Ancient Strengthening Technique

AST 941 – Attempt at carving formations, Small Success Stage of the Buddha’s True Eyes

The skins of high grade Demonic Beasts were especially thick. Of course, this depended on the Demonic Beast. Fox furs, especially from beasts that had been Martial Saints, were some of the best for making coats, but were not especially thick.

Yu He took a snow white beast skin blanket and covered Qing Shui. She smiled at Qing Shui, feeling a certain sweetness in her heart. After she saw that it had been done properly, she said goodnight and went to her room.

After she went in, she closed the door. Qing Shui did not need her to go through all that trouble. If he had wanted to rest, all he had needed to do was to take out the bed he used in the Realm of the Violet Jade Immortal. Furthermore, he would spend six hours in the Realm of the Violet Jade Immortal. By then, the sun would have risen. This was how he normally rested.

After he entered the Realm of the Violet Jade Immortal, Qing Shui spent some time cultivating and then researched formations.

Finally, Qing Shui started to research the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation.

He knew the effects of the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation. Pernicious aura was a kind of Spiritual Qi, which was just a general term. Pernicious aura, Core Qi of Demonic Beasts, and the Qi of Xiantian were all forms of Spiritual Qi.

The Spirit Sealing Minor Formation had sealing abilities. However, Qing Shui was not aware of how its mechanisms worked, which was why he was spending time to research it. However, after sealing Chi Ao and Chi Feng, it would be able to seal their pernicious aura for a period of time.

Even after they got stronger in a few years, it would still be able to restrain their auras. By then, they might be able to control their pernicious auras. After all, that was what they were cultivating.

They cultivated the pernicious aura of their bodies. The stronger their pernicious aura, the stronger their abilities. Thus, Qing Shui wanted to forge these things, and then carve the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation on them, in order to seal any pernicious aura that was released.

The two of them were only in the Xiantian grade, so Qing Shui felt that it should be easy. One day in the Realm of the Violet Jade Immortal was slightly more than three months. He had confidence in succeeding.

First, he researched the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation. This formation used the Spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth to suppress other kinds of Spiritual Qi, but it still left a path for it to trickle out. It was impossible to completely seal Spiritual Qi off. No one could be completely isolated from Spiritual Qi, as even air contained some Spiritual Qi. Completely sealing a person off would result in his death. As to whether there was a method of completely sealing, he was not aware. However, he knew that it is impossible for him to accomplish right now.

After this, he tried laying a Spirit Sealing Minor Formation. Fortunately, he quickly got the hang of it. Although it hadn’t yet succeeded, he knew that he would be able to succeed in slightly more than a day’s time.

After laying the formation, Qing Shui would obsessively test it out. Time slowly went by until a glow of formations surrounded him. He knew that he had finally succeeded.

Then, he removed the formation and set it up again repeatedly. This carried on for almost three days before Qing Shui stopped, sat down and closed his eyes. The things he learned in the past three days emerged, every detail clear.

In the following three days, Qing Shui did not touch any formations and instead cultivated. He continued to lay the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation, repeating the cycle. However, he discovered that there were more improvements this time than there had been previously.

Just like this, two months went by. Qing Shui felt that he had a solid grasp on the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation. After all, the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation and Spirit Gathering Formation were formations that were easy to learn.

He had spent so much effort and time because he wanted to understand it deeper and use it later. Now, it was time to forge the pendants.

He first started with some regular metal and produced the pendant base. Then, Qing Shui started to carve the formation on top of it. What Qing Shui was doing was creating a Formation Seal. Formation Seals would be carved on weapons or armors, but they rarely appeared within the Five continents. Even if they appeared, they would not be noticed.

Now, Qing Shui was attempting it, but with only the simplest formation on the pendant. This was a result of his breakthrough in the Ancient Art of Forging and in formations. He only dared to do this after breaking through to the Pentacolor Rainbow Art of Forging. Furthermore, he had only recently grasped formations.

If he had not encountered Chi Ao’s and Chi Feng’s pernicious aura, Qing Shui would not have attempted to carve formations like this.

High Grade Focused Concentration!

Since Qing Shui started laying the formations, he had been circulating the High Grade Focused Concentration. His Focused Concentration not only increased his abilities by 20%, they also increased concentration and mental capacity. Under such a state, when learning something, his powers of comprehension would be increased.

Fail!

Fail!

……

Qing Shui failed repeatedly. However, there were no changes to his emotions. This was because he had already anticipated this, and did not feel that it was strange. He carved it bit by bit, learning as he continued.

When breaking through to the Pentacolor Rainbow Art of Forging, Qing Shui had gained methods listed on how to carve formations. However, these were just methods and techniques, with the specific details only being discoverable by experimenting. He had to experiment on how to completely carve the Spirit Sealing Minor Formation.

