Chapter 976: Relics

La Qi tidied up his appearance; after all, he was going to see Yao Ji, and a fragment of his Master was still with Yao Ji.

For many years, perhaps more than a hundred thousand years, La Qi had been working tirelessly on this matter, even temporarily setting aside his Cultivation. Otherwise, with his talent, he would likely be close to the Fourth Rank.

Searching for traces of his Master's Rebirth and the self-identification of Reincarnated Cultivators was indeed a tedious task.

However, precisely because of this, Shen Shuibi's attitude towards this Disciple had softened considerably. Although the rabbit still appeared worried and haggard, it was clear that La Qi's efforts were backed by her support and help.

Otherwise, how could La Qi, only a Fifth Rank Cultivator, possibly produce treasures capable of moving Kawaleng? These were all Heaven And Earth Treasures, of no small value.

For Li Qi's Rebirth, the rabbit had always treated it as the top priority.

However, the rabbit refused to meet any of Li Qi's fragments, so La Qi had always been the one doing these things.

La Qi knew his Master's wife's concerns.

If she met a fragment of Li Qi, would that final fragment truly be her Master?

If she saw it with her own eyes, she would definitely be unable to resist. But if she poured out her heart to the fragment, and even helped that fragment in the end, then some bad things could easily happen.

For example… the one who survived might be the fragment, not Li Qi himself.

That would be a huge problem.

Therefore, although Shen Shuibi was anxious, she always supported him from behind, never personally showing herself.

As for La Qi, after tidying up, he entrusted the currently collected items to a Shaman Dao practitioner to send to Mystic Radiance Mountain, and then he set off.

Yao Ji was currently with one of Li Qi's fragments, a young man named 'Zhou Fang'.

The two of them were doing archaeology.

Or, to put it more bluntly, grave robbing.

This was an ancient ruin, and Yao Ji sensed it, so Zhou Fang excitedly drove an excavator to dig up the earth.

Clearly, they had gained a lot.

They had already dug up many things, all of which looked very high-end.

This was an incredibly grand industrial planet. The entire planet had no single spot that remained in its original state; all surfaces, everything around them, was man-made.

Vast man-made structures covered the sky, the land, and the oceans, emitting a grey, dilapidated feeling.

There were very few living organisms, as no natural life could survive on such a completely transformed industrial planet; this was not as simple as urbanization.

To construct buildings, the entire planet's surface had been hardened, preventing any plants from sprouting.

The surfaces of all buildings had been treated with antibacterial agents, so no natural bacteria or fungi could survive on them.

Even the sky was devoid of the sun, as anti-gravity floating islands obscured much of the sunlight. However… these floating islands were also the only places where indigenous primitive organisms existed.

Life is truly miraculous. Although no living path could be found on land and in the oceans, on the only floating islands that could receive sunlight, they still developed some floating, air-borne vesicular plants, relying entirely on photosynthesis and airborne dust for survival and reproduction.

Yao Ji and Zhou Fang were digging graves here, and it seemed they had unearthed many good things.

However, there was a problem.

That is… they couldn't understand what those runes meant.

However, Zhou Fang was very clever.

He quickly used corresponding illustrations to list these items in tables, one by one. Through the correspondence of five sets of tables, he finally proved the trigonometric function table of this civilization.

After Yao Ji helped verify the radian units, the numbers within were quickly identified, and the titles of each column were the runic writings corresponding to functions like sine, cosine, tangent, and cotangent in the relic civilization.

After deciphering these five sets of tables, many other mathematical expressions progressively revealed themselves, especially those related to trigonometric functions, which could be recognized at a glance.

From this, he could decipher the entire mathematical System of the other party, thereby improving his own understanding in this area, absorbing their technology, and cracking their data regarding the world's perception.

This entire planet was their tomb, and the information within was countless.

So far, Yao Ji and Zhou Fang had identified the symbolic System for ordinary algebraic operations and exponentiation, and subsequently confirmed the complete set of mechanical motion equations.

These equations showed that their work was effective, and then the two decided to redouble their efforts, deciphering some tables related to basic elementary integrals, as well as standard forms of low-order differential equations, and some algorithms for damped oscillations and resonance.

