Facing an Ancient God for a Year

Chapter 2353: Chapter 2348: The First Law of the Transcendent

”Lord Aike looks really overworked... this is that ’finding someone to take something off your hands’ you were talking about?”

After that brief visit, watching the Night Watchman Demigod leave in a hurry, Lisa glanced at Fu Qian with some feeling and brought up what he’d said earlier.

”Did we just overhear something we really shouldn’t have?”

She did in fact know perfectly well who Lord Aike had specially come here for; while it was hard to argue with how insanely busy Professor Fu was, she still didn’t forget to confirm whether what they’d just done was appropriate.

The main exchange had been so mundane it was hard to tell if she should have shooed the junior assistants out.

Yet in just a few lines, it seemed to brush up against something pretty serious.

”If Lord Aike isn’t worried, what is there for us to worry about?”

Professor Fu just laughed, of course not caring about such details in the slightest.

”...You two had best keep absolutely quiet about what you heard, especially you, Riet.”

Unfortunately, even with Professor Fu’s attitude, Lisa still didn’t want her junior assistants getting dragged into trouble.

She frowned at them for a moment, then turned her head and gave a special warning to Miss Liushuang and Riet.

”Got it.”

The Heaven’s Commencement Institute’s new hire who’d been called out looked mentally well-adjusted by now, and nodded earnestly.

”You’ve worked hard enough for today. Let’s stop here. Just leave the stuff here.”

And as soon as she finished speaking, the same Professor Lisa who hadn’t chased them out earlier now directly announced the end of the workday.

”Mental contamination is something you really do need to pay attention to, especially you, Liushuang.”

The reason even sounded perfectly proper: what they had piled in front of them was frankly obscenely blasphemous.

”I’ll be careful.”

It was really hard not to suspect her of just slacking off, but as the person being ”taken care of,” Ji Liushuang only smiled and agreed.

”Cass hasn’t said he needs results from this side urgently, has he?”

Already mentally clocked out, Lisa suddenly noticed Fu Qian still sitting there calmly, and her eyes grew wary again.

”He hasn’t.”

Fu Qian answered honestly, still leafing through his advisors’ wild ideas.

”Then are you planning to stay here and work overtime?”

Lisa’s brows knitted; something about this didn’t feel right.

”Not me—you.”

The answer made her heart sink on cue; she saw Professor Fu casually toss the file aside, smiling just as pleasantly.

”We left in a rush back then and didn’t come here together with Cass to have a look. Since I’m here today anyway, let’s go over that project of yours from before.”

...

You could tell that having the off-work bell run straight into the on-work bell, without even time for a bite to eat, was hard to stomach even for a Transcendent.

Once she processed Fu Qian’s words, it was like the light in Professor Lisa’s eyes dimmed a little.

”Out on survey lately, I’ve been feeling more and more that your idea was actually pretty good—worth taking a serious look at.”

But with just that offhand comment from Professor Fu, the light flared right back up the next second.

”Isn’t that laying it on a bit thick...? Professor Fu, with everything on your plate, you still have time to worry about little things like this?”

Maybe she craved academic recognition a bit too much, but even with her weak spot so cleanly poked, Professor Lisa still snorted her skepticism.

”We’ll be heading out then.”

Seeing that the higher-up still had the energy to squeeze the local peasants, Ji Liushuang looked honestly relieved. She exchanged a glance with Riet, then took her leave together with the latter.

”The Demon hides in the details. In our line of work, there’s no such thing as a truly ’small’ issue... That’s also why the archive has value.”

As he watched them walk off, Fu Qian laid his hand on the failure list in front of him and shared a bit of his academic philosophy with Lisa.

Although the nature of this project was extremely utilitarian, for someone like Cass who’d been through that catastrophe, it probably still carried a tiny bit of academic hope.

As for Miss Liushuang’s reaction from just now until now, that actually wasn’t hard to understand either.

Her Ranking might not be high, but Sword Heart Enlightenment was unreasonably sharp more often than not; she’d probably sensed that his Blood Bar wasn’t full.

”Understood... Welcome, Professor Fu, and thank you for your guidance.”

Since the other side had actually raised things to that level, Lisa could only let out a long sigh and admit defeat.

The next moment, she left everything on the table where it was and headed off first to lead the way.

...

”I actually haven’t done much since then. Partly it’s a lack of raw materials; partly it’s that this thing’s power decays way too fast.”

Compared to Fu Qian’s lab, the place Professor Lisa had run for years looked far more ”respectable.”

Heading upstairs, Fu Qian even saw décor similar to Kaldora’s storage area.

And as Professor Lisa kept modestly talking, she opened two metal doors in a row, and Fu Qian quickly spotted those familiar bone fragments.

Pale, tiny, all sorts of shapes...

Most were scattered across the metal table, but you could also see some with special structures, like the Bone Horseshoe Crab from before—finished pieces or half-finished ones.

In short, forced by project needs and lacking any shut-in talent, Professor Lisa had somehow turned herself into a model-building nerd in the lab.

”This thing basically doesn’t have any Divinity left.”

Feeling once again that human potential is limitless, Fu Qian followed Lisa’s lead and let his gaze fall on a dried-out Bone Plate.

The trophy from their last expedition into the Bone Spirit Realm, and the key to Lisa’s project.

With it, you could break bone down further into even smaller fragments, then use your imagination to recombine and create anew.

And now it really was as Lisa had said: its power had decayed badly and it looked almost ordinary.

”I tried all kinds of methods and couldn’t even slow that process down. It feels like something in its fundamental properties has already been damaged.”

Once it came to the actual work, Professor Lisa fell into proper researcher mode, picking up the Bone Plate as she described the project’s progress.

”In the end there was nothing for it—I could only rush to get more material while it hadn’t completely failed yet, and break everything down and reassemble it.

”From how it looks now, your idea back then was probably right. By combining these things, they really can be linked into a single chain that runs all the way to Divinity and leads to sublimation... Cass, after seeing it, was generally in agreement on that point as well.”

Talking, she’d already moved to stand by the metal table. You could see the old Bone Horseshoe Crab right there, along with many more complex, non-humanoid structures.

”Do you have any new thoughts about these things?”

After giving him a special moment to look, Lisa fixed him with a bright gaze, clearly expecting real guidance from Professor Fu.

”I actually do, a little.”

Nodding, Fu Qian traced a finger in the Void over the Bone Horseshoe Crab’s back.

”It feels like we’ve been missing a bit of reverse thinking. We’ve been climbing along this chain upward, even chasing Divinity—that’s what Transcendents have always done... But have you considered what it would mean if we took the Divine Beings’ point of view and looked all the way down instead?

”As long as there’s an endpoint, doesn’t that mean you can always follow the chain and get there?”