Wu Qiren sat in the classroom, his fingers flying across the keyboard as he quickly recorded the discussion between the other two students.
"Enlightenment means breaking free from the immature state one has brought upon oneself, such as laziness and cowardice. When Kant explained enlightenment, he emphasized that everyone possessed reason—in other words, universal reason."
Another student replied in a pleasant voice:
"Universal reason, born from enlightenment, was explored and utilized to the greatest extent possible. That was what created our era—reason is supreme, limitless, eternal, and capable of bringing us unprecedented power—"
When Wu Qiren heard this, he lowered his hands and frowned. Usually gentle and polite, he interrupted the other student directly and raised his head. "This student, I think you may not have read Foucault's discussion of the relationship between power and truth, or Heidegger's writings on technology—"
But he did not continue, because the moment he saw who was sitting before him, he was so shocked that he could not speak.
Wu Qiren's opponent was sitting directly across from him.
With long brown hair, dressed in blue, handsome and refined, was the Air Elementalist Echeida Sackern.
The other party was looking at him gently, speaking in that pleasant voice:
"If there truly exists unrestricted power and an omnipotent, omniscient reason in this world, Tales, would you really—"
"—not want it?"
Tales jolted awake in bed!
In the darkness, he clutched the JC Dagger beneath his pillow and panted, drenched in cold sweat.
Tales flipped out of bed. His bare feet touched the expensive heated floor tiles, and the pleasant calming perfume filled his nostrils. Only then did he realize where he was.
The bandages and adhesive strips wrapped around his chest and other wounds itched and hurt beneath them, sobering him considerably. He finally calmed his breathing and stuffed the JC Dagger back under his pillow.
Still shaken, he fell backward and lay down again on the huge bed, large enough for twenty Taleses.
The silk pajamas rubbing against his body made Tales extremely uncomfortable. The mattress, whose core was made of multiple springs, was soft and smooth, obediently sinking beneath his shape. The Northern Land goose-down quilt covered in silk wrapped him tightly, while the smooth silk pillow imported from the southern coast supported his head and shoulders from below.
At that moment, Tales felt as though something was squeezing him from head to toe.
It was as though the Air Elementalist had wrapped him in air and was slowly compressing him.
The thought made Tales feel irritated. He threw off the light, smooth, comfortable quilt, dropped back to the floor, felt around until he found a corner, and curled up there. The hard floor and thick wall gave him a familiar sense of security.
Only then did Tales slowly let out a breath and laugh helplessly.
I never thought I'd see the day, he thought, tapping the solid floor tile and laughing at himself.
I really miss those little guys from the Sixth House—I hope Yala is taking good care of them.
I'll have to tell Gilbert about this tomorrow. Even if I can't contact them directly, he can still look after them in secret.
But the memory Fragment he had found in his dream made the peace he had just regained suddenly tense again.
Dreams reflected the subconscious. The memories of his previous life were probably the fragments hidden deepest in his subconscious, but this time, even Echeida Sackern had appeared in his dream.
"Just as I thought. Am I still so bothered by what that lunatic said?" Tales murmured in the darkness.
The brief encounter with the Magic User several hours earlier flashed through his mind. The Magic User's behavior, sometimes rational and sometimes capricious, his mysterious and unfathomable might, and his almost inhuman immortal body all chilled Tales to the bone.
And there were his words.
"Seems you don't know your own nature, child."
Those words surfaced again in his aching mind.
Tales forced the unnecessary frustration and fear away, calming down as he analyzed the Magic User's words.
According to Echeida, he was the same as Echeida—both of them were demons—no, merely people with the potential to become Magic Users.
Judging from Echeida's performance, people with such potential were extremely rare. That was good news for me.
But for now, Magic Users did not seem to be particularly welcome in this world.
Echeida's words were too subjective, but if even part of what he said was true—namely, the so-called war between Magic Users and humans—then Magic Users were practically hated by everyone, existing only to die the moment they showed themselves.
And Tales worriedly thought of Echeida's body. After his heart had been pierced, Blue Light had shone from the wound. Had he really ceased to be human?
And Yordel Gatu. According to what he had said, he should have arrived at the Ruined House very early. Then he must have heard Echeida's words too—Tales clenched his fist—did he also know that I had experienced "Loss of Control" before the Magic User?
