245: Chapter 245 Interlocking Array Formation, Solid Defense Line

Less than ten miles outside the reef wall—two Golden Core Middle Stage Abyssal Beasts accelerated simultaneously.

Bone spears flipped up from underwater—the spiritual light released by the dark blue crystal shards on the spear tips illuminated the entire front of the reef wall.

Then, they collided with the Geng Metal Sword Net.

The sound of metal friction was an extremely low, deep, and slow tearing noise.

It was as if an iron plate were being torn apart from the middle by two giant hands—every inch of the tear was screaming, but the screams were buried by the low frequency—the high-frequency sounds could not be heard, but the stone slabs underfoot were shaking.

The fourth segment of the outer Sword Net—tore open for nearly ten zhang.

The blue light of the fourth formation eye on the Formation Flag in Leng Feng's hand dimmed for a split second—then lit up again.

The mending sword threads wove toward the center from both sides of the tear—but the mending speed was less than half the tearing speed.

Every time the Golden Core Middle Stage Abyssal Beast's bone spear thrust—the tear expanded by nearly a zhang.

On the reef wall—Leng Feng had already positioned the six members of his personal guard at the ninety-plus Formation Plate installation sites marked by Su Qingli.

Each installation site was circled on the reef wall with charcoal—numbered from one to ninety-three inside the circles.

The first batch of chained combination Formation Plates had already been wedged into the crevices of the reef wall—the backs of the copper plates facing outward, the charcoal combination markings on the back glowing with a faint grayish-white in the dawn light.

In the Formation Affairs Room, Su Qingli switched all the control lines for the sixteen formation eyes of the inner circle from automatic to manual.

Her fingers pressed down on three trigger lines on the Receiving Formation plate simultaneously—her left index finger held the outer fourth segment mending, her right middle finger held the inner Sword Net concentrated targeting, and her right ring finger held the chained Formation Plate synchronous activation.

The three lines were three different colors—blue-white for the Killing Array, grayish-white for the mending, and dark yellow for the chained Formation Plates.

Her rattan stool only had two legs left supporting it—the third broke in the middle of the night, and the fourth broke at dawn.

She pressed her knees against the edge of the stone platform—using her knees to steady her center of gravity.

"Chained Formation Plates—first group—deployed."

"Second group—deployed."

"Third group—deployed."

Leng Feng drew the Formation Flag from his waist—the flag surface unfurled in the sea breeze.

On the grayish-blue flag surface, a Killing Array formation eye diagram traversing the entire flag was drawn with black formation ink.

He raised the flag over his shoulder—the sixteen formation eyes on the flag simultaneously lit up with a cold blue-white light.

"Chained Formation Plates—standby. Outer Sword Net—full open. Inner circle—concentrate targeting on the front gap direction."

"Chained Formation Plates—first group—trigger."

Su Qingli pressed down with her right ring finger.

Thirty-eight of the ninety-three charcoal circles on the reef wall lit up with dark yellow spiritual light simultaneously—thirty-eight Profound Ice Formation Plates were activated at once through the chained wiring.

The freezing Spiritual Pressure was released from the copper Formation Plates—thirty-eight strands overlapping—forming an extremely wide ice-blue wall of Spiritual Pressure outside the reef wall.

The wall of Spiritual Pressure collided with the lower body of the first Golden Core Abyssal Beast—the water surface began to freeze at the point of contact.

The ice layer spread upward from the water surface—first covering the Abyssal Beast's leg armor—then the waist armor—and then the abdominal armor.

The Golden Core Abyssal Beast's advance slowed by nearly sixty percent in the freezing Spiritual Pressure—it pulled the bone spear out of the ice layer—bringing out a large chunk of broken ice—but the second group of chained Formation Plates activated the moment it pulled the bone spear out.

The second wave of freezing Spiritual Pressure from over forty Profound Ice Formation Plates overlapped with the first wave—freezing the entire lower body of the Golden Core Abyssal Beast.

