Chapter 779 Departure
As one of the few saber sects on the Divine Central Continent, they had a unique advantage in their understanding of the Saber Tao. The sect’s saberwomen, including the Leader of the Saber-drawing Sect, had been practicing and living with the saber all their lives. Although they had not mastered the hundreds of ancient saber manuals on the Saber Tower, they did know quite a few saber techniques.
They could obviously practice the 24 Moves of the Saber Technique.
These beautiful women would be the most suitable recipients of the saber manual.
Ding Hao was never a dog in the manger.
Besides his personal secrets, he was always happy to share with others what he had learned. Of course, that person must be a suitable person of integrity.
To Ding Hao’s surprise, he had exchanged the 24 Moves of the Saber Technique for the Saber-drawing Sect’s Superlative Raging Saber. It was an unexpected gift, but Ding Hao did not reject it like a pedant.
After leaving the Saber-drawing Sect, Ding Hao went to the array eyes of Tianyuan City’s defensive formation. With what he had learned and with his magic crystals, he repaired and consolidated the defense formation, as guided by the Saber Master and the Sword Master.
Even if the Demon Clan were to attack again, it would take more than ten days or half a month to break down this enhanced formation, unless they had an absolute master at the peak Saint Realm helping them.
After completing the consolidation, Ding Hao returned to the inn.
He had done all he could, to the best of his abilities. The fate of Tianyuan City would have to depend on the Human Clan members defending it. The Super Divine Hall would not sit idly by, and the Human Clan of the Central Region would also retaliate. He had to hurry back to Snow Province in the Northern Region.
Not long after Ding Hao left, the four Emperor-level saberwomen from the Saber-drawing Sect also arrived at the array eye of the defense formation. They had brought an expert of their sect to repair the formation.
“What? Ding Hao has already repaired this formation…?”
Hearing the defense guards’ report, the four beautiful Emperor-level saberwomen exchanged glances again.
“What? How is this possible?” A male inscription master from the Saber-drawing Sect asked in surprise.
Then he complained somewhat. “He’s not an inscription formation master. How could you, the disciples guarding the formation, allow an outsider to mess around with this formation? If something goes wrong with the City Defensive Array, who should get the blame?”
The inscription master who spoke looked very young. Beardless and fair-faced, he was dressed in a white robe, a scholar’s square scarf on his thick black hair. He looked handsome and quite refined.
The disciples of the Saber-drawing Sect who practiced the saber were all females. However, there were also external departments such as the weapon-forging house, the inscription house, and the elixir-refining house. Most of the disciples in those departments were male.
The young Inscriptionist who spoke was the chief Inscription master of the House of Inscription. He was of high status, and his name was Lu Yuanshan.
Lu Yuanshan was a das.h.i.+ng and promising young master. Learned in inscription formations, he was also one of the most influential figures of Tianyuan City, conceited and still single. He was in love with Empress Flower, the first of the Four Emperor-level Saberwomen of the Inner Chamber. Unfortunately, he had not succeeded in winning her heart.
Ding Hao’s appearance made the ambitious Lu Yuanshan feel vaguely threatened.
He had to admit that Ding Hao was more outstanding and talented than him.
Especially today, when he saw the faces of the Four Emperor-level Saberwomen when they mentioned Ding Hao’s name, Lu Yuanshan felt a little indignant inside. He took this opportunity to reprimand the defense guards, when in fact, he was actually criticizing Ding Hao.
The disciples guarding the formation did not dare to say anything.
“Let’s not be too busy blaming them. Master Lu, please check if there are any changes in the formation inscriptions,” said Empress Flower thoughtfully.
Hearing his beloved speak, Lu Yuanshan nodded with a smile. “All right, I’ll go over and check the formation. I hope Ding Hao didn’t do too much mischief. If he unwittingly damages the formation, it won’t recover its full power in just a day or two.”
After that, he turned around to check.
The Four Emperor-level Saberwomen stared at one other, suppressing their guesses and curiosity, as they waited quietly for the result.
After about 15 minutes, they heard Lu Yuanshan’s angry and indignant cry from a distance—
“Is this a joke? How can he modify the 62 inscriptions like that? Ridiculous! An utter farce!”
“And here…”
“Here…”
“This Ding Hao doesn’t understand inscription formations at all. The City Defensive Array is finished!”
“We must modify it back… Huh? What happened?”
Lu Yuanshan’s shocked voice resounded again in everyone’s ears. He seemed to have discovered something suddenly. The angry curses faded away. There was an incredible gasp in his voice.
Then his voice died away…
The Four Emperor-level Saberwomen waited, but Lu Yuanshan did not come back. In the end, they had to enter the array eye to find out what was going on.
Light swirled in front of them as they entered the array eye.
Lu Yuanshan was lying on the ground, sweat all over his head. His face was flushed crimson, and he seemed to be calculating something. His luxurious white robe was caked with dust. He was clearly so engrossed that he did not notice anyone around him.
