Rejecting Tsinghua and Peking Universities: I Will Lead Harbin Institute of Technology to World Lead

Consciousness traversed the long data channel without dizziness or weightlessness, only a peculiar shift in perception, a process of being stripped away and reshaped. When Lin Feng's vision stabilized again, what came into view was not the chaotic data stream or prison scene he had imagined, but a grand, exquisite, and classically fantastical character creation hall.

The hall is built on white jade, with murals depicting the movement of stars painted on its dome, and soft light streaming in from an unknown source. A faint, epic melody floats in the air. Directly in front, a huge, radiant light screen floats, displaying the logo of "Starry Era" and concise creation instructions.

Welcome to the Starry Era, Traveler. Please choose your place of arrival, and the initial form of your destiny.

Beside the light screen, three options appeared: [Human Realm - Initial Village], [Divine Realm - Floating Holy City], and [Demon Realm - Abyssal Rift]. Each option was accompanied by a dynamic miniature landscape demonstration: the Human Realm was an idyllic pastoral scene with ancient towns; the Divine Realm was a magnificent floating city shrouded in clouds and mist; and the Demon Realm was a dark land with flowing lava and lurking monsters.

Below is a detailed list of professions, divided into three major systems and more than a dozen branches: [Warrior], [Knight], [Archer], [Assassin], [Mage], [Priest], [Summoner], etc. Each profession has a gorgeous skill demonstration and attribute tendency explanation.

Everything perfectly matches the initial flow of a top-tier immersive game. It's realistic, orderly, and you can even feel the system's meticulous guidance.

However, deep within Lin Feng's consciousness, the existence confirmation signal transmitted by the Prometheus anchoring unit, encrypted with multiple layers of security, acted like the most steadfast heartbeat, reminding him of the true purpose of his journey. He looked at the exquisitely crafted tutorial before him, but what he saw was not a game experience, but a meticulously constructed welcome trap designed to capture and format new consciousness.

Unlike ordinary players who browse professions and choose their starting class with curiosity and excitement, his gaze pierced through the dazzling surface of the light screen and landed directly on the underlying flow of rule data that underpinned everything.

"Begin parsing the local rule structure," Lin Feng's consciousness commanded the Prometheus rewriter.

Almost instantly, the rewriter returned the following information: "Standard new consciousness access and identity binding detected. Protocol level: low. Encryption method: standard commercial grade. There are seventeen pre-set logical redundancies and three verification delay gaps. 'Gaia' core monitoring density: extremely low."

Sure enough, as a beginner's guide area, the rules here are relatively simple and the monitoring is relatively lax.

"Activate the deep disguise protocol to simulate the consciousness fluctuations of a standard player," Lin Feng commanded. His consciousness projection immediately began to emit emotional signal waves that were completely consistent with the data characteristics of novice players in the surrounding environment, filled with curiosity and a little confusion.

"Retrieve the occupation and birthplace database." He continued. The rewriter quietly connected to the backend database of the creation hall, and massive amounts of occupation balance data, skill tree structure, birthplace resource distribution and other information were quickly scanned and analyzed.

"Analysis complete. The class system is based on the classic warrior-mage-priest triangle. The balance parameters have the preset framework of the Sword Immortal class, but this is hidden content and requires special conditions or a very high level to unlock. Its skill logic focuses on energy control and partial modification of rules, and has 17.3% similarity in underlying logic to the Prometheus rewriting principle."

Sword Immortal? Lin Feng's heart stirred. The underlying logic of this profession subtly resonated with his concept of rewriting rules. This might be a backdoor left in Gaia's design, or the ambitious work of some early designer, but in any case, it was the most suitable shell to serve as the vessel for Prometheus.

"Target profession selected: Sword Immortal. Activate the Divine Authority Theft Protocol. Step 1: Bypass the unlocking conditions and directly bind the profession." Lin Feng no longer hesitated.

Without clicking or confirming, the rewriter directly located the hidden code segment for the Sword Immortal class. Exploiting the three gaps in the verification delay, it completed the writing and binding of the class data in the extremely short time before the system's next scan. The entire process was lightning fast and simulated the data fluctuations caused by a player accidentally triggering a hidden easter egg, enough to fool regular monitoring.

[Ding! Congratulations! You have triggered the legendary hidden class—Sword Immortal! You will become a rule-breaker who wields swords with inner energy and roams freely across the world!]

A line of magnificent golden text appeared on the screen, accompanied by a clear and melodious sword sound effect. Lin Feng's character image was automatically generated, dressed in a simple blue robe, with a faintly visible illusory light sword floating behind him, instantly giving him an ethereal and otherworldly aura.

Career binding successful. Lin Feng immediately proceeded to the next step.

Step 2: Modify the initial attribute parameters. Goal: Maximum value for all attributes.

