"The Grand Star-Crossing Array?" The avatar of the Heavenly Profound Mirror stood frozen for a long while.
Then he shook his head. "Though that array is damaged, it still concerns the safety of Xuanhuang. Only my main body holds its memories."
Hearing this, Li Fan could not help feeling a bit disappointed. However, he had not harbored much hope in the first place and had merely brought it up in passing.
Just as he was about to make another request, the avatar continued, "However, if you merely desire an array of the same grade to use as a reference for breaking formations, I can provide something else."
Li Fan's interest was piqued at once. "Oh? Such as?"
The avatar paused to gather himself, then snapped off another finger and held it out.
Likely because this transmission contained a substantial amount of information, the avatar's face turned somewhat pale.
His body also grew weak, and he braced himself against the wall to sit down slowly.
Li Fan paused his analysis of the Dharma-Transmitting restrictions and shifted to absorbing the contents within the new finger.
Instantly, his sea of consciousness felt as though it were being crammed and churned by an invisible mass. Li Fan let out a muffled groan, his body swaying uncontrollably.
Pressing a hand against his bulging, throbbing temples, Li Fan attempted to convert the array's data as quickly as possible while relieving the pressure on his sea of consciousness.
Not far away, sitting on the floor, the avatar wore a look of schadenfreude.
Evidently, he had withheld any warning beforehand precisely to watch Li Fan make a fool of himself.
Soon, however, the sneer on the avatar's face gave way to gravity.
He realized that Li Fan's speed of adaptation far exceeded his imagination.
One had to understand that the avatar had not played a baseless prank. Based on the information-processing capability Li Fan had demonstrated when converting the Dharma-Transmitting Heavenly Venerable's restrictions just moments before, he had specifically selected an Immortal-grade array from his memory.
It was calibrated to cause Li Fan a bit of trouble without actually blowing his head apart.
Yet beyond the avatar's expectations, in just this brief interval, Li Fan's capacity to process information seemed to have improved significantly.
Furthermore, the speed of that improvement was visibly accelerating.
"How... is this possible...?"
The avatar was both bewildered and consumed by curiosity. Had they not reached an agreement and had their strengths not differed, he might have split Li Fan's skull open on the spot to see what secrets lay within.
Meanwhile, inside Li Fan's sea of consciousness, invisible to the mirror's avatar, the Terminal Dissociation Disc was undergoing an unimaginably violent transformation.
"Xuanji, Myriad Spirits Numerical Reduction," Li Fan repeated the name of the array transmitted by the mirror's avatar in his mind, thoroughly overjoyed.
Truly worthy of an array that surpassed the mortal realm.
Even though the Terminal Dissociation Disc had not yet completely decrypted it, merely receiving the array's various data had already triggered a revolution within itself.
Prior to this, the Terminal Dissociation Disc had pushed its deductions of the fixed array formulas Li Fan possessed and those circulating in the cultivation world almost to their utmost limits.
The path ahead had run out; there was nothing left to deduce.
In the end, the Terminal Dissociation Disc was not a living being and possessed no sentience of its own.
It could not, like a true grandmaster of array dao, create something from nothing or blaze a new path out of a dead end.
It required new theories and new array frameworks.
And now, this grand array—Xuanji, Myriad Spirits Numerical Reduction—had opened an entirely new window for the Terminal Dissociation Disc.
"Xuanji" seemed to denote that it was one component of a larger set of arrays.
"Myriad Spirits Numerical Reduction" was the array's primary function.
True to its name, under the shroud of this array, everything within would be converted into a numerical expression.
Cultivation realms, destructive power, divine sense intensity, physical resilience, and more would all be manifested as concrete numbers.
At first glance, this might not seem particularly remarkable.
Yet Immortal-grade arrays often possessed the uncanny ability to turn the mundane into the miraculous.
Once digitized, every numerical expression within the array could be adjusted at will.
As long as it remained within the array's operational tolerances, there were no restrictions—it could be altered according to one's desires.
The ultimate outcome was...
Even a powerless mortal, once adjusted by the Xuanji, Myriad Spirits Numerical Reduction array, could instantly leap to become a presence whose combat strength rivaled an immortal!
Likewise, even if an immortal fell into the array, as long as they could not break out, their values would be adjusted in an instant, stripping away the cultivation accumulated over countless years and reducing them to a mere mortal!
It sounded like sheer nonsense, but this precisely demonstrated the terrifying might of an Immortal-grade array!
Never had Li Fan imagined an array could accomplish something so absurd. He was shaken to the core.
"If I possessed such a grand array..."
Yet he did not let this sudden windfall go to his head.
After fully absorbing and analyzing the information on the Myriad Spirits Numerical Reduction array, a feeling of helplessness washed over Li Fan.
Because Xuanji, Myriad Spirits Numerical Reduction was simply impossible for mortal cultivators to successfully lay down.
Setting aside the immortal spiritual qi required to power it, Li Fan had never even heard of the various materials needed to construct the grand array.
Mighty as the Terminal Dissociation Disc was, it could only deduce in theory; it could not manifest the array into reality.
Fortunately, this Immortal-grade array had indeed opened an entirely new domain of array craft for the disc.
The deduction process, which had gradually ground to a halt because there was nothing left to deduce, began to accelerate once more.
An infinite future unfolded from this moment onward.
...
Li Fan slowly recovered from his surging emotions. Looking at the avatar sitting on the floor—weak yet visibly shaken—he asked with genuine concern, "Brother, what happened to you?"
This was not false sentiment on Li Fan's part. He had already reaped tangible benefits from the other party and saw countless more to be extracted in the future. Having already deemed the Heavenly Profound Mirror a treasure mountain he could mine at any time, Li Fan naturally cared about its well-being at all times.
Hearing Li Fan address him as "Brother," goosebumps broke out all over the avatar.
Startled, he scrambled up from the ground and hurriedly insisted he was fine.
Only then did Li Fan nod in relief.
"With your Numerical Reduction array as a reference, my confidence in helping you break free has grown by several measures."
"Without further delay, I shall make contact and begin preparations at once."
"Stay here and do not wander off, lest any mishap occur," Li Fan instructed.
The avatar had intended to travel the mortal world and experience human nature anyway, so staying in this mortal city posed no issue at all; he nodded in agreement.
After discussing potential complications and further details, Li Fan paused just before departing and suddenly asked, "Brother, do you have any token of identification?"
"Mirror Keeper Cang helped you create this human avatar, so he should be trustworthy, right? On this trip, I might be able to get in touch with him and gain another hand to aid us."
Chapter 1004