8: Chapter 8 Oh no, I've become Jiahao!

"Three-Person Card-Making Mutual Aid Group," Su Bai had only just discovered when he had been added to this group chat. However, after looking at the history, he understood. Zhao Dahai had added him directly through his friend list... This chat software didn't need friend approval to add people to discussion groups, which was ridiculous.

And following Lin Xiao's first message.

Zhao Dahai immediately followed.

[Zhao Dahai]: "I have no clue! I have absolutely no clue what I'm doing. Are Armament Card magic cards too difficult? The basic Spatial Circuit alone is hard enough, not to mention trying to stuff a weapon inside. Do I have to stuff a small dagger in there?"

[Lin Xiao]: "What are you afraid of? Isn't your father a top-tier Card Creator? Can a Tier 1 Armament Card really stump you? The core requirement of this assessment is to understand the invocation of the Spatial Circuit. In layman's terms, it's just how to stuff an item into a card. That shouldn't be hard."

[Zhao Dahai]: "Easier said than done! Copying the Spatial Circuit is difficult enough, let alone balancing compatibility, stability, and structure. This is simply impossible to complete!"

Huh?

Su Bai, who was lurking in the chat, realized something was wrong and wore a shocked expression.

Tier 1 Card Creator... does it already involve Spatial Circuits? Clearly, only the advanced theories he read involved the underlying logic, but he hadn't expected...

Alright, it seems he had underestimated this world.

He cautiously typed: "Have you guys also studied non-linear spatial geometry?"

[Zhao Dahai]: "What is non-linear spatial geometry?"

[Su Bai]: "It's the basic principle of the Spatial Circuit."

[Zhao Dahai]: "What basic principle of the Spatial Circuit? Shouldn't the basic principle be invocation?"

[Su Bai]: "?"

[Zhao Dahai]: "?"

[Lin Xiao]: "Enough! You two aren't even talking about the same thing. Tier 1 Card Creators don't learn underlying theory, they learn 'invocation'—the concepts packaged by top-tier Card Creators. This is one of the purposes of the Monthly Exam; a Card Creator must learn how to invoke the Spatial Circuits packaged by their predecessors. As for Su Bai, if I recall correctly, you only bought that book this afternoon. Don't lead us astray!"

[Zhao Dahai]: "Damn, I was wondering why I couldn't understand what Su Bai was saying. Turns out he's just showing off!!"

Su Bai: ...

Silence. A long silence.

However, after Lin Xiao's explanation, he finally understood that he and Zhao Dahai were not talking about the same thing.

Although they were both essentially spatial theories, the relationship between the two was vastly different. To use a car analogy, it was roughly the difference between Zhao Dahai discussing how to pass a driver's test and Su Bai discussing how to build an engine.

"So that's how it is. Simply put, the first-year circuits are already defined by others; a Tier 1 Card Creator only needs to copy them. But the theory I'm studying involves the true underlying logic of the circuit, which is how to create a circuit 'from scratch'..."

A flash of realization crossed Su Bai's eyes.

No wonder he felt like he and Zhao Dahai were not on the same channel!

However, this also proved from another angle that he had truly absorbed the theory just now. Su Bai could already vaguely feel something, so he couldn't help but close his eyes and start to carefully reflect on the knowledge he had understood.

Those fragments of knowledge quickly took shape in his mind, then pieced together into a complete card-making theory.

Immediately after, Su Bai opened his eyes, picked up his draft paper, and quickly drew something on it.

Meanwhile, Lin Xiao and Zhao Dahai in the group chat were not idle, still discussing how to draw the circuit.

A moment later, Su Bai let out a breath.

Very good, a brand new Spatial Circuit was complete!

However, the group chat was still vibrating. Su Bai glanced at the discussion group and quickly discovered something new.

[Zhao Dahai]: "Brothers!! I found a super awesome tutorial on the starting gesture for Tier 1 circuits!! I recorded a video for you guys!!"

[Zhao Dahai]: [Video.mp4]

[Zhao Dahai]: "Look at this!! The wrist force point is here!! Not the fingers!! Remember!! It's the wrist!!"

Su Bai clicked on the video.

On the screen was Zhao Dahai's fat face, which took up most of the frame. The background was the "Card Creator Level Exam Countdown" poster stuck on his dormitory wall.

He held a card-making pen in his right hand and demonstrated the starting gesture on a blank piece of draft paper, his movements as serious as if he were participating in the Olympics.

"See that! Here! The wrist! Not the fingers! The circuit lines drawn with finger force will shake! If the lines go wrong during the Monthly Exam, you're finished! Remember—wrist force!"

Su Bai finished watching.

A thirty-five-second video.

It taught one knowledge point.

Just one.

Su Bai stroked his chin in contemplation. This kind of thing was quite useful for him, as Su Bai really hadn't come into contact with surface-level knowledge.

But perhaps because it involved the underlying layer, after watching the video, he subconsciously felt—this was very simple.

No reason, it was just purely simple.

Because on his draft paper just now, he had drawn a special Spatial Circuit using spatial topology to stuff a fat guy into a skirt, and he had drawn it himself!

The difference was that he hadn't injected Mental Power yet, so it couldn't take effect temporarily.

This feeling was very strange.

It was roughly equivalent to having just passed your doctoral qualification defense, and then turning around to see kindergarteners learning to write Arabic numerals.

No.

It was stranger than that.

Because the topic of the doctoral thesis was "On the Tactical Value of Pink Lace Puffy Skirts."

