Chapter 573: Absolute Zero and Casual Chat and Light God Transformation

Chapter 573: Absolute Zero and Casual Chat and Light God Transformation

The war, which had erupted abruptly due to an unexpected turn of events, came to an end.

It also ended in an extremely abrupt manner.

The pitch-black “wall” stretched across the center of the Information Plane, splitting the entire world into two halves.

On this side of the wall was the outpost camp the wizards had just established, along with the blue ocean filled with countless floating Entropy Brains.

On the other side of the wall lay the core region of the information beings—their homeland, the foundation of their survival.

No one could cross that barrier of nothingness.

At least not for now.

In the following days, the wizards exhausted every possible method to study this bizarre barrier.

Elemental bombardment – ineffective.

Law erosion – ineffective.

Information contamination – ineffective.

Spatial leap – impossible to even locate the other side of the wall.

After completing the construction of the forward outpost, Jie Ming also joined the research team.

He stood before the wall but did not dare approach too closely.

A faint golden light surfaced in his eyes.

The All-Purpose Eye operated at full power, with the Fate Subsystem providing an endless stream of computational support.

His gaze penetrated the pitch-black surface, delving deeper and gradually analyzing the true nature of the barrier.

He soon found himself utterly absorbed.

“This is…”

The microscopic particles around him had all come to a complete halt.

It was not slow movement or near stillness, nor was it any exaggerated description—it was complete, thorough, absolute stasis.

Every atom, every electron, every quantum, every element was fixed in place, without any fluctuation, without any motion, without any change.

Indeed, the wizards had detected the true nature of the wall shortly after coming into contact with it: absolute zero.

Here, all change was forbidden.

No energy transfer, no information exchange, no causal flow.

There was only eternal and absolute, deathly stillness.

Jie Ming was dazzled, his soul as a wizard researcher burning fiercely:

“This is… the ultimate extreme of entropy reduction? What about the elements? How do the elements manifest here? How exactly was this achieved…”

Those information beings, at the critical moment of life and death, had actually created such a barrier.

Suddenly, Jie Ming thought of something and snapped out of his research-induced trance.

He subconsciously turned his head and looked toward the center of the outpost camp.

There, Martin was floating in mid-air, his body radiating surging waves of energy.

It was the aura unique to an eighth-ring wizard—powerful enough to inspire awe.

Yet at this moment, the expression on this powerful eighth-ring wizard’s face was somewhat… awkward.

A seventh-ring wizard stood beside him, speaking with a helpless look on his face.

“I already told you to show some restraint…”

Jie Ming’s ears twitched as the voice drifted over faintly.

“Now we have no spoils again. We already lost a huge batch of those Entropy Brains earlier…”

Martin gave a dry cough and defended himself in a low voice: “I got a little excited and couldn’t hold back… You know, ever since I rotated off the front lines, it’s been a long time since I’ve really taken action…”

“Seriously, that Silent Abyss would definitely have produced some excellent materials, and you just wiped it out like that…”

The corner of Jie Ming’s mouth twitched slightly upon hearing this.

So that was how it was.

He finally understood why Martin took so few actions himself and why he always let the high-tier wizards go first.

It wasn’t out of caution, but because…

This eighth-ring wizard’s ability left behind no spoils at all.

Ashheart.

Martin had earned this title because the grayish-white flames that could reduce everything to ash were essentially a simulation of heat death. Any information being touched by those gray flames would have both its core and its information completely annihilated, leaving nothing behind.

Although the previous wave of gray flames had been blocked by the black wall, before that, it had already wiped out a large area of information beings. The Entropy Brains in that region had also turned to ash along with them.

The reason Jie Ming had snapped out of his research trance earlier was because he had suddenly recalled certain details from before.

Martin discovering this plane, launching a planar war, personally leading the probing team, then issuing tasks for everyone to find effective damage methods… Was it really all coincidence?

An eighth-ring wizard whose ability was essentially “entropy increase,” “heat death,” and “reducing everything to the most chaotic state” had coincidentally found a plane inhabited by a species that completely revered “entropy reduction”?

Jie Ming didn’t believe it.

While he was thinking, he suddenly sensed that the atmosphere around him had shifted.

He turned his head and saw that Martin had somehow appeared beside him.

