"Don't worry, I'm fine. It's not because of you. It will grow back in a while."
Lei Zongchao saw Meng Chao's surprise and comforted him gently.
Just as he expected, as he spoke, his left pinky grew back again, and gradually, it enveloped the white finger bone.
Meng Chao was certain that this was not cell regeneration.
He did not see any blood vessels, flesh sprouts, or scabs when a wound healed on its own.
Lei Zongchao's pinky seemed to have vanished into thin air before reappearing again.
However, it was fainter than before, and it looked a little blurry.
Meng Chao blinked hard and fixed his gaze on it. He still felt that Lei Zongchao's pinky was shrouded in a faint layer of smoke. It was about to disappear at any moment.
As for the flesh at the corner of his mouth, even though it had reappeared, it was still semi-transparent and empty. Meng Chao could still see his teeth through the flesh.
"Master Lei, what's going on?" Meng Chao was completely confused.
"It's just as you can see. I'm dying."
Lei Zongchao observed his left pinky with an emotionless expression. "Or rather, based on a certain probability, I'm already dead. Did you see a few different versions of me just now? Some of them were covered in wounds, some of them were covered in blood, some of them were badly rotted, and some of them were just bones?"
Meng Chao widened his eyes and nodded vigorously.
"Those were all versions of me that were 'different'," Lei Zongchao explained.
"You know, when I explored the ancient ruins, fought against zombies and monsters, absorbed rampaging spirit energy, and tried to break through the limits of my life, I went through countless near-death experiences.
"Based on probability, I'm really lucky to be able to live up to this day.
"If I had to repeat it one more time, no, one hundred times, I wouldn't be confident that I would be able to replicate this luck.
"Perhaps the other possibility is that I died a horrible death in the ancient ruins and turned into a pile of bones, or that I was heavily injured by zombies and monsters, so I'm lying on my bed with an incomplete body, struggling at death's door, or that I went through spirit energy deviation and turned into a deformed monster.
"And as you can see, the me in front of you is in a situation where multiple probabilities are stacked on top of each other. Besides, as I continue burning my life and use more power than I can handle, the probability of my death is gradually increasing. It's like I'm rolling a die once in a while. If the number goes past the limit, I'll really die."
"…"
Meng Chao was confused.
He felt as if he had wasted his years in university.
He had no idea what Lei Zongchao was talking about.
"How could this be?" He could only ask dryly.
"Currently, no one knows. Perhaps, this is the curse of the ancient civilization."
Lei Zongchao sighed and said, "The Earthlings and the Earth civilization that we are familiar with are three-dimensional carbon-based intelligent life and three-dimensional civilization. The biggest characteristic is that they are 'fixed' and 'unique'. We are life forms living in a unidirectional timeline and a single space. Our river of time can only flow forward, and we can only appear at a single coordinate in the three-dimensional space.
"If we want to move from a coordinate in the three-dimensional space to another coordinate, we will need to use up a lot of energy and a lot of time. It's like moving Dragon City and its tens of millions of people from the surface of Earth to the surface of another planet on the other side of the galaxy. This sort of technology is impossible in the concept of a three-dimensional civilization.
"But the primordial civilization is different.
"Based on the clues we found in the ancient ruins, there's a high possibility that the primordial civilization is a four-dimensional civilization that surpasses time and space.
"The river of time that flows slowly in our eyes and never returns might be a frozen river of ice in the eyes of the primordial civilization. They can freely cross it and travel back to its source.
"In our eyes, the boundless sea of stars is probably a small ball of paper that has been compressed to the minimum and is full of wrinkles inside and outside in the eyes of the ancient civilizations. As long as there is a needle that is thin and sharp enough, it can pierce through and communicate with hundreds of coordinates that are billions of lightyears away.
"The primordial civilization can jump between different timelines and coordinates. They can exist in several, dozens, or even hundreds of different timelines and spaces at the same time. They are life forms that have multiple probabilities stacked on top of each other. We can't understand them. At most, we can only observe and sense them.
"A few decades ago, Jin Wanhao, Jin Qianxi, and I were adventuring in the depths of the Primordial Ruins. One time, we mistakenly entered a maze that changed constantly. The maze's passageways changed randomly, and it was filled with danger, traps, and traps. But that wasn't the most terrifying part.
"The most terrifying thing was that when we wandered around the maze for a few days and couldn't find the way out, we noticed that someone was following us around five meters behind us quietly.
"At that time, all three of us were terrified.
"You have to understand that even though we were still young at that time, we had already trained ourselves through the trials in the ancient ruins and gained peerless supernatural abilities. How could we not notice that someone had been following us for a few days?
"Besides, no matter how quickly we turned around, we couldn't see our pursuer's true face.
"A barely discernible fog floated in the depths of the maze. It was the same as the fog that shrouded Dragon City.
