by Fang Xiang
But in the eyes of Zuo Mo who liked to make sneak attacks, this large formation was not so safe.
People that like to make sneak attacks usually were the ones that guarded against sneak attacks the most, Zuo Mo patiently examined the defensive formation of Turtle Island. Bases and patrols were the territory of Lil’ Miss, but formations, only Zuo Mo could do this.
In Zuo Mo’s eyes, this [Yinyang Cloud Thunder Formation] was grandiose but was not useful, and only had a good appearance. It seemed to appear powerful, but if it encountered a strong enemy, it would likely collapse. The person who had set up the formation clearly did not have good intentions. He had left a few backdoors inside the formation. The muddle-headed Ren Family had not detected it, but how could it escape the fiery eyes of Zuo Mo?
Zuo Mo did not erase the backdoors, and instead used them as bait. He slightly modified the formation scripts near the dark doors. The dark doors did not look any different than before, but if the other entered through the backdoor, hee hee … …
Zuo Mo had an evil smile.
Of course, this wasn’t enough. In his eyes, the [Yinyang Cloud Thunder Formation] could only act as a thin shell, and was far from a sturdy turtle shell.
They had to live up to the name!
With this thought, Zuo Mo started a major project.
To increase the power of the [Yinyang Cloud Thunder Formation], Zuo Mo planted that
Sonic Lightning Walnut tree at the heart of the formation. The fourth-grade Sonic Lightning Walnut tree was not as valuable as it was in the past, but it was a lightning wood element material. Placed in the center of the formation, it could greatly increase the power of the large formation.
Other than this, Golden Crow Camp that was targeting the Fiery Yang Cave was pulled over by Zuo Mo to be manual laborers.
Golden Crow Fire took over the island. The burning flames illuminated half of the sky, causing the nearby cloud islands to become nervous. Without exception, they all raised their island formations in fear they would be attacked.
The xiuzhe that had remained on the island were dumbstruck upon seeing such a scene. The ling plant farmers that had started to formed plans to leave and became slightly restless ending those thoughts of leaving.
There was only one thought in their minds.
People with knowledge were everywhere. Someone instantly recognized the fourth-grade Golden Crow Fire. When the news spread, everyone was filled with motivation!
——Holy, how many pieces of jingshi would this be!
That number of jingshi would be enough to buy all of Xu Ling City. The production xiuzhe on the island were mostly local xiuzhe. How could they not know what was going on in Xu Ling City? They had been worried before that this group would not be able to establish themselves, and lose against those factions, that were waiting in the wings, but now they did not worry at all.
So many jingshi, oh, Heavens!
A rich family!
A powerful family!
A tycoon!
Lacking imagination, they could only think of these scant phrases, but this could not stop the enthusiasm that came out of their hearts.
Boss, buy an!
Everyone’s eyes became as red as rabbits.
Chapter 448: The Strong Vermillion Bird Camp
While the attention of the most prominent factions of Xu Ling City were focused on this mysterious new faction, this new faction hadn’t even stepped a foot out of Ren Cloud Island, oh, wait, supposedly the island was now called Turtle Island.
The scouts hiding in the shadows outside the island found, to their dismay, that the entirety of Turtle Island was shrouded in clouds and nothing could be seen. Only the lights that occasionally penetrated the thick cloud layer seemed to reaffirm that changes were happening inside the island.
Turtle Island was truly changing.
Zuo Mo did not spare jingshi for reinforcing the safety of the island. He acted as though he would not rest unless he really made Turtle Island worthy of its name. The lights the scouts outside Turtle Island saw were the lights produced as Zuo Mo constructed the island protecting formation.
Zuo Mo had thought that the [Yinyang Cloud Thunder Formation] was not strong enough and ran to Pu Yao to demand a new formation.
Pu Yao had all kinds of techniques and spells, all of them were spoils of victory from his war campaigns. Naturally, he did not lack protective formations. In the beginning Pu Yao wasn’t willing to hand over any formations, as he kept on brooding over the fact that Zuo Mo’s mo physique was stronger than his yao arts. Adding on that he hadn’t gotten any benefits from this guy, Pu Yao wasn’t very eager.
