Won Over

"Hall Master Yaoguang..." Fang Jinxue stepped forward to greet him, but Yaoguang merely waved a hand at him. Relying on his astral force field, he rose into the air and looked out over the numerous formation masters and artifact refiners, his voice carrying effortlessly across a radius of over a thousand meters around the skyport. "You are all professionals when it comes to sky-patrol warships. A few days of research may not be enough for you to fully understand the *Spring Rain*, but I trust it has given you a working foundation. At the very least, activating its major formations should be well within your capabilities." With that, he offered no further explanation. "Now, I want you to fully activate the defensive formations, amplification formations, reinforcement formations, and sensory formations on this sky-patrol warship. Before researching the warship itself, you must know how to activate and deactivate every single formation like the back of your hand... even when only one or a few people are assigned to manage a given formation. After all, when a sky-patrol warship sets out on a campaign, it cannot carry large numbers of formation masters and artifact refiners." Though the artifact refiners and formation masters were unsure what Yaoguang intended to do, they exchanged glances and scattered toward the formations in which they specialized. They might not be capable of piloting the warship, but merely activating its numerous formations posed no problem. As the formation masters and artifact refiners took their positions, defensive formations, amplification formations, reinforcement formations, sensory formations, and attack formations began to glow one after another. Though the process was somewhat slow, over six thousand formation masters across the research institute were bustling around the warship. With anywhere from a few to a dozen or more assigned to each formation, they managed to activate the numerous formations and refined components within ten minutes. Fang Jinxue glanced at Yaoguang. The formations were about to come fully online, yet Yaoguang... In the next second, Yaoguang made his move. His body remained completely still. He merely extended his divine mind, pushing it slowly forward. His divine mind possessed a hint of the properties of divine sense, allowing it to influence external matter. Although its force was not immense, as it swept across, the glowing light stirred up by the nearest formation trembled and abruptly dimmed away. Fang Jinxue recognized it at a glance. Yaoguang had disrupted the operational flow of the formation, causing the people activating it to fail. And the failure of that single formation was merely the beginning. As Yaoguang's divine mind continued to spread, every formation it touched wavered and went dark without exception. This trembling and shutting down originated from Yaoguang, then rippled across the entire sky-patrol warship with unbelievable speed. Realizing what was happening, Fang Jinxue's eyes widened in sheer disbelief. To suppress the activation of a formation using only a "divine mind," which possessed minimal ability to interact with external matter... The level of formation mastery displayed here could only be described as miraculous. What was more, he was suppressing not one or two formations, but hundreds, even thousands. "How can this be!?" Fang Jinxue murmured under his breath. He was not the only one. The formation masters and artifact refiners operating the formations were equally stunned upon sensing what Yaoguang was doing. Several rank-six formation masters with exceptionally profound mastery exerted every ounce of effort to bring their assigned formations online, but in the end... Yaoguang still disrupted the critical nodes, causing the activations to fail and the light to fade. In just ten minutes, the radiant glow that had bathed the sky-patrol warship was entirely snuffed out. This speed was barely slower than the time it had taken thousands of people to partially activate the formations. In an instant... The thousands of formation masters and artifact refiners across the area fell completely silent. What had just happened!? Hall Master Yaoguang... Had he single-handedly suppressed their efforts to activate the formations across the *Spring Rain* sky-patrol warship? If Yaoguang had overwhelmed them with brute martial force to keep them away from the formations, that would have been one thing. The crux of the matter was... He had disrupted their activations purely through his superior understanding of formations, causing their attempts to fail. What did that mean!? It meant Hall Master Yaoguang had defeated every single person present based solely on his understanding of formations. A single individual had bested over six thousand formation masters and artifact refiners in his grasp of this warship. How... How was that possible!? After shutting down every formation, Yaoguang withdrew his divine mind and said calmly, "As formation masters, ensuring that every formation on a sky-patrol warship can activate smoothly is paramount. Therefore..." Yaoguang waved a hand through the empty air, conjuring a countdown timer of 900 seconds. "You have fifteen minutes to activate the formations." Shaken to the core, the formation masters and artifact refiners exchanged looks, their gazes settling back upon Yaoguang. At this moment, not a shred of arrogance or skepticism remained in their eyes; instead, they were filled with profound awe and conviction. The highest-ranking rank-six formation masters understood better than anyone just how difficult this feat truly was. Among the more than six thousand masters and refiners, their specialties spanned all disciplines, each possessing their own unique expertise. Yet before Yaoguang, they could not even manage to activate the formations they knew best. Such a disparity... Could scarcely be described as the difference between heaven and earth. "Continue," Yaoguang urged, his voice echoing in their ears. The crowd looked at one another. Someone stepped forward after all, quickly hurrying over to the formation they excelled at and channeling every ounce of concentration into bringing it online. Seeing this, whether out of pride, duty, or a desire to test Yaoguang's