244: Chapter 244 Array Masters Snatch Orders, Production Capacity Initially Established

Over the next three days, two wars were happening simultaneously on Blue Moon Island.

The first was outside the reef wall. The Haiyuan Clan's probing attacks came every few hours—not a full-scale assault, but small squads of Late Foundation Establishment Stage Abyssal Beasts slamming into the Sword Net.

They would strike, retreat, then return from a different direction to strike again.

Su Qingli marked six different attack routes on the Receiving Formation—each one testing the weak points of the outer Sword Net.

At least seven or eight new breaches appeared in the Sword Net every day—each one ranging from half a zhang to one and a half zhang in length.

Leng Feng divided the Sin Battalion's First Page into three shifts—each shift guarded the reef for four hours, and those who rotated off slept wrapped in oilcloth on the back of the reef wall's stone platform.

No one took off their armor.

The second war was at the Pier.

The space in front of the announcement board was never empty from the hour of the Rabbit to the hour of the Ox.

The twelve veteran Array Master from the Capital treated the stone floor as their drawing board—talisman paper was spread everywhere, stacks of Formation Plates and copper pieces piled up, and the friction sound of ink box The Lid being repeatedly opened and the scraping of engraving knives on copper echoed from morning till night.

No one spoke—not because they didn't want to, but because they had no energy left.

He Pingchuan drew from the hour of the Rabbit to the hour of the Horse—drawing nearly seventy Burst Talismans—then stuck his talisman brush into the ink box.

When he stood up, his knees cracked twice.

He leaned against the wooden table beside the announcement board for about three breaths—then squatted back down, changed to a new talisman brush, and continued drawing.

"Old brush—the tip is worn flat."

He placed the old brush on the edge of the stone slab—the bamboo fiber of the tip had already been worn into a bevel from repeated friction against the talisman paper.

In less than half an hour, he would pick this brush up again—using copper finger guards to clamp the end of the brush handle, rubbing the flattened tip against a whetstone three times, and continuing to draw.

Blind Qian did not draw talismans.

He only engraved Formation Plates—from the hour of the Dragon to the hour of the Dog, except for drinking water twice and gnawing on a dry cake while standing, his thumb and index finger never left the engraving knife.

The copper finger guards were placed beside the stone slab—he hadn't put them back on since taking them off at the hour of the Dragon.

The blade of his engraving knife chipped the next evening—he rubbed the tip against a whetstone a dozen times, but the chip remained—so he changed his grip on the knife and continued engraving using the second edge on the back of the blade.

"It's ruined."

He tossed the chipped engraving knife aside—it bounced on the stone slab and rolled to He Pingchuan's feet.

He Pingchuan didn't look up.

"I have a spare here—you should have replaced that old knife long ago."

"I need your spare knife for myself—I'm asking you to sharpen mine for me."

Commander Cai squatted on the stone platform next to the announcement board—in front of him were three stacks of bamboo slips and an open registry.

The pages of the registry were being blown upward by the sea breeze—he used his pipe to press down the corner of the paper; the tobacco inside the pipe had already burned down to the bottom of the copper bowl, leaving only a layer of grey-white ash.

He had forgotten to light it—he hadn't changed the tobacco since he started recording contribution points at the hour of the Rabbit.

"Blind Qian—third batch of eighteen Profound Ice Formation Plates. Five points each—totaling ninety points. Yesterday's balance was sixty-five points—today that brings it to one hundred and fifty. Enough to exchange for three incense sticks of time for Formation reading."

Blind Qian didn't look up—the engraving knife continued to scrape against the copper piece.

"Don't exchange it yet. Save it until two hundred—I want to audit one of Elder Mo's Formation lectures."

"Two hundred points—you're still fifty short. Either engrave ten more Formation Plates—or draw seventeen more talismans. Your talisman drawing speed is faster than my Formation Plate engraving—"

"Not drawing."

Blind Qian's engraving knife paused on the copper piece— "Haven't drawn talismans in twenty years. My hands are rusty. The talismans I draw won't pass inspection—it would be a waste of cinnabar ink."

