All the damage Xiao Lin suffered would ultimately be converted into a consumption of his Essence, and this consumption would gradually repair itself.
Therefore, as long as he wasn't killed on the spot, no matter what type of injury it was, it would eventually disappear.
After about three hours, those bizarre symbols on his body had completely vanished, and his hair had grown back.
Xiao Lin cautiously returned to his body. There was still a lingering sense of chaos and dizziness in his brain, but the uncontrollable thinking had stopped.
He squatted down to inspect the Wisdom Demon's remains. He took off its clothes, pressing down hard inch by inch while feeling its body structure.
The Wisdom Demon's body was emaciated, dry, without a shred of moisture, and its skin was like hard leather.
Its structure was similar to a human's; overall, it was like a mummified corpse that had been embalmed.
He then looked at the Wisdom Demon's true form, that red book.
The cover of this thing was leather, the spine was bone, and the pages were flesh and blood. The tactile sensation was extremely bizarre.
Right now, it was almost severed by Xiao Lin's slash. The dense eyes on the pages stared blankly, and bloody tears had dyed the pages red.
Moreover, there was content on the pages, but Xiao Lin couldn't understand it.
The preliminary inspection was over. Xiao Lin stood up, took a few photos, and then began the next step.
He slowly placed his hand on the book. His Essence began to flow, moving towards the book and forming a static "Essence Imprint".
It was with this Essence Imprint that he had awakened the Institute and the satellite. Now, he was attempting to awaken the Wisdom Demon.
Silent blue light began to erupt from the book. Amidst that brilliant blue light, the Wisdom Demon's body was gradually restoring itself to its original state. After just over ten seconds, the blue light extinguished, and this bizarre Calamity-corrupted creature slowly stood up, standing motionless like a statue.
Now came the core part of the experiment.
A few days ago, when he and Yue Taizhou were discussing "becoming stronger," Yue Taizhou had asked him, "Have you read a novel called Story of Your Life?"
"Yes, they even made a movie called Arrival," Xiao Lin nodded.
Yue Taizhou launched into a lecture: "Correct. That novel itself is an extreme extension of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which states that language influences the way of thinking."
"Native Spanish speakers think in Spanish, native English speakers think in English. Due to differences in grammatical structure, vocabulary size, and etymology, their ways of thinking also differ."
Xiao Lin felt a bit scared for a moment. "Pro... Professor, you're not going to tell me that if I want to get stronger, I have to study foreign languages well, are you?"
"No, there is a method more effective than language, and only you can do it."
The professor raised a finger.
"You don't need to learn the language from 'aliens'; you can become the alien."
Now, what Xiao Lin had to do was... become an alien.
He closed his eyes, transferred his consciousness, and in a flash, entered the Essence Imprint within the Wisdom Demon. A sense of emptiness, void, and peace he had never experienced before enveloped Xiao Lin.
He slowly opened his dozen-plus eyes and looked at this world. The sight made him almost dizzy, but more than dizziness, it was excitement.
First was clarity. Unprecedented clarity. He could see the texture on a blade of grass from over ten meters away. The field of view was astonishingly wide, reaching nearly 270 degrees.
Next was color. The contrast between colors became exceptionally distinct. He could see hundreds of colors he had previously been unable to distinguish. He even saw the color of the wind—a very faint, transparent silvery-white.
Then came information. At a glance, he knew how many pebbles and how many weeds were in his field of vision. When he looked at a bizarre plant, he immediately knew how long it had lived and how much longer it could live.
Finally, motion. When a small pebble rolled and fell in his field of vision, the falling trajectory left several afterimages. Xiao Lin briefly saw its "past."
This was a crazy, all-encompassing information perspective, paired with the Wisdom Demon's strange brain. It made Xiao Lin feel as if he had become a computer.
Then he looked at himself, but... saw nothing.
He was still him, standing there silently, with no extra information being perceived, like a silent, stubborn rock.
The all-information perspective seemed to have malfunctioned for himself.
However, Xiao Lin didn't have time to study it carefully right now, because while playing the role of the Wisdom Demon, his Essence consumption rate was shockingly fast. He estimated that half an hour would be enough to deplete him completely.
Next was the final step of the experiment: Reshaping.
Yue Taizhou had said that he wasn't a life form, but a transcendent existence, so perhaps he could transform himself by changing his way of thinking.
Xiao Lin returned to his own body and immediately closed his eyes, frantically recalling that unique experience of playing the Wisdom Demon. After thirty seconds, he slowly opened his eyes, and a dozen tiny pupils emerged within his eyeballs.
The silver wind was flowing past his line of sight.
The dark red sky had no visible sun, but when the red deepened, it meant night was approaching.
"It'll be dark in another hour," the fat man said to the thin man from atop the high-rise.
The thin man didn't pick up the topic but instead asked in return, "What did the Yang Gang come to talk to Boss Shen about?"
The fat man grumbled, "Didn't they try to target the Satellite Town a few days ago? Then Lan Shiyu wiped out half their core strength. Now it seems they've come to ask for our help."
The thin man frowned deeply. "Boss Shen shouldn't help them. They are nothing but scum."
"Making a living, my friend. We're all out here making a living, just with different methods." The fat man forced out a strange tone. "Besides, they're offering a very high reward this time, almost digging out half their family fortune."
"Did the Boss agree?" the thin man asked.
"He's still assessing the situation. After all, this is a big matter; making an enemy of the Satellite Town isn't wise."
The thin man sighed and said nothing more. Just then, he looked in the direction of the city depths. A small figure seemed to have briefly appeared in his peripheral vision.
The thin man frowned, raised his binoculars, and looked towards that street, waiting quietly for the figure to appear again. But after a few seconds, he still hadn't seen anything.
"What? See something?" the fat man asked.
"Nothing, probably saw it wrong," the thin man said, but he didn't lower his binoculars.
But just then, the figure appeared again. The thin man quickly focused his gaze. When he saw the other person's appearance clearly, he suddenly turned pale with shock.
"How is that possible?"
"What's wrong?" the fat man asked hurriedly.
"It's him. He... he's back."
"Him?"
The fat man also picked up his binoculars to look. Then, his whole body froze as if struck by lightning.
"No, impossible. No one can come back alive from the Wisdom Demon's hands, unless he never even entered Block 13."
The thin man gritted his teeth, thought for a moment, and said, "Let's go down and ask."