At this rate, they would soon be able to access truly advanced knowledge.

But it wasn't always smooth sailing; they still encountered the same problem: they remained uncertain about the units of measurement.

Considering this was a standard form of expression, applicable to electronics, thermodynamics, mechanics, and many other physical phenomena, because they didn't sufficiently understand the measurement units of this civilization, even after deciphering these mathematical formulas, they still didn't know what these formulas were actually describing.

Just as they were at their wits' end…

“Can't you figure this out?” At this moment, La Qi suddenly appeared beside them.

La Qi's appearance immediately put Zhou Fang and Yao Ji on guard, and they looked at the suddenly appearing mysterious person.

La Qi, however, ignored them. He found a nearby house, kicked through a wall, went inside, grabbed some energy conduits, and traced them to a device similar to an electricity meter.

The components on this electricity meter had some unintelligible runes written on them, as well as some metal tags, which were embedded next to plugs, sockets, and other input/output interfaces.

La Qi casually said, “If you can't figure out the units, why don't you look at the scale? There's a trick to excavating ancient sites. Look at this kind of device with markings; the symbols engraved on the tags should indicate the units. As for what specific units they are, you can test it yourself with this thing. It's nothing more than voltage, current, power, frequency, and so on. After a round of testing, you'll know what symbol corresponds to which unit.”

La Qi said this, looking very experienced.

In reality, he was indeed very experienced. La Qi was a professional grave robber; he spent years with his friends searching for civilizational relics, unearthing their knowledge, traditions, and their ‘Dao’.

La Qi's words surprised Yao Ji and Zhou Fang.

What he said… seemed to make a lot of sense, but… who was this person?

“Let me introduce myself, I'm La Qi. By the way, Yao Ji, don't you recognize me?” La Qi pointed to himself, looking at Yao Ji in the distance.

Yao Ji, who had already transformed into a small Dragon girl, frowned: “Hmm… Your tone sounds like you know me, but I don't remember you.”

“Ah… so, I understand.” La Qi nodded.

Clearly, Yao Ji's Reincarnation and Rebirth were not entirely without cost.

“What do you understand?” Yao Ji asked, her body swaying as she floated next to La Qi, showing no signs of tension.

There was nothing to be tense about… This was someone who didn't even utter a sound when killed in a Third Rank Great Power battle. Perhaps she truly didn't find anything special about it.

“Your Rebirth seems to have come at a heavy price,” La Qi said.

“Ah?” Yao Ji was puzzled. She said, “It seems you and I aren't very familiar. Let me ask you, do you remember what you ate for every breakfast?”

“This…” La Qi frowned.

If he wanted to recall, he could, and he could even deduce it using some magic, but it was clear he was too lazy to remember such things; even recalling would take some time.

At this very moment, he clearly didn't remember what he ate for every breakfast.

Seeing La Qi's expression, Yao Ji immediately replied, “See? That's the reason. Death is just a breakfast to me. Why would you think I'd remember those things?”

“What needs to be remembered, I haven't forgotten a single thing. For example, that's Li Qi, and I am Yao Ji. As for you… where did you come from, nameless nobody?” Yao Ji tilted her head and asked.

The 'Zhou Fang' next to them listened intently, and when he heard the name 'Li Qi', he clearly frowned.

“I am La Qi, Li Qi's Disciple,” La Qi replied, his expression somewhat subtle.

It seemed Yao Ji's arrogance permeated even here.

When La Qi was young, he had gone through many things with Yao Ji, and even then, La Qi couldn't stand Yao Ji's demeanor.

Now, he saw that Yao Ji's arrogance was even more severe than he had imagined.

He wasn't even worthy of leaving a trace in Yao Ji's memory; after Yao Ji's Reincarnation, she had forgotten La Qi.

“Oh, Li Qi's Disciple, so what are you here for? From your appearance, you're here to find me, aren't you?” Yao Ji flicked her Dragon tail, as if she had already guessed La Qi's purpose.