The duration of the freeze—approximately five breaths.

Su Qingli aligned the blue-white sword threads of the sixteen inner formation eyes simultaneously for those five breaths.

The aiming point for every single sword thread was the same—the seam between the Golden Core Abyssal Beast's chest armor and waist armor.

The bone armor was thinnest at the seam—so thin that the dark gray inner layer of the bone plate could be seen underneath.

Sixteen blue-white sword threads, nearly twenty percent thicker, pierced into the same seam simultaneously from different angles—the first strike penetrated less than two inches before being deflected by the bone armor.

The second strike hit the same spot—penetrating two and a half inches. The third strike—two point eight inches.

The sixth strike penetrated.

The Golden Core Abyssal Beast's Golden Core was plucked out from its abdominal cavity by the sword threads—a fist-sized bead emitting a pale golden spiritual light—was lifted out of the water on the tips of the blue-white sword threads.

The moment the Golden Core left the Abyssal Beast's body—the mountain-like great demon sank downward—the bone spear slipped from its hand—the spear tip pointing downward and plunging into the water.

Then the entire Abyssal Beast toppled sideways into the sea surface less than ten zhang outside the reef wall—the splashed seawater rushed over the top of the reef wall—soaking Leng Feng from head to toe.

The seawater was hot.

The temperature inside the Golden Core Abyssal Beast was nearly twice as high as human body temperature—the blue-green bodily fluids inside its body mixed into the seawater, dyeing the water splashed onto Leng Feng's face a very pale ink-green.

The other Golden Core Abyssal Beast broke free from the freezing.

It bypassed the freezing range of the third group of chained Formation Plates—but He Pingchuan and Blind Qian were already crouching on the stone platform.

In front of each of them were stacked three or four bundles of Explosive Talismans—one hundred per bundle, tied with old formation threads.

"Smash them—don't hold back." Leng Feng pointed the Formation Flag toward the stone platform.

Eight hundred Explosive Talismans were thrown in batches at the second Golden Core Abyssal Beast.

The first batch of two hundred exploded on its front—the fire light was not red, but the orange-gold peculiar to high-grade Fire Talismans—a wall of fire rose nearly twenty zhang from the water surface, swallowing the upper body of the Golden Core Abyssal Beast.

The second batch of three hundred was thrown from the flank—Blind Qian's accuracy was better than He Pingchuan's—nearly two hundred of the three hundred landed on the same spot on the Abyssal Beast's right shoulder.

The bone armor was torn open in the continuous explosions—first the outermost dark golden shell cracked into several pieces—then the middle layer of bone plates was blasted outward—finally revealing the dark gray muscle tissue underneath.

The muscle tissue was still wriggling—the frequency of contraction synchronized with its heartbeat.

The third batch of three hundred was thrown entirely onto the already opened wound.

The Golden Core Abyssal Beast's right shoulder was blown to shreds—its entire right arm hung outward from the shoulder—only half a section of bone tendon remained connected.

It switched the bone spear to its left hand—turned around—and retreated toward the Dragon Burial Trench.

The retreat speed was nearly half as slow as when it advanced—the wound on its right shoulder twitched every time it was washed by seawater—the bone spear dragged a crooked trail on the water surface.

He Pingchuan threw the last bundle of Explosive Talismans into the basket—his hands were shaking so much he could not hold the talisman paper.

His talisman brush handle was covered in his own hand sweat—the patina soaked white by sweat stains.

"It is gone—all thrown. Eight hundred—not a single one left."

Blind Qian crouched beside him—his copper finger cot had fallen off at some point—his right thumb was bare—a deep red mark had been pressed into the pad of his thumb by a carving knife.

He stared at the retreating Golden Core Abyssal Beast on the sea surface for about three breaths—then plopped down onto the stone platform.

"It ran away."

