Cultivation: I Have Studied Abroad in the Modern World
Chapter 208 - 105: Measurement

Chapter 208: Chapter 105: Measurement

In the retirement home.

Nightfall descends, as the head chef and his team have already departed. Zheng Fa and his three companions move a few more recliners and lie side by side in the courtyard.

The ecological environment here is excellent.

The weather today is clear and sunny, stars twinkle in the night sky, and the scent of grass and trees wafts through the air.

A gentle breeze blows from the mountainside, and their conversation is aimless but full of contentment.

"Their condition is to purchase daily, and I’ve sent you their price offer," Old Man Bai turns his head to speak to Zheng Fa.

Zheng Fa nods; he has seen the other party’s offer as well.

He has some understanding of market prices—during his three years of high school, he would always wander around the vegetable market on weekends, buying things like roast chicken.

But the opponent’s bid is a bit too generous.

The same tomatoes, which might cost a few yuan per jin at the market, are priced at several hundred on this price list, an increase of more than a hundred times.

And this is considered a low increase.

Some vegetables have even more outrageous mark-ups.

Seeing Zheng Fa silent, Old Man Bai seems to think he feels the offer is too low and explains, "This should be their most sincere bid."

"Hmm? They’re this sincere from the start?"

This seems to go against the normal routine of doing business...

"It’s because of..." Old Man Bai nudges his chin towards Tang Lingwu next to Zheng Fa.

Tang Lingwu smiles shyly, "I asked my dad about the restaurant’s turnover and food costs, and I checked their supply channels. After some calculations, it seems that they are not undercutting us."

"This... shouldn’t it be a trade secret?"

Zheng Fa is momentarily dumbfounded.

This is practically stripping the other party bare.

"Many times, the word ’secret’..." Old Man Bai reflects upon hearing this, "is just another expression for not being qualified enough."

Zheng Fa is speechless at this comment, but listens as Old Man Bai continues, "However, they also have demands."

"What?"

"Exclusive supplier status, and they even want to dictate our supply—meaning, whatever they want, we would have to grow. They said they would pay extra for this."

This isn’t surprising; for a restaurant of this caliber, the word ’exclusive’ may be more important than good taste.

As for dictating supply, naturally, they want more control.

"They’re offering a lot more money," Old Man Bai remarks appreciatively. "The amount they add in a week might be more than what I earned in a year."

That is quite a lot.

Although working in mathematics may not be as lucrative as many other fields, as a professor at Beijing University, Old Man Bai’s annual salary plus side income is still at the million level.

After thinking for a while, Zheng Fa asks, "If we don’t agree, what would our monthly income be approximately?"

Old Man Bai glances at him and says, "Ling Wu did the calculations. Their offer is high, but their demand isn’t that big—about five or six hundred thousand a week."

Zheng Fa then realizes why Old Man Bai seemed somewhat tempted.

If they agreed to the other side’s terms, the retirement home’s income could double at least.

"Mr. Bai, I have mentioned three principles regarding the retirement home before," Zheng Fa says after a moment of silence. "This business... is just a by-product of our research—our energy shouldn’t be overly entangled with it."

Old Man Bai smacks his lips, clearly understanding Zheng Fa’s perspective, and sighs, "At my age, I am dazzled by this money... But you..."

Tang Lingwu, on the other hand, nods in agreement, with a look of approval towards Zheng Fa.

"You girl, always showing that look no matter what Zheng Fa says, yet this business was clearly your idea..." Old Man Bai mutters, seemingly displeased.

"It’s my idea, but... Zheng Fa is Zheng Fa."

Zheng Fa is taken aback, looking at Tang Lingwu, not understanding why she said this.

Tang Lingwu reclines in the rocking chair, looking up at the stars, speaking softly, "He knows what he wants and always goes in one direction. He just wants to see what cultivation is really like. Isn’t that why we all came together?"

Old Man Bai is startled, then suddenly breaks into laughter.

Mrs. Tian, sitting nearby, pats him and laughs, "I think you’re not as clear-headed as these two youngsters."

...

With those words, the matter is settled, but the next topic proves to be quite challenging for the group.

"Thunder? Spirit Plants?" Old Man Bai frowns. "It sounds simple... but it’s too vague."

Zheng Fa understands what Old Man Bai means.

This can only be considered an idea.

"How can the change in magnetic fields promote the growth of Spirit Plants? What kind of magnetic field changes? Large or small? Sudden changes in magnitude? Which direction and for how long?" Old Man Bai mutters. "So many aspects to consider, we don’t even know where to start."

"I do know of a Thunder Skill. It is said to promote the growth of plants," Zheng Fa suddenly says. "To be precise, there are three incomplete Thunder Skills: Tribulation Thunder, Cloud Rain Thunder, and this one—I call it Spirit Tree Thunder."

At this point, Zheng Fa is also helpless.

How rough are those three Thunder Skills from the Heavenly Stele Realm? Even their names were made up on the spot.

For example, Tribulation Thunder and Cloud Rain Thunder were named by Yan Wushuang and the others.

And Spirit Tree Thunder was not named—mainly because there was no hope in mastering it, out of sight, out of mind!

"Three Thunder Skills?" Tang Lingwu asks from the side, "What are the differences among them?"

"Tribulation Thunder aims for power control."

"Cloud Rain Thunder seeks to control rainfall."

"And Spirit Tree Thunder is for controlling the growth of plants and vegetation," Zheng Fa slowly summed up.