Leng Feng came to the announcement board at the end of every hour of the Dragon to collect the lists.

The first day, he took the statistical paper handed over by Su Qingli—the paper was divided into two columns with charcoal pencil: the left column was Jade Talisman output, and the right column was Formation Plate output.

The first day—over two hundred High Grade Jade Talismans, thirty-some standard Formation Plates.

After reading the list, Leng Feng folded the paper—tucked it into the inner side of his belt—and walked toward the Lords Mansion.

Halfway there, he stopped—turned around and glanced at the talisman paper and Formation Plates scattered all over the ground in front of the announcement board, watched for about two breaths—then continued walking.

Lu Changyuan was drinking tea in the Chart Room when he received the list—the teacup was still that same chipped ceramic cup.

He spread the list out on the chart table—after reading the numbers, he didn't speak, but pressed the list on top of the pile of things in his inner sleeve pocket.

"This output—how long would it take at the Capital's Ministry of War Formation Equipment Division?"

Leng Feng stood before the chart table—his armor plates still stained with salt frost from the reef wall.

"At least half a month for the Array Master on duty at the Formation Equipment Division—and that's assuming everyone doesn't take leave or go on business trips. And this is only the first day."

The second day.

Before dawn—before the hour of the Rabbit, the space in front of the announcement board was full of people again.

He Pingchuan arrived first this time—he dipped his talisman brush in cinnabar ink and occupied a wind-sheltered spot in front of the announcement board.

The sea breeze blew from the reef wall—sending the scraps of talisman paper scattered on the ground yesterday swirling across the stone slab—he held the talisman paper down with his left hand, drew with his right, his right hand never stopping when his left hand changed paper.

By the time he drew the thirty-something-th one, the back of his left hand was covered in cinnabar ink—it was from the wet ink on the talisman paper smearing onto it while changing sheets.

Blind Qian was less than half an incense stick of time later than He Pingchuan—he didn't go to occupy a spot, but sat directly back on the stone slab from yesterday.

The surface of the stone slab had been warmed by his body heat—having sat from the hour of the Dragon to the hour of the Dog yesterday, the blue-grey color on the stone slab had been rubbed into a faint mark by his trousers.

He pulled out his engraving knife—the old knife with the chipped edge from yesterday had been replaced, and the blade of the new knife glinted with a cold blue oily sheen in the morning light.

Before engraving the first Formation Plate, he rubbed the new knife against the whetstone three times—not because the knife wasn't sharp, but because his hands hadn't woken up yet.

Second-day output—nearly three hundred Jade Talismans, forty-some Formation Plates.

Su Qingli added a note on the right side of the statistical paper: Quality stable.

Jade Talisman passing rate nearly ninety-five percent—about ten percent higher than the first day.

Formation Plate high-quality rate nearly ninety percent—the batch engraved by Blind Qian and another old Formation Master surnamed Xu was almost entirely qualified.

Below the note, she added another line: Blind Qian's Profound Ice Formation Plates—Formation path deflection angle error is less than half a degree.

The allowable error for standard military Formation Plates is one degree.

Leng Feng added one sentence when handing the second day's list to Lu Changyuan.

"They are nearly thirty percent faster than yesterday—the talisman drawers' hand speed hasn't changed, but the movements of changing paper and ink have become smoother."

The third day.

He Pingchuan and the others discovered a pattern in front of the announcement board—when repeatedly drawing the same type of talisman, the hand would memorize the pattern's direction on its own.

After the first one was drawn—when starting the second one, the brush tip would move to the correct position for the first stroke automatically.

This saved the few breaths of time needed to re-align the pattern for each talisman.

He Pingchuan told this discovery to Blind Qian who was squatting beside him—Blind Qian didn't reply after hearing it, but the position of the first stroke of his next Formation Plate was indeed nearly half a breath faster.

By the evening of the third day—Leng Feng received the third list.

The single-day output on the third day had increased by nearly forty percent compared to the first day.

Total for three days—about eight hundred High Grade Jade Talismans, one hundred and twenty-some standard Formation Plates.

