Chapter 6: The Deadly Cycle - C Language Cultivation

Upon understanding Lin Xun's intentions, Zhao Jiegou laughed and then said, "You should feel guilty." Lin Xun replied, "Guilt won't help me understand. You know me well, so can you understand it?" Zhao Jiegou took a seat beside Lin Xun, accepted the book, and flipped through a few pages. A moment later, he adjusted his posture and sat upright. He said, "Algorithm, even if you can write Luoshen, even if you’re hailed as the 'Xun God' — so what? You have no chance of understanding this, but I might. You have a saying in Chinese, 'Every measure has its own strengths and weaknesses,' which means..." He quickly corrected himself: "No, that's not right; saying that would be insulting myself; I'm not the 'shortcoming.'" Lin Xun quipped, "Now I'm beginning to doubt your Mandarin proficiency." Zhao Jiegou looked him in the eye, "Your reverse psychology worked." Closing the book, he said to Lin Xun, "Give me four hours." With that, he took the book, opened his laptop, and got to work. Wang Anquan reached for "The Thousand Days of Foundation," flipped through it, and skeptically eyed Zhao Jiegou. "Can you handle it?" "Learning a language is like decrypting a code, Anquan, and that's your field," Zhao Jiegou replied. Wang Anquan admitted, "Sorry, I can't." Zhao Jiegou shrugged and began typing on his laptop. Lin Xun and Wang Anquan leaned in on either side to observe his actions. ——Zhao Jiegou possessed an extraordinary talent for languages, demonstrating a sharp intuitive grasp of language structures, as evidenced by his fluent Mandarin. They watched as Zhao Jiegou opened a search engine, looked up classic Chinese literature, and filtered out texts with a heavy archaic style, later pulling up a copy of the "Tao Te Ching" from the cover of "The Thousand Days of Foundation." He started going through these ancient texts, matching them with modern translations. After five minutes, Lin Xun and Wang Anquan gave up and returned to their respective tasks. Humming a tune, Zhao Jiegou glanced at them, "First, I need to familiarize myself with their grammatical structures." Wang Anquan suggested, "If we ever go out of business, you could become a linguist." Zhao Jiegou: "That probably won't work. I lack artistic sensibility. I'm decrypting them like a code." Two hours later, Zhao Jiegou closed the browser and picked up the blue-covered book, flipping through it at a quick pace, as though reading in his native tongue. After about five pages, he turned to Lin Xun. "My dear Algorithm," he said, "although I don't understand why you're interested in this, it's all nonsense." "Even if I think it's nonsense too," Lin Xun replied, "its content might help me—I’ll give you a raise." Zhao Jiegou: "Alright, I'll try to summarize the book into comprehensible terms for you." Another hour passed, and it was lunchtime. Zhao Jiegou closed the blue book, "I'm ready." He then extorted a lavish takeaway meal from Lin Xun and began explaining. "This is a cultivation manual. Its purpose is to guide a person to reach a level called 'Foundation Establishment,' which is utterly absurd. Do you know what it says?" Zhao Jiegou tapped the book cover. "It claims a person can draw air from the environment into their body—the original text calls it 'Qi,' or perhaps something else." "Once Qi is inside your body, it enters your belly—a place called the 'Dantian,' but it's just the belly. Your belly is connected to your body's blood vessels and nerves, which are referred to as 'meridians.' And what do you do next? You control the Qi, making it circulate through your meridians continuously." Circulation. Lin Xun sharply caught onto the term. He asked, "What comes next?" "The subsequent content lacks scientific basis and is utterly ridiculous," Zhao Jiegou spoke rapidly. "The book states that illnesses occur because pathogenic Qi clogs your meridians, creating blockages. As you control the Qi to circulate within your body, it gradually clears all obstacles, making your entire body's meridians unobstructed. When all disease sources disappear, your body achieves a state of 'complete health,' a process taking about three years, hence 'The Thousand Days of Foundation.'" Wang Anquan: "Complete health? No sickness, no obesity, no balding?" "No sickness and no balding, but not necessarily obesity," Zhao Jiegou coolly commented. "When your body reaches a state of complete health, you've successfully established your foundation. You can use your perfectly healthy body to undertake other forms of cultivation. That's what the book is about." Lin Xun: "That’s all the book says?" "The first third discusses this," Zhao Jiegou opened the latter half and pointed to a diagram of the human body. "The latter two-thirds instructs on how to implement it, like how the Qi should circulate through certain meridians or the postures for meditation—meditation, Algorithm, I think this isn't a normal book. The person who wrote it must be mentally unwell." Lin Xun took the book from Zhao Jiegou's hands, lost in thought. Zhao Jiegou and Wang Anquan watched him with concerned eyes, like two fathers worried their son might join a cult. Lin Xun said, "I’ll be in my room for a bit; I want to verify something." Zhao Jiegou asked, "You're not really going to cultivate, are you?" "Regardless," Lin Xun squinted his eyes slightly, "I’m still a materialist." Zhao Jiegou: "Then please, hold the line." Lin Xun: "Alright." He lay on his bed, clutching "The Thousand Days of Foundation," reflecting on Zhao Jiegou's words before closing his eyes, focusing on that