But this was a matter of life of death. Zuo Mo didn’t want to have someone sneak in while they were sleeping. He harassed, nagged, and grinded down Pu’s resistance, while Wei, the person who wanted the world in chaos, was pouring oil onto the fire, he managed to drag a formation from Pu Yao’s hands.
Wei started to resumed his liveliness, after having lost his motivation.
This formation was called the [Meridional Azure Aether Formation] and was a sixth-grade formation. Supposedly, it was the mountain-protecting formation of a formation sect called the Azure Formation Sect.
When Zuo Mo held the formation scroll, his drool came out. A sixth-grade formation, it was a formation he didn’t even dare to think about in the past!
When he read it in depth, he increasingly felt that this formation was deep and profound. With his skill at formations, he could only understand thirty to forty percent of the formation. He saw that, at this speed, without a year or two of study, he could not completely comprehend this formation.
But time waits for no man, and there were many eyes staring at them from the outside.
Zuo Mo, realizing this and decided to gather the Golden Crow Camp. He gave all of them a copy of the formation. He had a simple thought, since his individual power wasn’t enough, then everyone should work on this together. More people meant more strength!
It had to be said that this move was effective.
These people from Golden Crow Camp were not the same people of the past who didn’t understand anything. Zuo Mo never concealed anything about formations from them, and gave them any good formations he had to comprehend. Their study of all kinds of mo matrixes had caused their knowledge and vision to broaden and increased their understanding of formations.
They also had an accurate measure of themselves, and knew that their talents were average and were not anything spectacular. Due to this, they put more importance on communicating and cooperating with each other. Even they did not know that they had unwittingly stepped onto a new path that was different than other production xiuzhe. While it was true their individual strength was not strong, but when they worked together and were skilled at cooperative forging.
Gathering everyone’s strength to study a formation together was a familiar job for Golden Crow Camp. So when Zuo Mo handed them the problem, Golden Crow Camp under the leadership of the two masters, Sun Bao and Ji Wei, started to methodically study the [Meridional Azure Aether Formation].
This was the first time Zuo Mo attended the collective comprehension process of Golden Crow Camp.
Following a requested from Sun Bao, Zuo Mo first presented what he understood about the formation in detail. After the gathering slowly digested his lecture, the immediately string of reactions caused Zuo Mo to gape in shock.
The [Meridional Azure Aether Formation] was divided into several parts by the two masters and the members most skilled in formations. Golden Crow Camp also divided into groups to specifically target these parts.
Zuo Mo had a feeling the large formation was dismembered into pieces!
Golden Crow Camp quickly showed Zuo Mo what efficiency was. During the discussions on the second day, several problems that he did not understand were resolved by the group. Each little team reported their progress as well as the problems they encountered. The heated discussion that followed also caused a great shock for Zuo M
o.
The mood was heated, there were people slamming the tables, faces flushed, swearing and shouting, glaring angrily at each other. They almost started fighting physically.
The second day was so.
The third day was so.
The fourth day, the fifth day … …
On the fifth day, the problems of the formation were all solved!
The people of Golden Crow Camp that had just comprehended a sixth-grad formation disregarded the astounded Zuo Mo. They interestedly started to discuss how many variations there were in the [Meridional Azure Aether Formation] … …
So he had such a powerful group of people as subordinates!
Zuo Mo’s mind was dazed.
After the introduction on the first day, Zuo Mo was like an audience member. The completely deciphered [Meridional Azure Aether Formation] was recombined into a jade scroll along with twenty thousand characters of notes.
Receiving the jade scroll, Zuo Mo read the twenty thousand characters worth of notes. The profound and deep [Meridional Azure Aether Formation] was presented and straightforwardly as though it was an introductory jade scroll. In the twenty thousand character notes, it managed to explain almost every seed formation in the [Meridional Azure Aether Formation.]
