Academia across the globe erupted as though someone had stirred up a hornet's nest.
Two weeks after Professor Li published his paper, follow-up research was pouring out at a rate of more than a dozen papers a day.
It wasn't just history and archaeology... physics, biology, anthropology, linguistics—every discipline was diving in.
The biggest bombshell came from the joint biology and paleoanthropology laboratory at Capital City University.
Its title: "A Revised Model of Evolutionary Pathways in the Genus Homo Based on Documents from Inheritance Island."
Its central conclusion came down to a single sentence: the linear model of modern Homo sapiens evolution was wrong.
Approximately fifteen thousand years ago, at least three species of the genus Homo with advanced cognitive abilities had coexisted on Earth... and one possessed the physiological basis for manipulating natural energy.
In other words, cultivators of the Primordial Era hadn't been ordinary people who became cultivators through "cultivation." They had been a different species to begin with.
Or, more precisely—humanity had once possessed that potential, but at some point in time, that ability had been stripped away.
The shock this paper sent through academic circles was even greater than Professor Li's had been.
Chen Siyao discussed it with Professor Li over a video call.
"Professor Li, is this conclusion reliable?"
Professor Li rubbed his temples. He had been working for more than forty hours straight, and dark circles ringed his eyes.
"The data holds up. That batch of skeletal samples unearthed on the twenty-fifth island—we sequenced their genes, and they really do differ from modern humans by 3.7 percent. The difference isn't in physical appearance. It's in the regions that regulate gene expression."
"What does that mean?"
"Put simply—the hardware is the same, but the software is different. Those cultivators of the Primordial Era had the