Su Qingli wrote six characters at the bottom of the statistical paper with charcoal pencil— "Formation Plate quality stable" —then drew a circle next to the six characters.

Every evening, Elder Mo would punctually open the door of the stone room next to the Formation Affairs Room—and unfold the rubbing of the outer Formation veins on the stone table.

The unfolding time was exactly half an hour—no more, no less.

The twelve old men went in by batches—two people per batch, one standing on each side of the rubbing paper, holding their contribution point exchange tokens, eyes fixed on the lines on the rubbing paper—without blinking.

The first time Blind Qian went in, he stood in front of the rubbing paper for an entire incense stick of time—when he came out, he was clutching his copper finger guards in his palm, his knuckles turned white from the force.

"The routing of the fourth section on that rubbing—is the same section as the one that was wrong on the third page of the deduction method He stored away twenty years ago."

He slowly put the copper finger guards back onto his thumb—it took him two tries to get it right.

"He mistook the dead line of the false junction for a live line back then—the entire deduction was off by nearly a foot.

The end of the dead line marked on the original chart—the concentration of Formation ink decreased by exactly ten percent per inch.

It was completely opposite to the direction he calculated."

Every time Elder Mo unfolded the rubbing, he would sit in the corner of the reading room—holding a piece of Spirit Essence debris in his hand, using the cold light of the debris to illuminate the newly re-drawn simplified Formation chart in his hand.

The simplified Formation charts re-drawn by Su Qingli had already piled up into a thick stack—each one marked with a serial number in the upper right corner, from one up to nearly sixty.

Elder Mo checked them one by one—after checking each one, he would put a tiny, faint dot with a charcoal pencil next to the serial number.

The checked Formation charts were placed on his left hand side—the unchecked ones on his right.

By the evening of the third day—only two remained on his right hand side.

He paused when checking the fifty-third simplified Formation chart.

This one was not a simple re-drawing of the ancient Formation vein routing—Su Qingli had marked a new routing scheme on the back of the simplified routing with a charcoal pencil.

The scheme was drawn with dashed lines—the dashed lines started from the radial branches of the ancient Formation veins, passed through the core arc segment of the simplified routing, and then branched into three sets of parallel routings at the end of the arc segment.

The convergence direction of the three sets of parallel routings all pointed to the same point—and at that point, she had written three characters with a charcoal pencil: "Chain combination."

Su Qingli had picked out the best quality ones from the hundred and twenty-some standard Formation Plates—ninety-some in total—and she had marked the combination positions on the back of each Formation Plate's copper piece with a charcoal pencil.

She re-grouped these Formation Plates according to the ice-sealing Spiritual Pressure coverage range of the Profound Ice Formation Plates—forty pieces per group, connected in series within the group via chain routings.

The routings used a modified version of the radial branches from the ancient Formation vein rubbing—retaining the convergence angle of the core arc segment, but changing all the diverging paths at the ends of the branches into one-way parallel flows.

Elder Mo looked at the markings on the back—for nearly half an incense stick of time.

His finger paused next to the three characters "Chain combination"—his fingertip hovered less than half an inch above the charcoal writing, not touching it.

Then he pulled half an old piece of paper from his sleeve—the edges of the paper were already frayed, and the paper fibers at the folds had worn into extremely fine cracks from being opened and closed repeatedly.

He placed the half-sheet of old paper on Su Qingli's workbench—pressing it on top of the fifty-third simplified Formation chart.

The old paper was drawn with a sketch of Formation Plate series routing.

The routing logic of the sketch was almost identical to the scheme marked by Su Qingli—three sets of parallel routings starting from radial branches, passing through the core arc segment, and converging at the same ice-sealing coverage point at the end.

The difference was—the routing on the old paper had an extra heat dissipation branch when passing through the core arc segment.

The branch extended from the inside of the arc segment outward—extending to the edge of the Formation Plate—marked with two characters: "Overheat."

"Drawn twenty years ago."

Elder Mo moved his finger away from the old paper—his voice as steady as usual.

