Leveling up from level 9 to level 10 wasn’t as simple as changing a number on the characteristic panel.
The second Lu Zhou left the system space, he felt like he was just slapped in the back of his head; he nearly fainted.
The sensation didn’t stop there.
He felt a wave of sensations pouring down his cerebral cortex. A fiery ripple of heat rose from the back of his neck, crawling to the front of his face.
The sensation lasted for around five minutes. After the pain was gone, his back was soaking wet.
When Lu Zhou opened his eyes, the world had changed.
The trees were no longer trees, they were a growing collection of Mandelbrot sets, and the clouds were no longer clouds, they were Calabi–Yau manifolds.
Perhaps the object themselves didn’t change, but in his eyes, they had transformed into mathematical concepts.
Is this the meaning of the universe?
I feel this in my soul.
“… Is this what the world is like, in the eye of the gods?”
Lu Zhou thought of himself as an atheist.
But now, he wasn’t sure if anyone else in the world saw the universe in the same way as him.
His retina seemed to have become a filter, filtering out the chaos, leaving behind only order.
The world is beautiful.
Lu Zhou sat motionlessly at his desk, staring at the world around him. He sat there for an entire afternoon.
It wasn’t until Xiao Ai reminded him to eat dinner that he snapped back to reality and walked out of his study room…
…
Level 10 was a paradise for mathematicians.
Of course, not everything was perfect.
Becoming extremely sensitive to numbers and geometry was somewhat annoying for Lu Zhou’s life.
For someone who had obsessive-compulsive disorder, this type of sensitivity and intuition was a torture for him. Seeing the non-perpendicular toothbrush leaning in his cup, the two asymmetrical slices of bread… The details of life that he never noticed before had become difficult to ignore.
However, this problem didn’t last for long.
The third day after uploading the paper, Lu Zhou had already adapted to his “level up”.
On the fifth day, he no longer felt any discomfort. He even fell in love with the beauty of his surroundings.
He couldn’t describe this beauty in words.
However, Lu Zhou believed that, if he was at level 10 in physics or engineering instead…
He would see the world in a different way.
Lu Zhou couldn’t help but look forward to the future.
He wondered what the world would be like if he reached level 10 in physics.
Just thinking about it made him excited.
Other than adapting to the new changes in his perspective of the world, Lu Zhou didn’t do much over the last few days.
On one hand, he was paying attention to the reaction and response from the mathematics community regarding his paper, and on the other hand, he was tinkering with the rewards he was given from completing the mission.
Even though he wanted to know what the Void Memory was, this was obviously not the right time.
He only had one ticket.
In order to collect the maximum amount of clues, he had to do more preparation.
The shampoo and Energy Medicine were pretty self-explanatory, and the final thing he received was the “Transcendence” X-1 glasses.
On the surface, it looked like normal glasses, similar to the ones found in optometry stores. He wasn’t able to find anything after scanning it with a metal detector.
However, after he put on the glasses and passed the retina verification, it was like he opened a door to a new world.
After he connected to the “Transcendence” X-1 server, it was like he was wearing the glasses Tony Stark gave to Spiderman.
But…
It seems underwhelming?
After playing around with it, Lu Zhou was bored.
Even though the glasses were cool, it was just a data dashboard.
The only difference between this and a brain-computer interface was that he had to control the glasses through his voice, and the glasses also tracked his eye movements.
Lu Zhou speculated that the civilization that mastered this technology had integrated AR technology into every aspect of life. Wearing the glasses and not wearing them could mean a world of difference.
But for right now…
It seemed like there was no use for this AR technology.
It’s not like I can use the glasses to catch Pokemons, right? Like in Pokemon Go?
That would be ridiculous.
When he tried to connect the glasses to the experimental observation satellite independently developed and designed by Star Sky Technology, he opened another door to a new world.
When he put on the glasses, he could see the world in a bird’s eye view hundreds of kilometers above the sky.
Not to mention, this was just one satellite…
If he connected to multiple satellites…
Lu Zhou held his breath and looked at the drone resting on his bookshelf.
“Xiao Ai.”
Xiao Ai: [Yeah? (•̀∀•́)]
Lu Zhou spoke with excitement.
“Let me borrow your body!”
Xiao Ai: [???]
…
Jin Ling University.
Perelman walked through the corridor as his hair swayed through the air. He came to the end of the corridor and opened the door.
When he saw Lu Zhou sitting behind the desk, he sighed and walked over with a paper in his hand, which was filled with his own written comments.
When he walked closer, he paused for a second and asked, “When did you start wearing glasses?”
Lu Zhou: “Recently… It’s a prescription, why?”
“Nothing… Cool.”
Perelman opened his mouth and decided to change the topic of conversation. He placed the paper on the table and said, “I’ve read your paper… about five times.”
Lu Zhou: “Did you understand it?”
Perelman nodded and said, “Most of it, but it took me a long time.”
Lu Zhou looked at the paper on the desk and smiled.
“Looks like this is the part you didn’t understand.”
Perelman nodded. His curious facial expression told the whole story.
Lu Zhou twisted the pen in his hand and spoke.
“I understand your confusion… But you might have to wait a few days.”
Perelman: “Do you have something to do?”
“Sort of…” Lu Zhou smiled and said, “A second ago, I received an email from my former supervisor, Professor Deligne. He sent me a request from the International Mathematical Union. Basically, they want me to give a detailed report on the paper.
“It is happening in a week, at Jin University.
“You can ask your questions at the report. I’ll clear your confusion.”