"Let it run if it wants to." Leng Feng retracted the Formation Flag to his waist—the sixteen formation eyes on the flag surface were still lit.

"The first one is dead—the second is seriously injured. The remaining Foundation Establishment beast tide is leaderless—they will retreat."

The Late Foundation Establishment Stage Abyssal Beast swarm was already dispersing the moment the Golden Core Abyssal Beast's Golden Core was plucked out.

The formation turned from a fan-shaped array into a pile of loose sand after the Golden Core-level commander died—the Abyssal Beasts in the front row started retreating—those in the back were still charging forward—front and back collided—then they all fled toward the Dragon Burial Trench together.

On the sea surface in front of the reef wall—the corpse of the first Golden Core Abyssal Beast was still sinking.

Blue-green bodily fluids gushed out from the abdominal wound—dyeing the surrounding nearly one hundred zhang of seawater a very thick ink-green.

Floating on the sea surface were bone armor fragments, broken sword thread remnants, and bone debris blasted apart by the Explosive Talismans.

Leng Feng stood up from the stone platform—the seawater on his face had already been dried by the dawn sea breeze—leaving a layer of pale white salt frost on his cheeks.

"Count the casualties."

The post-battle count was completed at the end of the Mao hour.

Four people died in battle.

Two veteran soldiers from the first page of the Sin Battalion—bone spear fragments thrown by the Golden Core Abyssal Beast pierced through the shield seams.

One Foundation Establishment Middle Stage Loose Cultivator—while crouching at the chained Formation Plate installation site to secure the copper plate, was pierced through the left chest armor by splashed armor fragments.

One veteran Formation Master—was struck in the throat by bone spur fragments spat out by an Abyssal Beast while throwing talismans on the stone platform.

Over a dozen people were injured—the hemostatic powder on Leng Feng's old left shoulder wound burst open during the battle and had to be reapplied, Deng Yue's right arm was slashed by flying bone fragments, and most of the other wounded had abrasions and concussive injuries.

Commander Cai squatted on the reef wall stone platform—crossing the names of the four fallen soldiers off the roster.

He had his pipe in his mouth while drawing the horizontal lines—the tobacco was not lit—the horizontal line went from left to right in one stroke.

Then he copied the names into the casualty registration page on the other side—when writing, his pen stroke was nearly twice as heavy as usual—the charcoal pen pressed indentations into the paper surface.

After the battle—Elder Mo stood on the reef wall stone platform.

The sea breeze blew up the right sleeve of his old cloth robe—revealing the snake-scale-like ancient formation backlash burn scar underneath.

He watched Su Qingli crouching on the reef wall—checking the remaining spiritual power of each recovered chained Formation Plate one by one.

Her fingers traced over the back of each copper Formation Plate—those with normal temperatures were placed back into the usable basket, those hot to the touch were placed into the overheat basket, and those deformed were placed directly into the scrap pile.

Ninety-three Formation Plates—nearly thirty overheated, seven or eight deformed, the rest were still usable.

The few deformed copper plates had obvious high-temperature oxidation layers on the front—the edges were blackened—but the charcoal markings on the back of the copper plates were still there—baked into a pale gray by the high heat.

Elder Mo watched Su Qingli stack the overheated Formation Plates and deformed Formation Plates separately—and spoke up.

"Twenty years ago, I drew a chained Formation Plate series wiring diagram—and the method Su Qingli used today is the same."

His voice was as steady as usual—but his speaking speed was nearly half as slow as usual.

He pressed the weight of every word to the bottom.

"Back then, I trial-produced three batches of sample plates—one hundred per batch. The first batch all overheated and deformed—the temperature on the back of the copper plates cracked the stone slab of the testing platform.

The second batch added heat dissipation branches—the overheating slowed down, but the freezing Spiritual Pressure of the Formation Plates was partially diverted by the heat dissipation—the stacked Spiritual Pressure was not enough to trap Golden Core-level entities. The third batch—"

He paused.

