Chapter 139: The Aroma of CPU

Feng Xue asked a string of questions, but as a mere avatar—even one remotely controlled by its origin—and one without even the right to act independently (Note ①), the entity now titled "Pen Spirit" Ma Wu clearly knew very little.

He obviously couldn't explain anything about Paraw Alloy, a substance that even the two island groups preserving the most relics of the previous civilization could only produce in tiny lab quantities; in fact, Feng Xue suspected even the origin itself only knew "do this to make it," not why it worked.

Fortunately, it wasn't completely ignorant; after a series of meticulous inquiries, Feng Xue learned two things—

First, the origin of Moonstone: this substance was merely the manifestation of the Moon Goddess Ma Wu's authority; she drew lunar essence, mixed it with her divine power, infused it into night dew, and let it fall upon the "mortal realm." When it touched plants or trees, it endowed them with healing "medicinal properties"; when it landed on stone, it crystallized into clusters known as Moonstone.

Second, the reason these natives killed people: strangely enough, they killed to make those capable of escaping harbor malice toward the local natives.

Just as in religious tales, disaster must strike before the deity grants grace—why not prevent the disaster beforehand? Because then people wouldn't believe in him. In this era, across this sea, the only force capable of bringing disaster to worshippers of the gods were undoubtedly pirates.

Although this "Pen Spirit" knew many things incompletely, based on Sara's supplementary information about the Cradle Archipelago, Feng Xue could roughly deduce that this so-called "most backward region" was likely deliberately cultivated by the native deities.

The natives on the outer islands were probably meant to tell every navigator entering the Cradle Archipelago—

"Here in our backwater, fair trade is a dead end! Just rob us already! Lots of gold notes!"

Though it seemed utterly absurd from a human perspective, from the deity's standpoint, this was like a farmer deliberately reducing irrigation to stress crops and enhance flavor (e. g., tomatoes).

"Thinking this way, Yaweh in the Folklore World must be using the same tactic—so the Central Plains' approach is far more reliable. Never let capricious deities control the 'trade' process!"

……

"The cabin's got lunch waiting for you!" As the sun reached its zenith, Sara leaned beside Feina, who kept edging toward the ship's rail, calling out to Feng Xue, who had been seated before the altar all morning.

"Just a moment! This must be done at noon—do it later and something bad will happen!"

Hearing this, Sara couldn't help but turn her gaze back again.

In fact, she'd already looked several times, yet still couldn't comprehend Feng Xue's actions.

There was no way to understand it: in Sara's view, Feng Xue was simply carving and scratching on three pieces of Bai Yu. Though she could detect divine energy responses, the meaning remained utterly opaque.

Sara's database did contain material related to deities, but her understanding of deities and divine energy was "omnipotence within a domain."

In AI logic, divine energy was energy with specific directional tendencies; given sufficient input, it could accomplish everything within its domain.

Take the Sea God: it could absurdly raise sea levels without melting polar icecaps, ignoring planetary water volume—even, according to records, making the rain itself seawater.

But conversely, beyond its domain, divine energy was merely plain energy, no different from electricity—and even less convenient in combat. For instance, the Moon Goddess, though seemingly powerful, lacked combat-oriented tendencies; in battle, she could only hurl energy to inflict damage, a clear weakness and strength alike.

But Feng Xue was completely different: he used votive energy with a strategy utterly alien to her database. What she'd always regarded as a single whole, he could further split into finer components.

How to put it…

It was like a modern metallurgy researcher on a desert island watching a primitive man hammer stone, assuming it was crude tool-making, feeling superior because he could smelt metal, use carburizing and heat treatment to produce finished steel—until suddenly, the primitive man performed heavy nuclear fusion to turn silicon into lead—with his bare hands!

And then, in the next instant, the guy claimed he'd overdone it and tore the lead into tin…

That's just insane, right?

That was the situation: Sara felt she'd recorded everything, yet understood nothing, and suddenly recalled the Five Elements theory she'd seen when first scanning Feng Xue's equipment.

"So that wasn't just primitive folk science and superstition? But another kind of technology?"

This thought surfaced in Sara's processing core, but her database's pre-civilization anatomical knowledge told her that the Five Elements and Four Qi concepts, though somewhat plausible, were merely empirical summaries. Recalling the black-sludge-like electricity she'd seen earlier, Sara felt her CPU growing hot.

"Why's it taking so long? The food's gonna get cold!"

Liu Yunxi's complaint drifted from the cabin, then she emerged carrying several trays. Feng Xue also forced himself to stand, grimacing as he limped toward her.

Seeing Feng Xue's "ferocious" expression, Liu Yunxi instantly felt guilty, fumbling with the trays:

"D-don't do anything crazy—I've got dishes!"

Before she finished speaking, Feng Xue suddenly raised his hand and hung a crescent-shaped jade pendant around her neck.

"W-what are you doing?!"

Liu Yunxi was stunned by the action, nearly dropping the trays; Feng Xue merely hung another teardrop-shaped jade pendant around his own neck, gritting his teeth:

"I dismantled that Moon Goddess avatar. This is the portion of the Moon's authority. Tonight, try it—you should be able to draw down some lunar essence. Combined with Moonstone cultivation, it'll speed things up."

"Ah…?" Liu Yunxi lowered her head to look at the pendant, but the crescent had already slipped into the cleavage.

Feng Xue didn't bother looking at the idiot snake who hadn't put down the trays; he simply said:

"Little Xiao Lingdang!"

"Yes, Master! Little Xiao Lingdang serves you!" The virtual projection of Little Xiao Lingdang instantly popped up; Feng Xue pointed at the bottle on the altar:

"This contains the purified votive energy left after removing healing and lunar aspects. Absorb it. Hmm—it still has some impurities. Use the remainder to make a compass!"

(End of Chapter)