Finding that the other party’s attitude was not bad, Jeming felt a bit more at ease.

He took a deep breath and asked the most critical question:

"Lord Artarius, may I ask, why did you personally... project yourself to meet me? And also, the ’increasing variables’ you mentioned just now... what exactly does it refer to?"

The Starcaster Artarius’s gaze once again fell on the chart in front of Jeming, and his kindly smile seemed to deepen somewhat.

"It’s not so much an order." His tone was casual, as if discussing the weather. "As for ’variables’... actually, your two questions are one question."

He didn’t wait for Jeming to fully digest this sentence but instead shifted the topic to a more fundamental question, his tone like a mentor guiding a student to derive a conclusion:

"After studying for so many years, with your current understanding, what is the essence of this Plane’s continuous time reversal?"

Jeming gathered his mind, his gaze sweeping over the data streams on the chart.

Fifteen rounds of research results quickly integrated in his consciousness, stripping away the details and pointing to the most likely conclusion.

"It’s unlike a natural phenomenon." Jeming began, his voice clear in the quiet laboratory. "The triggering conditions are too quantifiable, the range of effect is strictly limited, and the way it deals with ’memory paradoxes’... is more like a set of predefined error correction procedures."

"After synthesizing many situations, we believe that this Plane or its core structure is a strategic war machine. The time reversal is its fundamental function to ensure that the internal combat unit: the Reaper Race can infinitely restart, trial and error, and exhaust strong enemies."

He was stating the research group’s consensus, but as he spoke, he himself could feel the excitement behind this conclusion.

A world that forges an entire civilization into weapon components, the knowledge and technology behind this... just thinking about it is exciting!

Artarius nodded slightly, his expression carrying a "good, you’ve seen this step" meaning:

"More accurately, it’s a Time Paradox Generator. Ordinary time manipulation is the dance of Water Elements, the ripples of the Law. But it, while reversing time, must systematically ’resolve’ the causal contradictions involving all those involved—material state conflicts, information loss and reappearance, memory logical breaks. It forcibly makes these contradictions ’rationalize’, which is its most significant characteristic as a ’machine’."

Jeming immediately grasped the key point.

Yes, the Wizards’ detection data repeatedly showed that the Plane’s mechanism for handling ’paradoxes’ was dramatically different from conventional space-time laws, as if it had special built-in fault tolerance and overlay protocols.

If seen as a machine specialized in creating and digesting time paradoxes, all anomalies are explained.

A complete war system emerged in his mind: the Reaper Race as the blade and expendable, time reversal as the core, and paradox-handling ability as the ultimate defense and potential fatal blow against high-level enemies.

Binding a Plane with such a terrifying space-time weapon in depth, the creator’s coldness and ambition are chilling.

As he pondered, Artarius’s voice sounded again, peaceful yet imbued with a force that pierced the fog:

"You were perplexed earlier in finding the core entity related to time reversal, which is natural, since as the core of a war system, it must be the best hidden. After personally experiencing several rounds, I also saw through this point. Dealing with a precisely designed machine, whose core might simply be ’non-intelligent inherent rules’, searching externally for a vague ’controller’ is often futile."

The Starcaster’s finger lightly tapped in the void, as if pressing on the invisible pulse of the entire Plane.

"I chose another path: rather than seeking a weakness, I tried to make it overload."

Overload.

This word was like a bolt of lightning, cutting through the fog in Jeming’s thoughts.

Artarius didn’t pause, guiding along this line of thought: "No matter how incredible the technology of this machine is, there are still some universal principles for realizing ’time reversal’. Jeming, with your current level of knowledge, you should already know where the fundamental difficulty in achieving time reversal lies, right?"

Jeming accessed his knowledge reserves.

"It’s computational power." He said slowly, his thoughts gradually becoming clear.

In Jeming’s former world, there was no clear entity of ’time’, what was called time reversal was essentially replicating the state of all elementary particles in the universe to a past position according to some ’record’.

This requires an inconceivable amount of information and computational power.

And in the Wizard World, although one can directly manipulate the entity of ’time’, to reverse the state of all matter, energy, information, and even soul within a certain range to a precise past node without contradictions, the data to be processed and the laws to be calculated are similarly astronomical in number.

It’s no exaggeration to say that the computational amount required for the latter is no less than the former.

This is also why many Wizards, even if they master the time rules, merely try to use time acceleration or deceleration to assist in combat.

Even with the computational power of a High Tier Wizard, attempting local time reversal is too difficult.

"Any time manipulation, or rather any Element manipulation, requires enough computational power to process the information."

"Exactly." Artarius affirmed.