His fingers rubbed unconsciously against the cuff of his old cloth robe—the spot he rubbed was exactly where the snake-scale-like burn scar began.

"The third batch—it stopped halfway through testing. There was nothing wrong with the plan itself—what was missing was one thing. The heat dissipation branch requires a Spirit Marrow-grade thermal conductive medium—back then, I flipped through the Ministry of War's strategic stockpile inventory three times—it wasn't there. It didn't exist in the entire continent."

He moved his hand away from his cuff—reached into his robes—and pulled two rolls of yellowed formation blueprints from a hidden pocket inside his old cloth robe.

The edges of the paper rolls were tied with old formation threads—the color of the threads had faded from light gray to nearly white.

On the paper rolls was the blue archival stamp of the Capital Ministry of War Array Bureau—the seal was intact, but the paper of the seal had become brittle, and a small corner fell off at the slightest touch.

"These are the last two rolls. One is the detailed wiring diagram for the heat dissipation branch—the other is the formation circuit design for segmented temperature control. Those blueprints—" He handed the rolls to Su Qingli—his fingers pausing on the paper for a heartbeat. "They're just collecting dust with me."

Su Qingli took the paper rolls—the moment her fingers touched them, half of the seal fell off—shattering into several blue paper fragments on the flagstone.

Elder Mo did not go to pick up the fragments. He turned and walked toward the reef wall—stopping when he reached the third step of the stone stairs—without turning back.

"Those deformed Formation Plates of yours—don't throw them away. After the copper plates deform under high heat, the crystal lattice rearranges once—the hardness of the copper will be even higher when you melt and cast it again. Next time you engrave Formation Plates—you can melt these seven or eight pieces and mix them into the new copper plates."

Then he continued walking down—the right sleeve of his old cloth robe was blown upward by the sea breeze behind him—revealing the entire patch of snake-scale-like old scars on his forearm.

In the daylight of the Chen hour, the scar extended from his wrist to the middle of his forearm—the color was the waxy white of an old wound, with the edges tinged with a very faint dark blue.

That was the residual energy scar from an ancient Formation backlash twenty years ago—at the current rate of Spirit Marrow restoration, it could probably fade by another half.

Elder Mo did not say "join." But on the bookshelf in his stone house—an entire shelf was already empty. That shelf had originally held those three old rolls of blueprints from twenty years ago.

Su Qingli spread the two rolls of blueprints out on the workbench—and noted down the first line of annotations with a charcoal pencil. Then she turned her head—and said something to Leng Feng.

"Record the serial numbers for this batch of deformed Formation Plates. Use them for the next smelting—the copper crystal lattice is indeed nearly twenty percent denser than new copper plates."

Leng Feng hung his observation scope at his waist—and nodded. The newly replaced hemostatic powder on his left shoulder was still seeping out tiny threads of blood—the blood soaked through the white gauze and dried into a dark red line at the edge of his armor plate.

At the same time—at the Grade-Wu stronghold forty miles to the left flank of Blue Moon Island, the garrison had not sent any transmissions since last night.

At another Grade-Wu stronghold thirty miles to the right flank, the content of the last emergency talisman at the Yin hour contained only six words: "Beast tide breached the wall—do not send reinforcements."

Leng Feng turned his observation scope nearly thirty degrees toward the left flank. Inside the scope—dark purple smoke was emerging from the base of the stone wall at that Grade-Wu stronghold.

That was the spiritual power corrosion released by the crystal fragments on the Abyssal Beast's bone armor when they struck the stone wall—the corrosion speed was extremely fast, and the protective Array Patterns on the stone wall were dimming layer by layer.

Behind the stone wall—no one was guarding it.

Leng Feng put down the observation scope. Just as he was about to walk toward the Lords Mansion—he swept across a moving point of light in the scope.

