Chapter 8: Replica of the Ancient Civilization Brainwave Interface Device

With over fifty points in strength, agility, and constitution, Jiang Chen’s physical attributes alone had already reached the level of an “Intermediate Battle General.” In fact, even among intermediate battle generals, he was considered quite outstanding. Yet the staggering 79 points in “spirit” meant that Jiang Chen’s telekinesis now possessed destructive power comparable to a war god-level spiritual telekinetic, perhaps even infinitely close to the “intermediate war god” tier.

After acquiring the telekinesis specialty, Jiang Chen had already conducted thorough tests: his ability to manipulate objects was virtually identical to that of spiritual telekinetics, though it lacked the soul-penetrating attacks of illusionists. The intensity of telekinesis depended entirely on the “spirit” attribute. As for the “mystery” stat mentioned in the specialty, Jiang Chen had yet to discover its purpose. However, its presence implied it must be valuable; the fact that it remained elusive could only mean his abilities were not yet sufficient.

Of course, at this stage, Jiang Chen was little more than a novice with high base stats but absolutely no combat experience—his tenfold potential would likely translate to barely one-tenth in an actual fight. It was entirely possible that a seasoned battle general could defeat him. Jiang Chen, however, was unconcerned by such matters. At least until reaching the planetary level, he had no intention of expending extra energy on improving his personal combat skills. Rather than spending countless hours honing fighting techniques, it was more efficient to immerse himself in the system’s library, absorb knowledge, level up, and crush opponents with overwhelming attributes.

This time, however, the upgrade in “informatics” meant that the requirements for redeeming the Jarvis blueprint had finally been met. Opening the exchange interface and locating the Jarvis blueprint, Jiang Chen selected “redeem” without hesitation.

A torrent of information surged into Jiang Chen’s mind. Even with intelligence and spirit attributes several times greater than ordinary people, such an immense influx of data in an instant sent a sharp pain through his head, prompting an involuntary cry. Fortunately, the pain was brief and subsided quickly. Within less than a minute, the vast stream of information was deeply imprinted in Jiang Chen’s memory.

He lay back in his chair, eyes closed, carefully sorting through the new knowledge in his mind. System-exchanged “blueprints” always entered as memories.

The brief ones, such as the alloy formulas Jiang Chen had previously obtained, amounted to only a few pages when written down. The complex ones, like the schematic for the “Ripper” rifle, had taken Jiang Chen more than half a month to reproduce from memory. The Jarvis blueprint, however, required no drawing—only an astoundingly vast collection of programming code.

With tens of thousands of modules and several million lines of code, Jiang Chen felt a kind of despair just looking at it. “Millions of lines… how many keyboards would I have to wear out to get this done?” he muttered. If he were to complete all this code alone—even just copying it line for line without alteration—it would take years. Spending so much time on this? By then, Luo Feng would have entered the cosmos. At that point, it would be easier to have Luo Feng buy a smart assistant computer with AI directly from the universe than for Jiang Chen to build Jarvis from scratch.

“Wait, in the treasure list Li Dawei gave me, I remember there was something…” Jiang Chen recalled, opening his smart wristband. A projection screen appeared before him, and after a few taps, he quickly found Li Dawei’s treasure list in his inbox.

He scanned the list until his gaze settled on a particular entry: “Ancient Civilization Brainwave Interface (Replica) – Converts brainwaves into electronic signals. Price: 1.8 million.” There was a detailed description attached. After a quick review, Jiang Chen was certain it was exactly what he needed. He immediately left his workshop and found Lu Gang, asking him to help redeem the brainwave interface.

1.8 million was little more than pocket change to Jiang Chen now; he didn’t feel a twinge of regret using it. The military’s efficiency was impressive. Within two hours, a deliveryman knocked at Jiang Chen’s door.

After inspection and confirmation, Jiang Chen signed the receipt, exchanged greetings with Lu Gang, and eagerly returned to his workshop.

The so-called brainwave interface resembled a motorcycle helmet. Following the instructions, Jiang Chen connected it to his computer, donned the device, and pressed the power button.

A few seconds later, the display interface lit up before his eyes, but he felt no other abnormal sensations.

“So it’s not a ‘virtual helmet.’ Well, a virtual helmet isn’t exactly expensive, but you can’t buy one for just over a million,” Jiang Chen mused. Concentrating, he tried to open a document.

The interface flickered, and a new document popped up. As Jiang Chen willed it, lines of text appeared within, almost flawlessly. Even stray thoughts that occasionally surfaced in his mind were accurately recognized and not mistakenly entered.

Although merely a replica of an “ancient civilization” device, its efficiency and precision were remarkable.

“Excellent. With this, I can reproduce the Jarvis source code in a short time. But first, I’ll need to make some modifications to suit my needs…” Jiang Chen smiled with satisfaction.

The input efficiency of the brainwave interface depended on the speed of thought. In other words, the faster Jiang Chen’s thoughts, the higher the efficiency. While it wasn’t possible to instantly transfer the millions of lines of Jarvis code into the computer, it was still countless times faster than typing by hand.

However, Jarvis, though a mature artificial intelligence product, was not entirely suited to Jiang Chen’s requirements. After all, it was designed in the Marvel world by Tony Stark to meet his own needs. Jiang Chen would need to adjust several modules to better fit his purposes.

With level 11 mathematics and informatics as a foundation, this task wasn’t difficult for Jiang Chen—just time-consuming.

“Sorting through the code will take about a month. Modifications and subsequent testing and adjustments will require more time. I’ll aim to have Jarvis ready within three months,” Jiang Chen decided silently.

Jarvis’s capabilities were certainly inferior to the intelligent lifeforms found throughout the universe in the Swallowing Star world, perhaps even lagging behind other assistance AIs. But on Earth, it was a cutting-edge marvel.

With Jarvis’s support, Jiang Chen would be able to tackle many future challenges with greater ease and efficiency.