“…”

Jie Ming instinctively took half a step back, then quickly reacted and saluted: “Senior Martin.”

Martin waved his hand, a gentle smile on his face.

He looked at Jie Ming with a hint of amusement in his eyes.

“It seems you’ve already figured out some of the inside story here.”

Jie Ming was silent for a second, then nodded honestly: “Mainly because you didn’t try to hide it.”

Martin burst into laughter.

“Indeed, there’s nothing worth hiding.” He turned and looked at the pitch-black wall, his gaze growing profound. “That’s right. I deliberately chose this plane.”

Jie Ming listened quietly.

“I study entropy increase, heat death, and how to return everything to chaos. I’ve walked this path for over a hundred thousand years and have already reached the limit of eighth-ring wizard.” Martin’s voice was calm. “But the opposite of entropy increase is entropy reduction. The two are opposed yet unified. Pure entropy increase is ultimately one-sided.”

He paused, the corner of his mouth curving into a smile. “Therefore, I needed a species that completely revered entropy reduction to help me complete the final piece of the puzzle.”

Jie Ming’s heart shook.

A deliberately chosen plane…

A deliberately targeted species…

From the very beginning, everything had been planned?

However… to complete the final piece of the puzzle…

He asked subconsciously: “You’re trying to advance to ninth-ring?”

Martin’s expression froze instantly.

He turned his head and looked at Jie Ming with the expression of someone who had seen a ghost.

“What nonsense are you spouting!”

Jie Ming was startled by his reaction: “Ah?”

Martin took a deep breath to calm himself, then shook his head helplessly: “The strength enhancement I mentioned refers to improvement within the eighth-ring level. Ninth-ring? That’s still very far away.”

He paused, his tone turning serious: “If you had truly seen a ninth-ring wizard, you would know that their power is not something that can be touched by mere entropy increase or entropy reduction.”

Jie Ming’s curiosity grew even stronger.

“What exactly is the strength of a ninth-ring wizard?”

Martin was silent for several seconds, then shook his head.

“I won’t tell you for now.”

Jie Ming was stunned: “Is it because of some regulation?”

Martin thought for a moment and spoke slowly: “It’s not really a hard rule. It’s just…”

He looked at Jie Ming, a trace of complexity in his eyes.

“It’s a bit like not wanting a child to come into contact with life’s cruelty too early.”

Jie Ming was stunned.

Cruelty?

The word stirred countless speculations in his heart.

But Martin clearly had no intention of continuing the topic. He patted Jie Ming’s shoulder and smiled: “When you reach high-tier wizard, you’ll understand that the path of a wizard has only just begun.”

He turned and looked at the pitch-black wall.

“Just like this plane. Actually, the moment any high-tier wizard saw it, they knew I had deliberately chosen it.”

Jie Ming frowned: “Why?”

“Because it possesses sufficient uniqueness,” Martin explained. “High-tier wizards above sixth-ring can only perceive the existence of other planes after merging with a plane’s origin. When you observe this plane up close, it does look quite strange—a perfect sphere of pure white. But if you place it against the backdrop of the entire endless chaotic void…”

His tone grew meaningful:

“No one would notice this slight color difference at all.”

Jie Ming fell into thought.

“High-tier wizards rely on their fusion with a plane’s origin to perceive other planes,” Martin continued. “It’s somewhat similar to… if a plane forms by gathering somewhere, we can sense the fluctuations it emits in the endless chaotic void—like stars shining in the night sky.” He pointed at the pitch-black wall, then at the core region of the Information Plane on the other side.

“But this plane is different. Because of its extreme entropy reduction, it has instead blended into the ‘background noise’ of the endless chaotic void. The light of those ‘stars’ is completely absorbed here and cannot be detected at all.”

“Only because the knowledge I study is rather special was I able to find it.”

Jie Ming finally understood.

None of it had been coincidence.

It was the accumulation of tens of thousands of years and a meticulously planned hunt.

Martin looked at him with a trace of encouragement in his eyes.

“You are Clark’s student. That fellow has a sharp eye. The fact that he accepted you as a student means you definitely have potential. Advancing to high-tier wizard won’t be a problem for you.”

He smiled: “So don’t rush. Take your time.”

With that, he turned and left to deal with the remaining post-battle matters.