mysterious space from last night. Sure enough, the next moment, he was there again, facing the gigantic blue C language interface. The premise of "The Thousand Days of Foundation" hinged on creating a cycle of Qi within the body. And loop structures are one of the fundamental structures in programming, designed to repeatedly execute a specific algorithm. Lin Xun placed his hands on the keyboard and typed a simple loop program. It was a single loop, straightforward, intended to multiply numbers from one to seven. First, a loop variable i was set, starting at 1. Each cycle execution involved evaluating whether i was less than 8, achieved with the statement while(i < 8). If the condition within the brackets held true, meaning i was less than 8, multiplication occurred, storing the result. Subsequently, i incremented by one for continuous reevaluation, ceasing when i equaled 8. Soon enough, the result, 5040, appeared. The progress bar hadn't budged. Expressionless, Lin Xun adjusted the loop. His fingers flew over the keys fast — this keyboard's size was perfectly suited to his style, allowing him to touch-type effortlessly. He transformed the single loop into a nested loop, crafting a multiplication table. The nested loop involved inserting another, larger loop over the initial single loop. Simple multiplication with natural numbers sufficed with one loop, but if further demands emerged, layers might increase. Upon completion, the result was a flawless multiplication table. He witnessed the progress bar inch forward, changing from 85 percent to 88 percent. He then created a new file, writing a three-tiered nested loop. Once more, the bar advanced, this time from 88 percent to 90 percent. Indeed, the secret was in the loops! So, what next? Should he continue increasing the depth of the loops? Lin Xun felt that wasn't correct. Loops above three levels were rarely used in programming, requiring significant computation and were unpleasantly clunky; altogether impractical. As for "The Thousand Days of Foundation," the essence — Qi flowing continuously through meridians, night and day, ceaselessly circulating — Perpetually, eternally... Lin Xun's fingers on the keyboard trembled slightly, his heart racing, as if suddenly grasping the solution! He held down the delete key, erasing the initial condition of the three-layered loop! In its place, he entered a simple directive: while (1) The while statement meant, if the expression within the brackets was true, the loop would execute. ——And the value '1' in C language is always true. Thus, this statement implied that the loop would execute indefinitely. In some ways, this is a flawed program because it lacks a termination condition for the loop — the computer would endlessly run the instructions until externally halted. Yet, sometimes, even errors hold value. Lin Xun hit the run button, invoking the execution result. A pure black interface popped up, yet it remained unresponsive — this loop would never conclude, meaning no results would ever manifest. This was an infinite loop. Lin Xun exhaled softly, closing his eyes. He understood now that this cultivation might not be as straightforward as he imagined — after all, writing a correct program is easy for Lin Xun, but to craft an incorrect one is somewhat challenging. As he anticipated, the mechanical voice resonated throughout the space: "Cycle initiated, Foundation Establishment begins, estimated time: ten days." Lin Xun opened his eyes and observed the task progress starting to slowly, slowly move towards completion. This meant that in ten days, once the progress bar reached the end, his Foundation Establishment would be completed. Subsequently, he would receive rewards: 50 in sect funds and 30 in spiritual energy. The sect funds likely referred to company assets, though how they converted to real-world units was unknown. And as for this so-called "spiritual energy"? That remained a mystery for now. Lin Xun focused his attention again, returning to the real world, and opened his eyes while lying on the bed. The midday sun streamed through the window, casting its light upon him. This room had excellent lighting, and two hawthorn trees planted by the elderly man downstairs a decade ago had now grown to the height of the third floor, perfectly shading Lin Xun’s window, modulating the sunlight into an ideal soft glow. Lin Xun gazed at the window. He suddenly paused. Since learning to read, he had been interacting with computers, spending countless hours staring at screens. Though he later adopted better habits and maintained decent vision, he still developed a slight myopia. This minor degree was negligible, not requiring glasses, and it never impacted his everyday life. However, objects far away were inevitably a bit blurry. Yet, in this instant, he could distinctly see the very tips of the hawthorn tree branches, where two newly sprouted green leaves unfurled! He had never seen with such clarity before! Lin Xun rubbed his eyes and looked again, still finding everything vividly clear. Startled, he got off the bed, walked to the window, and scrutinized the entire hawthorn tree from top to bottom, then cast his gaze towards the various distant buildings. His vision was as clear as if it had been washed with water, every detail crystal clear. The breeze stirred the leaves, creating a rustling sound, and every collision of two leaves seemed to softly echo in his ears. Recollecting all that had happened moments ago, an idea slowly formed in Lin Xun’s mind. Sorry, Jiegou. I might not be able to uphold my materialistic worldview anymore.