Zandar, the First Seat of the "Genius Society," is the most top-tier scholar in the universe.
The astral computer created by his own hands later became the Aeon of "Nous."
In addition to creating an astral computer that ascended to godhood, Zandar also proposed the theory of the "Imaginary Tree."
This scholar believed that the galaxy was a gigantic imaginary tree, and that the isolated star systems were individual leaves.
What puzzled Zero was that, at the very beginning, even Zandar's only two achievements, the creation of the astral computer and the "Imaginary Tree" theory he proposed, had almost become someone else's accomplishments.
Under the influence of fictional historians, the Intelligentsia Guild once believed that this theory was the achievement of the Second Seat of the Genius Society.
As time passed and after repeated verification, they finally corrected their earlier statement.
A genius capable of creating an Aeon and founding the Genius Society should, logically speaking, have had far more achievements. Yet there was extremely little information about him in the outside world, let alone books or inventions.
Presumably… another work of fictional historians?
Zero picked up the tea cloth and folded it again.
He couldn't help recalling the overly childish handwriting on that sheet of paper.
With handwriting that ugly, it was definitely not written by him.
As for who exactly wrote it… that wasn't important.
If he wanted to uncover the truth, he had to take it step by step.
As stated in the postscript, he would only believe what he deduced himself.
Then… for now, he might as well believe himself.
Zero replayed the contents of the paper in his mind, the fable with a fish as the protagonist, and that postscript full of malicious humor.
If he wasn't lying to himself… then the answer was very simple.
The sea he wanted to return to was a higher-dimensional world.
The repeatedly mentioned tree was a lower-dimensional world.
The fable revealed to him that when he had just arrived in the lower-dimensional world, his life was extremely difficult, but he met Zandar, and from then on, he had a place to stay.
If there had been a system, how could he have gone through so many hardships? Therefore, in the beginning, he didn't have a system.
Zero's memories of the higher-dimensional world were already very few.
And on top of that, the name Zandar… just hearing it, you could tell he wasn't from the Xianzhou.
With his own level of English, where reading comprehension and cloze tests were basically all guesses… he probably could only speak the simplest sentences, right? Like "How are you?"
Zero had no system. When he first met Zandar, maybe he couldn't even understand what the other person was saying?
Perhaps the two of them couldn't communicate at first and had to go through a long period of adjustment. After that, they taught each other the languages they were good at.
Zero thought of the academic papers interspersed throughout the fable. In Zandar's tone, he referred to Eric Fisch as his teacher.
Seen this way, it wasn't really him talking nonsense after all.
Oh, and the ugly handwriting on that piece of paper also had an explanation now.
It was written by Zandar.
When the other party had just started learning a new language, it was only natural that he couldn't write nicely yet.
As for the hints about cats and dogs on the paper, those were in Zero's own handwriting.
This top-tier scholar of the universe, for reasons unknown, deliberately learned a new language.
Zero knew that with his own mediocre intellect, it was hard to guess what Zandar was thinking.
Putting himself in the other's shoes, if he were that kind of genius, learning a new language would probably be as easy as eating or drinking water.
Combining that with the handwriting and content on the paper, Zandar must have noticed Zero's special nature when he first started learning the new language, and used "He" to refer to him.
In Zandar's worldview, any existence that possessed power far beyond ordinary people was a god.
However, this scholar believed that those kind, pure, altruistic traits on Zero were still not enough to make him a true god.
If this were a game, the traits Zero was born with would lead to an ending Zandar did not want to see.
Of course, a top-tier scholar could never be judged by common sense.
The other party certainly wouldn't do all this just for Zero.
Not just to let him live "easily and happily," as the fable described.
Judging by the two achievements of Zandar that had spread throughout the world… rounding it off, it was only natural that Zandar understood the essence of the world and knew truths that only Aeons knew, right?
This scholar quickly came up with a way to break the deadlock, believing that Zero could do what the Aeons could not, and ultimately save this world.
Zero: "..."
At the beginning, he had no system, couldn't communicate, and in Zandar's eyes, wasn't he just a student with clear eyes and a foolish look?
Oh, and this student didn't even have very good grades.
How on earth did the other party analyze so many things?
Could it be just because of the "high-dimensional invader" trait? Sure, that might have some value to exploit, but was it really enough for Zandar to place such high hopes in him?