"Our pursuer hid in the depths of the fog and maintained a distance of around five meters from us. When we advanced, they retreated. When we retreated, they advanced. It was like … a shadow that was separated from us but entangled with us.
"In the end, Jin Qianxi cleared the core mechanism of the maze, and we were finally able to locate our pursuer. Then, we immediately launched our fiercest attacks.
"I struck one of our pursuers into a trap, but when he was devoured by the metallic fangs in the depths of the trap, I used the dark light to see that the pursuer was me!
"Up to this day, I still don't understand what happened.
"Perhaps when we stepped into the maze in the ancient ruins and passed through each fork, our bodies split into two, four, eight, sixteen, and countless other possibilities.
"In one possibility, we successfully cleared the mechanisms in the maze and escaped.
"But in another possibility, we fell into a trap and were crushed to pieces.
"The third possibility was that we curled up in the depths of the maze and starved to death. We rotted away and turned into skeletons.
"When we leave the labyrinth, all the possibilities of life and death, of life and death, will be condensed and superimposed on this body.
Lei Zongchao used his blurry left pinky finger to point at the X-shaped eye tattoo on his body.
His words stirred up a storm in Meng Chao's heart.
It was not that Meng Chao completely understood Lei Zongchao's theory.
Instead, he realized that this theory could perfectly explain Dragon City's transmigration and his return to the past.
'Could it be that the so-called return to the past is just a wave of probability? Is it a jump from one possibility to another?'
Meng Chao mumbled in his heart. 'Just what is the true face of the ancient civilization?'
"There's no need for us to be troubled by this question."
When Lei Zongchao saw that Meng Chao was deep in thought and even obsessed, he waved his hand and said, "Right now, we're still miles away from the level of the ancient civilization. If we force ourselves to search for the so-called truth and answer, it'll be like asking elementary school students to do university exams. We'll only go astray and waste a lot of time, resources, and energy. It's meaningless to solve the real problems we face.
"You can think of my injuries in a simple and crude way. When I explored the ancient ruins, I was poisoned by a slow-acting poison. The stronger I am, the worse the poison becomes. After decades of accumulation, the poison finally entered my lungs, bones, and brain. It's time for me to pay back my debt.
"That's why I can only hole up in this house made of Black Stars and soak in the gene stock solution that is filled with spirit energy and nutrients. With this method, I can barely control my vitality magnetic field and maintain my last shred of life."
'A' Ji's right. '
Lei Zongchao's "injuries" were indeed worse than Jin Wanhao's.
In fact, it was not just a matter of him being heavily injured. Instead, there was a certain probability that he was already dead.
Jin Wanhao's hidden injuries could be solved by regaining his youth.
But even if all the cells in Lei Zongchao's body were renewed, he might not be able to stop the probability that he would die.
That was indeed the case in his previous life.
The legendary Battle God died during the final moment of the Monster War.
In this life, if Meng Chao wanted to change Lei Zongchao's fate, he might have to work even harder.
When he thought of this, Meng Chao became even more puzzled. "Master Lei, if that's the case, why …?"
Why did you have to take the risk of increasing the probability of your death and activate your vitality magnetic field to the max to help me cleanse my bones and meridians so that I could be enlightened?
"You don't have to find it strange, Meng Chao. In truth, I noticed your existence a long time ago, and it was much earlier than you imagined."
As if he could see through his puzzlement, Lei Zongchao smiled and said, "When you taught your high school classmates the modified Reckless Bull Force and helped Yan Hengbo develop Ripple Force V2.0, I knew that another amazing rising star had appeared in Dragon City."
Meng Chao was surprised and a little embarrassed.
But when he thought about it, it made sense. Who was Lei Zongchao? He was the legendary Battle God. Even if his absolute fighting strength was not as great as when he was at his peak, his judgment had become even more shrewd. It was only natural that he could tell just what sort of terrifying potential was contained in the future Reckless Bull Force and Ripple Force.
However, in Lei Zongchao's eyes, the Old Fire Relayer's tricks might not be able to fool him.
It was very difficult for him to explain the origins of these two future martial arts with the word "extraordinary talent".
Meng Chao was a little conflicted, but Lei Zongchao waved his hand and did not bother himself with the details. "The most important reason why I was able to survive until this day when I faced countless deaths is that I don't butt into other people's business!
"I don't care where you got your strength. I only care whether you can use it to do more things for Dragon City, our comrades, and our civilization.
"By the looks of it now, you've been doing very well over the past two years, and the new wave of martial arts you've stirred up has opened up a brand new path for Dragon Citizens, be it the upgraded Reckless Bull Force or Ripple Force, or the brand new fighting style of the Ultimate Style.
"With this alone, I should do my best to help you, shouldn't I?"
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