"This sounds more difficult than the last," Old Man Bai spoke, "In terms of raw power, we can compare it to electrical current or voltage levels, but the other two are different."

"Yes." Zheng Fa also had his own thoughts on the matter: "For Cloud Rain Thunder, if we consider the process of rainfall, it could involve altering the polarity of water molecules and using an electromagnetic field to cause them to coalesce into raindrops, or to disperse and evaporate—this is relatively simple, large-scale electromagnetic field control."

"Spirit Tree Thunder is even harder to understand, even if Mrs. Tian’s hypothesis about magnetic fields altering plants is true," lamented Zheng Fa, "The changes in water molecules, or rather raindrops, in electromagnetic fields are clear, but how plants change is vague. The necessary magnetic field changes could be much more complex and microscopic."

Old Man Bai and the others all had serious expressions on their faces.

They clearly recognized the difficulty.

"That’s why I said these are three fundamentally incomplete Thunder Skills," explained Zheng Fa, "You could say, they are three entirely new research subjects. Of course, they are somewhat difficult, but the experiments on Heavenly Tribulation Thunder should be simple."

Zheng Fa did not underestimate these three Thunder Skills – after all, many cultivators from the Xuanwei Realm skilled in Thunder Skill had gathered within the Heavenly Stele.

Faced with these three types of Thunder Skill, they too were clueless.

Without the modern world, Zheng Fa actually had no confidence in reaching deeper insights into Thunder Skill than these individuals...

"Don’t fear the difficulty," Mrs. Tian said with a smile at this moment, "As long as we have a direction, we will eventually get there..."

"That’s actually quite true," Old Man Bai smacked his lips, "Why do I suddenly feel that cultivation and scientific research are a perfect match..."

Zheng Fa also felt like sighing.

He had considered this matter long ago...

If the Xuanwei Realm had scientific civilization, and if those hundreds of thousands of years had been used to explore the world,

Perhaps things wouldn’t be in the state they are today.

But on the other hand, scientific civilization is not an inevitability...

...

Several days later, in front of Zheng Fa, stood a long metal pole connected to several sensors—the current sensor, voltage sensor, and infrared sensor. The sensors were connected to optical fibers that led to Tang Lingwu’s computer indoors.

A high-speed camera was set up a few dozen meters away.

Zheng Fa admitted that people like Yan Wushuang might have a better sense for Thunder Skill than he did...

But he has never been on the track of sensibility...

Why not enjoy experimentation!

For safety reasons, Old Man Bai and the others watched him from inside the house.

This was the first experiment they conducted with the Tribulation Thunder.

To prevent the interference of Spiritual Energy with the electromagnetic field and signals, all these devices were placed outside the range of Spiritual Energy.

Spiritual Power surged out of Zheng Fa’s body, and under the control of his Divine Sense, it moved in patterns resembling those of the Heavenly Tribulation Thunder from the Sealing God Book.

It wasn’t his first time using a Spell, but he used them very infrequently.

In his view, the Spells and talismanic magic of the Xuanwei Realm were two sides of the same coin.

For instance, right now, his Divine Sense was manipulating his own Spiritual Power to "capture" the talismanic diagrams in the void—which was very much like a talismanic diagram—but the difference from runes was that he was controlling his own Spiritual Power.

This method was quite inefficient; in fact, the power of a Spell is mostly determined by the intensity of the practitioner’s Spiritual Power.

Whereas talismanic magic involves gathering the air’s rune diagrams onto talisman paper, with the Cultivator’s imbued Spiritual Power playing a smaller part.

There were other differences, such as Spells having a long preparatory time, while Spirit Talismans were extremely fast.

Thus, Spells were gradually replaced by Spirit Talismans.

And Zhang’s Primordial Talisman Foundation Establishment Method advanced further, being faster still, without needing talisman paper or Spirit Ink.

The Heavenly Tribulation Thunder they were attempting now could not even be considered a Spell.

Zheng Fa could feel that many of the paths his Spiritual Power took in the air were pointless, while others seemed to draw in the air’s rune diagrams without knowing their effects.

What set the Heavenly Tribulation Thunder apart from the Thunder Skills in the Xuanwei Realm was its immense power—so great it couldn’t be quantified.

Zheng Fa hadn’t used the Thunder Talisman often, and rarely to the power of a Tribulation.

To many Cultivators in the Xuanwei Realm, the difference between weak power and strong power can still be perceived.

But between extremely powerful and extremely powerful, it becomes difficult to measure accurately.

Under such force, a person would be reduced to ashes, you couldn’t even tell if they were well-done or not...

Even if one could sense the power, it could hardly be measured precisely.

But with modern instruments, Zheng Fa could—to some extent, the progression of modern science is based on the improvement of observational methods.

...

As Zheng Fa’s Spiritual Power circulated, suddenly, a flash of lightning appeared in the sky, striking down upon the metal pole.

"Is he alright?"

Before Zheng Fa could say anything, Old Man Bai and the others rushed out of the house and asked.

"I’m fine," Zheng Fa shook his head lightly and said to Old Man Bai: "I’ll draw the pattern my Spiritual Power followed just now, please have a look for me."

"Okay."

And so it went on.

Flash after flash of lightning struck the metal pole.

One after another, the tracks of Spiritual Power movement were recorded in Old Man Bai’s notebook.

While related data such as electric current, voltage, temperature, and even the length and shape of the lightning were recorded on Tang Lingwu’s computer.

Only when Zheng Fa’s Spiritual Power was significantly depleted did they stop the experiment.