Carving formations exhausted spirit energy. At first, the carving was very smooth but after 30 minutes, when the side needed to be changed, it would suddenly fail. It was like the sensation of a thread breaking.

It kept failing. The item would have to be completely covered in carvings, regardless of the size. This pendant was not large, but it was not small either. If it were too small, Qing Shui would not have the abilities to succeed at the present. When just starting out, people would start carving on something larger. Something that was too small would require extremely precise carving skills and a large amount of spirit energy.

The Spirit Sealing Minor Formation was relatively simple. Thus, he was able to casually carve it on the palm-sized pendant. However, Qing Shui had already failed countless numbers of times.

The position where he switched sides was very important. This was because he needed to connect the spirit energy of the reversed side together at that location.

“Hmm, connection?”

Suddenly, Qing Shui discovered that he had been wasting time on an insignificant problem. When he started carving again, he began from the front, not in a rush to deal with the connection. Instead, he next chose to work on the reverse side.

Fail!

Fail!

……

After another string of failures, Qing Shui started to wonder if this method of working from the back was possible. Could it be that he had to complete it all in one go from the front?

Qing Shui sat silently in thought for 15 minutes before continuing. Maybe because he was carving from the back, the difficulty was higher? He was resolute and tried it again. After resting for while, he kept on going.

He was still failing over and over. Qing Shui was already numb to it. He saw that there were not many pendants left. For the sake of carving formations, Qing Shui had forged many simple pendants, but they were just made of regular metal.

Attempting to carve again, Qing Shui was already used to failure. Just as he expected to fail again, there was no sound indicating failure. Looking at the result, he was incomparably happy. Although he had not completely succeeded, this small success was proof this method was feasible.

It was difficult to make the initial start, but there was slow progress after that. It was like climbing a mountain. Although it was difficult, there would always be some slow progress. It was impossible for anyone to just climb it in one go.

He carved it bit by bit. When he finished carving about half the back, it failed. He put down the damaged pendant but was still pretty excited. He then went to eat something and took a rest.

After that, he pondered silently.

Qing Shui continued to forge more pendants and began to carve again. WIth his earlier success, it was easy to make a start from that point and progress slowly. Seeing that slow progress, he was very happy. It meant a completed pendant was getting nearer bit by bit.

Fail!

Just when he was about to finish the back, he failed again. But on the next try, he actually managed to succeed. This caused Qing Shui to feel surprised. He originally thought that this final breakthrough would be tough, and had even worried about it earlier.

Both sides were completely carved and all that was left was the connection. This connection was the eye of the formation that would activate it and its position was very important. Thus, he was not in a rush to connect the sides with the eye of the formation.

Instead, he picked up another pendant and continued carving. He found that once that he had succeeded once, the carving was easier.

With the High Grade Focused Concentration, he would basically not fail after succeeding just once. Very soon, he had carved tens of pendants. They were all completely carved on both sides. Now, only the final connection was left.

Once he completed the connection, the pendant would be complete. Qing Shui was very excited, because once he succeeded with this Spirit Sealing Minor Formation, it would mean that he would be able to carve formations on weapons and armor from then on.

Maybe even carving the Spirit Gathering Formation…

This would increase a cultivator’s recovery speed. In normal conditions, this would increase cultivation speed, and in battle, might even let a little bit of recovery occur.

Qing Shui thought that the future of a Formation Seal Master was not bad……

Calming his emotions down, he allowed himself to reach a state of no expectations. Allowing his spirit to be calm and temporarily forgetting everything. Qing Shui thought of the Golden Buddha Temple.

He thought about that old man, the Buddha’s True Eyes, that Buddha statue. He felt his thoughts turn empty and he slowly closed his eyes. However, his surroundings were all clearly perceived by his mind.

Furthermore, he even saw that Buddha image behind him again. He was astonished, but was still very calm. Suddenly, the Buddha Image opened its eyes. In that instant, Qing Shui was stunned. The profoundness of those eyes was indescribable.

It had spirituality, great changes, slight smiles, grief, righteousness, pain, mercy, killing intent……

Suddenly, Qing Shui felt an energy enter his body. It was not just pure energy, but partly spirit energy. Suddenly Qing Shui opened both his eyes and a faint golden light emerged.

Buddha’s True Eyes!

The Buddha’s True Eyes had actually managed to break through to the Small Success Stage. Although it was just the Small Success Stage, he knew that the Buddha’s True Eyes was very sharp. It could see everything, see through everything, and suppress spirits. Of course, this was just a saying. Actually, the Buddha’s True Eyes could see through the emotions of man, be it grief, pain, or even an injured spirit……

QIng Shui smiled. Truly, what an unexpected gain. When he had wanted it to succeed, it hadn’t. Yet at this random moment, it had broken through.

This success led Qing Shui to feel many things. The things that he comprehended with the breakthrough of Buddha’s True Eyes were many. At this moment, he understood a lot more of the world than he did in the past.