If Yordel knew, then would Gilbert and King Kessel know as well? How would they view me?
There were far too many questions.
For example, that nervous, unnaturally cold, and deeply suspicious King father of his.
For example, he was clearly seven years old, yet the Bloodline Lamp blessed by Divine Art was from twelve years ago.
For example, his origins, his surname, and what he represented to the kingdom.
For example, why news of his return had to be kept so secret—Yordel and Gilbert had practically snatched him back like a pair of thieves.
For example, what kind of world was this, exactly? A medieval ecosystem? A high-magic world? Steampunk?
Tales patted his head.
No, I can't figure any of this out. My basic understanding of this world is still far too limited.
I need comprehensive childhood enlightenment starting from the fundamentals!
Tales helplessly exhaled.
But his eyes immediately turned solemn.
Enlightenment and learning could wait.
But—
There was one matter that had to be resolved.
It concerned his life and body.
He began recalling the Magic User's words again:
"Seems you don't know your own nature, child."
"But it's fine. Everyone experiences Loss of Control for the first time. We all begin in ignorance."
In the darkness, Tales clasped his hands together as he recalled that so-called "Loss of Control."
Echeida had used magic energy to compress him inside the air, preparing to squeeze him into a ball.
His entire body had boiled as though it were burning.
He had seen the energy ball in Echeida's hand. That should have been the so-called Air Wall.
The energy ball had turned red and suddenly appeared before him.
And then—
Wait!
Tales seemed to have grasped a crucial clue.
Blood—and the burning sensation!
Tales slowly sat up.
Quade.
That name flashed through his mind.
He had experienced that sensation of boiling blood before. It had happened precisely during the two times Quade had beaten and abused him. The common factor between those two incidents—and even his encounter with Echeida—was that he had bled each time!
Tales had previously thought that the burning sensation inside his body had been caused by the so-called "Divine Art" Gilbert had mentioned, triggered when his blood fell onto the ground.
But now that he thought about it, Echeida's so-called "Loss of Control" had also occurred precisely when that burning sensation appeared.
Tales suddenly realized that the incident before Echeida had not been his first so-called "Loss of Control."
His true first Loss of Control had been Quade.
When Quade had tried to kill Colia, that bastard should have been holding Tales's JC Dagger!
How had the dagger suddenly appeared in his hand?
It was just as bizarre as the energy ball that had suddenly appeared before him!
Quade
Bleeding.
Burning sensation.
Dagger.
Echeida.
Energy ball.
Yordel and Gilbert
Bloodline Lamp.
Tales closed his eyes. He found that he could not sort out these chaotic elements.
There were too many.
It was all too messy.
But he was not discouraged. Instead, a long-lost excitement welled up from the depths of his heart.
Classifying chaotic and complicated phenomena, establishing assumptions and a theoretical framework, eliminating irrelevant variables, deducing causal logic, and finally verifying the completeness of the theory.
And then there was the eternally unverifiable "uncertainty," the eternally inescapable "endogeneity," and the "quasi-experimental method" and "counterfactual analysis" that could never approach perfection.
Wasn't this precisely the kind of alluring puzzle from the social sciences that could never be answered perfectly—and the game he had once loved playing most?
Moreover, this time he was not facing a multi-causal social phenomenon that offered no starting point and could not be verified. He was facing a single problem within himself, one that could also be repeatedly verified!
When Tales opened his eyes again, his pupils were filled with the desire to challenge the problem.
He tried to calm himself and sort out the phenomenon he was facing.
The sample size was small, the variables were excessive, and the mechanism was simple. An overly complicated qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) method was unsuitable.
The most basic Mill's inductive method would be enough.
First, using bleeding and Loss of Control as keywords, select the relevant cases and events.
He slowly closed his eyes. The familiar sensation surged back into Tales's mind, and all kinds of chaotic elements and factors quickly arranged themselves within his consciousness.
Based on the research objective and chronological order, he determined the different "conditions" for each sample—not "causes"—and whether the "result" had appeared.
One event after another flashed rapidly before his eyes. He removed event samples with too many missing values, combined the conditions and results of each event, and then distinguished them by level and category.
A clear and orderly table surfaced in his mind, containing four observable and comparable event samples:
Sample One:
Condition 1.1: Quade beat him for the first time. Condition 1.2: Bleeding. Result 1: No anomaly.
