Chapter 259: The Dao Master Has Awakened!

The game world operates with such regularity—it was again the day of the monster siege, yet unlike before, today none of the top players in the game appeared outside the fortress they were meant to defend.

"Maniac, are you done over there yet?"

Though asking about progress was annoying, within Hidden Village, some players had already achieved results with Fixation, Transformation, and Transfer; many had even passed their corresponding trials by learning their spells. Even Gang'er and Battle Dragon had, through cross-applying insights, fully cleared all three trials—but for Selection, not a single spell had been created yet.

Hearing Gang'er's question, the Research Maniac sighed and let the mana in his hands disperse again:

"Not yet. The ritual structure for Selection isn't hard to build, but crafting a spell based on Selection is troublesome—because a spell isn't just about filtering something out; it must do something with what's filtered. Otherwise, it's not a spell."

"But to produce an output effect, you first need to define a target, so the mana can identify it and pick it out from the entire environment. That identification mechanism is too difficult."

"I even think you need to master all three other Foundation Skills to the peak before even touching this. Anyway, if you have ideas, try them out—I'm going to attempt the other three trials first."

Saying this, the Research Maniac, dejected, began practicing the three "passkeys": 【Spiral Ball】, 【Instant Step】, and 【Armament Haki】.

Watching the most research-driven player, the Research Maniac, give up, Gang'er turned his attention to other players who had hoped to compete with him—they too shook their heads.

In truth, the Foundation Skill of Selection wasn't harder than the other three—it could even be called the easiest.

Selection, at its core, is simply building a filter to sieve out a desired target from a specific source. The difficulty has never been weaving the net, but in making sure only your designated target passes—or fails—to pass.

Players have struggled this long mainly because this world lacks the easiest target to filter: Willpower.

Willpower is extremely sensitive to thought—it can be identified simply by thinking of it.

But in a world without Willpower, finding a target suitable for filtering requires establishing an entire identification mechanism.

It's like assembling a robotic arm to grab objects—easy for a mechanical engineering expert—but making that arm precisely identify the object you want to grab goes far beyond mechanical engineering knowledge.

At this very moment, not only were the players thinking about this, but Feng Xue himself was also pondering it.

In truth, with his mastery of the four Foundation Skills, developing a spell based on Selection wasn't difficult—for instance, the simplest would be a shield.

The kind found in fantasy and xianxia works: a barrier that envelops the caster to defend against external attacks.

Such a spell must block incoming attacks while allowing the caster's own attacks to pass through. That process of distinguishing friend from foe is precisely Selection.

The Folklore World solved this problem simply: directly identify friend and foe, because Willpower exists—no complex reasoning needed. Just allow only attacks infused with one's own Willpower to pass.

But if you forbid using Willpower, that's an entirely different level of difficulty.

Still, he had no intention of interfering with the players' choices. After all, he was genuinely curious what kind of surprises these little players might bring him.

As for if they truly couldn't figure it out…

If they truly couldn't figure it out, then so be it. If they lacked this much creativity, Feng Xue didn't expect them to produce any quality spells anyway—let them stay in Hidden Village and keep experimenting.

Though he thought this way, Feng Xue ultimately hadn't abandoned these useful wetware. As the Research Maniac rapidly cleared Spiral Ball and began studying Armament Haki, a dark cloud slowly drifted in from the horizon…

"Boom—!"

The sudden thunder startled many players, but before they could react, large raindrops began falling from the sky.

"Damn it, why is it raining?! Isn't the game's weather system supposed to have thunderstorms only in extreme zones?!"

Staring at the downpour, players scrambled to flee—but at that moment, the Research Maniac, who had been shaping mana, suddenly seemed struck by a flash of insight, shouting:

"I get it! No need to make it so detailed! Physical objects work too! It really does require combining other techniques!"

As he spoke, a soft glow emanated from his body, and an arched light shield appeared above his head.

The large raindrops were blocked by the mana—Gang'er, seeing this, said:

"Useless—your technique is just a Transformation shape change…" But before he finished, Gang'er suddenly noticed the barrier was leaking!

He stared in disbelief—the barrier had no holes, yet fine mist-like raindrops fell like fine hairs. Everyone present was soaked to the bone, yet the Research Maniac stood bathed in the misty rain, his cultivation robes making him look like a celestial being fallen to earth.

"What the hell is this technique?" Gang'er tried creating his own rain shelter and drilled several holes into it—but even the tiniest holes produced streams of water.

"I was going to ask how you cast so fast!" The Research Maniac, watching Gang'er's spell complete almost the instant he thought of it, winced. Gang'er scratched his head sheepishly:

"Blame that damn trial. I can't claim to master property changes, but for shape and color alone, I can do it fast. Don't just talk about me—how'd you pull this off? Did you pass?"

"Not yet, but I think I'm close." The Research Maniac, refining his spell as he spoke, explained: "It's basically a colander—but instead of punching holes directly, I set it to let only water droplets of a specific size fall. So only the tiny droplets that splash off the barrier can pass through; the rest flow away, creating this misty rain."

"Still, I don't get how you identified it." Gang'er had practiced Selection too—he knew the difficulty well.

The Research Maniac scratched his head, seemed to rephrase his thoughts, then said:

"It's comparison. I once had the idea of a mana computer—this is similar. It uses 'switches'… Wait! Damn it, I get it now! That's why this spell didn't pass! Selection isn't a switch—it's the program controlling the switch. Holy shit, we need to develop a programming language based on switches? Start simple—begin with 'if'…"

(End of Chapter)