Chapter 270: Knowledge is Priceless
I had a joke in my previous life, like if anesthesia was invented in 1846, then doctors before 1846 must have knocked patients unconscious with a punch before operating, or the word “cry” was invented in 1662, so people attending funerals before 1661 must have done so with smiles.
Of course, this is a joke. In reality, anesthetics already existed before that. Before anesthetics, doctors in Europe would knock patients unconscious by getting them drunk with alcohol or by hitting them on the head with a copper pot before operating.
The core of this joke is that things existed before these words were invented, and human language might not have been able to describe such situations, but it didn’t mean they didn’t exist.
This situation is most common in cooking. The scarcity of words often makes it impossible to describe a specific taste. For example, the basil I’ve been using in my cooking lately is a very uniquely flavored spice. Its taste is not sour, sweet, bitter, spicy, or salty, so much so that I can’t describe what it tastes like.
But it doesn’t matter if I can’t describe it in cooking; one taste and you’ll understand. However, when it comes to profound scientific issues, it’s even harder to explain. I never expected that I would actually face the problem in the joke one day.
And now I’m in such an awkward situation where existing language cannot describe this knowledge. These cultists don’t understand what ribonucleic acid, exons, or cell walls are.
This is essentially the same problem the Princess encountered earlier, except that others couldn’t understand me, while she couldn’t even understand herself.
When we communicate, we use what is called Purgatorial, a demonic language with extremely strange pronunciation. The pronunciation is simple and not suitable for communicating complex intelligence.
So I switched to Castilian, then to English to describe it, trying all sorts of ways to explain these basic biological concepts to them, and I was interrupted many times in between.
The more they listened, the more confused they became. From confidence fueled by their own brains, they realized they couldn’t keep up and involuntarily wanted to take out paper and a pen to jot things down. Then they realized they hadn’t brought paper and pens before coming to the party. Many people anxiously shouted to the Pope, “Do you have paper and pens?!”
“Huh? Oh right, right, quickly go get paper and pens!” the Pope urgently shouted, his own temporary notebook almost full.
Miss Succubus and her group were full of frustration. The original plan was for everyone to have a meal, then have a cult gathering in a friendly and harmonious atmosphere, and finally, have some intimate time with the succubi, a wild party, and then everyone would disperse happily, satisfied. What a great plan.
As a result, they found themselves acting as secretaries, busy fetching paper and pens for the attendees. The succubi were naturally very upset. What about the feast of essence promised by the Pope?
After the paper and pens were brought, they could finally engage in learning and research. The original feast had turned into my personal lecture, and the pace of explanation slowed down.
This was also a good thing because there were many things I also couldn’t figure out and needed to ponder slowly. Explaining and thinking at the same time was indeed beneficial for me to understand this knowledge.
The cultists became more and more alarmed as they listened. This was profound knowledge they had never touched upon before. In fact, most of the people present were experts in plagues, but they now realized that their understanding of plagues was only at a very superficial level.
They only used methods similar to raising Gu, cultivating a large number of viruses or bacteria together, selecting the more powerful mutated strains to spread them, or simply releasing them all together. The methods were very primitive.
Some even used spells to increase the reproductive ability of bacteria or accelerate their mutation, but this was still like drawing lots, relying entirely on luck and completely uncontrollable.
Among them, a few advanced individuals, such as the Pope or the Plague Master covered in cysts, would use spells to induce the mutation of bacteria in the direction they desired.
But that was all. Their methods were still very crude, like the difference between using fire ignited by lightning and drilling wood to make fire. The knowledge on this stone tablet was like the difference between a gas stove and the latter.
From the most microscopic perspective, modifying bacteria, assembling bacteria, combining bacteria, and even inventing bacteria were things they had never even considered. They didn’t even have the concept before and only learned about it today.
No wonder they couldn’t understand the stone tablet before. It would be strange if they could. They had no idea that there were such profound explanations behind these words. Some cultists even suspected that such terms didn’t exist before and that the Saintess had made them up.
Actually, not to mention them, I also became more and more alarmed as I explained. Because I had only explained half of it, and the latter part had already entered a realm I couldn’t understand. After all, I wasn’t a medical student in my previous life, and perhaps only someone with a medical doctorate could understand these things.
However, although I couldn’t understand it all, I could still vaguely grasp some of the content. The later content mentioned how to use viruses to reverse-engineer and modify human genes, pollute the gene pool, and create genetic diseases.
I stopped abruptly, afraid to continue. The subsequent content was too terrifying, like Pandora’s Box. Opening it would inevitably lead to serious consequences. In fact, I had already said too much.
“Hmm? What’s going on? Saintess, please continue,” my sudden pause made many people wake up. They felt they were just getting into it and suddenly there was no follow-up, leaving them stuck halfway and feeling very uncomfortable.
“Cough, cough, I can’t understand the rest either,” I lied with a straight face. In fact, I could still understand a little, but I stopped immediately after understanding.
“Ah, I see. What a pity…” They didn’t suspect anything, as it was too profound. Not only could they not understand the text on the stone tablet, but they also didn’t understand much of what I explained.
“Saintess, you’ve worked hard explaining so much valuable knowledge to us. This knowledge will be enough for us to research for several years to come,” the Pope said, and others applauded.
Let alone several years, I think these things could be researched for several centuries, or even endlessly. The mysteries of life are too profound and complex. Even humans in my previous life understood less than one ten-thousandth of it.
“The Saintess has solved the mystery of the stone tablet for us, but we cannot be without some token of appreciation. We should give her a suitable reward,” the Pope said.
“Indeed. We should establish a rule that knowledge has value. If there is no reward or remuneration mechanism, people will hoard their own findings in the future. How can we achieve great undertakings then?” someone else agreed.
Soon, this proposal was met with widespread approval. In fact, most of the people present had some secret techniques they were proud of and couldn’t help but want to show off, or wanted to discuss and improve with others. But because they were afraid of not getting rewarded for their achievements, they dared not speak out.
Therefore, rewarding and sharing were very necessary. The Pope strongly advocated for it because he had always been the one sharing knowledge before.
“Then, Saintess, what do you want?”
