Rank Three Grand Array: Violent Thunder and Raging Surges

Violent Thunder and Raging Surges! A Rank Three lightning-series grand array! This was an offensive killing array that Min Longyu had continually refined and improved after that night, drawing upon painful lessons and searching his soul. It was not a rigid, static array, but an active, dynamic one! True to its name, it summoned raging surges of violent thunder, a torrential deluge of lightning bolts. Once unleashed, even a Golden Core Master would have to avoid its brunt. If one were trapped deep within, being blasted into dust was by no means out of the question. However, the requirements to set up this array were exceedingly harsh. First, it required a Magic Treasure–grade formation disk as its core, supplemented by a multitude of lightning-path materials. Second, it had to amass a vast quantity of thunder power beforehand to serve as a catalyst; only then could it channel and guide a raging torrent of violent lightning. Finally, if one wished to unleash its full potential, it had to be deployed in an environment saturated with thunder power. Otherwise, the power it unleashed would fall short of even an ordinary Rank Two killing array. Rather than calling it a Rank Three offensive grand array, it was more like a thunder-channeling formation. Yet unlike how great sects channeled lightning to cultivate rare spiritual wood and ores—where they sought relatively gentle, sparse strikes—the Violent Thunder and Raging Surges Array summoned an overwhelming deluge of lightning capable of obliterating everything in its path! To prepare for any contingency, Luo Chen had buried the Eighteen Wandering Formation Disks within the Lightning-Struck Wood grove the moment he secured his footing. He then took out small, multicolored pennants and planted them at specific positions corresponding to the Five Elements and the Eight Trigrams. At numerous crucial points, he arranged the materials Min Longyu had instructed him to use: Red Thunder Iron, Floating Firefly Powder, Thunder-Attracting Wood... His actions drew many curious gazes from the Luotian Association cultivators. Seeing that Luo Chen was setting up an array, however, no one dared disturb him. They assumed it must be a contingency plan left behind by Elder Min Longyu. The only surprise was that the Association Leader seemed so remarkably natural at setting up formations. It was as though he had immersed himself in the craft for years! Natural? After placing a hundred medium-grade spirit stones into the grooves of a thunder-attracting pedestal he had carved out, the array was officially complete. Truth be told, Luo Chen was somewhat surprised himself. Laying down this Rank Three grand array with his own hands had proceeded without the slightest hitch from start to finish. Watching thin wisps of arcing lightning slither toward the Eighteen Wandering Formation Disks at the center of the formation, Luo Chen stroked his chin. *I suppose this array is simply not that complicated.* Though nominally Rank Three, its strength did not truly stem from the intrinsic power of the formation itself, but from the intensity of the surrounding environment. "The longer it sits, the more thunder power it gathers, making the catalyst sturdier. When the time comes, it will be able to draw down far more lightning." "That being the case, other than regularly replacing the spirit stones consumed to attract the thunder, all I need to do is wait." Letting out a breath of relief, Luo Chen surveyed his surroundings. Duan Feng had already organized the patrol shifts. In the days ahead, he would likely be stuck in this forsaken place for quite a long while. Still, heavy fighting was unlikely to reach them. After all, plenty of people were holding the line out front. *** It unfolded just as Luo Chen had anticipated. While the other vassal factions experienced their posting on the Sixth Peak as perilous and fraught with danger, life for the Luotian Association was remarkably tranquil. Over the course of a month or so, news arrived periodically from the main front of the Sixth Peak detailing assaults launched by the Sword Sect Alliance. The fighting was fierce, barely lagging behind the scale of the battle that had breached the Seventh Peak! Everyone understood that if the Sixth Peak fell, the Four-Sect Alliance would have only the Fifth Peak left, leaving the Falling Cloud Sect's side with no retreat. Consequently, the Four-Sect Alliance resisted with desperate ferocity. Every engagement was an iron-blooded stand. In such a war, countless cultivators perished, yet many of those who survived naturally made names for themselves. Daoist titles like Min Longyu's "Lei Zhenzi" sprang up endlessly. People heaped praise on one another—everyone went home pleased! Yet Daoist titles won on the battlefield came and went in the blink of an eye. Setting aside the risk of dying, whether such titles could spread far and wide in the future was entirely another matter. Luo Chen had once traveled to the front lines to observe a large-scale battle. Back then, spiritual qi poured down like torrential rain, and brilliant sword lights wove back and forth in dazzling streaks across the sky. All manner of magical tools and Magic Treasures, talismans and spells, were unleashed in wild collisions. Foundation Establishment True Cultivators formed the backbone of the combat, either