The long table in the meditation room was piled with half a foot of yellowed paper. These weren’t cultivation method manuals or secret texts, but rather the Repair Hall’s accumulated “Formation Accident Reports” and various rubbings of discarded formation plates.

Three days ago, that Formation Peak genius, Luo Feng, had personally come to the Repair Hall under the pretext of “verifying a batch of training formation plates.”

After the handover was complete and the crowd had dispersed, he seemingly casually strolled to Su Ming’s side. His fingertip quickly traced a few obscure structural nodes on the tabletop with spiritual energy, his voice dropping extremely low:

“Hundred Refinements Peak, Examiner is Shishu Zhang. This person has a fiery temper, despises trickery the most, and uniquely loves this formation’s uprightness and its method of overwhelming with momentum. Throughout all previous exam questions, despite myriad changes, they never stray from this core. Do well for yourself.”

With that, Luo Feng flicked his sleeve as if nothing had happened and drifted away.

Combined with the fragmented information Wang Defa had pried from the old clerks at the External Affairs Hall about Zhang Lie’s preferences, this became the starting point for the deduction diagram in Su Ming’s hands. This information was probably only known to him and Luo Feng at the moment.

Su Ming pinched a specially made, extremely fine charcoal pencil in his hand and drew a heavy red circle on a sketch depicting complex formation lines.

“Master, according to the information from Luo Feng, plus the hints Steward Wang managed to dig up, this Examiner Zhang has a ‘fiery temper’.” Su Ming lightly tapped the red circle with his fingertip. “What he’s most skilled at, and what he most enjoys setting up in assessments, are variant questions based on the ‘Nine-Curve Solar Yang Formation’.”

“Nine-Curve Solar Yang Formation…”

Lin Yu’s voice echoed in the Consciousness Sea, carrying a hint of nonchalance. “Sounds intimidating by name. Its characteristics are fast initiation, high burst damage, and this formation has nine energy loops, one nested within another. If you mess up just one part slightly, the entire formation will collapse like dominoes, incidentally blasting the problem-solver into a dusty mess.”

Su Ming gave a slight nod, his charcoal pencil quickly sketching nine intertwined curves on the paper, representing the trajectories of spiritual energy flow.

“Steward Wang says this Steward Zhang has a stubborn, self-willed personality and hates people cutting corners the most. In past assessments, anyone who used ‘tricky’ methods to break formations, even if they succeeded, didn’t get high scores. He likes to see that kind of… head-on, brute-force solution.”

“Head-on brute force?” Lin Yu snorted with a laugh. “Using your head to smash against a rock, that’s recklessness. Disciple, we are technicians, not a demolition crew.”

The corner of Su Ming’s mouth lifted slightly. He didn’t argue, just took another sheet of paper from the side, densely covered with the ninety basic runes he currently mastered.

“I’m not planning to go head-on with him either. I only have these ninety basic runes in hand right now, and most of them are defensive, guiding, or stabilizing types. Trying to directly clash with an offensive grand formation designed by a Foundation Establishment formation master would be suicide.”

Su Ming spread that rune chart flat next to the formation diagram, his gaze becoming deep and sharp. “What I need to do is ‘follow the momentum’.”

“That’s more like it.” Lin Yu perked up. “He likes ‘Solar Yang’, right? When a fire’s momentum is great, what does it fear most? Not water, but ‘chaos’. If a fire’s momentum loses its guidance, it can burn itself out. Your ‘Like Water Art’ is most adept at infiltration and guidance.”

Su Ming lifted his pen and lightly drew a tangent line at the third loop node of the “Nine-Curve Solar Yang Formation”.

“Here, this is the essential path for spiritual energy acceleration.” Su Ming murmured to himself, as if entering some kind of deduction state. “If I implant three ‘Slow’ character runes here, combined with a ‘Flow Split’ structure…”

“Three isn’t enough.” Lin Yu immediately pointed out. “The spiritual pressure of the Nine-Curve Solar Yang is very high; three ‘Slow’ characters would be instantly overwhelmed. You should use a ‘Vortex’ structure, turning the directly rushing spiritual energy into a whirlpool. Just like how we guided spiritual energy in the ancient well, let it spin on its own, consuming its own kinetic energy.”

Su Ming’s eyes lit up. The charcoal pencil in his hand swiftly danced, transforming the originally sharp, direct lines into gentle spirals.

“With this, although the fiery energy is vigorous, it remains pent up and doesn’t release. Once it accumulates to the critical point, I just give a light nudge at the ‘pressure release port’ at the end of the formation…”

“Boom!” Lin Yu provided a sound effect. “That Examiner Zhang’s face will probably be darker than a pot bottom.”

Su Ming put down the charcoal pencil and rubbed his slightly throbbing temples.

This was only the first step.

Tactical deduction was certainly important, but more crucial were the “cards” in his hand.

He turned to look at the antique shelf behind him. There, displayed were the fruits of his “standardized operations” during his time at the Repair Hall—a pile of seemingly unremarkable, yet actually meticulously fine-tuned formation modules.

“Master Lin assists with calculations, the ‘Like Water Art’ provides fine control, plus these…” Su Ming casually picked up a “Universal Voltage Stabilizer Plate” only the size of a palm. “This is my trump card.”

This voltage stabilizer plate was his improvement, combining Lin Yu’s concept of an “electrical circuit voltage stabilizer” with the cultivation world’s “Spirit Solidification Formation”. It had no offensive power, and its defensive capability wasn’t strong either. Its only characteristic was—extreme stability, and compatibility with the spiritual energy interfaces of the vast majority of first-order formations.

“Ordinary people breaking formations think about how to dismantle the opponent’s moves. My line of thinking is to turn the opponent’s formation into my formation.” Su Ming rubbed his thumb over the cold metal texture, his eyes revealing a confidence named “control”.

“What do you call this move?” Lin Yu asked with a laugh.

“The cuckoo occupying the magpie’s nest.” Su Ming said calmly.

For the next few days, Courtyard D-7 was completely sealed off.

He no longer practiced new runes. Instead, he took those ninety long-mastered basic runes, broke them apart, kneaded them into pieces, and recombined them.

The “Gathering” character didn’t necessarily have to be used for gathering spiritual energy; carving it in reverse produced the “Disperse” character that generated repulsive force.

If the “Flow” character was combined with high-frequency vibration, it could serve to cut spiritual energy flows.

If the “Solidify” character was used at the opponent’s key spiritual energy circulation nodes, it became the most annoying “lag”.

Discarded drafts piled up like snowflakes throughout the room, only to be incinerated into ash by Su Ming using spiritual fire.

Until late at night on the ninth day.

Su Ming stopped all movement.

On the long table before him, only a single blank sheet of paper remained.

The paper was empty, without a single word.

He closed his eyes. In his Consciousness Sea, countless complex lines, runes, and nodes converged like a hundred rivers returning to the sea, ultimately transforming into a calm, waveless expanse of deep blue water.

Beneath the water’s surface, undercurrents surged, yet remained orderly and systematic.

“How do you feel?” Lin Yu asked.

“I have a clear grasp in my heart.” Su Ming opened his eyes, his gaze clear, showing no trace of fatigue. “No matter what question he sets, as long as it doesn’t exceed the scope of basic formations, despite myriad changes, they never stray from the core.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep