Chapter 452
Professor Wang walked along, casually speaking.
“...Do we really need to be this intense...”
“I’m asking you, why did Dean Zheng only seek us out, instead of others?”
“...To expedite the research?”
“Exactly...” Professor Wang patted the student on the shoulder, smiling as he said, “How can we not hurry?”
Cheng Yun fell silent.
“I told you before, when I was young, I used to pull all-nighters in the lab, but you didn’t believe me...”
“...”
Professor Wang pointed at the listless scholars in the cafeteria, then turned to Cheng Yun and chuckled:
“Intense?”
“To become the first batch of people to learn the art of immortality.”
“To read some books and conduct some research, and find a way to become free from illness and even achieve immortality...” Professor Wang laughed softly, “This opportunity is too rare and too suitable for us.”
Cheng Yun looked at the group of people with slightly reddened eyes, unable to find his voice for a long time.
“Which one of these people isn’t someone who has emerged from the mountains of books and the seas of experiments?” Professor Wang chuckled again, countering, “Otherwise, why do you think Dean Zheng values us, who can’t even lift a finger?”
“What’s the harm in spending a little more time?”
Cheng Yun nodded in confusion, suddenly feeling less confident as an elder in the retirement home, replaced by a sense of urgency.
He looked at Professor Wang, realizing that after all these years, he was once again being taught a lesson by his mentor.
...
Dean Zheng lectured for an entire week on the fundamentals, then held a seminar in the auditorium.
The seminar’s topic was naturally how to improve the “Tianhe Sword Path” or the “Nine Turns Golden Elixir Method.”
Zheng first distributed the collected materials and experimental data to everyone present.
This time, the retirement home had expanded its recruitment, bringing in about a hundred newcomers from various disciplines—
Physics, chemistry, materials science, biology, even agriculture and mathematics, all fields that could relate to the art of immortality.
These newcomers also participated in the seminar.
However, Zheng was most concerned about scholars from physics or materials science backgrounds.
After all, they seemed to have a closer connection to this project.
As the audience flipped through the materials, Zheng explained the principles and progress of the “Golden Elixir Project.” By the time he finished, the audience had a general understanding of the current issues and began to whisper among themselves.
Once the discussions wrapped up, Zheng said, “You can break into groups or propose ideas independently. What I hope for is that everyone can approach this problem from various angles.”
This was a necessary step.
Currently, research on the “Tianhe Sword Path” had nearly hit a bottleneck, and even Zheng and his team didn’t know where the problem lay.
By holding this seminar, he hoped to leverage the diverse thinking of these scholars from different disciplines to explore various possible solutions.
That was why he had invited scholars from biology and mathematics as well.
“During the seminar, everyone can submit papers and review each other’s work.”
“Contributions to this topic can be counted towards retirement home points, which can later be exchanged for spiritual materials and techniques.”
Once Zheng finished speaking, the discussions in the audience grew even more animated.
To allow these scholars to refine their ideas, Zheng set the seminar duration to half a month.
However, the very next day, a top student from nuclear engineering proposed a hypothesis—the Fusion Reaction Hypothesis.
“From this experimental data, it seems the experimenters have been fixated on the third step, which is how to combine the spiritual energy sub-symbols with particles. But in reality, the normal process of condensing a Golden Elixir is divided into three steps. Therefore, I believe the second sub-symbol may only combine with the first one during fusion or even fission.”
Zheng listened from the audience and found some merit in the argument.
But the subsequent discussions sparked even more inspiration:
Some suggested that the issue might lie in the structure of the alchemical furnace. For instance, the furnace for the Shenxiao Golden Elixir is suitable for that elixir, but producing a second sub-symbol of the five elements would naturally require a different approach.
Others, from a chemical perspective, argued that certain catalysts or specific experimental conditions might be necessary.
From a physics standpoint, someone raised the question of whether there was insufficient energy...
Over the course of half a month, these scholars submitted around eighty papers, with about fifteen or sixteen main hypotheses.
From Zheng’s perspective, seven or eight of those possibilities seemed quite promising.
“Fundamentally analyzing the condensation of the second sub-symbol from a chemical reaction perspective...”
“There are actually three potential problem areas:”
Tang Lingwu summarized from the side, “First, the raw materials; second, the environment; third, the process.”
Zheng nodded.
The raw materials were the most troublesome. For example, the “Symbol Path Foundation Method” requires the Condensing Yuan Dan. If the Tianhe Sword Path is similar, then without understanding the original methods of the Tianhe Master, it’s highly unlikely they could learn this—especially if there are catalysts involved; they would be completely out of luck.
The environment was somewhat easier to address; the conditions for the Golden Elixir Project mainly involve the structure of the alchemical furnace, the concentration of spiritual energy, temperature, and pressure.
That was relatively traceable.
As for the process, it was actually the area Zheng and his team excelled in.
The Golden Elixir Project had already broken down the process of forming the elixir into a production line, and their understanding of the techniques for elixir formation was nearly unparalleled.
This aspect of the problem was relatively simple for them.
At that moment, Professor Wang hurried over to Cheng Yun, handing him a freshly minted paper. Zheng looked up sharply at the two of them: “Mutual interaction?”
“Exactly. We were thinking, if we consider the spiritual energy sub-symbols as a type of particle, or a form of matter, then there must be some kind of attraction when they combine. From a fundamental physics perspective, isn’t this a form of interaction?”
“Electrons interact through photons; what do spiritual energies rely on for interaction?”
Zheng suddenly realized: “The soul!”
From the very beginning of learning the symbol methods, this had been clear— the mutual attraction between spiritual energy symbols is limited to the range of the soul, meaning that the symbols only attract each other within the same soul’s domain!
Conversely, when Zheng was condensing the symbol base within himself, his spiritual power already contained his own soul...
Zheng had always thought it was the effect of the Condensing Yuan Dan, but now he wondered, if the Condensing Yuan Dan were that effective, why did everyone’s five-element rings differ?
If he explained it through the function of the soul, everything suddenly made sense.
“So, the soul...” Tang Mu frowned, “is the medium through which spiritual energy exerts its effects?”
Zheng was taken aback, suddenly realizing that this theory actually pointed to the essence of spells!
Or rather, it explained one thing: why cultivators need to cultivate their souls! Why only cultivators can cast spells!
At a more fundamental level, it resolved a question for Zheng: where does a person fit into the spells?
“It’s still too early to say; it needs verification.” Zheng shook his head. While this theory could explain some issues, it still counted as a hypothesis.
Further verification of certain phenomena was necessary.
He glanced at Professor Wang, feeling a surge of admiration, and stood up to say to him, “Regardless, this theory is incredibly insightful... Professor Wang, thank you for your hard work!”
“Cheng Yun, you’re familiar with the retirement home. If Professor Wang has any questions, you help him out. If you can’t solve them, just let me know.”
Seeing him being so courteous, Professor Wang blinked and smiled at Cheng Yun, the meaning in his eyes unmistakable—
Who’s got whose back? Your teacher is still your teacher, even if he turned to ashes!
...
In the Jiushan Realm, Zheng Fa gently opened his eyes and took out the Creation Jade Tablet.
Within the Creation Jade Tablet were the over eighty papers from the seminar, with the most important being Professor Wang’s paper on the interaction of spiritual energy.
However, he couldn’t make any assumptions about this matter. In fact, the reasons for the experimental failures were not singular, and he still hadn’t clarified whether it was related to the soul.
He pondered for a moment and sent the eighty-plus papers to Madam Xuanhua and the others via private message on the forum.
...
On the experimental island, Yan Wushuang watched as Madam Xuanhua printed out the papers one by one, her face blank.
“Did... Zheng Fa think all this up?”
“Just get used to it.”
“He thought of all this by himself?”
“Who else?” Madam Xuanhua smiled, “I only gave him the data yesterday.”
Yan Wushuang read the two freshly printed papers and covered her head with her hands.
This stuff made her head spin just looking at it.
What kind of brain does Zheng Fa have?
---
Chapter 363: The Trial Boat Ceremony, I’m About to Enlighten!
Chapter 363: The Trial Boat Ceremony, I’m About to Enlighten!
On Jiushan University Island, in a classroom.
Eighty to ninety Jiushan cultivators sat inside, no one spoke, only the rustling of paper turning could be heard.
Table of Contents