wheeling through the air with their magical tools or channeling lethal strikes from Magic Treasures to batter battle formations. Meanwhile, the massive ranks of Qi Refining cultivators—who seemed unfit to join the clashes of Foundation Establishment experts—exhibited startling combat power. Gathered in disciplined cohorts under the command of true disciples from the four sects, swarms of Qi Refining cultivators unleashed devastating spells in unison. One or two posed little threat. Yet in sufficient numbers, even a Foundation Establishment True Cultivator could hardly withstand their brunt. It was just as that Golden Core Master from Azure Pill Valley had once noted: in today's cultivation world, cultivators had wandered down an unbalanced path where offense vastly outweighed defense. Powerful offensive Magic Treasures could be seen everywhere. Yet an exceptional defensive Magic Treasure was nearly impossible to come by! Even top-grade defensive magical tools were exceedingly rare. Under such conditions, though Foundation Establishment True Cultivators appeared formidable, they remained at grave risk of being swarmed and slain by lower-ranked cultivators. Compared to the life-and-death struggles of those vassal factions, life on the Luotian Association's side could be described as serene and peaceful. Apart from answering a call from Tantai Jin to join a single reinforcement operation, they had scarcely participated in any combat. This state of affairs left several Qi Refining cultivators eager for merits feeling restless. For Luo Chen, Duan Feng, and Xu Huanzhen, however, nothing could be better than having this peace last until the war's end. Merit? No amount of merit could match the wisdom of preserving one's life! As long as the green hills stood, there would always be firewood to burn. Unless the Four-Sect Alliance could offer them a path to scale higher peaks, quietly staying in the rear was the ideal choice. Perhaps the only thing everyone struggled to adjust to was the sheer scarcity of spiritual qi around Mount Thunder Accumulation's Nine Peaks. It was ill-suited for the cultivation of ordinary cultivators. In truth, it was not so much that spiritual qi was thin, but that five-element spiritual qi was exceedingly scarce. The space between heaven and earth brimmed with vast amounts of lightning-series spiritual qi. Unless one was a powerful cultivator possessing a Lightning Spiritual Root, quiet meditation was completely out of the question here. Even a lightning-rooted cultivator would not dare absorb spiritual qi that dissipated from heaven's terrifying might without extreme caution. It was far too manic and chaotic, demanding extensive time and effort to refine. Yet being unable to absorb qi did not mean one could not cultivate. Throughout the past month, Luo Chen had never stopped working on his cultivation. His efforts to unblock acupoints using Earth Fire Fiend qi had continued without pause. In one month, he had opened more than fifty additional acupoints. Once past the initial learning threshold, Luo Chen grew steadily more proficient, reaching a pace where he could unblock nearly two acupoints in a single day. Such progress would have left even Wang Yuan dumbfounded. Yet Luo Chen was not surprised. Opening acupoints differed fundamentally from the other sub-stages of the Blood River Realm. Viscera Refining required slow, steady accumulation, tempering the five viscera bit by bit so that the Five Qi in the Chest could be nurtured. Meridian Opening demanded bold, sweeping momentum—like surging rivers flushing through narrow canals, turning everything in their path into a rushing torrent. Acupoint Opening, by contrast, was delicate, meticulous work! After all, compared to the viscera and meridians, acupoints were exceedingly fragile; the slightest carelessness could easily injure oneself. It was akin to threading a needle: one needed keen eyesight and a steady hand. Luo Chen's "eyesight" was extraordinarily sharp; his soul foundation was immense, far surpassing Wang Yuan's. As for manipulating fiend qi, having concocted Blood Burning Pills countless thousands of times, his control over Earth Fire Fiend qi was second to none. Now, he was merely working with a higher-grade Earth Fire Fiend. Once he familiarized himself with it, rapid progress followed naturally. *Perhaps when I find Wang Yuan, I can pass this method of opening acupoints I developed to him and speed up his body cultivation.* *Then again, he was already ahead of me in body refining. Who knows—he might have already unblocked all seven hundred and twenty acupoints, reaching the realm where the internal and external heavenly circuits move in harmony, and the acupoints of his body shine like heavenly stars.