[HOST COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT: 25%]
[SYSTEM FEATURES PARTIALLY ACCESSIBLE]
[WOULD HOST LIKE TO VIEW DETAILED STATUS?]
Finally!
Runar focused on the floating text with all the mental energy he could muster. Yes. Show me everything.
[STATUS INTERFACE - RUNAR CROSS]
[AGE: 15 DAYS]
[CULTIVATION: None (Body too underdeveloped)][REALM: N/A]
[PHYSIQUE: Universal Refinement Physique (Divine Grade)]
Current Function: Passively absorbing ambient energy to accelerate body developmentEfficiency: 0.1% (Will increase with age)
[MARTIAL SOUL: Void Severance Katana Soul (Supreme Grade - Dormant)]
Awakening Requirements: Host must reach Planetary Core realmCurrent State: Sleeping. Passively strengthening host's spiritual foundation
[TECHNIQUES LEARNED: 0]
Note: Techniques can be studied in Comprehension Space Realm but cannot be practiced until body develops sufficient meridians
[SYSTEM FEATURES:]
Infinite Qi Realm
Entries Available: 20 Time Dilation: 1:1000 Status: LOCKED (Unlock Condition: Reach Stardust Awakening realm)
Comprehension Space Realm
Entries: UNLIMITED Comprehension Boost: 1000x Time Dilation: Near-Infinite (Outside world nearly frozen) Status: UNLOCKED Warning: Prolonged use may cause mental strain in underdeveloped host. Recommended session length: 1 hour subjective time maximum
World-Hopping Transfer Gate
Activations Available: 20
Space Energy: 0.03% (Passively absorbing from environment OR comprehend Space Law to generate space energy.)
Status: LOCKED (Unlock Condition: Reach Stardust Awakening realm )
[INVENTORY: 209 ITEMS]
[SPECIAL ABILITIES:]
Heaven-Defying Comprehension Mantra (Active)
Universal Refinement Physique (Passive)
System Interface (Active)
[CURRENT OBJECTIVES:]
Survive infancy Reach sufficient cognitive development to study techniques Begin cultivation at earliest safe opportunity
Runar read through the status three times, his baby brain working overtime to process and memorize everything.
The Comprehension Space is unlocked. I can use it right now.
The temptation was overwhelming. He had three Heaven Grade cultivation techniques and The Heaven-Defying Comprehension Mantra(HDCM - i will call it this from now one) just waiting to be studied. The Beginner's Rune Compendium was sitting in his inventory, full of knowledge that could revolutionize his understanding of this world's power system.
But the warning gave him pause. Mental strain on an underdeveloped host. His brain was already struggling with basic thoughts—what would happen if he pushed it too hard?
I need to be smart about this. Strategic.
His programmer instincts kicked in, even through the fog of infant cognition. Break the problem down into manageable pieces. Prioritize tasks. Don't try to optimize everything at once.
First priority: Learn about this world's cultivation system. Not the techniques themselves yet, but the theory. The framework.
Second priority: Study runes. If they're really the programming language of reality, that's my ultimate advantage.
Third priority: Plan my cultivation path. I have three techniques covering all three paths. I need to understand how to integrate them properly.
The system seemed to sense his thoughts.
[RECOMMENDATION: HOST SHOULD BEGIN WITH BEGINNER'S RUNE COMPENDIUM][BASIC RUNE THEORY WILL PROVIDE FOUNDATION FOR UNDERSTANDING ADVANCED CULTIVATION CONCEPTS][ESTIMATED STUDY TIME IN COMPREHENSION SPACE: 30 MINUTES SUBJECTIVE]
Thirty minutes in the Comprehension Space. How long is that in real time?
[APPROXIMATELY 0.0005 SECONDS EXTERNAL TIME]
...okay, that's actually insane.
Runar glanced around his crib. His parents were both in other rooms—his father at work, his mother in her shop attached to the house. He was alone, safe, and unlikely to be disturbed.
Alright. Let's do this. Enter Comprehension Space Realm.
[ENTERING COMPREHENSION SPACE...]
The world shifted.
Runar's consciousness separated from his body with a sensation like stepping out of a heavy coat. Suddenly, his thoughts were clear—sharp, precise, operating at full speed without the limitations of his infant brain.
He looked down and saw himself—not his baby body, but his original form from Earth. Twenty-eight years old, comfortable jeans and a hoodie, standing in what appeared to be an infinite white void.
"Holy shit," he said, and hearing his own adult voice was startling enough that he laughed. "Okay. Okay, this is amazing."
[COMPREHENSION SPACE REALM ACTIVE]
[ALL MENTAL LIMITATIONS REMOVED]
[HOST MAY ACCESS INVENTORY AND STUDY MATERIALS]
[CURRENT SESSION TIMER: 0:05sec / 60:00min RECOMMENDED MAXIMUM]
A timer appeared in the corner of his vision, counting upward in seconds. Runar took a deep breath—or at least the sensation of one—and focused on his inventory.
