Setting Weaver

Two hours later, Bai Ge arrived home—not naked.

With the brainhole, he only needed to provide real-world materials and pay some processing costs. Making clothes and the like was not difficult.

He tossed the burned rags in his hand into the brainhole, gave them a little design, and when he took them out, they had become a small robe.

The robe was very short. Most of Bai Ge's clothes had burned away, and the remaining material was not enough to make a complete robe.

Even so, it was good enough for covering his shame in the middle of the night.

"I can't waste energy like this anymore. It feels like using a superpower for just a few seconds is a terrible deal..."

All this time, because of his lack of energy, the traits Bai Ge designed had only lasted a few seconds or a few minutes.

They were basically trials. Once he got a taste of them, they were gone.

If possible, Bai Ge naturally wanted a permanent solution—to directly add a permanent anomalous trait to his body.

If he only had one chance, he felt he would choose immortality.

"No... eternity!"

"Eternity in every sense of the word!"

This was practically Bai Ge's dream—or rather, one of humanity's dreams.

Perhaps the dream was somewhat cliché, but Bai Ge truly thought this way. Once a person became eternal, they would possess endless possibilities.

If he could become eternal, he would have unlimited time and energy to achieve his other dreams as well.

If possible, he hoped his younger sister could too...

"I'm thinking too much... Haha! That's still too far away..."

This had originally been an unrealistic dream, but Bai Ge knew that after opening the brainhole, he was qualified to pursue it.

It was simply still too far away, so he would not consider it for now.

"What should I do with this huge amount of electricity?"

Bai Ge's first reaction was to turn it into money. With money, he could obtain more energy, and he would not need to steal electricity anymore in the future.

"No, I already have ten million. Money isn't particularly urgent. What I need most right now is... to increase my electricity-storage duration."

The Safe Electricity Storage trait Bai Ge had previously created lasted for one day.

Nearly half a day had already passed, so the trait would disappear tomorrow night.

"I need to extend it... I'll be relying on this ability to obtain energy from now on... at least until I find a better method."

After thinking it over, Bai Ge still felt that electricity was the best choice for now.

Solar energy weakened through layer after layer of transmission, and after reaching Earth, it was further isolated by the magnetic field. It was no longer very strong. Moreover, the area receiving light was only as large as his body, so obtaining energy this way was extremely inefficient.

As for nuclear energy, it was not within his considerations for the time being. He could not obtain nuclear energy in the short term.

Therefore, electricity was still the most efficient and widespread source.

"I'll make the Safe Electricity Storage trait a physiological characteristic of my Earthling body! Not a racial trait possessed by all humanity, but an anomalous exception belonging solely to me within the entire species!"

Actually, in his previous attempts, he had also made the electricity-storage trait a physiological characteristic.

It had simply been more exceptional, existing only for a short time before disappearing.

Now, Bai Ge intended to make it permanent. He would not set an expiration time, turning it into one of his regular traits.

It would be as natural as eating and drinking water—a 'law of nature.'

That way, he would not need to calculate when the trait would disappear in the future.

The electricity-storage trait would become his permanent supernatural ability.

"Success!"

After implanting the trait into his body and returning to reality, Bai Ge discovered that energy had been consumed. This meant that reality had acknowledged the trait.

"Huh? It only used forty percent?"

Less than half his energy had been consumed, which surprised Bai Ge greatly.

"I used the equivalent of enough energy to manifest it for one hundred thousand days, and that made it permanent... Looks like permanent traits don't cost as much as I imagined."

"Then... I'll make teleportation too..."

Bai Ge set himself the ability to teleport anywhere at will, but it soon failed.

He changed it to teleportation within his field of vision, but the result was still failure.

"Why did it fail again?"

"Are there different levels among traits? How are they measured?"

Bai Ge did not sleep that night. He pondered and mulled over reality's 'thoughts' all night.

Only when dawn broke, after repeatedly experimenting with trait editing and creating a pile of minor traits, did he finally understand.

"I see. I understand now."

The anomalous traits designed through the brainhole were actually being forcibly imposed on reality.

If they were produced for no reason, reality could refuse to acknowledge them, making the traits equivalent to nothing.

But if Bai Ge paid costs such as 'real-world energy' and 'real-world matter,' then reality had to acknowledge them.

That was because reality's energy and matter belonged to reality. They could not be rejected, nor could they be turned into 'something that never existed.' They had to objectively exist.

In other words, a brainhole product with a 'real-world foundation' was practically forcing reality to adapt to it.

There was no need to worry about the adaptability of the real world. It could probably adapt to anything.

The strange flower Danmu had a material foundation, so it was acknowledged.

The electricity-storage trait had an energy foundation, so it was acknowledged.

At that moment, Bai Ge was practically a virus or Trojan horse in the real world, capable of forcibly implanting anomalous phenomena into reality—settings reality had no choice but to pinch its nose and acknowledge.

He had understood this far because Bai Ge had discovered a pattern.