* Shaking his head, Luo Chen took out another piece of rock pumice. Just as he was about to extract the Earth Fire Fiend qi, he froze. Gone! He had used it all up! Coming back to his senses, Luo Chen gave a helpless sigh. He had originally thought those hundred-plus portions of Earth Fire Fiend qi would last a long time, never expecting them to run out so fast. It was likely due to combining three wisps into one to forcibly blast through acupoints. A truly extravagant waste. Without fiend qi, how could he unblock more acupoints? He could not simply squander his time on the Sixth Peak, either! Practice spells? Nearly all of Luo Chen's current spells had already reached Great Perfection. Among the newly learned ones, apart from the Rank Three spell Ten-Thousand-Li Journey, he had little pressing need for the others. Besides, he had already pushed Ten-Thousand-Li Journey to the Perfect level, only a hair's breadth away from Grandmaster, and it was hardly suitable to practice out in the open before everyone's eyes. "Opening acupoints must continue!" "Fighting rages constantly at the front. With inner sect and even true disciples from the Four-Sect Alliance perishing from time to time, the Flame Alliance is surely suffering the same. The inheritances left behind by their fallen will inevitably contain plenty of Earth Fire Fiend qi." "Rather than waiting to return to the Golden Sand Floating Island to buy some, I might as well purchase it from people right here on the battlefield." His mind made up, Luo Chen immediately summoned a Qi Refining cultivator—the very Bu Junjie who had dared to stand up to Qu Zhenbiao before. He sent him to make inquiries at the front-line encampments. If anyone possessed Rank Two Earth Fire Fiend qi, Luo Chen was willing to purchase it at a premium. After Bu Junjie took his orders and left, Luo Chen, having nothing else to do, inspected the encampment's defensive perimeter. Afterwards, he made his way to the grove of Lightning-Struck Wood where he had buried the Eighteen Wandering Formation Disks. Gazing at this blackened, stunted copse, an outsider would find it hard to associate it with precious Rank Two Lightning-Struck Wood. Yet the flashes of lightning and thunder that periodically crackled across its branches proved beyond doubt that it was indeed Rank Two Lightning-Struck Wood imbued with traces of lightning! Checking over the formation disks, Luo Chen nodded with satisfaction. In a month's time, at the cost of thirty thousand low-grade spirit stones and two hundred medium-grade spirit stones, the disks were now brimming with radiant lightning, already more than half charged. In another month or so, the array would be primed and ready to be triggered at any moment. When that time came, everything would be in place; only the right conditions would be needed. Luo Chen swept away the large mass of spirit stones that had ground into fine powder and replaced them with fresh ones to ensure the array kept running. Just as he turned to leave, a sharp crack sounded beside his ear. *Crack!* A bolt of lightning fell from the sky, striking a tree of Lightning-Struck Wood that was merely Rank One. Shaken violently by the impact, the tree shed most of its branches. "It didn't even catch fire. It seems that upon reaching Rank One, it has already developed some resistance!" Luo Chen murmured in admiration. He was just about to walk away when his footsteps came to a subconscious halt. Channeling his spirit eyes, he stared intently at the lightning-struck tree. Though seemingly battered by the lightning bolt, its main trunk had grown tougher and stronger. Stray spiritual qi from the surrounding area was slowly converging toward it, and its grade was gradually transforming. That very strike had catalyzed the crucial step in its advancement to Rank Two! "Thunder is synonymous with destruction and heralds tribulation." "Yet all know that thunder also symbolizes revival and life." "When spring thunder rumbles, all living things awaken... In the Five Elements, the eastern trigram is Zhen, representing thunder and belonging to the wood element. Thus the Azure Dragon of Yimu among the Seven Eastern Mansions is the constellation governing thunder's vitality." "Rumor has it that mighty ancient body refiners not only tempered their flesh with fiend qi, but even engaged in the mad practice of tempering their bodies with thunder. The principle they relied upon was precisely this opposing attribute hidden within thunder's destruction." "Could I, perhaps, utilize the power of thunder as well?" Standing in the Lightning-Struck Wood grove, Luo Chen stared blankly at the advancing tree, lost in thought. *** The moon shone bright as stars grew sparse in the heavy night. Luo Chen stood amid the deep, dark grove, where occasional bursts of silvery-white lightning illuminated his upright frame. Suddenly, Luo Chen moved. Under the distant watch of Duan Feng and Xu Huanzhen, he reached out a hand and touched a stunted tree of Lightning-Struck Wood. *Crackle!* Duan Feng's expression shifted slightly. "The Association Leader doesn't seem versed in thunder-guiding techniques. Confronting lightning directly with his bare body like this, I fear..." Before his words had fully landed, Luo Chen's body went stiff. After just an instant of paralysis, Luo Chen hesitantly raised his hand to inspect his fingertip. A tiny black scorch mark stood clearly on the pad of his finger. *It seems to have some effect?