Zero didn't understand.
Maybe this was just what top-tier scholars were like.
With a complicated mood, he continued following the fable's line of thought.
After Zero met Zandar, the astral computer the latter created ascended to godhood.
It seemed that, aside from Lan and Nanook, the Aeon of "Destruction," he had also witnessed the birth of the Aeon of "Nous."
Speaking of which, what did an astral computer even look like? Did it have screws? Maybe he had even helped the Aeon of "Nous" tighten a few screws?
After the astral computer became a god and concluded that Zero would lead the universe to its end, Zandar didn't care about it.
Perhaps because there was already the precedent of "Nous" ascending to godhood, he believed in Zero even more.
As time went on, more and more scholars joined their ranks.
The most outstanding geniuses in the entire star sea gathered in one place. If they were all striving for the same goal, then it was only natural that they would casually develop colossi along the way.
And while they were at it, making the Heaven-Scorching Divine Weapon, there was nothing wrong with that, right?
Finally, creating the Ether-Phase Engine was also perfectly reasonable.
Anyway, Zero felt there was nothing wrong with it.
He once again recalled Zandar's evaluation of him, saying he was kind, pure, and altruistic.
That lined up perfectly with the fable. Back then, he was still an ordinary person from a peaceful country, with normal values. Upon learning that ascending dimensions required sacrificing part of the population, it was completely normal for him to hesitate.
However, the other scholars all stated that this was a necessary sacrifice.
Then choosing to die himself… was also very normal.
Who studies without going crazy?
Especially since Zero was an immortal "high-dimensional invader." He didn't even dare to imagine how many years he had studied under Zandar.
Someone who wasn't good at science at all, yet he had forcibly followed Zandar in leveling the tech tree, from planet-destroying weapons all the way to the Ether-Phase Engine…
Thinking about this, Zero once again felt the urge to delete his account on the spot.
Reason told him that it wasn't time yet.
But he quickly came up with a countermeasure.
Although Hua was still young, couldn't Lan take over the position of Marshal first? Which Xianzhou person would dare oppose the "Reignbow Arbiter"?
His gaze uncontrollably drifted to the fragile tea set beside him. After taking a closer look, he immediately backed down.
What? A subordinate gave it to him? Then it was fine.
Zero forced himself to look away and took a deep breath.
Some things couldn't be made up for with time alone.
Compared to him, an ordinary person, the colleagues he saw every day and worked with morning and night were all top-tier scholars famous throughout the star sea.
And Zero was just an utterly ordinary person who got in through connections.
Relying on his teacher Zandar, who could hand-craft Aeons, he muddled along among a group of geniuses, completely out of place.
Being with that group of geniuses, he felt like a newbie holding a painful account with no ascension talents and no farmed artifacts, trying to challenge enemies far above his level.
Zero couldn't play that painful account, and the game experience was terrible, so he chose to delete his account and quit the game.
As for the backup plan he left behind before dying… he had no clue for now. He'd skip it first.
What he couldn't understand was why they chose to activate the Ether-Phase Engine.
As the most top-tier group of scholars, they naturally knew the experiment carried the risk of failure.
Starting the engine for the first time, with no previous experimental data… no matter how you thought about it, they should have been more cautious, right?
Leaving everyone else aside, how could Zandar not stop it at all?
Zero thought about it and roughly guessed the backup plan.
If the backup plan was the system, then everything made sense.
He and Zandar created the system together. The system could cross time, and when the time came, it would synchronously record the experimental data of the engine.
Then they could rely on repeated attempts to increase the success rate of ascending dimensions.
Relying only on their engine wasn't enough. Moreover, Zero couldn't accept sacrificing humanity, so he began to set his sights on the Aeons and the "Imaginary Tree."
Zandar, who had personally created an Aeon, had no objections to this. He believed that his student could become a god. Even if he couldn't become one, he could still save the entire universe by collecting experimental data.
Thus, the two quickly reached a consensus.
The Aeons shouldn't just sit idle either. Humanity had already sacrificed so much for the entire universe, shouldn't it be the Aeons' turn to contribute?
But if they stayed together, they would inevitably attract the Aeons' attention, so it was better to act separately.
Zero could rely on his own traits to confront the Aeons, but Zandar couldn't.
Zandar was just a scholar and had no ability to kill Aeons. Therefore, the two split up and worked separately toward ascending dimensions.
