56: Chapter 56 Magical Artifact Upgrade

Jiang Yan did not rest. There was still sixty percent of his Qi left in his Dantian, which was enough. He picked up the damaged High Grade Flying Sword from the ground.

The sword body was about two feet long, and it felt slightly heavy in his hand.

The patterns of the ten Restrictions on the sword spine were interwoven and overlapping. After his Divine Sense probed inside, he could clearly see the direction of every Restriction—unfortunately, nine of them were already broken.

The crack spread from the chip at the sword tip toward the sword body, passing through the circuit nodes of the three core Restrictions: Sharpness Restriction, Armor Piercing Restriction, and Lightness Inscription. The Qi conduction at these breaks was forced to turn, like river water hitting a dam.

Only the Durability Restriction at the sword hilt remained intact; after injecting Qi, he could still feel a faint resistance.

The repair plan was divided into three steps.

Step one: repair the cracks.

He cut a fingernail-sized scrap from the purple pattern gold—as the Flying Sword cut down, the blade slipped; the purple pattern gold was tougher than he had imagined.

This scrap slowly melted in the spiritual fire, dark purple droplets rolling in the flames, and his Divine Sense enveloped it, seeping into the interior of the cracks in the sword body.

The purple pattern gold was light and tough. After filling the cracks, it did not increase the weight of the sword body; instead, it used its natural Divine Sense affinity to reconnect the broken Restriction circuits.

After the droplets cooled, several extremely fine dark purple lines appeared at the cracks, standing out strikingly against the golden base color of the sword body—like the kintsugi patterns left after repairing porcelain.

Step two: re-engrave the Restrictions.

The Sharpness Restriction was re-routed at the sword tip. The original chipped position was polished into an arc, and the Restriction pattern was re-embedded along the curved surface.

The Armor Piercing Restriction reconnected its circuit at the middle of the sword spine, bypassing the edge of the purple pattern gold filled area.

The Lightness Inscription was wrapped three times above the sword hilt, with three layers of reinforcement applied at the Qi node where it intersected with the previous two Restrictions.

Step three: quenching and shaping. The Flying Sword was put into the Artifact Refining furnace and calcined with spiritual fire for three hours. The sword body changed from crimson to dark gold, then back to its original golden color, before being quenched in spring water—with a hiss, white steam gushed out from the furnace opening, spreading through the limestone cave and dampening the stalactites hanging overhead.

After repeating this three times, the sword body gave a clear ring.

The dark golden sword light was once again refined and flawless.

All ten Restriction patterns lit up, and the sword body hovered at the furnace opening, trembling slightly, like a beast that had just awakened from slumber and was stretching its limbs.

Jiang Yan controlled it to fly around the cave three times. Wherever the sword light passed, hair-thin sword marks were left on the rock wall; the cuts were as smooth as a mirror, and gravel fell rustling to the ground.

He withdrew the Flying Sword and flicked the blade with his finger—a long, humming sound echoed in the limestone cave for several breaths.

First-tier High Grade Flying Sword, completely repaired.

The repair of the small golden shield was much simpler.

The dent in the center of the shield face caused by a Sharp Weapon was heated by Jiang Yan with spiritual fire until it was semi-molten, and then he filled the dent with a fist-sized piece of gold essence.

After the gold essence droplets seeped into the indentation, they were fused with the shield face under repeated forging by his Divine Sense. After cooling, the color of the filled area was half a shade darker than the surrounding shield face—like new skin after a scar heals.

The defensive Restriction originally had eight layers, and three layers were broken at the dent. He used a fingertip engraving knife to re-route the lines along the curvature of the shield face, and the broken Restriction circuits reconnected by bypassing the edge of the filled area.

After repair, the shield face was as smooth as a mirror. When Qi was injected, the shield face emitted a thick, dark golden halo, and all eight layers of Restrictions resumed operation.

First-tier High Grade, completely repaired.

Jiang Yan put the two repaired Magical Artifacts back into his Storage Pouch, then drew his own gold essence Flying Sword from his waist.

This sword had only been refined a few months ago.

It was more than enough to deal with trash like Zhao Xuancheng, a Qi Refining Stage 2 waste who relied on Medicinal Pills, but if he were to face a Cultivator at the Late Stage of Qi Refining, or a Yao Beast in the Manghuang Mountains, the First-tier Medium Grade rank would be a bit embarrassing to bring out.

The upgrade material was flame gold. He cut another small half from the remaining flame gold; it was as crimson as charcoal.