"This machine’s reversal range is confined within the Plane. Therefore, theoretically, if we continually inject new information and new variables into this closed system beyond its preset processing capability, it could potentially overwhelm its inherent ’error correction’ and ’overlay’ logic, causing confusion and delay, until... a collapse and overload."

As the words fell, Jeming instantly understood all the layouts of Artarius in his mind!

The million-strong vanguard legion serves as a "base" and "anchor point," maintaining fundamental combat power while forming the "basic information flow" for daily system processing.

Wizards inherently contain vast amounts of information. A legion of one million wizards is strong enough to ensure that they are not wiped out by the Reaper Race through information asymmetry in each cycle.

When changes occur in the wizard ranks later, the more numerous the foundational legions, the more information changes will result from each change.

Moreover, each entry of support personnel divided into thirty support squads constitutes a "major variable injection" for this system.

In Artarius’ eyes, a gleam of calculation shone: "According to my calculations, this system can roughly withstand about twenty-five ’significant tactical changes.’

More crucially, the entry of a squad will inevitably provoke a response change from the Reaper Race, leading to adjustments in wizard tactics.

Therefore, a single injection of reinforcements triggers at least two ’information changes.’

Thirty squads amount to at least sixty change impacts far exceeding tolerance levels!

Furthermore, those two Seventh Level lieutenants under Frost, as High Tier individuals, are powerful variable sources in themselves, serving as the final straw to break the camel’s back.

"A plan... to use ’surprises’ and ’variables’ to overload a precision machine," Jeming murmured, his eyes glinting with understanding.

Yet he immediately had a new question: "Sir, if the objective is to increase variables, why don’t you enter the field yourself? The amount of ’information’ you carry and the potential ’variables’ you could trigger should far exceed the total of all support units."

The near-always present, almost amiable smile receded from Artarius’ face.

He did not avoid the question. Instead, he showed a rare honesty.

"Two reasons." He raised a finger, "First, the amount of ’information’ I bring is too vast. If my true form enters, it might trigger not ’gradual overload’ but an immediate triggering of the highest-intensity paradox counterattack. It’s like smashing a watch with a star—sure, the watch will be destroyed, but we wouldn’t gain any studyable remnants. Our goal is to obtain a ’relatively intact’ space-time machine, not a heap of raging law turbulence."

He paused, raising a second finger, his tone becoming more serene, even carrying a hint of undeniable gravity, "Second, I dread the potential time paradox this plane could trigger."

The "fear" of an Eighth Level Wizard.

This word sent a chill through Jeming’s heart.

Artarius’ gaze swept over what was nearly a perfect "mass projection" of himself.

"Why do I only use a projection? Besides precise control of variables, it’s also because... with my current state, stepping into this realm in my true form would have a high probability of directly triggering a paradox attack strong enough to severely injure me."

He looked at Jeming, his eyes void of any element of jest: "In fact, I’ve already been injured once. When I first noticed the anomaly of time rewinding and judged that the situation was beyond the ordinary, I forcibly intervened to pull the entire legion from a cycle as a whole. That intervention prompted the deepest countermeasure of this plane."

Jeming held his breath: "The injury... was severe?"

"Severe." Artarius nodded, his tone as flat as if stating an objective fact, "It took me a full three seconds to completely heal the injury."

Three seconds.

Jeming was initially dazed, then a chilly shiver seized him.

He knew all too well what this "three seconds" meant for an Eighth Level Wizard.

Even though it took only three seconds to heal, it might sound as if the injury were a mere joke.

But in reality, as one’s level increases, the depth of a wizard’s self-modifications also deepens, and the immortality of wizards becomes even stronger.

For an Eighth Level Wizard, ordinary physical destruction and energy annihilation often don’t even count as "damage."

Even if most of the body material is blasted away, it only constitutes a temporary change in the form of existence, quickly restored with a mere thought.

Only attacks touching the soul’s foundation or existence level would be defined as "injuries" needing "healing."

The healing time directly reflects the wound’s depth and lethality.

For an Eighth Level Wizard, an injury requiring a focus of "three seconds" to heal... the force contained within, in theory, could indeed threaten Artarius’ life!

"The most alarming aspect of time abilities..." Artarius seemed unconcerned about revealing such matters as he calmly explained, "is their capacity to manipulate the ’sequence of events,’ stacking multiple substantial damages to erupt in the same instant. If this machine is pushed to its limits and opts for self-destruction, theoretically, it could continuously trigger paradox attacks aimed at me thousands of times in the same ’moment.’ Such stacking..."

He did not finish, but Jeming already envisioned that terrifying scene.

Even for an Eighth Level Wizard, they might fall under those accumulated temporal blades.

Although for a being like an Eighth Level Wizard, death does not mean revival isn’t possible, but perhaps it might be socially disastrous.

And for a being with infinite life, sometimes social death might be more distressing than actual death.