limits, the others threw themselves into activating their chosen formations as well. Before long, the radiance of activating formations lit up once more, consuming massive amounts of spirit stones. Fifteen minutes was enough for some of the formations to finish activating. Yet even after bringing them successfully online, the formation masters dared not relax in the slightest, scrupulously checking for any flaws in their operational arrays. However... Even with so much effort poured in, the outcome remained the same. As Yaoguang's divine mind swept past, vast swathes of formations began to wink out once more. Certain rank-six formation masters not only brought their formations online but guarded them with everything they had, rendering Yaoguang's divine mind unable to disrupt them directly. However... A sky-patrol warship was always an integrated whole, never a collection of isolated parts. Even if an individual formation could not be disrupted, Yaoguang disrupted the surrounding arrays to trigger an "avalanche." Under the weight of the cascading collapse, even if a formation resisted his divine mind, it still faded away as the neighboring formations went dark. With Yaoguang delivering a gentle finishing strike... In less than ten minutes once again, the formations glowing across the *Spring Rain* were extinguished in their entirety. "Perhaps I can give you another twenty minutes. If that is not enough, thirty minutes will do as well," Yaoguang said again. The formation masters looked at one another in silence. Finally, several of the most senior, highest-ranked formation masters stepped forward, smiling wryly. "There is no need. The gap in formation mastery between us and Hall Master Yaoguang cannot be expressed in words. We yield completely." "To master so many formations at once... could he be... someone born with innate knowledge?" "I used to believe it impossible for anyone to master every formation. The discipline is simply too complex and vast. Even the greatest prodigy could never have enough energy to span every subfield of formations. After all, I was recognized as a prodigy in the eyes of the world, but only upon seeing Hall Master Yaoguang today did I truly understand what it means to look at the sky from the bottom of a well!" The other senior formation masters nodded in deep agreement. As for the ordinary formation masters, they now looked upon Yaoguang as though gazing at a god. "I see." Yaoguang's eyes swept over them one by one. "It seems none of you have any further objections to me overseeing the research, development, and construction of our sky-patrol warships." "With Lord Yaoguang directing the warship refining, how could our Nine Cauldrons Sect ever fail to build our own sky-patrol warships!" Fang Jinxue hurried forward, responding with fervent enthusiasm. "Indeed! Not only can we build our own sky-patrol warships, but by studying the technology aboard the *Spring Rain*, we can even bypass first-generation warships entirely and forge second-generation sky-patrol warships directly!" Other formation masters chimed in eagerly. Having witnessed Yaoguang's prowess with their own eyes, their confidence was fully bolstered. However... "How could second-generation sky-patrol warships be enough? If we are to build them, we will build third-generation warships straight away," Yaoguang said bluntly. At those words, the formation masters and artifact refiners froze. This... Right now, the Nine Cauldrons Sect did not even possess the capability to manufacture a first-generation sky-patrol warship. Leaping over first-generation warships to forge second-generation ones was already a daring vision—an attempt to overtake rivals on a sharp curve. Yet Hall Master Yaoguang went further, intending to directly build third-generation warships that represented the pinnacle of Cangwu! Before the others could speak, those with quicker wits considered Yaoguang's comprehensive mastery of both formations and artifact refining, as well as the string of miracles his Zixiao Institute had produced... Especially Fang Jinxue. He was the first to solemnly cup his hands and declare, "The Third Sky-Patrol Research Institute is ready to spare no effort in assisting Hall Master Yaoguang to achieve this goal!" The others voiced their heartfelt submission as well: "We await Hall Master Yaoguang's orders." "If we can truly forge a third-generation sky-patrol warship... even if I were to die that very day, I would smile in the underworld." "Hahaha, then let us follow Hall Master Yaoguang and give it our all! Though I am advanced in years, my blood has not grown cold. I am still willing to contribute every last bit of my light and heat toward forging our sky-patrol warships!" Pledges and endorsements rang out from all sides. Yaoguang glanced at the crowd and nodded slightly. Their morale was ready to be harnessed. He wasted no time, assigning preliminary tasks one after another. The key to refining a sky-patrol warship lay in having someone who could oversee the entire system, ensuring that the myriad formations and artifact components functioned in harmony. Only after resolving that integration could the layout of formations and refined components follow. The primary formations of a third-generation sky-patrol warship were all rank-six three-star formations. The top formation masters present did not lack the strength to handle them; now, it came down to whether Yaoguang could draw out every ounce of their potential. ... As the entire Third Sky-Patrol Research Institute bustled with feverish activity, the construction of the Nine Cauldrons Sect's first third-generation sky-patrol warship finally was put on track. As for Yaoguang... While coordinating the Third Sky-Patrol Research Institute, he did not completely abandon his work at Zixiao Institute or his teaching and optimization of the Spirit Gathering Formation. However, affected by the demands of the Third Sky-Patrol Research Institute, his efficiency in those areas inevitably slowed. Even so, as the warship refining reached its one-year mark, Zixiao Institute finally completed the delivery of the first batch of six hundred upgraded Zixiao-15 flying swords. The transaction involving the spirit treasure Hunyuan Bell was formally concluded.