Chapter Twelve: Pre-setting of Arrays

Zhen Nantian kept watching Huo Zun’s expression. From it, he could tell that Huo Zun indeed had a way to improve the efficiency of artifact crafting at Juehuo Peak, so he was eager to know the specifics.
“Hurry up and tell me!” Zhen Nantian urged anxiously.
Seeing that Zhen Nantian was truly anxious, Huo Zun stopped teasing him and said with a smile, “Fat guy, the twenty array jade slabs you gave me are all simple arrays—those used to craft low-grade immortal artifacts. So, I’m sure the artifact crafting tasks assigned to Juehuo Peak are all related to low-grade immortal artifacts. Now, I have a method to improve the efficiency of crafting them. Go apply to the sect for some primordial copper ore; I’ll need it a lot.”
The arrays given by Zhen Nantian to Huo Zun were indeed low-level, which made sense. After all, Juehuo Peak ranked low among all the peaks in Tongzhou Hall and naturally didn’t receive advanced arrays. Moreover, even if Juehuo Peak had arrays at the Earth Immortal level, Zhen Nantian wouldn’t have given them to Huo Zun—these were the foundation of Tongzhou Hall and couldn’t be handed out casually.
Zhen Nantian was puzzled, unable to understand why Huo Zun needed primordial copper ore.
“Huo Zun, primordial copper ore is abundant on various planets in the Immortal Realm. It’s just an ordinary ore that can only be used to craft immortal artifacts below the level of three-star Human Soul Immortals,” Zhen Nantian reminded him, utterly confused.
Huo Zun nodded and said, “I know.”
Zhen Nantian stared at him in shock, still unable to figure out what Huo Zun intended.
“Alright, you want primordial copper ore, right? Juehuo Peak already has it. Show me how it relates to improving our artifact crafting efficiency,” Zhen Nantian declared, staring intently at Huo Zun.
Judging from his expression, it seemed he was ready to swallow Huo Zun if he couldn’t explain the connection between primordial copper ore and efficiency.
Huo Zun smiled, stood up, and said, “Fat guy, take me to the material warehouse. I’ll demonstrate it for you.”
Without wasting time, Zhen Nantian took off immediately, leading the way to Juehuo Peak’s material warehouse.
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On Juehuo Peak, many disciples without any crafting tasks gathered together. They had already heard that Peak Master Zhen Nantian had brought back the legendary Huo Zun. Thus, these disciples, who had been discussing Huo Zun for a year, gathered with great interest, eager to see him and discover what talents he possessed to earn such attention from the peak master.

“I’ve already heard that Fire Lord, in his cultivation space, spent just one year to advance from a one-star Human Soul Immortal to a four-star Human Soul Immortal.”
“No way—is that even human? That’s monstrous! Does Fire Lord possess some extraordinary cultivation talent?”
“What’s even stranger is that the Peak Master took Fire Lord back to his own cultivation room, and he still hasn’t come out. Could it be that Fire Lord has already mastered all the formations?”
“That’s impossible! Mastering all the formations of our Extreme Fire Peak in just one year? I’ll never believe it.”
“Anyway, this Fire Lord is too mysterious. Let’s go and take a look at him together…”
Around five hundred disciples of Extreme Fire Peak flew toward the Peak Master’s Pavilion like a flock of birds, eager to meet Fire Lord.
By this time, Zhen Nantian and Fire Lord had already reached the sky.
“Peak Master!”
As soon as the five hundred disciples in the sky saw Zhen Nantian, they shouted in unison.
Zhen Nantian didn’t even glance at them. Impatiently, he waved his hand and roared, “Go do what you need to do. Don’t disturb me and Fire Lord on such important matters. If you waste my time any longer, I’ll strip you naked.”
Immediately afterward, Zhen Nantian accelerated and landed at the foot of Extreme Fire Peak.
Fire Lord remained calmly smiling, not even glancing at the disciples, before landing right beside Zhen Nantian.
In the sky, the five hundred disciples were stunned, too shocked to speak, their eyes filled with disbelief at what had just happened.
Had the Peak Master rejected us?
The five hundred disciples, who had come full of enthusiasm, were now faced with such a blow and were completely dumbfounded.
At this point, they finally realized one thing: there was a huge gap between them and this newcomer.
※※※
Zhen Nantian led Fire Lord into the material warehouse.
The material warehouse was a huge underground cave with many chambers filled with various materials used for crafting weapons. However, the quality of these materials was quite low—mostly just materials suitable for creating lower-grade immortal weapons.
As Fire Lord moved around, his immortal sense scanned through them, quickly determining their quality. Of course, Qu Yi had obtained the Emperor of Heaven’s space ring in the Vast Heaven Immortal Mansion, which contained countless materials, most of which were of higher quality than those in this warehouse. Thus, Fire Lord showed no surprise at all after just a quick scan with his immortal sense.
Zhen Nantian, of course, kept an eye on Fire Lord. Seeing his calm expression in this vast warehouse, he felt waves of emotion once again.

“All the new disciples who come to the Peak of Absolute Fire can’t help but marvel at the vastness and abundance of materials in the material repository when they enter it. Yet Fire Lord remains completely calm, as if he has seen countless high-grade materials before—truly unfathomable,” Zhen Nantian thought to himself, then led Fire Lord to a cave.