It was not an Abyssal Beast—the point of light was coming from the direction of the Zhenhai Fortress, and its speed was at least three levels faster than a military warship.

The point of light dragged a very thin, pale golden trail in the high sky—that was the Spiritual Pressure trace of a Golden Core-grade flying ship from the Capital Ministry of War.

He raised the observation scope again—and adjusted the focus to the maximum.

A war flying ship flying the golden sword flag of the Capital Ministry of War was lowering its altitude.

The density of the protective Array Patterns on the hull of the flying ship was at least two levels higher than that of ordinary military ships—every Array Pattern was dark gold, shimmering with an extremely restrained luster in the sunlight of the Chen hour, as if gold powder had been pressed into the fine grooves of copper plates.

On the stern of the flying ship, three golden sword emblems were engraved side by side—three swords crossed.

In the entire Zhenhai Fortress, only the front of Commander Tie Zhan's Central Army main tent flew the same golden sword flag—Commander Tie Zhan had one sword on his epaulet. Three swords—at least one rank higher than Commander Tie Zhan.

The flying ship slowly landed at the north corner of the Blue Moon Island Pier. There was no vibration when the bottom of the ship touched the ground—the protective Array Patterns turned from dark gold to a very pale silver-white the instant it touched the ground, evenly distributing the weight of the entire flying ship from the bottom of the ship into the flagstone foundation of the Pier.

The cabin door opened. Two personal guards wearing black light armor with gold-trimmed epaulets stepped down first. Then Special Commissioner Wei Yuan followed behind a tall old man and walked down the flying ship.

The golden sword emblem on the old man's epaulet was three crossed swords—a Golden Core Late Stage Elder with real power. His hair was gray, but his back was straight—there were no tactical embroidery marks on the cuffs of his military robe, only a very simple golden sword pattern. The sword pattern was not a military rank badge—it was a personal mark exclusively for the Elder Council of the Capital Ministry of War.

Special Commissioner Wei Yuan followed half a step behind him—his eyes looking only at the ground while walking. His stride was nearly half as small as usual—every step landed exactly less than three inches outside of Elder Wei Changfeng's footprints.

He had changed to a new pair of leather gloves on his left hand—dark gray, the leather at the fingertips hadn't been worn into wrinkles yet—but the wrist of the glove still couldn't hide the edge of that press-burn scar above the web of his thumb.

He Pingchuan lifted his head from the reef wall stone platform—saw the three crossed golden swords on the old man's epaulet—and the talisman paper he was half-rolling in his hand stopped.

Blind Qian paused his carving knife on the copper plate—looked up and glanced—then continued carving, but the position of the next three cuts was off by nearly half an inch.

Leng Feng came down from the reef wall—and fastened the buckle of his scabbard.

The handwriting of the post-battle statistics on the Pier's notice board was not yet dry—Su Qingli's charcoal pencil writing shimmered with a very faint grayish-black in the sunlight.

The flying ship's personal guards glanced at the notice board—then their eyes landed on the several stacks of Formation Plates, copper plates, and talisman papers piled under the notice board—and stopped.

The Pier was littered with traces left by three days and three nights of non-stop talisman drawing and formation engraving—broken old formation threads stuck in the crevices of the flagstones, an ink box that hadn't been put away sitting on the corner of the notice board's wooden table, and a layer of extremely fine copper filings scattered on the ground—glittering with the fragmented light unique to metal in the morning light.

Elder Wei Changfeng walked to the notice board—and stood for about five heartbeats. He was not looking at the wartime regulations—but at the three stacks of Formation Plates and talisman paper bundles underneath that hadn't been collected yet. Then he turned around—and looked at Leng Feng.

"Take me to see your Lord."

Lu Changyuan met him at the entrance of the Chart Room of the Lords Mansion. There was charcoal powder piled up on his cuffs from three days—and today, a new layer had been added.

