After receiving her spirit stones, Shi Yu departed Tongyi Pavilion. Her sharp spiritual sense keenly picked up several covert gazes lingering on her from the shadows.
Lowering her eyelashes, she feigned ignorance and walked straight back toward her courtyard.
“So they really did follow me.”
Once she confirmed those gazes hadn't left and were indeed targeted at her, Shi Yu returned to her courtyard and shut the gate. Without delaying or lingering, she immediately retrieved an Escape Talisman and injected spiritual energy into it.
In an instant, the Escape Talisman transformed into a dull yellow light, enveloping her.
Shi Yu's body flickered, and in the next moment, she had vanished without a sound. The only trace left behind was a soft swirl of dust rising from the ground.
Everyone in the market city knew the Spirit Wandering Talismans had come from her, and since they had fetched such a staggering price at the auction, it was bound to attract malicious attention.
Even though she had used a nonexistent master as a shield to deter most harborers of ill intent, there was no guaranteeing that desperate cutthroats wouldn't be willing to take a gamble.
Unsurprisingly, the eyes she had detected earlier were now lying in wait near her courtyard, contemplating how to strike or claim a share of the spoils.
The closed courtyard gate blocked their view, leaving them completely unaware that Shi Yu had already slipped away.
“Time is precious. I don't have time to waste playing games with you.”
Burrowing through the soil, she activated a Speed-Enhancing Talisman to pair with her escape, moving rapidly underground.
However, since she lacked an Earth-attribute Spiritual Meridian, traveling through the earth was deeply uncomfortable, as a heavy pressure and sense of suffocation constantly enfolded her.
Fortunately, after being tempered by the Earth Qi from the Qi of the Five Elements of Heaven and Earth via the 《Soul Tempering Art》, this heavy pressure was hardly worth mentioning.
Still, as she was only in the Qi Refining Realm, she could not hold her breath for too long. Estimating that she had traveled a good distance and left the market city behind, she performed a hand seal and burst out from underground.
Dust billowed into the air.
“Cough, cough!”
The moment she emerged, Shi Yu clutched her throat, coughing from the dust before gasping for air. It took a while for her to catch her breath.
She looked around. Lush green trees surrounded her, with birds chirping and insects buzzing all around. She had successfully left the market city.
However, faint human voices could still be heard in the distance, indicating she wasn't too far away yet.
It was difficult to keep her bearings underground, so she had only traveled in a general direction. Now facing unfamiliar terrain, she retrieved the map Jiang Qihe had given her and carefully studied her route.
There wasn't much time left before the semi-annual grand auction held by the Xie Clan auction house.
After identifying her route, Shi Yu tucked the map away. “It's roughly seven to eight hundred li away. I need to hurry.”
Now that she was well-supplied with spirit stones, she was determined to acquire that Heavenly Tone Lotus at the Xie Clan's main city auction and would not miss it under any circumstances.
Meanwhile, the malicious cultivators waiting outside Shi Yu's courtyard watched from the shadows for an entire day, but the gate never opened. When night fell, they decided to take advantage of the dark and leap straight into the yard.
Yet after searching cautiously, they found not a single soul, leaving them filled with deep regret and frustration.
...
Shi Yu followed the map, heading toward the main city.
The market city was located on the outer periphery of the Fulong Mountain Range, and she still had several dozen li to go before completely leaving the mountains.
The mountainous terrain was rugged and densely forested, making the Speed-Enhancing Talisman impractical, so she had to walk on foot.
Fortunately, there were no troublesome spirit beast stampedes. The path outward was relatively safe, with few beast encounters.
Even if she ran into one or two, her current cultivation at the fourth layer of the Qi Refining Realm posed little danger against these weak outer-periphery beasts.
By the time dusk fell, she was still quite a distance from the nearest town or village marked on the map.
“I'll find a desolate hill to camp on tonight, and refine the Spirit-Gathering array plate while I'm at it.”