Up until now, Zuo Mo had never stayed in Golden Crow Camp before. He would only come to deliver new formations, or if he needed to forge something. He had never thought that Golden Crow Camp had grown to such a level!
It was fantastical to believe!
Shocked, Zuo Mo could not understand even when he thought for a while.
While shocked and dazed, Zuo Mo had started to set up the formation. The [Meridional Azure Aether Formation] was very complicated and had complex formation scripts, but for Zuo Mo who had pretty good perception, these were not major problems.
The biggest barrier that Zuo Mo encountered were the Meridional azure aether spikes!
The meridional azure aether spikes were the most important weapons in the [Meridional Azure Aether Formation.] Almost half of the jade scroll was spent explaining how to forge meridional azure aether spikes, and the secret techniques that were used to forge them in azure aether. The best material to use were gold element materials and it had to be fourth-grade or above, the most suitable were those that were strong and sharp. When they formed, they would be dark azure and extremely powerful.
Materials were not a problem for Zuo Mo, he had a lot of Golden Crystal Sand.
The biggest problem was azure aether. He did not have azure aether. Azure aether was an unique mist of the world. It was a rare fifth-grade material, was completely azure in colour, and belonged to the water element.
Zuo Mo stared. Where could he go to get azure aether?
The main body of the formation was completed, and the only thing left was the one hundred and eight meridional azure aether spikes. When they were forged, and the meridional azure aether spikes were put into the formation, the entire formation would be completed.
Supposedly, the complete Meridional Azure Aether Formation could stop the attacks of yuanying xiuzhe, and jindan xiuzhe couldn’t break through at all.
Of course, considering that each sect liked to boast, Zuo Mo did not have that high of hopes for the [Meridional Azure Aether Formation]. He didn’t even know what yuanying xiuzhe looked like. But even taking that into account, that was enough security.
Without any azure aether, Zuo Mo could only temporarily stop the work on the formation.
Just at this time, Xie Shan suddenly ran in. “Daren, that old man Xu, from last time, is asking to meet you. He is with someone else.”
Old Man Xu? Zuo Mo recalled the scene that day. Old man Xu had been pretty courteous the entire time and hadn’t acted even at the end. After thinking, he flew into the air.
———
Outside the formation, he saw Old man Xu. There was also a young and handsome male standing beside him in an azure robe.
“Mister Xu, welcome to my place, welcome! Welcome!” Zuo Mo put a smile on his face, and raised his folded hands with friendliness.
Xu Zheng Wei had been afraid the other would posture. The rock in his heart landed and a smile unconsciously came onto his face. “When this old man saw Boss Zuo that day, this man knew that Boss Zuo wasn’t ordinary. Young, talented, and handsome! Let this old man introduce to Boss Zuo, this is the young master of the Cloud Pavilion, Mister Liao Junior.”
He saw that young person raise his hands in a greeting, and say in an apologetic tone, “This one apologizes to Boss Zuo. Boss Zuo, please have great tolerance about the employees of my store who offended you.” As he spoke, his hands moved, and a jade scepter appeared. “This fifth-grade scepter is this one’s token, please, Boss Zuo, accept this.”
Zuo Mo, naturally, moved to take the jade scepter. He said, “Boss Liao is too polite. Come come, come in to sit!”
He ushered the two into the island.
When Boss Liao and Xu Zheng Wei saw the furor of activity on the island, they maintained calmness on their faces but they were shocked inside. Sword lights flashed across the island. There was most likely thousands of people and the factions outside the island were completely ignorant of this.
The two were shocked at Zuo Mo’s uncanny move. How could they know the normal-looking Black Turtle had a great belly?
Liao Qi Chang was alright, but the shock in Xu Zheng Wei was like a storm! He had come to the Ren Family Island before and had a general impression of the island’s situation. But the cloud island had now been completely transformed and he could not find any traces of the Ren Family at all.