“You're always Reincarnating, so I hope to ask you here about the issue of self-identification after Rebirth. For example, how do you know he is Master?” La Qi said.

“Haha, does something like this even need judgment? Of course, it's based on feeling!” Yao Ji laughed heartily, then transformed into a very small Dragon, wrapping around La Qi's neck like a scarf, and said, “Very worried, aren't you? About your Master.”

“Yes, that's why I came,” La Qi said honestly.

His answer made Yao Ji frown slightly, so Yao Ji said, “Actually, I don't know either. Your worry is useless because Rebirth is something that depends on the person. Not everyone can be like me, treating Reincarnation like eating a meal.”

Yao Ji casually revealed a fact.

As the daughter of the Heavenly Emperor, she seemed to possess certain special qualities, so no matter what, her Rebirth only cost her the memories she was too lazy to remember.

Thus, she had undergone Rebirth many, many, many times.

So many Rebirths had made her accustomed to it.

“Then why are you staying by his side?” La Qi looked at Zhou Fang.

“The Heavenly Emperor told me to stay by Li Qi's side,” Yao Ji frowned.

“Is he Master?” La Qi asked.

“Is this question important?” Yao Ji asked.

“Extremely important,” La Qi said decisively.

“Precisely because you deem it important, that is why this is the question,” Yao Ji said.

“Buddhism has been destroyed, and you're still playing Zen riddles?” La Qi sighed.

“This isn't playing Zen riddles,” Yao Ji uncoiled from La Qi's neck. “Playing Zen riddles is often something done out of necessity when there's no other way. I never do such things.”

La Qi nodded; he understood.

Many times, even if the speaker is highly skilled, uses precise and meticulous wording, speaks no subjective conjectures, and presents only cold, unalterable, irrefutable objective facts, when these words leave their mouth and enter the minds of different people in the world, various strange distortions occur.

Once these are understood through the five aggregates or mental organs and truly enter the subjective will, they become even more bizarre.

Therefore, sometimes, being explicitly clear is not as good as playing Zen riddles.

But Yao Ji was clearly someone who didn't care about such things; she wouldn't play Zen riddles with La Qi.

Then… what exactly was she?

As La Qi was thinking, the young man named Zhou Fang suddenly spoke.

“So, you are my Disciple, is that right?” Zhou Fang pointed at La Qi and asked.

This wasn't his first encounter with matters related to Li Qi; in fact, these matters had brought him many mysterious fortuitous encounters, which was also the reason he could gradually step into the Universe from that backward planet.

Zhou Fang clearly knew that he was not ordinary; he even once thought he was the protagonist. After all, look… he was a Great Power Reincarnated, accompanied by the daughter of the Heavenly Emperor, blessed with various fortuitous encounters, and could dig up good equipment every day while robbing graves in ruins. And now, another Disciple appeared?

Moreover, upon closer inspection, this Disciple seemed extraordinarily impressive.

Zhou Fang had the Heavenly Eye brought by his fortuitous encounters, so he could see the high-dimensional manifold constantly fluctuating and folding around La Qi. Anyone with a sound mind could perceive his extraordinary nature.

La Qi could arbitrarily change the dimension he was in, fold out all physical properties, simulate all life forms he could understand, and transform his body into all matter.

According to some theories, matter is formed by the combination and folding of microscopic particles, and microscopic particles are composed of membranes and strings. La Qi, being the membrane itself, could naturally simulate all matter.

Zhou Fang couldn't help but scrutinize him.

However, La Qi spoke at this moment.

He shook his head and said, “You are not my Master, and I am not here for you; I am here for Yao Ji.”

Zhou Fang, however, said indifferently, “Aren't Reincarnation and the previous life the same person? I heard that Reincarnation would be exactly the same as the previous life, I just need to awaken my memories.”

This attitude made La Qi take a deep breath, and then, pressure rose around him!

The surrounding spatial dimensions fluctuated, a dimensional labyrinth unfolded, light twisted accordingly, and gravity, due to traversing dimensions, would decay, so gravity itself became chaotic!

“I warn you, it's best not to claim his name,” La Qi said with a cold voice. (End of Chapter)