"There was no Spirit Essence back then—the temperature of the core arc segment would rise to the deformation critical point of the copper piece within ten breaths when the Formation Plates were connected in series.

The heat dissipation branch could only delay the temperature rise—it couldn't solve it.

So it was abandoned by the Formation Department."

Su Qingli turned the old paper over.

The back of the paper was filled with tiny charcoal characters—all of them were trial calculations of the material ratio for the heat dissipation branch.

From "Old Sand 70%, Water Temperature 30%" to "Old Sand 40%, Water Temperature 40%, Spirit Essence Debris 20%"—every set of trial calculations had an X drawn behind it.

The last set of trial calculations was only half written—the ink stopped after the four characters "Spirit Essence Debris."

It wasn't that it was finished—it was that there was no Spirit Essence back then, so the calculation couldn't continue.

Su Qingli turned the old paper back to the front—her finger traced the routing of the heat dissipation branch once.

Then she picked up the charcoal pencil—and drew a reverse arrow next to Elder Mo's annotation of "Overheat" from back then—drawing it back to the core arc segment—and then wrote down: "Spirit Essence debris half percent—arc segment temperature rise is less than fifty percent of the old Formation base."

After writing it, she added a line of notes in the corner of the paper— "Ratio according to the third Formation base from the Killing Array upgrade—Old Sand 10% plus Spirit Essence debris 0.5%—the effect is optimal."

Elder Mo looked at the words she wrote—his eyes paused on the six characters "less than fifty percent of the old Formation base."

He reached his hand into his sleeve—touched the seal of the three scrolls of heat dissipation Formation blueprints inside—but didn't pull them out.

"Try the chain combination first."

He pushed the old paper toward Su Qingli's hand.

"As for the heat dissipation—wait until after this wave is fought."

The fourth day, early morning—the end of the hour of the Tiger.

Su Qingli pushed open the door of the Chart Room—the rattan stool behind her fell to the ground.

She moved the baseline marked with charcoal pencil for the spiritual power fluctuation values on the Receiving Formation Plate to the right by nearly three inches—her fingers pressed on the communication Formation piece—her fingertips turning white from the pressure.

Her voice was nearly twice as fast as usual.

"The main fluctuation source has moved. Two Middle Stage Golden Core Abyssal Beasts—leading a beast tide of ten thousand Foundation Establishment ones—are charging at the front defense zone.

The fourth section of the outer Sword Net breach has expanded to nearly ten zhang—nearly three times larger than the breach torn by the False Core Commander last time.

The inner Sword Net is being repaired—but the repair speed can't keep up with the expansion speed of the breach."

Lu Changyuan put down his teacup—the bottom of the cup made a very light muffled sound on the stone platform.

The tea had been cold for nearly four hours.

"Move everything He and the others have drawn over the past three days—onto the reef wall.

Leng Feng—deploy according to the chain positions marked by Su Qingli."

On the second floor of the Lords Mansion, Leng Feng turned the observation mirror the last half-degree toward the Dragon Burial Trench.

In the mirror tube—the bone armor color of the two Middle Stage Golden Core Abyssal Beasts was different from the previous Golden Core level one.

A very deep dark gold—the bone texture on the armor plates was spiral-shaped, and at the center of each spiral was embedded a glowing dark blue crystal fragment.

The two Abyssal Beasts floated out of the water side by side—the waves pushed out to both sides from less than thirty miles outside the reef wall.

Behind them—the reflection of the Foundation Establishment Abyssal Beasts' bone armor covered the entire horizon.

Leng Feng put down the observation mirror—grabbed the Killing Array Formation Flag from the stone platform.

"Commander Cai—the entire Sin Battalion First Page, get onto the reef wall.

Shield wall on the stone platform."

At the Pier—He Pingchuan stood up from in front of the announcement board, holding the bundled Burst Talismans in his arms.

Blind Qian stuck his engraving knife into his belt—carrying a basket of Profound Ice Formation Plates in each hand.

The other ten old Array Master followed behind—twelve old men with disheveled hair and bloodshot eyes, holding the thousands of consumables they had drawn without sleeping for three days, running toward the reef wall.