If it had to be asked what the greatest impression this place gave him, then it was strict!
There were sword xiu patrolling by all over the sky. Of course, that wasn’t strange, but if these sword xiu passed over one’s head in organized ranks like a blade, the startling feeling in their heart wasn’t a pleasurable one to experience.
It was possible to see a black mist shrouding a camp in the distance. It was possible to feel the thick killing energy from a great ways off.
On this short walk of five li, Xu Zheng Wei’s expression kept on changing. Liao Qi Chang showed more calmness but the shock inside could be seen through the graveness in his eyes.
He could see more than Xu Zheng Wei. He was the young master of the Cloud Pavilion and seen countless treasures. There were not many that could rival his eyes. At first glance, he was deeply attracted to the Sonic Lightning Walnut tree. The Sonic Lightning Walnut was just fourth-grade but it was very rare. This Sonic Lightning Walnut tree was already mature. There were a few fruits hanging off it, and the thick power of the hard lightning was wondrous.
It was not a wonder to have Sonic Lightning Walnuts, but having the Sonic Lightning Walnut tree was a whole other matter.
What were the origins of this group?
Liao Qi Chang thought inside, he was both shocked and suspicious.
Chapter 449: Institute of Ling Plants
The conversation with Liao Qi Chang progressed under a very relaxed mood. Zuo Mo also requested Liao Qi Chang to help him search for azure aether, expressing he was willing to it buy at a high price. Liao Qi Chang naturally agreed.
After conversing for about two hours, Liao Qi Chang and Xu Zheng Wei stood and bid farewell.
Zuo Mo accompanied them on their way off the island to show them respect.
The two of them flew out a long distance before Xu Zheng Wei opened his mouth, “What do you think?”
Liao Qi Chang’s expression was grave. “They are not simple,” he paused for a beat and then said, “look how long we conversed. Did that Zuo person even give a hint about his origins? This person is secretive, has a group of strong subordinates, and is not a softy.”
“Yes!” Xu Zheng Wei’s face was emotional. “They were really vicious when I saw them destroy the Ren Family that day, they definitely did not come from a peaceful place.”
“I still am not clear where they came from,” Lia
o Qi Chang said, “but he has many subordinates, does not lack experts, has vicious conduct, but is not arrogant and domineering, and is as sly as a fox. This kind of a person is one we should not become enemies with.”
“I hear that many people are aiming for them,” Xu Zheng Wei said in a low voice. He had lived here for a long time, and naturally had sources to obtain information.
“We won’t enter into it.” Liao Qi Chang shook his head, “There are only a few families that can match this group in power. There probably are people manipulating the situation from the shadows, wanting to use others to do their will!”
Xu Zheng Wei nodded. “We really can’t touch this kind of matter. It’s possible to lose our lives if we aren’t careful.”
“Tian Ye came back?” Liao Qi Chang suddenly asked.
“En, he came back a few days ago. Supposedly, he earned a lot of merits for combat service and got numerous benefits.” Xu Zheng Wei was admiring.
“Ha, just beautiful on the surface,” Liao Qi Chang said dismissively. “This Cloud Sea Jie that none of the Four rule, even if he went to the front lines, no one will think highly of him. He just has what the large sects let slip through their fingers.”
Xu Zheng Wei smiled uncertainly.
“However,” Liao Qi Chang’s tone turned and he said sternly, “Tian Ye Battalion is probably harder to deal with after the combat experience. How many battalions does the Tian Family have?”
“Three, other than Tian Ye Battalion, there is also the Tian Wei Battalion and the Tiao She Battalion,” Xu Zheng Wei said. “In the past, the Tian She Battalion was the most outstanding of the three, and was considered the second best battalion in Xu Ling City.”
“Oh, who is first?”
“Xu Ling Sect’s Xu Ling Battalion.”
“Ah, that’s true. I forgot about Xu Ling Sect.” Liao Qi Chang nodded. He then ordered, “Don’t get too near other people in the short-term, we will observe from the sidelines.”