Chapter 104: Creating a Formation Map
Originally, the first thing he wanted to do after breaking through to the Marrow Cleansing stage was to deduce the second level of the "Ten Absolute Scripture". But now, it seemed that this plan would have to be postponed.
While cultivating, he could simply drink the Spirit Spring Water, which would not slow down his cultivation speed. In the short term, not having a technique wouldn't be a problem.
After deciding this in his heart, he immediately filled several large barrels with Spirit Spring Water, sealed the cave entrance to prevent the abundant spiritual energy inside from leaking out, carefully checked everything, and then left.
The most urgent task was to research the Microscopic School Formation as quickly as possible, completely occupy the Spirit Spring's location, and then relocate. Nothing was more pressing than this.
However, just as he was thinking this, he suddenly remembered there was something he needed to do first, something even more important than creating his own formation.
But for a moment, he couldn't recall what it was. Long Xuan furrowed his brows in deep thought. Finally, a flash of inspiration struck him, and he remembered what he had forgotten.
The ancient tomb. He had forgotten about the ancient tomb. He finally recalled that when he left the tomb, he was afraid that the rabbit would be discovered by the family, so he had stuffed it into a insect raising bag and hid it in a concealed corner of the tomb, intending to retrieve it after everyone had left.
If possible, he also planned to pick that demonic flower, as it seemed he had the ability to see through its illusions, making it highly likely that he could subdue it.
But as soon as he returned, he was preoccupied with refining the Spirit Surge Pill and preparing to break through, and ended up forgetting about this matter.
That rabbit hadn't eaten or drunk for nearly two months by now—could it have starved to death? What a sin! What a sin!Thinking of the rabbit, Long Xuan became extremely anxious, genuinely worried that it might have died, which would have wasted a precious treasure. So, without delaying any further, he immediately packed his things and set off.
Since this time he wasn't using the peak -grade dragon boat of the Long family, it was impossible to arrive within half a day.
Riding as fast as he could on his Treading on Star steps, it still took him ten days to reach the ancient tomb.
By then, it was already night, the time when the danger level of the Yaoguang Ancient Tomb was at its lowest.
Upon arrival, Long Xuan was shocked by the scene before him.
It was clear that a fierce battle had taken place here. The ground was so damaged that it was unrecognizable, trees and bushes were charred, and the bloodstains on the ground had dried, indicating the intensity of the battle and the heavy casualties.
There were no bodies on the ground, presumably already removed.
Long Xuan was curious about the outcome of the battle—had Feng Yu died or not?
After returning, he had been busy breaking through and hadn't paid attention to this matter, so he didn't know the result of the battle. He also didn't know whether the Spirit Surge Grass had been destroyed in the battle or had fallen into the hands of some family.
He only knew that after the Long family brought back more than a hundred Spirit Surge Grass plants from the ancient tomb, the family had gained dozens more Marrow Cleansing stage experts.
The entire family had celebrated with feasts and festivities for three days, and the atmosphere had been very lively—how could he not be aware of this?
The Long family's strength had skyrocketed, and the number of experts had increased dramatically.
Long Xuan was pleased with this situation. Currently, he and the Long family were on the same boat—sharing both glory and defeat. The stronger the Long family, the safer he was. He hoped the family would become as powerful as possible.
Perhaps because of the Long family's growing strength, someone became envious and organized another tomb raid, possibly intending to trade a large amount of Spirit Surge Grass with the rabbit, and so they entered the tomb again.
But they were doomed to be disappointed. The rabbit had long been stuffed into the insect raising bag by Long Xuan. There was no rabbit left in the herb garden.
Moreover, they had no chance to even get close to the garden now, as the Dream Butterfly Gu guarding it had already ventured out, and its range of activity was no longer confined to the garden.
The ancient tomb had now become extremely dangerous—except for Long Xuan, anyone who entered was likely to die. It's estimated that those who ventured in suffered heavy losses and retreated.
Since all the most valuable items in the tomb had already been taken by the resurrected Empress, and there was no more Spirit Surge Grass to be found, the tomb had lost all its value aside from its dangers, and so it had been completely abandoned by all the clans.
Now, the tomb entrance was no longer guarded by any clan's Gu masters, meaning anyone could enter and search for treasures at any time.
But others weren't foolish. If the major clans didn't dare enter, how could the weaker minor clan Gu masters and rogue cultivators dare to?
Besides, the tomb was now empty except for the dangers. Anyone who entered to rob an empty tomb would be a fool.
This was why Long Xuan didn't see any tomb watchers or grave robbers when he arrived.
But this also worked to his advantage, making it easier for him to carry out his plans.
The tomb entrance that Long Bao had blocked was already reopened by someone. Without hesitation, Long Xuan flew straight in.
The ancient tomb was now filled with the unsolvable Dream Butterfly Gu—anyone who entered was likely to die.
But Long Xuan was an exception. He could see the Dream Butterfly Gu, and its speed was far inferior to his.
The Dream Butterfly Gu posed no threat to him, so what was a deadly place for others was like a stroll through his own backyard for him.
After entering, he easily avoided all the Dream Butterfly Gu and quickly found the insect raising bag with the rabbit.
He hurriedly opened the insect raising bag and pulled out the rabbit, noticing that its four short legs were flailing in the air and it was making soft cries. It seemed to be alive, and he finally breathed a sigh of relief.
He then stuffed it back into the pouch and tossed in a handful of carrots for it to eat, to prevent it from starving to death on the way back.
With the rabbit still alive, one worry was off his mind. After hanging the insect raising bag on his waist, he let out a heavy sigh and began walking toward the sleeping chamber.
Arriving at the entrance of the sleeping chamber, although he knew how to break the demonic flower's illusion, he still didn't risk approaching it himself out of caution. Instead, he skillfully sent his clone to handle it, directing the Fire Clone to pluck the demonic flower.
He had fallen into the illusion from a distance after seeing the demonic flower, while others, lacking farsight ability, didn't fall into the illusion at his distance.
So, he could basically conclude that only by seeing the demonic flower would one fall into the illusion; if one didn't see the demonic flower, they wouldn't fall into the illusion.
Thus, he had the Fire Clone cover its eyes with a black cloth while he guided its actions through a soul transmission.
The plan went unexpectedly smoothly. Following this method, the Fire Clone indeed didn’t fall into any illusions, pushed open the crystal coffin, and effortlessly pulled out the demonic flower.
Long Xuan was overjoyed and immediately ordered the Fire Clone to seal the demonic flower in a box.
After eliminating the danger of the demonic flower, Long Xuan finally dared to enter the sleeping chamber.
Upon seeing the storage bags hanging from the waists of the corpses scattered all over the floor, he naturally gathered them all up.
Storage bags cannot store other storage bags, so for a while, his waist was wrapped in storage bags, making him appear quite bulky.
Especially the storage bags left behind by the two Gu Kings who perished together during his first tomb-raiding expedition; these made him grin from ear to ear. This was a big haul, a real windfall.
One could easily imagine how valuable the items in the Gu Kings' storage bags must be.
However, he didn’t have time to check what was inside the Gu Kings' storage bags at this moment. After scanning the sleeping chamber, he finally displayed the typical behavior and style of small medicine boy and even lifted the crystal coffin where the Empress resided and took it away.
He swept the area once more, looking to see if there was anything else worth taking. He quickly removed the ever-burning lamps and the Golden Crow statues hanging on the walls, and finally, he took down the complete mural recording the "Sun and Moon Heart Sutra," leaving the ancient tomb completely satisfied.
By now, the sleeping chamber was thoroughly stripped bare, destroyed beyond recognition, and in utter disarray.
Under his frenzied looting, there was truly nothing left in the tomb except for the Spirit Surge Grass.
In the end, he didn’t go to the medicine garden to loot the Spirit Surge Grass again. This thing was no longer useful to him, and it wouldn’t be appropriate to hand it over to the clan in exchange for contribution points since he had no way to explain how he could see the Dream Butterfly Gu...
He spent another ten days returning to his medicine garden in Great Stone Village.
By this time, he had already broken through to the Marrow Cleansing Stage, confident that using the speed of his Stepping Star technique, he could easily shake off a Spiritual Sea Stage Gu cultivator, so he wasn’t as afraid of Feng Yu anymore. He could return to the medicine garden with peace of mind.
After returning to the medicine garden, he pulled out the rabbit with its little legs flailing from the insect raising pouch and threw it into his medicine garden.
The rabbit hopped into the soil and instantly disappeared.
Long Xuan wasn’t afraid it would run away. Its ginseng body was still in his hands; he essentially held its lifeline, so where could it possibly go?
The rabbit might run away, but the ginseng couldn’t. It was impossible for it to abandon its original body.
Long Xuan smiled and stopped paying attention to the rabbit. After sitting back in the familiar pavilion, he began his formation diagram project.
Creating a formation diagram on his own was something he was doing for the first time, and he was filled with a sense of novelty. This gave him great enthusiasm, and he was determined to create an unparalleled, deadly formation, one that even Di Xin couldn’t break.
The fact that the Great Ice Formation didn’t have the ability to stop Di Xin made him feel insecure.
He took a light sip of honey water with ice and began brainstorming about the formation.
He had quite a few ideas regarding formations; there were too many works from his past life to draw inspiration from.
Formations can be divided into trapping formations, killing formations, illusion formations, maze formations, linked formations, defensive formations, auxiliary formations...
Due to the limited size of the formation base, most killing formations are just killing formations, illusion formations are just illusion formations, and it’s very difficult to cover other functions. Even if they do, there will be a primary and secondary distinction; it’s impossible to master all types of formations.
Even Long Xuan's Ice Formation was primarily a defensive formation with a secondary killing formation, with no illusion effects at all.
There are formations that cover all types of formations, but they require a large area, a massive formation base, and ample space to carve formation patterns to achieve this.
This already falls into the category of large-scale formations, and formations that encompass all types of formations are known as Combination formations.
Combination formations are extremely troublesome, and even a formation expert would find it very difficult to break a complex combination formation.
But Long Xuan could use the Heavenly Eye to draw the formation patterns smaller, which was enough to carve out a massive number of formation patterns, giving the Combination formation an embryonic form.
And if the core of a Combination formation is pressed down on spiritual veins, spiritual mountains, or spiritual springs, it would then change names and be called a deadly formation. A particularly formidable deadly formation might even be called a peerless deadly formation.
If Long Xuan’s microscopic flow formation concept could truly be realized, then his formation would become a deadly formation, perhaps even a peerless deadly formation, capable of withstanding the assault of a Gu King.
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