The Martial Unity

Chapter 3639: Guilty as Charged

”Both,” the Divine Doctor explained. ”When entering the thymus, nascent T-cells don’t have any of what we call TCRs, or T-cell receptors. These receptors are essentially chemical compound structures on the walls of the T-cells that help them manually vet each cell they come across. Those TCRs are developed inside the thymus with training and exposure to friendly cells. And those T-cells that fail to develop the right TCRs are tossed out.”

”So... if I just add the evosapien stem cell to the education program within the thymus, then the T-cells will develop the necessary TCRs to recognize the evosapien cells in my body as a part of my body.” Rui realized with an excited expression.

”Correct,” the Divine Doctor remarked. ”Of course, the implantation of the evosapien stem cell into the thymus cannot be done haphazardly. You will need to be very careful and make sure you are actually integrating it into the thymus in a proper manner, where it becomes a part of the system. You should be able to figure that part out by yourself.”

Rui nodded. ”...And eventually my body should come to accept Anthea’s stem cell as my own?”

”Eventually, yes. It will take a few months for all the old T-cells to die off and the new generation of T-cells to take their place.”

”...To think that this problem has such a simple solution to it,” Rui murmured with an excited expression. ”Will there be any problem with integrating evosapien physiology into my body on a biochemical level?”

”No.” The Divine Doctor shook his head. ”We are reproductively compatible and have the same sets of chromosomes. Our biology is extremely similar, and we play by the same rules and systems. Once you acclimate your immune system to evosapien physiology, you will be set.”

Rui nodded. ”How would you recommend I go with the process of integration?”

”In-vivo is the way to go,” the Divine Doctor remarked. ”Slowly replace cells of your body with evosapien cells. Have the evosapien stem cell in your possession begin cell division aggressively and begin creating a stable supply of those stem cells to all parts of your body. The stem cells will react to the chemical stimuli in the environment and undergo changes to specialize into the kind of cells around them. All of this is after you have acclimatized your immune system to the evosapien physiology, of course. Your body should accept the evosapien physiology rather smoothly. There is one part of your body where you will need to be more manual about the way that you implant the evosapien cells, of course.”

”The brain,” Rui mused knowingly.

”Correct, the brain does not have cell death and division cycles like the rest of the body. So, just like with the Body Evolution process, it will have to be more deliberate.”

”...You think I need to create a predictive model for each neuron I want to replace, right?”

”It will be necessary if you want your mind to remain the same as far as the thoughts, emotions, decisions, and actions you take and experience,” the Divine Doctor remarked. ”If you don’t care about that, you can be more unscrupulous.”

”A predictive model on half of all neurons in my brain...” Rui muttered. ”That’s absurd.”

”You have performed the action of resurrection.”

”With Gigabrain,” Rui countered. ”But this... this is even harder than the time I brought Amare back to life. At least back then, I simply needed to bring her chemical state back to what it was five minutes prior. This time, I’m not simply trying to brainlessly revert; I’m trying to change the underlying circuitry of my brain while trying to preserve the information of my mind.”

It was a vastly more sophisticated and challenging ordeal as far as he was concerned.

”I’ll need to perform dozens of billions of predictive models on the cells in my brains if I want their replacements to act exactly like they do, and if I mess up...”

His expression darkened.

In the worst-case scenario, it would affect his Enlightenment of Self, and he would cease to be a Martial Sage. Unlike the other Realms of power, the Sage Realm was one that could be lost at any moment, even if it was not common.

That was why Martial Sages were extremely careful about fundamental changes to them; it came with risks of losing the most important part of themselves.

”This is a process that will take years uninterrupted,” the Divine Doctor remarked. ”For instance, bone cells take seven to ten years to be replaced, so natural replacement will take a long time. You can manually destroy and replace those cells, but...”

He shook his head.

”I wouldn’t recommend it. There’s a lot that can go wrong. Such aggressive and deep replacement is prone to a sudden surge in biochemical problems that will flood you all at once. You also risk mutations causing sub-optimal outcomes, and so on and so forth. If you do it in a nice and slow, natural process, then you will achieve the best outcome while being able to easily troubleshoot any problems that emerge. There will be lots of rejection and incompatibilities that you will need to smooth out with your Martial Soul and specialized evolution processes within your body. Best to take your time and do it slowly and naturally.”

Rui nodded. ”I don’t want to take excessive risks, but seven to ten years...”

He winced.

”That’s a lot.”

”It is the price of power,” the Divine Doctor remarked. ”In your case, you have another variable that greatly complicates all of this.”

Rui’s expression hardened. ”...the gu and esoteric substances like negatron matter and pluripotent matter.”

”...I was not aware you had both of the latter in your body, but yes. The gu will be a problem that I’m aware can be solved, but it will make things harder. And then there’s your explosive cancer...”

He turned towards Rui with a knowing expression. ”Your solutions are always butchery. You rely on brute force rather than finesse. If not my elegant solutions, you probably would have tortured your body until it evolved to accept evosapien physiology.”

”Guilty as charged...”