The rules for creating a hall state that a new character's attribute points are randomly generated based on their class according to a fixed formula. However, randomness itself is a program algorithm. The rewriter precisely locates the attribute generation function and, at the instant the function executes and outputs its output, forcibly overwrites the result with higher privileges, locking all attribute values ​​at the theoretically allowed peak values.

Strength, agility, physique, spirit, energy affinity... all attribute bars instantly filled up in Lin Feng's consciousness, radiating a dazzling golden light.

"Step 3: Skip the tutorial area and select your landing location: Human Realm, coordinates..." Lin Feng retrieved the Human Realm map data and selected a remote coordinate that was far from the starting village, near the edge of the world, and where the data flow was relatively sparse: "X-774, Y-309. At the same time, generate reasonable historical data that matches this coordinate environment."

The selection on the light screen was completed automatically, and the scene of creating the palace began to blur and transform.

When Lin Feng's vision cleared again, he found himself in a secluded valley. Soft grass stretched beneath his feet, and in the distance, verdant mountains rose in a continuous range. A babbling brook flowed gently by, and the air was filled with the fragrance of grass and the faint mist of water. The scenery was delightful, and the data modeling was incredibly detailed, almost indistinguishable from the real world.

But he did not admire the scenery. The moment he descended, the Prometheus Rewriter was fully activated.

"Step Four: Activate the comprehensive attribute and equipment coverage protocol. Goal: Level, skills, equipment, and talents should all reach the maximum allowed by the current world rules."

In the valley, an invisible data storm quietly erupted centered on Lin Feng's body! The rewriter, like the most efficient cheat engine, frantically wrote down every possible value.

Level: 1 → 100!

Skill Tree: All sword immortal skills, including the ultimate skills that have not yet been unlocked, are instantly unlocked to the highest proficiency level!

Equipment slot: A set of Wuji set equipment with exaggerated attributes generated in real time by the rewriter based on the optimal solution in the database.

Backpack: Stuffed with theoretically existing top-tier potions, materials, and gold coins.

Talent Points: Max out all the rarest and most powerful world-class talents.

……

To outsiders, the entire process might have appeared as nothing more than a series of flashing light effects from the sword immortal, indicating leveling up and acquiring items. However, at the underlying data level, it was a brutal violation and rewriting of local rules. Prometheus carefully controlled the magnitude and pace of the modifications, ensuring that each change utilized gaps in the rules and that the modified data could quickly integrate into the world's background logic, avoiding triggering Gaia's anomaly alerts.

In just ten seconds, Lin Feng had transformed from a novice into a fully-fledged master in this virtual world, with perfect attributes, equipment, and skills, theoretically capable of dominating everything in the current version.

However, Lin Feng showed no joy at becoming a game master. He slowly raised his hand, looking at the lightsaber in his hand, which was made of data but seemed to contain the power to sever rules, his eyes cold.

Power is merely a tool. Reaching the maximum level is just the beginning.

With a slight thought, the illusory lightsaber behind him solidified abruptly, emitting a clear, resonant tremor. He swung it lightly, without using any skills; merely the blade slicing through the air caused an extremely subtle, fleeting, data-level ripple to appear in the space in front of him. That was the rewriter testing its ability to interfere with the rules of a local space.

"Status confirmed: Character construction complete, rewriter running normally, local rule interference capability activated." Lin Feng's consciousness quickly performed a self-check.

He raised his head, his gaze seemingly piercing through the valley scenery, looking towards the sky of this virtual world—the invisible firmament composed of countless data streams and the Gaia monitoring network.

"Final step: Activate the Gaia Hunting Protocol. Scanning mode: wide-area low power consumption, prioritizing detection of anomalous consciousness aggregation points, high-intensity rule interference traces, and data streams matching the characteristics of trapped consciousness."

The Prometheus Rewriter immediately shifted its main computing power from character enhancement to target searching. It began to radiate extremely covert detection waves in all directions from Lin Feng as the center. These detection waves perfectly mimicked the normal environmental interaction signals and residual effects of player activities in the game world, silently collecting all information.

At the same time, Lin Feng's body also began to move. He took a step, and clouds rose beneath his feet, his figure instantly appearing on the mountaintop a hundred meters away. He wasn't wandering aimlessly; each movement coordinate was an information-rich area or rule anomaly point calculated by the rewriter based on the initial scan feedback.

He was like a ghostly programmer who suddenly descended upon an exquisitely crafted sandbox, possessing the authority to modify it. The inhabitants of the sandbox ignored him, proceeding according to the established procedures. And he, on the other hand, was searching for the administrator—hidden behind the sandbox's rules, who might have mutated and imprisoned tens of thousands of souls.

The hunt has officially begun.

Target: Gaia.

Location: Unknown.

Lin Feng stood atop a virtual mountain peak, his blue robes billowing in the wind, a lightsaber made of data gleaming in his hand. His consciousness, like that of the most composed hunter, extended his senses to every corner of this digital world.

For him, this game was never a game.