and his pen tip was still trembling when it landed—but that was the trembling of excitement, not the trembling of being unable to control it. He was drawing a Spatial Circuit, the most basic kind, an entry-level framework essential for all Tier 1 Armament Cards.

Previously, it took him forty minutes to draw this circuit, with twenty minutes spent erasing crooked lines, ten minutes spent drawing them crooked again and then erasing them again, and the remaining ten minutes spent staring at the paper, doubting life.

But this time—his pen tip never stopped.

The lines traveled across the paper like a little boat that had finally found the river.

It wasn't him drawing the circuit.

It was the circuit leading his hand.

That feeling. That process from "groping in the dark" to "mastery." That moment from "not understanding" to "so that's how it is." That epiphany from "there is a wall between me and card creation" to "this wall actually never existed."

Zhao Dahai had heard his mentor say before that Card Creators would experience a qualitative leap at a certain stage, called "enlightenment."

He had always thought that was just chicken soup for the soul.

Now he knew it wasn't.

Seventeen minutes later, Zhao Dahai put down his pen. A complete Spatial Circuit lay on the draft paper.

No crookedness. No stuttering. Not a single place needing correction.

"I—" His voice was trembling, but this time it was from being frightened.

"I think I've broken through too."