Jie Ming stood in place, watching his figure disappear into the camp.

After a moment of silence, he turned back and continued gazing at the pitch-black wall.

Jie Ming took a deep breath, and a faint golden light once again surfaced in his eyes.

Several days later.

Jie Ming stood before the absolute zero barrier, his brows tightly furrowed.

Wizards surrounded him. Some frowned in deep thought, some discussed in low voices, and others simply sat cross-legged on the ground, eyes closed in deduction.

Yet no matter what method they tried, the result was the same…

No progress.

This pitch-black barrier was like an insurmountable chasm standing before everyone.

“It won’t work.”

A seventh-ring wizard stood up and shook his head with a grim expression. “Conventional methods simply cannot break it. The absolute zero barrier itself isn’t difficult to handle—as long as enough mass or energy is added, its balance can be disrupted.”

He looked gloomily toward the depths of the barrier. Another seventh-ring wizard picked up where he left off: “The problem is that the information beings on the other side are continuously supplying computational power. We can’t break through at all.”

Everyone fell silent.

They all understood what this meant.

Because the absolute zero was maintained through the manipulation of information, it was far easier than using other methods.

The information beings only needed to keep outputting computational power to maintain the barrier indefinitely.

To destroy it, there were only three possible ways:

First, directly attack the information beings’ main bodies behind the barrier.

Second, surpass them in total computational power.

Third, use a sufficiently powerful attack to pierce through the defense in one go.

The first method was a dead loop—if they couldn’t break the barrier, they couldn’t reach the enemy; if they couldn’t reach the enemy, they couldn’t break the barrier.

The second method was even less realistic.

Information beings were naturally the best at computational power. Individually, a single information being’s computational strength might even approach that of a fourth-ring wizard. Coupled with their absurd numbers…

Even if all the wizards present, along with every cannon-fodder creature, combined their computational power, it would still be less than a fraction of the collective computational power of the countless information beings within the Information Plane. Unless several more eighth-ring wizards were dispatched.

But if that happened, Martin’s gains would shrink drastically, and so would the gains of every wizard present.

Unless absolutely necessary, no one wanted to take that route.

That left only the third method.

Everyone turned to look at Martin in unison.

Martin stood at the front of the crowd, staring at the pitch-black barrier, his eyes flickering.

His right hand rose slightly, and a faint point of gray light appeared and disappeared in his palm—that was the power of Ashheart, the entropy-increasing flame capable of burning away everything.

“Lord Martin!”

Several seventh-ring wizards beside him spoke up at the same time, their faces filled with alarm.

“Think thrice!”

“If you go all out again, this expedition will really be for nothing!”

“We already lost at least thirty percent of the Entropy Brains last time!”

“If we get nothing again this time, we’ll really have to sell the plane itself to make money!”

Martin’s hand froze in mid-air, his expression somewhat embarrassed.

He gave a dry cough and withdrew his power.

“I was just thinking about it.”

Everyone around let out a collective sigh of relief.

Jie Ming stood at the edge of the crowd, watching the scene, and couldn’t help shaking his head.

Greed.

These wizards clearly knew the method to break the deadlock was right in front of them, yet they hesitated because they were unwilling to part with the spoils.

Reason told them they should let Martin take action, but greed made them cling to the hope of finding a perfect solution that could break the stalemate while preserving the Entropy Brains.

“This is what wizards are like. But for me, the current situation… isn’t bad at all?”

Jie Ming murmured to himself.

Inside the inner world within his body, the array specially designed to collect Mortal Dust Qi was operating at full capacity.

The greed, restlessness, and anxiety of gain and loss emanating from the wizards around him were continuously absorbed and converted by the array.

The efficiency was astonishingly high.

It was even higher than the combined total from the expeditionary forces in the several planar wars he had experienced before.

Jie Ming sighed inwardly.

Indeed, wizards were a contradictory combination of reason and greed.

At that moment, he suddenly sensed an unusual fluctuation.

He looked up and saw that Martin had ultimately been unable to hold back. He raised his hand and released a thin strand of gray flame, tentatively striking toward the pitch-black barrier.

The gray flame collided with absolute zero.

The cluster of entropy-increasing fire capable of burning away everything began to twist violently the instant it touched the barrier.

It tried to burn, but absolute zero froze all microscopic particles in place. It tried to spread, but the barrier firmly sealed off every path.