“Fire Lord, this cave contains Yuan Copper ore,” Zhen Nantian said with a smile.

Fire Lord nodded, stepped to the entrance of the cave, and with a gesture of his right hand, ten pieces of Yuan Copper ore flew out and landed inside his space ring.

“Fatso, let’s go to the Purple Flaming Sky Fire Caves. I’ll show you how to refine weapons efficiently,” Fire Lord said calmly with a smile.

Zhen Nantian’s eyes lit up, and he smiled. He immediately took off and led Fire Lord to the Purple Flaming Sky Fire Caves beneath the Peak of Absolute Fire.

Purple Flaming Sky Fire is a true fire inherent in the bodies of immortals. Naturally, there are eighteen such caves in this range of purple volcanoes. Later, the founder of the Tongzhou Hall arranged arrays to stabilize, guide, and control this fire for use in weapon refinement.

Now, Zhen Nantian had brought Fire Lord to the Purple Flaming Sky Fire Caves underground.

The cave was only about ten meters wide. In the center of the flat ground lay a square platform, with a palm-sized circular hole in the middle, from which purple Purple Flaming Sky Fire continuously erupted.

Around the cave’s corners, there were also some materials—precisely those needed for a weapon refinement task on the Peak of Absolute Fire.

“Fatso, what kind of immortal weapon will these materials be used to create?” Fire Lord asked with a smile.

Zhen Nantian replied calmly, “The Wolf-Throwing Spear!”

The Wolf-Throwing Spear is a low-grade immortal weapon crafted by certain cultivation sects to train their disciples. These disciples use it to attack evil wolves and demons.

Fire Lord nodded, then waved his hand, causing the materials in the corners to fly out—exactly the materials and quantities required to refine the Wolf-Throwing Spear.

“Fatso, watch carefully,” Fire Lord said with a smile, then focused on demonstrating his weapon refinement skills.

Zhen Nantian didn’t respond, just watched intently.

※※※

Instead of immediately refining the materials for the Wolf-Throwing Spears, Fire Lord first wrapped the Yuan Copper ore in immortal energy and placed it all into the Purple Flaming Sky Fire to melt it. Then he refined the Yuan Copper ore, purifying it endlessly and removing all impurities.

A ball-like piece of elemental copper rolled on top of the Purple Flaming Sky Fire. Suddenly, the Fire Lord waved his hand, causing the copper ball to fly away from the fire and form a thin, rectangular sheet resembling paper made of elemental copper. In an instant, the Fire Lord swiftly moved his hands, emitting streams of immortal energy to arrange the “Sharp Edge Formation” on the copper sheet. Arranging a formation on an object meant using immortal energy to engrave patterns, focal points, and other elements onto it. This way, once a cultivator held the immortal weapon and channeled immortal energy into it, they could activate the internal formation and unleash its power. Quickly, the Fire Lord engraved over a dozen identical “Sharp Edge Formations” on the copper sheet before stopping. Under Zhen Nan Tian’s astonished gaze, the Fire Lord took out a lower-grade immortal weapon, the Fire Soaring Sword, and divided the copper sheet into more than a dozen pieces, each containing a complete “Sharp Edge Formation.” Then, he wrapped all the raw materials for the wolf-throwing spear in immortal energy and placed them over the Purple Flaming Sky Fire to melt and purify them, resulting in a uniform mixture. Soon after, the Fire Lord inserted the copper sheets into the mixed material and rapidly shaped it into a spear-like core. Once the core was formed, he threw it out of the Purple Flaming Sky Fire and into the Clear Refreshing Spring to complete the tempering process. Watching this, Zhen Nan Tian was extremely surprised—was this considered successful weapon crafting? Normal weapon crafting involved tempering materials, shaping, arranging formations, and tempering. But what Zhen Nan Tian had just witnessed was that the Fire Lord first recorded the formation on the copper sheet before proceeding with tempering, shaping, and tempering. Arranging the formation had been separated into its own step. “Fatty, try this wolf-throwing spear and see what its power is like,” the Fire Lord said with a smile at Zhen Nan Tian. With a flick of his right hand, Zhen Nan Tian retrieved the spear from the spring and, by channeling immortal energy, saw a cold glint shoot from its tip. The glint, like a spear point, split the ground, creating a crack of unknown depth. “This… its power is the same as those spearheads I made before,” Zhen Nan Tian exclaimed in astonishment. The Fire Lord laughed loudly and said, “Fatty, you’ve seen the whole process. I think you should understand by now.” Hearing this, Zhen Nan Tian immediately shook his head vigorously and shouted, “Fire Lord, what method is this? I can’t figure it out. Just tell me directly!” The Fire Lord’s method of weapon crafting had already overturned the traditional ways in the immortal realm, and Zhen Nan Tian truly couldn’t understand the reason.

Fire Venerable smiled faintly and stopped keeping things mysterious. He said, “Yuan copper ore may seem like just a low-grade material for refining, but it has a special property: an extremely high degree of compatibility, allowing it to blend with many other refining materials. The method I used just now is called pre-setting the formation, which involves engraving the formation into the yuan copper slab in advance, then letting the slab be tempered and fused with other materials. As a result, the formation also changes shape and merges perfectly with the core of the artifact to form a single entity.”
“Pre-setting the formation…” Zhen Nantian kept repeating those words.