Using numerical Dao talismans to comprehend heaven and earth was a monumental challenge in itself. The Master of Haotian View had presented over two hundred mathematical formulas to explain the Great Dao of this world.
Every formula represented a single point of the Great Dao. Yet the Great Dao was boundless; exhausting all the principles of heaven and earth was impossible. Even an immortal could only achieve perfection in one or a few aspects, and on that basis ascend, transcending the shackles of heaven and earth to reach a higher plane, looking down upon all living beings from then on.
For now, Wei Yuan could only do his utmost to memorize all the material, intending to study and analyze it slowly after returning.
The Master of Haotian View had laid out in a single afternoon principles that would ordinarily take a Scenery Command cultivator several centuries to study. Taking just a few of these supreme truths into sects below the second grade would make them sect-guarding treasures, the kind that none but the sect master's successor was permitted to hear.
Even in many first-grade grotto-heaven sects, these were closely guarded secrets, or required the accumulation of massive amounts of so-called contributions and merits to exchange for.
Thus, the Master of Haotian View had essentially laid the entire foundation of a blessed-land sect right before Wei Yuan. If measured in heavenly merits, it would be worth tens of thousands at least. Wei Yuan memorized desperately, transcribing them through the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World as he committed them to memory.
Wolong and Fengchu were completely silent, copying without a sound.
Wei Yuan soon discovered that the simpler the principle represented by a formula, the harder it was to understand. The complex ones were actually easier to grasp.
Understanding the essence of the worldly Great Dao was only the beginning; what was even harder were the calculations regarding the void world where the mindscape world resided. That truly left Wei Yuan completely baffled. Relying entirely on numerical Dao talismans to understand it had already exceeded the bounds of ordinary perception and divine sense.
Wei Yuan instinctively felt that perhaps modifying his own dharma body—like Feng Tingyu, learning to think with different parts of the body—might yield miraculous results.
Calculating the mindscape world was not even the hardest part; the hardest was calculating how to locate the realm where the mindscape world resided from this world, as well as describing the connection and transformation between the two. The Master of Haotian View had only briefly touched upon this section, offering a few concepts without delving deep. Perhaps he knew that even if he wrote it down, Wei Yuan would not understand.
The half-day lesson ended in a flash, leaving Wei Yuan thoroughly in awe of the Master of Haotian View.
Problems of staggering magnitude were grasped and mastered by him at a single glance, without any need for deliberation. Yet Wei Yuan felt that merely memorizing all of it was already a headache-inducing ordeal, to say nothing of contemplating it.
Walking out of the side hall, Wei Yuan was completely at a loss, unsure what he had actually learned over the course of the half-day. It felt as though he had learned a great deal, but upon careful reflection, it seemed as if he had learned nothing at all.
At that moment, a rather irreverent thought suddenly crossed Wei Yuan's mind: How was Patriarch Xuanyue going to ascend to immortality in the future? The patriarch seemed, likely, probably, definitely unable to understand these formulas.
Yet from Tinghai and Yanshi down to the True Monarchs of each hall, everyone was supremely confident in Xuanyue's ascension, as though it were something that would happen naturally when the time came, as simple as eating and drinking. Could it be...
Wei Yuan hurriedly snuffed out the budding phrase "fools have fortune," leaving no trace behind.
On the way back to the garrison city, Wei Yuan spotted a flying boat cruising lazily ahead, also bound for the garrison city. It was a flying boat from Qingming, still carrying nothing but military supplies, without any troops.
Wei Yuan followed the flying boat back toward the garrison city, slaying several Liao tribesmen along the way who attempted ambushes, and arrived without incident.
This flying boat had brought several dozen cannons, with the rest of the cargo consisting entirely of ammunition. Combat consumed ammunition at an alarming rate; no matter how much arrived, it was never enough, so the seven flying boats shuttling back and forth were used almost exclusively to transport ammunition.
On the return leg, in addition to tens of thousands of corpses, the flying boat carried a thousand Qingming elites. These men had fought in multiple bloody battles in succession, and Wei Yuan intended to cycle them back in batches for rest and recuperation, replacing them with other units.
Just as the flying boat vanished beyond the horizon, the Liao Clan launched a fresh round of attacks. But this time, the Liao cavalry ran into serious trouble. Flying swords shot out from countless small strongpoints, artillery fire grew even more ferocious, and the ubiquitous trenches made it impossible for the Liao cavalry to charge. The humans scurried through the trenches like mice, making them exceedingly difficult to target.
By this point, the Liao Clan discovered that they could no longer gain the upper hand in ranged exchanges with the humans.
The Liao Clan detached several cavalry units to harass the heartland of the Palace of Grand Beginning, but whenever they dared to push deep, they were struck by large-scale mountain gate Dao techniques, suffering heavy casualties. Every garrison city was a node of the mountain gate array; without tearing down these garrison cities, compressing the mountain gate array effectively was nearly impossible.
After suffering grievous losses in their opening wave, the Liao Clan switched tactics again. Large numbers of elite Liao donned iron armor and plunged into the trenches, initiating brutal hand-to-hand combat—something they were not adept at.