"Traits with a basis in reality are easier to acknowledge. In other words, they cost less."

"But pure nonsense, or even self-contradictory traits, cost an astronomical amount."

If he had to establish a rough standard, Bai Ge had so far divided them into six levels, from high to low.

Self-contradictory traits had the most outrageous cost.

Those that contradicted existing laws of reality while also being absolute came next.

Contradictory but not absolute traits came after that.

Traits that did not contradict existing laws of reality but were very absolute had a low cost.

Those that were neither contradictory nor absolute had an even lower cost.

And things already existing in reality were the cheapest.

These six levels could each be divided into two types: 'universal to all reality' and 'individual anomalies.'

Based on Bai Ge's experiments, the design of the electricity-storage trait belonged to the cheapest, sixth level.

Reality already possessed this kind of trait; it was not fictional.

At most, only the way it appeared was somewhat anomalous. But the universe was vast, and there were always some creatures that would consider this 'very realistic.'

"The electricity-storage trait actually exists in reality... An electric eel? No... It's different. An electric eel's ability comes from its muscle structure, while mine comes from the cells themselves being special..."

"Forget it. The universe is vast, and there are all kinds of wonders. Even if someone told me there was an extraterrestrial species whose cells could naturally store huge amounts of electricity, I'd believe it. All I did was make this biological trait appear anomalously in my Earthling body. Everything else is normal... That's the cheapest kind."

Bai Ge understood one thing very clearly: Earth was Earth, while reality was reality. The real world was not limited to Earth.

The universe was so vast that perhaps some strange laws unimaginable to Earth's humans existed in some distant corner.

Humanity was too insignificant, and the things it knew were negligible.

Moreover, one of the criteria for dividing these six levels was 'absoluteness.'

Bai Ge had discovered this by accident during an experiment.

Previously, he had unintentionally created the Universal Unlock Passcode, whose setting emphasized 'any' lock.

So while researching, Bai Ge wanted to test settings such as 'absolute,' 'forcibly,' 'any,' 'everything,' and 'regardless.'

He added the '100% Two Birds with One Stone' trait to himself.

It actually worked.

When he used this ability to throw an object, he could absolutely hit two birds.

Whether it killed them was another matter... but he would definitely hit them!

Even if there were no birds for several miles around, the stone in Bai Ge's hand could forcibly fly far away, find two birds, and strike them...

It sounded utterly absurd, even to the point of violating Newton's three laws of motion...

But so what? Bai Ge had made the trait last for half a minute. Within that time, he could throw however he wanted.

He could perform 'two birds with one stone' in all sorts of fancy ways. He would hit them somehow...

It could be said that during those thirty seconds, whenever Bai Ge threw a stone, Newton's coffin lid would be unable to stay shut.

This was actually similar in effect to the Universal Unlock Passcode.

Whatever kind of lock it was, as long as it was a lock, Bai Ge could open it automatically with a single passcode.

Bai Ge called this kind of anomalous trait an 'Absolute Trait.'

Traits that applied throughout the universe, were not limited to Bai Ge, and could be activated by anyone who spoke the relevant passcode—traits that were like objective laws—were called 'Universal Traits.'

Over the course of one night, Bai Ge exhausted all the electricity he had painstakingly stolen, gaining one permanent Absolute Trait and several temporary Absolute Traits in exchange.

As for Universal Traits, he had not managed to create a single one.

The temporary traits soon disappeared, leaving only the permanent Absolute Trait: 'Absolute Trait: Calm Command.'

The so-called Calm Command meant silently reciting the words 'remain calm,' after which one's thoughts would become extremely rational, turning one into the paragon of human composure and preventing external stimuli from causing one to lose control.

Put simply, it was a state. Everyone could enter this state; the difference lay only in how long they could maintain it. It was also a very realistic trait, which was why Bai Ge had enough energy to grant it to himself permanently.

By using the command, Bai Ge could control this state. He would not be as easily affected by external factors as other people, and could turn it off whenever he wanted. It was extremely convenient.

If the Calm Command had not included 'absoluteness,' it would definitely have cost much less than Safe Electricity Storage for cells.

After all, the universe was vast. There were certainly organisms capable of controlling their own emotions and mental states, perhaps even creatures that were naturally 'heartless and devoid of feeling.'

Overall, this was more realistic than traits such as '100% Two Birds with One Stone,' '100% Three Birds One Stone,' 'Forcibly Striking the Ox Across the Mountain,' 'Absolute Defense Counterattack,' and 'Whoever You Stare At Gets Pregnant.'

If even these seemingly unscientific and unrealistic traits could be realized...

Deep in Bai Ge's heart, a tremendous ambition toward 'absolute eternity' began to grow.

"I'm not creating superpowers. I'm creating settings, rules, objective definitions themselves..."

"Perhaps one day, I'll be able to overturn the universe with a single word and rewrite reality with a single thought."

"To become reality's... Setting Weaver."