He moved his hand away from the inner pocket of his sleeve—and slightly cupped his hands in a salute—the movement was neither humble nor arrogant, without the bowing of a subordinate meeting a superior, nor the stiffness of someone intentionally putting on airs.

"Blue Moon Island Lord Lu Changyuan—greets the Elder."

Elder Wei Changfeng sized him up for nearly three heartbeats. From his military robe—deep black without trim—to the old stains of charcoal powder on his cuffs—and then to the defense map spread out on the chart table.

The defense map marked the spiritual power consumption curves of the sixteen array eyes on the outer ring of the Killing Array—next to the curves were the placement locations of the chain Formation Plates annotated by Su Qingli with a charcoal pencil. Every annotation had pressed a clear impression onto the paper.

"Of the twenty strongholds on the left flank—only Blue Moon Island did not collapse." Elder Wei Changfeng's voice was not loud—but the trailing sound of every word carried the Spiritual Pressure resonance of a Golden Core Late Stage cultivator. This resonance was not intentionally released—it was naturally brought about by reaching that Realm.

"The Ministry of War defense area assessment form is already prepared. According to the rules—all strongholds of Grade-Ding or higher that did not collapse during the beast tide need to undergo an on-site defense assessment."

He had Special Commissioner Wei Yuan take out a Ministry of War standard defense area assessment form—the form was divided into three columns: Formation Base spiritual power reserves, actual number of troop establishment, and the smooth status of material supply lines.

Special Commissioner Wei Yuan spread the form on the chart table—his movements were one beat slower than when he was inspecting Blue Moon Island earlier—after spreading it out, he stepped back half a step and continued to look at the ground.

Elder Wei Changfeng sat opposite the chart table—Leng Feng pulled over an old chair. When he sat down, his back remained straight—his sitting posture was not relaxed, but the habit of a soldier of decades, stacking his spine from his waist to his cervical vertebrae, one segment at a time.

"Formation Base Spirit Stone reserves—the Spirit Stone consumption of your front reef wall is nearly fifteen percent higher than the standard. Why?"

Lu Changyuan did not look at the assessment form—and answered directly. "The front reef wall withstood the direct impact of Golden Core Middle Stage Abyssal Beasts. Every time the outer Sword Net of the Geng Metal Sword Array was torn open by a Golden Core-grade bone spear—the Spirit Stones required for the mending sword threads were nearly three times the usual amount. During the second wave of the beast tide yesterday, my front defense area was rammed by two Golden Core Middle Stage Abyssal Beasts simultaneously—the fourth section of the Sword Net rift expanded to nearly ten feet. The standard assessment's Spirit Stone consumption model is aimed at Late Foundation Establishment Stage level impacts—it does not have parameters for Golden Core level impacts."

Elder Wei Changfeng's finger paused on the first column of the assessment form—then moved to the second column.

"Sin Battalion establishment—the roster I received registered two thousand seven hundred people. But on the same day, four people were added to the death registration page—one of whom's serial number was not in the official roster of two thousand seven hundred people."

"That fallen Foundation Establishment Loose Cultivator—their serial number was on the peripheral auxiliary defense roster. The peripheral auxiliary defense roster was not merged with the Sin Battalion official roster—because peripheral personnel do not enjoy the monthly salary and allowances of official garrison troops, and only receive supplies based on contribution points." Lu Changyuan's voice was steady—exactly the same as when he answered about Spirit Stone consumption just now. "The contribution point system started three days ago—the details are posted on the Pier. The Elder should have seen it when you got off the flying ship."

Elder Wei Changfeng raised his eyes—and looked at Lu Changyuan. This was the first time he had moved his gaze away from the assessment form since entering the Chart Room. He did not ask about the third column of the assessment form—folded the form—and placed it on the side of the table.

"Lord Lu—you have answered all the questions on the Ministry of War assessment form. However—" He paused—and tapped his finger lightly on the edge of the folded form. "I want to see things that are not on the form."