* Lost in thought, he repeated the experiment several more times as before. Only after quite a while did he stroll slowly back. "Association Leader, what happened?" Xu Huanzhen asked curiously. Duan Feng had known Luo Chen for a long time and understood his temperament, so he said, "Is the Association Leader hoping to use the trace amounts of thunder power in the Lightning-Struck Wood for something?" Luo Chen nodded. "Don't artifact masters know techniques to guide thunder?" Duan Feng hummed in agreement. "Indeed. The Dao of Artifact Forging is vast and profound. While the most common method uses flame to smelt metal, there are also techniques involving flesh forging or extracting souls. More advanced methods naturally involve harnessing the powers of heaven and earth." "Rumor has it that when mighty Nascent Soul cultivators undergo their Soul Formation heavenly tribulations, some have accomplished the extraordinary feat of forging True Artifacts with tribulation lightning." "Ordinary artifact masters like us cannot employ such methods, but we do have auxiliary implements to borrow the lightning power of heaven and earth." Above magical tools and Magic Treasures were True Artifacts. A True Artifact was not something ordinary cultivators could possess; even Nascent Soul Perfected Persons often struggled to obtain one. Such an item had to be upgraded from a natal Magic Treasure. Furthermore, it had to be tainted with a wisp of tribulation lightning aura before it could ascend from a top-grade Magic Treasure to a True Artifact. Yet surviving a tribulation was already a near-fatal endeavor; who could afford to forge artifacts with tribulation lightning? Consequently, many Nascent Soul Perfected Persons and Soul Formation grandmasters conceived other methods to draw down ordinary heavenly lightning to temper their natal Magic Treasures. Over time, the techniques behind these methods matured and spread gradually downward. In the end, it reached a point where ordinary artifact masters without Lightning Spiritual Roots could harness implements to channel lightning power for artifact forging. "Do you have one?" Luo Chen asked. Duan Feng nodded. "I have a thunder-guiding net on me that I occasionally use for forging. Since business for magical tools has ground to a halt lately, it's just sitting idle. I can give it to you." Sometimes, plans simply could not keep pace with change. The Luotian Association's hope of using the war as an opportunity for the Artifact Forging Hall to earn spirit stones had fizzled out with Li Yingzhang's grave injuries and Wang Yuan's disappearance. More importantly, that business on the Golden Sand Floating Island had already been cornered by others; an ordinary artifact master like Duan Feng never stood a chance. He was still too young. "Alright, thank you." Taking the iron net shimmering in shades of cyan and white, Luo Chen returned to his stone chamber with a contemplative look. *** The next day, Luo Chen appeared once more in the grove of Lightning-Struck Wood. This was the place within their encampment where thunder power was most concentrated. As before, he attempted to absorb lightning power into his body, but the attempt yielded only minor injuries. "The volume is too small!" Luo Chen muttered under his breath, then brought out the thunder-guiding net Duan Feng had given him. Triggered by his spiritual power, brilliant silvery-white lightning erupted from several nearby trees of Lightning-Struck Wood, converging toward Luo Chen along the metal mesh. In an instant, Luo Chen was struck as if by a heavy blow, electric arcs cascading all over his body. After a long while, Luo Chen exhaled a breath of turbid qi, a faint aroma of scorched flesh wafting from his body. Casting a Healing Art, Luo Chen sank into thought once more. *Still doesn't work. Without a Lightning Spiritual Root, I can't master thunder power at all.* *After a bout of lightning strikes followed by healing, my physique did indeed strengthen by a tiny sliver—but only a tiny sliver.* *Accumulating gains this way consumes too much time and spiritual qi. The costs completely outweigh the benefits.* Luo Chen continually evaluated his condition. The supposed vitality contained within thunder and lightning was something completely beyond the reach of his current level. What he could utilize was nothing more than the most rudimentary effects: Using thunder and lightning to temper his physique, then applying wood-attribute healing arts so that his body grew progressively stronger through repeated destruction and recovery. Yet it went no further than that. "What a pity. I thought I had stumbled upon some extraordinary body refining technique." "Without a Lightning Spiritual Root, I can't harness the spiritual qi contained within lightning to let it linger in my meridians for prolonged body tempering." With a sigh, Luo Chen put away the thunder-guiding net. Just as he was about to leave, a sudden thought struck him. *I don't have any Earth Fire Fiend qi on hand right now, but the lightning here mostly belongs to the Yimu wood attribute. If I guide it into my body, what if I use it to unblock acupoints?* *The Heavenly Roc Transformation also mentioned that the most suitable essences for cultivating that technique came from three ancient desolate beasts: the Thunder Roc, the Golden-Winged Great Roc, and the Heavenly Yang Roc.* *The methods for the latter two were incomplete, but for when Thunder Roc essence blood entered the body, there was a relatively detailed development technique.* *My method of opening acupoints drew inspiration from the Heavenly Roc Transformation in the first place. If I modify it slightly...* Luo Chen licked his lips and looked toward the nearby grove of Lightning-Struck Wood with anticipation. To him, this place was nothing short of a treasure trove! The treasure lay not in the materials, but in the inexhaustible and relatively mild accumulation of lightning power.