Sample Two:
Condition 2.1: Quade beat him for the second time and prepared to kill Colia. Condition 2.2: Bleeding. Result 2: Loss of Control; the dagger appeared in his hand out of thin air.
Sample Three:
Condition 3.1: Echeida prepared to kill him. Condition 3.2: Bleeding. Result 3: Loss of Control; his energy ball appeared before me.
Sample Four:
Condition 4.1: He verified his Bloodline before Yordel, Gilbert, and the lamp. Condition 4.2: Bleeding. Result 4: No anomaly.
The list was complete. He began comparing them.
Seeking similarities and differences, then summarizing and generalizing.
The table slowly simplified, normalized, and merged into a paragraph of text.
Tales gently opened his eyes.
Conclusion: When bleeding during a killing incident, there was a chance of experiencing the so-called "Loss of Control"—nearby objects or energy would undergo displacement to varying degrees.
No, that conclusion was still too preliminary.
First, the sample size was still too small. Second, certain confounding variables could not be eliminated.
Also, "killing incident" seemed too distant. It might be a false mechanism. Had the killing incident triggered something else, with that something being the true cause of the Loss of Control?
He also had to find a way to include the lamp in his analysis.
Finally, he could only prove the degree of correlation between several things. That was still insufficient for a causal inference.
In any case—Tales rolled over and lay down—he had at least reached a preliminary conclusion about "Loss of Control."
Then, the next direction of research—
Tales let out a breath and suddenly felt a wave of exhaustion in his mind.
As expected, he rubbed both temples vigorously. Was thinking about these things too much for a seven-year-old brain to bear?
But he immediately noticed something strange.
That logical induction and deduction just now should at least have required a pen and draft paper to write down.
Yet the process of carrying it out inside his mind had taken—almost an instant?
After a long while—
Tales slapped the floor and felt the pain in his head.
Just as he had thought, from magic energy and Loss of Control to the so-called Bloodline, and then to this monstrous thinking efficiency—this body, this brain—
There was something abnormal about them.
With that thought, Tales slowly drifted off to sleep.
When Gilbert politely woke Tales, he found himself back in bed, neatly tucked beneath the quilt.
"Tales, my esteemed young sir. Good afternoon."
Gilbert respectfully drew open the floor-to-ceiling curtains. Afternoon sunlight streamed through the enormous windows, brightly illuminating the luxurious and comfortable room.
The magnificent heated floor tiles decorated with Star Kingdom patterns, the lounge sofa made of giant lizard hide, the spacious copper four-poster bed, the large crystal lamp hanging from the ceiling, and the full-wall fireplace all appeared before Tales's eyes.
Everything constantly reminded him that his life had already changed.
It was unbelievable. Just a few hours ago, he had been a little gang-affiliated beggar whose life hung by a thread.
And now, he was actually a bloodline descendant of the supreme ruler of the entire Starfall Kingdom.
"It is precisely two o'clock in the afternoon. I sincerely recommend that you rise and dine now, as it will effectively promote your recovery and health." The middle-aged nobleman spoke in a mild tone, but Tales could sense the urging beneath his words.
"And," Gilbert added with a friendly wink and smile, "at His Majesty's request, our first lesson will begin this afternoon."
"I imagine you must have many questions as well, and I would be delighted to answer them."
Tales rubbed his eyes and yawned as he removed the uncomfortable silk pajamas. Feeling around, he clumsily pulled on the noble attire Gilbert had prepared.
"Excellent," he said lazily through narrowed eyes. "I love lessons."
And Tales silently thought with his eyes closed: I was sleeping so peacefully. Who put me back in bed from underground?
"Mr. Tales, you must like these trousers very much."
"Huh?"
"Because you are currently putting them on your head."
"What? With this shape, that's actually a pair of trousers?"
"Mr. Tales, you seem rather fond of that buttoned coat too."
"Oh, so it's an overcoat to be worn on the outside."
"Mr. Tales, I think you'll need the belt on your left."
"Mm, thank you. I was wondering why it kept falling down."
After a while.
"Mr. Gilbert."
"Yes?"
"Please help me put on this damned outfit."
"With great pleasure, my esteemed young master."
A reader told me that some of the specialized social science terminology in this chapter was too pretentious, leaving them completely bewildered and frowning as they read.
So I came back and revised it into a simpler version. I wonder if it will be any better.