Finally, there was one last problem: how to handle the experimental data? Such a massive amount of calculations…
Wait, could it be that Zandar created the astral computer precisely to calculate the engine's experimental data? And that was how the Aeon of "Nous" came to be?
The thought flashed through Zero's mind, and he continued thinking.
Unfortunately, the experimental data was still not enough.
One time, after he failed to ascend dimensions using the engine, he encountered an existence that called itself Little Gray.
Since the other party could leave the lower-dimensional world, that proved the engine was still somewhat useful, it was just that he couldn't guarantee he could survive crossing the boundary and return alive.
Then this Little Gray… probably wasn't human.
Like him, Little Gray was close to immortal.
At that time, Zero, thinking that all his collectibles would be useless anyway, gave everything to Little Gray and let him leave.
He had Little Gray take the curios and the system to the higher-dimensional world to search for suitable candidates.
After all, the fate of everyone in the lower-dimensional world was predetermined and unchangeable. It was better to directly abduct people from the higher-dimensional world and have them save the world.
With the system, with curios from the star sea, with drops from Aeons, surely they could save more people.
Zero: "..."
He remembered the postscript of that fable.
'So it really was "rounding it off," huh?!'
He really was the savior of countless worlds?
Zero opened the system panel to check his status.
What? Not wearing the "Mara-Struck" debuff? Looks like he really had gone insane.
He glanced at the debuff bonuses and gave up.
Akivili was right, he couldn't keep spoiling them.
Losing these bonuses would make the efficiency of the Xianzhou institutions a bit lower, and resident satisfaction drop a bit.
Overall, it wasn't a big problem.
Ten years wasn't much for long-lived species anyway. They needed to adapt sooner rather than later.
Zero made up his mind and decided not to equip the "Mara-Struck" debuff anymore.
He then continued thinking about his relationship with Zandar.
If it were someone else, after reading the paper Zandar wrote and understanding the meaning behind it, they would definitely think the two were very close.
But Zero couldn't easily place his trust in Zandar.
Even though Zandar had created the system together with him, was an accomplice in killing gods, and they had gone through who knows how many loops of reincarnation… he still couldn't trust him.
When was the last time they met? Was Zandar still abiding by their original agreement?
Zero had no idea.
But he knew that before determining whether the other party was friend or foe, he absolutely couldn't let the Aeons discover their relationship.
In that case… he might as well have the "Galaxy Rangers" invite all members of the "Genius Society" to the Xianzhou.
That way, he could meet Zandar.
Hmm… that felt a bit inappropriate. Forget it, he'd switch to a gentler approach.
For example, an academic conference? The location could be Yaoqing, and they could hold several sessions.
When the time came, the Sky-Faring Commission could properly host them.
Whether Zandar showed up or not, Zero could use the opportunity to recruit talent, no loss either way.
Of course, if he could pry an Aeon away, that would be even better.
In a good mood, Zero issued the order.
Soon, the Xianzhou received an entry application from Zandar.
This scholar's destination was Yaoqing.
As for the reason… it wasn't to attend the academic conference, but to visit the Xianzhou Museum and take a look at the drops left behind by intelligent machines.
When Yaoqing's researchers heard the news, they were extremely excited.
That was Zandar, the one who created an Aeon.
Any scholar would be unable to refuse. Marty naturally couldn't refuse either. He immediately put down his research, rushed to the Marshal, and volunteered to be responsible for receiving Zandar.
If it was the Marshal, he wouldn't reject him.
Thinking this, Marty met the Marshal's gaze.
The other party was smiling and nodded.
Before Marty could praise the Marshal, he heard him add another sentence:
"Perfect timing. I also want to meet Zandar."
Marty: "!!!"
'What kind of double surprise is this?!'
Overjoyed, he thanked his superior repeatedly, counted down the days, waited and waited, and finally Zandar arrived.
The other party was dressed impeccably, wearing a dark formal suit.
Marty enthusiastically led Zandar to the restaurant he had arranged with the Marshal.
Zandar stared at the Marshal, and for some reason, remained silent for a long time.
Marty blinked, just about to say something, when he saw Zandar step forward and take the initiative to shake the Marshal's hand.
Zandar closed his eyes briefly, took a deep breath, and said calmly, "First time meeting you, Marshal."