In the end, the gray flame extinguished.

It was like a spark falling into an icy sea, unable to stir even the slightest ripple.

Yet Jie Ming stared in that direction, his eyes growing brighter and brighter.

Grayish-white flames…

Entropy increase…

Absolute zero…

Countless thoughts collided wildly in his mind.

Light God Transformation.

His strongest combat form at the current stage—constructing a body with Trigram Fire Annihilation Divine Light, fusing the three core techniques of Return to Ruins Armor, Causal Trace Shadow Technique, and Great Void Step to achieve light-speed movement, ultra-fast regeneration, and destructive energy output.

The core of Light God Transformation consisted of five architectural steps:

Five Aggregates Rainbow Mirror—informationization.

Trigram Fire Divine Light—energy filling.

Return to Ruins Armor—stable state maintenance.

Causal Trace Shadow Technique—information control.

Great Void Step—energy-information resonance.

Jie Ming had chosen these five steps to form Light God Transformation purely because of the limitations of his current techniques.

But now…

Looking at Martin’s grayish-white flames, a thought suddenly flashed through his mind—relying on the wizards around him, he might be able to replace the Trigram Fire Annihilation Divine Light segment.

The essence of that step was simply “energy filling.” It didn’t matter what kind of energy was used to fill it.

If he could substitute Martin’s grayish-white flames for the Trigram Fire Divine Light…

Jie Ming’s heart pounded wildly.

He had personally witnessed the power of the grayish-white flames.

It was the entropy-increasing fire capable of reducing everything to ash—the core power of an eighth-ring wizard.

If he could incorporate this power into Light God Transformation…

But a problem arose.

The five steps of Light God Transformation were interlinked. If the energy source was changed, the other four steps would also need to be adjusted simultaneously to adapt to the new energy characteristics. Informationization would need to match the new energy frequency. Stable state maintenance would need to handle the new energy intensity. Information control would need to be compatible with the new energy logic. Energy-information resonance would require recalculating the resonance parameters.

Under normal circumstances, such a level of modification would take decades or even centuries to complete.

But now…

Jie Ming looked up at the group of high-tier wizards around him, all at least sixth-ring or above.

These were all old monsters who had lived for thousands or even tens of thousands of years.

In terms of knowledge reserves, deductive ability, and understanding of laws, any one of them could outmatch him by a wide margin.

There was no reason not to use them.

Jie Ming raised his hand and opened the magic network terminal, quickly organizing his idea into a detailed technical proposal.

After checking it once, he clicked send.

[Recipients: Expeditionary Force High-Tier Wizard Group]

A few seconds later, the magic network terminal vibrated wildly.

[Seventh-ring Wizard Alva: Is this the combat form you designed?]

[Seventh-ring Wizard Mia: Informationization → Energy Filling → Stable State Maintenance… This architecture is too exquisite! Every single technique inside is incredibly refined! How did you come up with this?]

[Sixth-ring Wizard Karl: The modification plan is completely feasible! I can help deduce the resonance parameters on my end!]

[Seventh-ring Wizard Silas: Jie Ming, you’ve been hiding quite deep… A combat architecture of this level would be first-rate even among high-tier wizards!]

Jie Ming looked at the messages, the corner of his mouth twitching slightly.

As a researcher, his sense of ethics made him want to say that this was not his original creation but the crystallized knowledge of another civilization.

But he couldn’t say that.

He could only silently accept the praise, maintaining an awkward yet polite smile on his face.

“Wizard Jie Ming!”

A sixth-ring wizard ran over excitedly. “I’ve looked at your plan! For the informationization module’s adaptation parameters, I already have a ready-made deduction model that can be called at any time!”

“Jie Ming!”

Another seventh-ring wizard’s voice came from afar: “Leave the stable state maintenance module to me. I’ve done some research on countering entropy increase structures!”

Looking at the wizards’ reactions, Jie Ming took a deep breath, suppressed the embarrassment in his heart, and strode toward the crowd.

“Alright, then I’ll have to trouble everyone.”

He looked toward the distant pitch-black barrier, eagerness flashing in his eyes.

Using the core power of an eighth-ring wizard to ignite his own combat form.

Just how strong would he become then?

It was truly something to look forward to…