The Liao Clan was naturally stronger of body than humans. Although infantry combat was not their forte, engaging in a ranged exchange against a human defensive line fortified by strongpoints and trenches was practically suicide. Charging into the trenches for close-quarters fighting actually narrowed the casualty gap.
Thus, by relying on mutually destructive charges throughout the second half of the day, the Liao Clan finally managed to push the casualty ratio down to around four to one by day's end.
In this battle, the Dao soldiers suffered over twenty thousand casualties, while the Liao army lost a hundred thousand. Wei Yuan's brow was tightly furrowed in deep concern. The Palace of Grand Beginning did not have many Dao soldiers to begin with, and now their reserves were nearing exhaustion, with reinforcements growing scarcer by the day.
Although Wei Yuan's Seventh Garrison had achieved an exceptionally brilliant record, other fronts had not fared so smoothly. Some garrison cities had suffered catastrophic losses, with casualties approaching those of the Liao Clan.
Noticing Wei Yuan's expression, He Fang consoled him, "Junior Brother actually has no need to worry. Even if the Liao Clan knows that entering the trenches for hand-to-hand combat is the most effective approach, they will find it hard to sustain. This is entirely different from mounted archery; entering trenches for close combat means throwing lives away.
"After fighting such a battle once, the surviving veterans will surely be vehemently opposed, completely unwilling to do it again. And once other units hear of it, their will to fight will also be thrown into doubt. The Liao barbarians are flesh and blood too; they fear death just as much. Besides, they are the ones attacking us. A tactic of trading life for life surely cannot last."
Hearing these words, Wei Yuan felt slightly relieved. He immediately sent an urgent order to Qingming, instructing them to load a batch of stockpiled directional sword-mines onto the new transport flying boats. That weapon ought to prove quite effective in trench warfare.
As soon as the battle ended, Wei Yuan headed to the Northern Mountain Gate to see if he could apply for a few more flying boats. The carrying capacity of the existing seven flying boats was already stretched to its limit.
In Qingming, another flying boat from the Northern Mountain Gate arrived. A crew of mighty warrior laborers unloaded large wooden crates, loaded them onto wagons, and transported them toward the Reincarnation Furnace.
While being unloaded from a wagon, one wooden crate slipped from someone's grasp, rolled once, and its side shattered. What spilled out from within were shockingly all Liao corpses!
The laborers and porters were dumbfounded, and many passing cultivators halted in their tracks, looks of unease on their faces.
Several cultivators responsible for maintaining order flew over swiftly to disperse the onlookers, shouting, "What are you staring at! Get back to work, do none of you have anything better to do?"
A young Dao Foundation cultivator stiffened his neck and retorted, "What's wrong with looking? What right do you have to boss me around? I'm Dao Foundation too, no worse than you! What right do you have to point fingers at me?"
The cultivator maintaining order was incensed, drawing his dharma sword on the spot as he barked, "Prying into secrets without authorization and defying orders—I say you're a spy sent by another state! Men, help me seize him, take him back for a thorough interrogation, and verify his identity!"
The young cultivator was just as stubborn, shouting, "If you want to frame someone, you can always find an excuse! Declaring someone guilty on a whim—what magnificent arrogance! On what authority? Are you the Domain Lord's father or something?"
Nearby cultivators hastily tugged at him, warning, "Watch your tongue!"
The young cultivator yelled, "Am I wrong? Qingming has laws! This fellow decides guilt just like that—who does he think he is?"
The cultivator in charge of order sneered, gritting his teeth. "A mere templated piece of trash. Let's see how many moves you can last against me!"
He raised his dharma sword, just about to unleash a technique, when a cold voice rang out beside them: "Halt! Take all of them in for investigation!"
The cultivators turned their heads to look. Seeing an expressionless Dao Foundation warrior clad in a black uniform with red trim hovering in midair, an instant shiver ran down their spines.
By now, the cultivators of Qingming all knew that Dao Foundation warriors wearing specially designed commandant uniforms were avatar puppets left behind by Wei Yuan. Naturally, none dared resist, obediently following him away.
Another Dao Foundation warrior appeared, directing the laborers to repack the corpses, seal the crates, and wheel them into the Reincarnation Furnace.
Several months flew by, and the lingering heat of late summer had already settled over the north.
Wei Yuan attended a lecture once every seven days. The rest of the time, aside from fighting, he devoted himself to diligently studying the supreme truths of the worldly Great Dao, struggling through the ocean of numerical Dao talismans in agonizing torment—far more grueling than taking pills had been in the past.
After all, taking pills was passive; endure it, and it would pass. But delving into the Great Dao was active self-inflicted torment, an entirely different matter.
Through months of bloody warfare, the Liao Clan's offensive showed no signs of waning, and hundreds of thousands of corpses had already been fed into the Reincarnation Furnace. The primal chaos qi surrounding the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World also steadily increased.
On this day, Han Li and Long Wushuang, who had been cultivating intently in the Battle Saint Hall, suddenly felt one of the invisible shackles bound around them vanish. Their long-suppressed cultivation began to erupt, spirituality was born within their Dao Foundations, and they finally stepped into the late Dao Foundation realm.
Chapter 708