083: The First Doubt Cast upon the Attribute Panel!

After dozing for more than twenty minutes in the car, Chen Jue finally woke at Uncle Yu’s gentle call. By then, his strength had slowly begun to return, and with the help of the earlier IV, he barely felt capable of moving again.

Seeing that they had arrived at the guesthouse, Chen Jue took a deep breath to steady himself. He stepped out of the car unaided, refusing Yu Yue and the others’ support, and instead offered his heartfelt thanks. To Uncle Yu’s family, he was merely a stranger, a fleeting guest in their home. Their concern and care warmed him deeply, filling him with both gratitude and guilt.

Without their help tonight, he doubted he could have made it through, unless he’d called an ambulance himself. And tonight of all nights—a typhoon was bearing down, the winds and rain outside fierce and unrelenting, making every trip out hazardous. Both Uncle Yu and Yu Yue were soaked through, yet they bustled about, helping him and even covering his medical expenses. Such kindness, Chen Jue would never forget.

“Uncle, would you mind asking Auntie to make some seafood porridge? I’m a little hungry and need something to regain my strength,” Chen Jue managed a smile, trying to ease their worries, and entrusted Uncle Yu with the request before following them back to his small villa.

“Of course! I’ll have her cook some immediately and bring it right over to you,” Uncle Yu replied, nodding with understanding. Knowing Chen Jue was still recovering, he instructed the housekeeper to prepare the fishermen’s usual claypot seafood porridge, just as Chen Jue had asked.

...

Chen Jue spent another forty minutes half-asleep on the living room sofa, dutifully taking the doctor’s prescribed medicine, both internally and externally. Soon, the housekeeper arrived, carrying the steaming claypot.

She had worried all night upon seeing Chen Jue’s injured state, but now, hearing he was out of danger, she finally relaxed. Following his suggestion, she had prepared the porridge and braved the wind and rain to deliver it herself.

“Ah Jue, are you feeling better? Eat while it’s hot!”

“If you can’t finish, just leave it. I’ll come by in the morning to clear up. Once you’re done, head upstairs and get some rest—you look so pale. Don’t shower tonight, or you’ll catch a cold,” she said, setting the pot down and gently feeling his hand and face.

Finding his skin warm, unlike the icy coldness when he’d first come for help, she felt much reassured.

“Auntie, you should rest too! I’m much better now. The doctor said I’ll be fine,” Chen Jue smiled, struck by how caring she was—so much like his own late mother.

“Alright! As soon as you finish the porridge, go straight to bed, you hear me? Don’t be like Yu Yue, staying up all night gaming and scrolling on his phone. He never rests, even when he’s home, always making me worry,” she said, ladling him a bowl to cool before quietly leaving and closing the door behind her.

After a night of worry and a rush to make the porridge, she too needed to rest.

Chen Jue, meanwhile, felt warmth spreading through him, body and soul, as he finished the entire pot of seafood porridge. His health index had climbed to 65%—the medicine must have started working. With food in his stomach, he felt his strength returning faster. He went to the bathroom, wrung out a hot towel, and wiped himself down; a full shower was impossible, as his wounds were still too raw.

After washing up, he went upstairs, crawled into bed, and began reflecting on the day’s events.

Outside, the storm raged—the wind howled, the waves pounded the rocks and beach. Inside, bundled in his warm bed after a hot meal, Chen Jue felt the chill of earlier, soaked by seawater, gradually dissipate. His mind, no longer clouded by exhaustion, grew alert. He began to analyze his attribute panel from his own perspective.

The red exclamation mark, he reasoned, must be a warning about sudden physical issues. Once it appeared, it was as if all his stats were sealed—no matter how he tried to increase his strength, stamina, or agility, the panel would not respond.

After his recent injury, his body was depleted and weak. Forcing an increase in attributes would only worsen his injuries, not help him. Chen Jue surmised that any growth in strength, stamina, or agility would consume his body’s energy reserves—carbohydrates, fats, proteins, trace elements, all the nutrients he absorbed through diet and medicine.

He’d felt something similar before: when adding points, the fat he’d accumulated seemed to burn away, transforming him gradually into his current robust, low-body-fat self. Breakthroughs in skills had a similar “siphoning” effect, consuming energy as his body evolved. Training and breakthroughs, the growth of muscles, bones, teeth, and fascia—all these consumed energy.

It occurred to him that the attribute panel must still operate under some form of conservation of energy—it didn’t grant him power from nothing. The appearance of the exclamation mark was a built-in safeguard, a kind of fuse to stop him from self-destructing through reckless point allocation.

“This panel isn’t omnipotent after all,” he mused. “It has its limitations.”

“Injured as I am, I can’t force an increase in health or stamina. I can’t rely on it to heal me directly. For internal injuries, I still need proper medical care.”

“So perhaps this attribute panel is designed specifically for martial arts training—to correct the wrong paths of physical transformation?”

“If that’s the case… then why were my intelligence and starting stamina so high?”

Deep in the quiet of night, his mind was abuzz, thoughts leaping from one to the next. Chen Jue’s questions about the attribute panel surged one after another.

Back when he’d tested his athletic data at Shannan Elementary, he’d thought the panel’s “1” represented the normal human limit. But at the moment he first awakened the panel, his intelligence was already at 1.22 and his stamina at 0.98. Yet, recalling that time, he’d been overweight and frail, exhausted by the slightest exertion—nothing like what a stamina of 0.98 should indicate.

It was only after a period of martial training that his endurance soared and his bodily functions exploded beyond normal human performance.

“Could I have been mistaken before?”

“No, ‘1’ should still be the limit—otherwise, how do I explain my earlier test results?”

“But then, that conflicts with my initial attributes. There’s an inconsistency…”

Lying under the covers, Chen Jue felt as if sparks of thought were flying in his mind, images flashing by in quick succession. Memories of a joyful childhood in the countryside, his mother’s final illness and heartbreaking death when he was in junior high, the blow of his father’s accident in high school, the passing of his grandparents during university—his long journey of growing, studying, and working—all these memories flickered through his mind like a slideshow.

At last, his thoughts stilled, and his gaze fell upon his intelligence stat, now at 1.24 on the attribute panel.

“So that’s it! I understand now—the answer lies right here!”