The sword blank of the gold essence Flying Sword was forged from six jin and three liang of gold essence, so the foundation was excellent. This upgrade would not involve recasting the sword body, but rather fusing flame gold into the sword spine on the original foundation to enhance the fire attribute.

The Flying Sword and the flame gold were put into the Artifact Refining furnace together.

The spiritual fire temperature of the upgraded Artifact Refining furnace was indeed different—the gold essence sword body and the flame gold began to soften almost simultaneously, changing from dark gold to incandescent white, while the flame gold turned into a mass of crimson-gold viscous droplets.

Jiang Yan controlled the flame gold droplets to descend slowly along the centerline of the sword spine, seeping into the gaps of the gold essence crystals.

This process was extremely taxing on his mind—flame gold was volatile, while gold essence was stable. Fusing the two at the crystal level required precise temperature control; one degree too high and the sword body would deform, one degree too low and the flame gold would not be able to fully penetrate.

He split the flame gold droplets into hundreds of tiny beads, embedding them evenly along both sides of the sword spine's centerline. The distance between each bead was controlled to within three hair-widths, causing a needle-pricking pain to burn in his Meridians.

After the flame gold had completely seeped in, the sword body changed from incandescent white to a deep dark gold, and a very fine crimson centerline appeared on the sword spine, extending from the guard all the way to the tip—that was the fire attribute channel formed by the condensed flame gold.

Inscribe nine Restrictions.

The original four were all re-inscribed—the Sharpness Restriction followed the edge of the blade, the Durability Restriction crossed and wrapped around the sword spine, the Lightness Inscription wrapped around the hilt three times, and the Armor Piercing Restriction was arranged in a sawtooth circuit along both sides of the crimson centerline.

Five new ones were added—the Flame Amplification Restriction was laid out along the crimson centerline of the sword spine to amplify the fire attribute of the flame gold to the maximum.

The Burst Restriction was designed specifically for the Blazing Flame Slash, allowing the flame blade aura to explode a second time after hitting the target.

The Wind Control Restriction increased the flying speed of the Flying Sword, and the Turning Restriction kept the trajectory stable without shaking during sharp turns.

The Qi Compression Restriction made the Sword Qi more condensed with the same output of Qi.

The moment the nine Restrictions finished being inscribed, they lit up simultaneously. The sword body let out a clear, long ring, and the crimson centerline was particularly striking on the dark golden sword body, like a tiny blood vessel pulsing.

First-tier High Grade gold essence Flying Sword, completed.

He gripped the hilt and swung it casually. A pale golden Sword Qi shot out silently, striking the opposite rock wall.

Gravel did not splash—the edges of the sword mark were as smooth as a mirror, and the rock at the cut had been scorched by high heat into a dark green glaze, hissing and emitting white steam.

The sword mark was half a zhang deep, and the sunlight leaking in from the cave entrance shone right on the cut, the glaze reflecting a faint green light.

Next were the thirteen gold needles.

The upgrade material was that piece of cold iron. It was the size of a fist, grayish, First-tier Medium Grade.

This thing was cold and hard, most suitable for refining armor-piercing hidden weapons.

The gold needles and the cold iron were put into the Artifact Refining furnace together.

The cold iron turned into dark blue droplets in the spiritual fire, and the gold needles softened in the flames, turning into golden droplets.

He used his Divine Sense to control the two types of droplets to fuse, then shaped them into needle forms.

He newly inscribed three Restrictions—the Paralysis Restriction, which was retained and had its node density increased; the Protective Aura Breaking Restriction, which utilized the cold attribute of the cold iron to specifically break Martial Artist Protective Aura and Cultivator protective spiritual light; and the Sound Suppression Restriction, which made them silent when controlled.

After the inscription was completed, the thirteen flying needles hovered around him, slowly rotating. The needle tips had a faint dark blue cold light, and the dark golden needle bodies were almost non-reflective under the moonlight—the Sound Suppression Restriction had even altered the light refraction index, also having a weak masking effect on vision.

First-tier Medium Grade flying needles, completed.

When the two Magical Artifacts were repaired and the two Magical Artifacts were upgraded, the Qi in Jiang Yan's Dantian hit rock bottom.

The dark golden vortex turned sluggishly, each rotation accompanied by hesitation.

He swallowed a peiyuan pill; the dark red pill dissolved as soon as it entered his abdomen, and the warm medicinal power surged from his stomach to his limbs and bones, causing the Dantian vortex to accelerate again.