[SELECT ITEM: BEGINNER'S RUNE COMPENDIUM]
The jade slip materialized in his hand, warm to the touch and thrumming with contained knowledge. He'd seen similar items in the news broadcasts—knowledge jades were apparently common storage methods for cultivation techniques and information.
He pressed the jade to his forehead.
Information flooded his mind.
Not all at once, but in a structured, organized flow—like downloading a massive file and watching it unpack in real-time. The Comprehension Space's thousand-times boost meant he absorbed and understood concepts that would normally take months to grasp in mere seconds.
Runes are the fundamental language of reality, the knowledge explained. All existence—matter, energy, space, time, causality—operates according to runic patterns established at the universe's creation.
Images formed in his mind. Runes were intricate symbols, yes, but more than that—they were multidimensional structures. What looked like a simple mark on paper was actually a three-dimensional, sometimes four-dimensional pattern that interacted with reality's fundamental code.
Cultivation techniques create temporary runic structures. Physiques are permanent runic patterns encoded into a being's existence. Laws are deep comprehension of specific runic frameworks. Rules are the ability to rewrite runic structures themselves.
It was exactly like programming.
Variables, functions, classes, inheritance, polymorphism—all the concepts Runar knew from software development had analogues in runic theory. A cultivation technique was like a program. A physique was like firmware. Laws were understanding the underlying codebase. Rules were having root access.
This is incredible, Runar thought, absorbing page after page of information. Every cultivator is basically running software they don't fully understand. But if I can read and write the actual code...
The implications were staggering.
He could analyze any technique and understand its runic structure. Copy physique patterns from others. Debug flawed cultivation methods. Eventually, write his own techniques from scratch, optimized and without the inefficiencies that accumulated over generations of inherited practices.
The timer in his vision read 28:43.
Runar had absorbed the entire box of Beginner's Rune Compendium—a text that would normally take a cultivator years to fully understand—in less than half an hour of subjective time.
And he still had time left in his session.
Let's look at those cultivation techniques, he decided. Not to practice them, just to understand their structure.
He pulled up the Stellar Ascension Method first.
The technique was beautiful. Elegant. A carefully structured series of runic patterns designed to draw in cosmic energy, refine it through the meridians, and condense it in the dantian. It had clear stages corresponding to the cultivation realms, each building on the previous one.
But as Runar studied it with his newfound understanding of runes, he began to notice inefficiencies.
There was redundant processing in the third circulation pattern. The fifth meridian pathway took a roundabout route when a direct connection would be faster. The condensation rune for the Planetary Core stage was elegant but not optimized for maximum compression.
I could fix these, he realized. Not now, obviously. But eventually. I could take a Heaven Grade technique and make it even better.
He studied the Cosmic Forge Body Scripture next. This one was more brutal—runes designed to break down and rebuild the physical body, each iteration making it stronger. It was like an aggressive optimization algorithm that treated the body as code to be constantly refactored.
The Eternal Soul Codex was the most complex. Soul cultivation involved runes that operated on consciousness itself, strengthening the spiritual foundation and expanding awareness. Looking at it made Runar's head hurt even in the Comprehension Space.
I'll need to revisit that one when I'm more advanced.
The timer read 55:17.
Runar took a moment to just exist in the space, his mind clearer than it had been since reincarnating. This was going to be his sanctuary—the place where he could think, plan, and study without the limitations of his physical body.
Five minutes left. What else should I—
The Heaven-Defying Comprehension Mantra.
He'd received it from truck-kun, felt it settle into his mind like a half-remembered song, but he hadn't actually practiced it yet. Now, with his consciousness unrestricted and his mental faculties operating at full capacity, seemed like the perfect time.
Let's see what makes this technique special enough for a truck to spend a thousand merit points on it.
Runar closed his eyes—or rather, the mental equivalent in this space—and turned his attention inward to where the mantra resided. It wasn't written in words or runes, but existed as pure concept, a pattern that transcended language.
He began to practice.
The moment he engaged with the mantra, Runar understood why truck-kun had been so proud of this gift.
It was exquisite.
The technique operated on multiple levels simultaneously. It wasn't just a cultivation method—it was a fundamental restructuring of how consciousness itself processed information. Each repetition of the mantra created microscopic changes in his soul's architecture, optimizing neural pathways that didn't even exist in physical brains, refining the very essence of thought.
This is insane, Runar thought, even as he continued the practice. It's like... like refactoring my consciousness into more efficient code.
His soul began to resonate. That was the only word for it. The mantra created a harmonic frequency that rippled through every layer of his being—physical, spiritual, mental. Each wave of resonance cleared away impurities in his thinking, dissolved cognitive bottlenecks he hadn't even known existed.
His thinking speed increased. Not dramatically—maybe five, ten percent—but noticeably. Connections between concepts formed faster. Pattern recognition sharpened. Memory became more precise, more readily accessible.
But the real change was in his comprehension ability itself.
It was as if someone had taken the processing core of his mind and upgraded it. Not just made it faster, but fundamentally more capable. Problems that seemed complex began revealing their underlying simplicity. Abstract concepts crystallized into concrete understanding with minimal effort.
And this is just the first practice session, Runar realized with growing awe. This technique is designed to be cultivated continuously, each repetition building on the last, compounding improvements infinitely.
The mantra wasn't simple. Even here, in the Comprehension Space with its thousand-times boost, Runar struggled with the intricate mental patterns. The technique demanded perfect precision—one wrong thought, one misaligned intention, and the whole structure collapsed.
Forty-five seconds passed. Sweat that didn't exist in this mental space seemed to bead on his forehead. The mantra required total concentration, absolute mental discipline.
Almost there...
At fifty-eight seconds, something clicked.
The mantra synchronized perfectly with his consciousness. The pattern locked into place, and Runar felt it—true mastery. The technique would now operate automatically, constantly refining his comprehension ability whether he was actively thinking about it or not.
[HEAVEN-DEFYING COMPREHENSION MANTRA: MASTERED][COMPREHENSION ABILITY: +500%][SOUL FOUNDATION: STRENGTHENED][THINKING SPEED: +300%][SPIRITUAL PERCEPTION: +400%][PATTERN RECOGNITION: +600%]
The timer read 56:15.
One minute. He'd mastered a technique in one minute that, even with the Comprehension Space's boost, should have taken weeks.
If any true powerhouse knew he'd mastered this mantra in sixty seconds, even with the realm's help... They would most likely feel a mixture of amusement and trepidation and most definitely rip the hair out of their heads and give up on cultivation. They'd either declare him a once-in-an-epoch genius or assume he was lying. Probably both.
For truck-kun, this had likely seemed like a nice comprehension-boosting technique—useful, certainly, but nothing revolutionary. After all, the multiverse surely contained countless treasures and methods to enhance one's understanding. Pills, artifacts, special physiques that granted similar benefits.
But Runar's programmer instincts screamed that this was different.
This wasn't just a boost. This was a fundamental optimization of the consciousness itself. It was recursive—the better his comprehension became, the faster he could improve his comprehension further. It was a positive feedback loop, the kind that could compound into something truly extraordinary given enough time.
His intuition—sharper now than ever before—whispered urgently: This technique isn't simple. This is something special. Something important.
[TIME LIMIT REACHED][RECOMMENDATION: EXIT COMPREHENSION SPACE]
Runar ignored it for a moment, his enhanced mind racing through the implications.
I need to keep this active constantly. Not just when I'm studying—always. Every second of every day, this technique should be running in the background, refining my comprehension ability.
It would happen automatically now that he'd mastered it, but he needed to remain conscious of it, to actively engage with the mantra whenever possible. The passive benefits were significant, but active cultivation would multiply the effects exponentially.
[WARNING: RECOMMENDED TIME LIMIT EXCEEDED]
[MENTAL STRAIN MAY OCCUR IN INFANT HOST BODY]
Right. Baby brain. Can't push too hard.
[FORCEFUL EXIT IN 3... 2... 1...]
Reality snapped back.
Runar blinked, his thoughts instantly sluggish again as his consciousness returned to his infant body.
The contrast was jarring. In the Comprehension Space, his mind had been a finely-tuned instrument, processing information at incredible speed with perfect clarity. Now, back in his fifteen-day-old body, it was like trying to run that same software on ancient hardware.
But something was different.
Even through the fog of infant cognition, Runar could feel it—the mantra was still there, still active. A gentle pulse in the back of his mind, constantly working, constantly refining. His baby brain couldn't leverage the full benefits yet, but the foundation was being strengthened with every passing second.
It's working, he thought slowly but with certainty. Even now, it's making me sharper.
He lay quietly in his crib, processing the experience. Time passed—he wasn't sure how much. Minutes? An hour? His sense of time was unreliable in this tiny body.
Eventually, soft footsteps approached.
His mother appeared in the doorway, her jade-green eyes concerned as she leaned over the crib. "There you are," she said softly, reaching down to lift him. "You've been so quiet I got worried. Usually you at least make some sounds."
I was in a timeless void studying the fundamental nature of reality and mastering a heaven-defying technique, Runar thought slowly, the internal monologue taking several seconds to formulate. But I can't exactly tell you that.
He made a small cooing noise instead, managing to grasp weakly at her finger.
Lirien smiled, relieved, and carried him toward the kitchen. "Let's get you fed. And maybe your father will be home soon. He said he might bring something interesting from the Archive."
As his mother prepared his feeding—formula, thankfully, since his underdeveloped body wasn't ready for solid food—Runar's mind churned through everything he'd learned.
He had the tools. The knowledge. The resources.
Now he just needed to survive long enough to use them.
One day at a time, he told himself, settling into his mother's arms. Master the runes. Plan the cultivation path. Grow stronger in secret. And eventually...
Eventually, he'd become something this world had never seen before.
A programmer who could rewrite reality itself.
The system pulsed softly in acknowledgment, and Runar Cross—fifteen days old and already planning his rise to power—allowed himself a small, secret smile.