[Lin Xiao]: "@Zhao Dahai I watched the video. Wrist force is fine, but you didn't mention that the friction coefficient of different materials of draft paper is different. The pen tip resistance of Iron-Armored Bull parchment and ordinary draft paper is very different. If you use that gesture on Iron-Armored Bull parchment, the ink will jam on the third stroke."

[Lin Xiao]: [Attachment: Basic Magic Conductivity Optimization Chart.pdf]

[Lin Xiao]: "This is what I compiled. A table matching eleven common Tier 1 circuit drawing methods with corresponding materials. Use it as you see fit."

[Zhao Dahai]: "Holy crap!! Sister Lin is amazing!! Eleven charts!!"

[Lin Xiao]: "Don't call me Sister Lin."

[Zhao Dahai]: "Okay, Sister Lin!!"

Su Bai looked at the chart Lin Xiao sent on the screen.

Eleven circuit drawing methods. Each one was marked with corresponding material parameters, pen pressure ranges, and examples of common errors. The logic was clear, the layout was neat, and at the end, it was attached with the note, "This chart is only applicable to Tier 1 Element Cards; Armament Card circuits are more complex, for reference only."

Serious.

Su Bai gave this evaluation in his heart.

Lin Xiao was the type of person who claimed to be doing things just for fun, but what she produced was always serious. The fifty-thousand-yuan transfer was serious. The guide to the black market was serious. This chart was also serious.

Su Bai stared at those pictures, and all kinds of miscellaneous vocabulary instantly surged in his mind. He felt as if he had directly seen through from the surface to the inner layer. Countless Spatial Circuits drawn by predecessors formed various geometric shapes in his mind, constantly changing, constantly producing corresponding effects.

Then Su Bai was stunned for a moment.

Was it an illusion?

It felt... a bit simple?

Just like a person who had just learned calculus looking back at addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division—not with any contempt, but just suddenly realizing that he was already standing in a completely different dimension.

No, this didn't seem to be an illusion. The power of knowledge was affirming itself.

This was just very simple!

Su Bai's eyes flickered slightly. He felt his inspiration was overflowing, just like discovering a brand new train of thought when solving a math problem. The inspiration and desire to share burst forth, making him unable to resist making a decision.

A decision that, when he looked back on it later, he felt might have been the first wrong decision he had made since transmigrating.

He picked up his phone and started typing rapidly.

"Those things of yours are too basic."

The moment this sentence was sent, the two people who were discussing heatedly in the group stopped simultaneously.

Not because they thought Su Bai was right.

It was because they thought Su Bai had gone crazy.

Su Bai didn't notice the silence in the group. He continued to send voice messages, his speech speed getting faster and faster, his tone becoming more and more excited:

"I combined it with 'Non-linear Spatial Geometry' to study it, and found that as long as you twist the spatial coordinate axis by 720 degrees when engraving the array, you can stuff a two-hundred-pound muscular man into a pink loli dress without any damage.

It's not a joke. A 720-degree rotation of the coordinate system can completely reconstruct the external morphology parameters while maintaining the complete conduction of internal physiological functions—this is called 'Heteromorphic Isomorphic Folding' in spatial topology. It's not a new theory, but it's really good for making transformation cards."

Send.

"Combine it with the neural signal reversal technology in 'High-Dimensional Armament Structure' to achieve 'physical immortality' in the physical sense. The principle is very simple—extract the user's soul, compress it into a high-density soul gem, and then use the remaining body as a remote-controlled robot.

The body can be beaten at will, and the soul is very safe in the gem. The price is losing the sense of taste and touch, but this belongs to the side effects in the user manual and does not affect the Armament rating of the card itself."

Send.

"The best part is 'Micro-Spirit Particle Transition'. Negative emotions are a highly efficient energy source, and shame is the most important of all. It's not a metaphor, it's physically efficient—the spirit particle transition frequency triggered by shame is nearly two orders of magnitude higher than anger. Superconducting magic fluid can compress this energy into a light cannon and blast it out.

In other words, the more socially dead the user is, the fiercer the firepower. Theoretically, the shame energy generated by an adult male dancing in a pink lace skirt in public can directly level a mountain."

Send.

"So the core logic of my card is actually very simple—use spatial topology to achieve transformation, use a soul gem to ensure survival, and use shame to provide firepower. A three-in-one set, a perfect closed loop. This is why I said your circuit gestures are too basic. It's not that they aren't good, it's that the dimensions are different."

Send.

Su Bai leaned back in his chair and took a sip of water with satisfaction.

He felt that his argument just now was clear, well-supported, and insightful.

It could be called a perfect group discussion contribution.

Then he looked down at the screen.

In the group—

Dead silence.

Three minutes.

A full three minutes.

Neither Zhao Dahai nor Lin Xiao said a word.

Su Bai frowned. He was just about to type and ask "Have you finished reading," when a message finally popped up on the screen.

[Zhao Dahai]: [...]

Another minute.

[Zhao Dahai]: [Su Bai.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [These words you said.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [I recognize every single character.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [But put together.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [I can't understand a single word.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [Didn't you go out to buy materials? How come you started talking nonsense when you got back? Were you swapped by someone? Did you eat something unclean at the black market? Do you need me to call an ambulance???]

Su Bai: "..."

[Su Bai]: [I'm not crazy.]

[Zhao Dahai]: [All crazy people say they aren't crazy!!!!]