With her mind made up, she kept an eye out for a suitable hill as she traveled.
Since she was on the edge of the mountain range, finding one wasn't difficult.
Before complete darkness fell, Shi Yu found an inconspicuous low slope between two mountains and slipped inside. Winding along the path, she pushed aside a few bushes and chanced upon a hidden cave.
The cave was only a bit over a meter wide. After probing with her sense to ensure no creatures occupied it other than a few rustling insects, she stooped and stepped inside.
It was pitch-black inside—narrow, yet surprisingly deep.
She concealed the narrow entrance with loose rocks and branches, then flicked a small flame onto her fingertips for light as she ventured deeper.
Reaching the end, Shi Yu raised her arm, casting the flame's glow around her surroundings.
The space at the end was slightly larger than the tunnel, perfectly suited for refining the array plate.
Finding nothing unusual, Shi Yu extinguished the flame on her fingertips. In its place, she retrieved a small oil-lamp-like item and set it aside, slotting a spirit stone into the groove on top.
Instantly, a soft yet bright illumination lit up the small space.
This spirit stone lamp was something she had specially refined earlier when she found oil lamps too inconvenient. It required only a spirit stone in its groove, and a single low-grade spirit stone could keep it lit for ten days, making it extremely convenient.
Though refining the spirit stone lamp wasn't overly complicated, it contained clever craftsmanship that others couldn't easily replicate.
Alchemists and weapon refiners in the Origin Realm likely focused their energy on standard artifacts and paid little mind to such minor everyday gadgets. At least, since arriving in the Origin Realm, Shi Yu had yet to see anything similar in the market cities.
Setting the lamp aside, Shi Yu set up a small pot and cooked some spiritual rice.
Once she had eaten her fill and her exhaustion from the journey had mostly faded, she retrieved the various materials for refining the Spirit-Gathering array plate and set to work.
When cultivated to a high level, the Dao of Formations could carve array restrictions directly into the void, harnessing the power of heaven and earth to create peerless array formations capable of shifting winds, altering clouds, and reversing heaven and earth with boundless mystery.
However, such a realm was largely confined to legend. For most array masters, an array plate was still required as the array core to lay out and execute a formation.
An array plate was a tool used to store and activate formations. Crafting one required techniques from artifact refining, though it differed significantly from refining standard artifacts.
If anything, it shared more similarities with talisman crafting. Multiple materials had to be fused together to shape the array plate prototype, after which complex array runes were carved upon it. Finally, the array master would inject their spiritual energy to merge with the array plate, forming a self-sustaining, smoothly circulating formation system.
Shi Yu first quenched the required spiritual materials in Slaughter Spring water before using her natal fire to melt them together one by one.
The materials—White Star Stone, Mystic Ice Crystal, Jade Sun Marrow, and Earth Yin Crystal—complemented each other exceptionally well in this combination. The melting process proceeded smoothly, and before long, a disc-shaped object took form.
Next, she tore apart the Golden Bone Ganoderma, dividing it into ten small branches of equal size and thickness. Connecting them with high-quality beast hide, she created the array flags, completing all the raw prototypes.
With that done, Shi Yu began drawing the array runes upon them.
These array runes were a form of restriction, but unlike the restrictions carved on artifacts, the runes on the array flags were only partial. Only when all ten array flags were combined with the array plate would they form a complete restriction. If even one was missing, the formation could not take shape.
Once all the array runes were drawn, Shi Yu injected her spiritual energy into them. She watched as the patterns lit up one by one across the array flags before finally converging onto the array plate, enveloping it in a soft, misty glow.
The refinement was a success.
At the sight, she wiped away her sweat and smiled.
Refining the array plate and flags, as well as drawing the array runes, had taken her a full two days. Fortunately, with the Spirit-Gathering array plate now complete, her cultivation efficiency would improve from now on.
Shi Yu placed the array plate on the flat ground, set the array flags around it, and sat cross-legged in the center, eager to experience its effects.
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