The ground in the array eye was securely paved with heavy yellow stones.
There were complicated motifs engraved on these stones. They were inscription patterns. At first glance, they were like billowing sea waves, dense and complicated. Warriors of low strength would feel faint and even pa.s.s out glancing at them.
Seeing Lu Yuanshan, a man with a mania for cleanliness, wildly gesticulating like he was calculating something, heedless of the dust on his body, the four beauties were all stunned.
A long while later…
“It’s impossible. How could it be? Not possible…!”
Lu Yuanshan sat down, his b.u.t.t on the ground. He did not care about his image at all. His face pale, he muttered to himself in a daze. His facial expression could not hide the great shock in his heart.
“Master Lu, what happened?” asked Empress Flower with a frown.
Looking at his expression, the beautiful saberwomen thought there were major loopholes in the formation. Ding Hao had damaged the defense s.h.i.+eld that had acc.u.mulated in Tianyuan City for thousands of years. It was surely a terrible blunder. Instinctively, she thought of how to help Ding Hao out with an excuse…
At this moment, Lu Yuanshan smiled bitterly and said, “I have to admit I’m not as good as Ding Hao! The power of this enhanced formation is many times stronger than the last complete one. What’s even more terrifying is that after Ding Hao’s enhancements, the activated formation will consume less than 1% of what it used to consume! With the crystals now stored in Tianyuan City, this formation can last for another three months!”
“What?”
Everyone was stunned.
Lu Yuanshan stood up in a daze, staggering out of the formation and muttering to himself, “I have been practicing inscriptions for decades, and thought myself an extraordinary prodigy, to have reached the eighth grade as an Inscriptionist before I was 50. I thought I was already the most brilliant of geniuses! Yet I am far surpa.s.sed by the Saber and Sword Addict… I’m not good enough… and far, far below him!”
It was easy to imagine how shocked and frustrated a conceited, confident person would be, when suddenly confronted by another talent far surpa.s.sing himself.
Empress Flower opened her mouth and was about to say something, but decided to hold her tongue.
The four beautiful saberwomen’s faces had begun to turn numb from the repeated shocks. That peerless genius from the Northern Region had tested them so much psychologically today.
Just when they were about to return to the Saber-drawing Sect and report the happy news to the leader of the sect—
“Hahaha, even if I’m now inferior to him, so what? I still have time on my side, and can still study and cultivate. Haha, how did Ding Hao do it? Let me take a good look…”
Lu Yuanshan ran back like a madman.
He looked radiant and energetic, unlike his former crestfallen self. Like a fierce dog pouncing on its prey, he dashed back to the modified inscription formation and studied it carefully.
The moment when he turned to leave, Lu Yuanshan suddenly understood something.
It was not frightening to see someone stronger than yourself.
What was terrible was yourself giving up the effort to pursue the man.
Moreover, the inscription formations that Ding Hao had modified were really fatally attractive to him. They were like lethal poisons he could not give up.
The four saberwomen smiled at one other.
Although Lu Yuanshan had a bad temper and was a little conceited, he was sometimes really quite adorable.
Ding Hao left Tianyuan City that night.
He did not bid goodbye to the disciples of the Saber-Drawing Sect. Instead, he asked Evil Moon to take the Superlative Raging Saber manual back to the sect.
By the time the Four Emperor-level Saberwomen and the Leader of the Saber-drawing Sect found out about his departure, Ding Hao and Tianshu had already left Tianyuan City.
Ding Hao finally reached Qian City through the s.p.a.ce gate.
It was the largest Human city in Qian Province.
Qian City had also been attacked by the Demon Clan, but the Human Sage experts in Qian City were far more numerous than those in Tianyuan City. Helped by the fact that they had a large population with countless experts, their long-acc.u.mulated resources and strength far exceeded those of Tianyuan City. Hence, the Demon Clan’s siege did not pose much of a threat. On the contrary, they managed to toss down hundreds of thousands of Demon corpses and defeat the Demon army!
But the moment Ding Hao walked out of the s.p.a.ce gate, he could still sense the tense atmosphere in Qian City. It was clearly different from how it used to be.
Soldiers clad in st.u.r.dy armors patrolled the streets, while many martial artists of major sects maintained order in the city. All suspicious people were thoroughly inspected, in case the masters of the Demon Clan had disguised themselves as Humans and sneaked into the city in an attempt to destroy them.
Ding Hao also heard some news.
Qian City was already preparing to send an army of reinforcements, led by five Martial Sage experts, to Tianyuan City. It included 40 Super Divine Guards.
It made Ding Hao somewhat relieved.
While waiting for the s.p.a.ce gate to open, Ding Hao asked around and obtained a lot of information. According to the information he collected, there was a rupture in relations between the Human Clan and the Demon Clan on the Divine Central Continent. The two Clans had dissolved the Primitive Alliance Treaty, and the situation in the Northern Region was also not optimistic. The Demon Clan was said to have exterminated many sects there…
This undoubtedly made Ding Hao even more anxious.