Chapter 1351: The Nature Of Core Metacs.

Unwilling to give up, he visualized the structure of law fragments and forced the spark of power to create it. He thought of tiny points of energy carrying information that could be linked together to form one-dimensional vibrating strings.

The law fragments he thought of were similar in structure to photons. They were both waves and particles.

Then he urged the spark of power to manifest them, saying, "Come on. You already have it within you. What are you hesitating about?"

As if in response to his urging, specks of law fragments began to appear with the spark of power. But the spark of power wasn’t spontaneously creating law fragments. The law fragments only appeared because he tried to create Metacs but failed on purpose.

He stopped short on the step where law fragments would combine to form Metacs. So producing law fragments meant interrupting the production of Metacs.

Of course, this failure still cost him lifespan. But in exchange for burning through his lifespan, the specks of law fragments increased rapidly.

Seeing this, he said, "That’s true. I’ll also die if I run out of lifespan."

But he wasn’t worried about that because he had a lot of lifespan. He had billions of lifespan, so what he had to worry about was running out of divine crystals.

As more and more law fragments were created, he got to work putting them together like building blocks. He made one-dimensional strings by linking them. Then he linked, combined, and arranged the vibrating strings into two-dimensional Mortal Metacs.

He chose to make Core Metacs. Specifically, he chose to make the Root of Power Metac that white Loki was working with earlier.

He made the Root of Power Metac from Rank 1 to Rank 5. Then he fused them with the spark of power. The result was the Rank 5 version, but larger.

When he saw this, he said, "Now let’s try it from another angle."

Usually, a Rank 1 Mortal Metac contained 1 vibrating string. A Rank 2 Mortal Metac contained 2 more strings, making a total of 3 vibrating strings. The Rank 3 contained 3 more strings for a total of 6. Then, from Rank 4 to 5, there were 10 and 15 units of vibrating strings.

Fusing the Rank 1 to Rank 5 versions produced a Rank 5 Core Metac with 17 units of vibrating string. The result should have been 1 + 3 + 6 + 10 + 15, which equals 35. Clearly, a lot had been lost during the fusion.

But he didn’t think it was a waste of time. The fusion confirmed what he already knew; now he wanted to test a hypothesis that had never been confirmed.

It was common sense among Dao Lords that the single vibrating string in Rank 1 Core Metacs contained the information for the Core Metac’s ability. In rare cases, like the Root of Life, where two Supreme Metacs were working together to give it two abilities, extracting lifespan and the usual unique ability, the Core Metac could have two vibrating strings.

No case had ever occurred where a Rank 1 Core Metac had up to three vibrating strings. This was because the Core Metac would become too difficult to control and energy-expensive for Rank 1 Mortals to use.

In fact, Rank 1 mortals might not be able to use Rank 2 Metacs at all because their Mind, Will, and Spirit attributes were too weak. After all, Rank 1 cultivators are limited to 1 unit per attribute.

Even at Rank 2, with at least three vibrating strings, the extra strings were there not to add more abilities. They were there to help the mortal advance to Rank 2 and sustain their Energy Well up to the peak of Rank 2.

So the extra strings would contain instructions that allow the Core Metac to fuse with the Rank 1 version without rejection, fuse with the Energy Well without breaking it, grow Energy Threads without killing the host, and withstand increased Energy Density until the peak of Rank 2.

Then the Rank 3 version would have extra strings containing instructions for fusing with the Rank 2 version without rejection, fusing with the Energy Well without breaking it, creating Life Abilities without killing the cultivator, and withstanding increased Energy Density until the peak of Rank 3.

Therefore, every Rank of Core Metacs contained the instructions that form the very backbone and foundation of the cultivation system. The instructions they contained were why a Rank 3 cultivator can have a Life Ability.

Life Abilities didn’t arise spontaneously through advancement. If the Dao Lord didn’t add the instructions to the Core Metac, Rank 3 cultivators wouldn’t have Life Abilities.

The orderly structure of Core Metacs gave advancement fixed requirements that everyone on the cultivation path could follow, regardless of identity. It was also why anyone could reach Rank 5, call down a Divine Position, and replace a divine being, regardless of race or identity.

Dao Lords have to balance functionality with complexity. They had to make sure their Core Metacs could help their disciples advance while giving them abilities unique to the pathway and allowing them to use the pathway’s Branch Metacs.

They had to do all of these while making sure the Core Metac wasn’t too complex to control or too heavy to use. So with every Rank up, they discarded redundant instructions in the Core Metacs to make room for new ones and keep the Core Metac light.

That’s why fusing the five versions produced a light Rank 5 Core Metac with 17 vibrating strings, not 35. In fact, since the Root of Power contained one extra string for its second ability, it should have one extra string at Rank 1, so the fusion should have created a Core Metac with 36 vibrating strings.

Yet, that was the normal outcome which any Dao Lord could predict. Now it was time to test something abnormal.

He created the five versions of the Root of Power Core Metac again. Then removed the backward compatibility between them.