17. Soaring Heroic Spirit

Mo Fei and Cain returned to their hotel room. Only then did Mo Fei take out the items he had acquired at the auction from his storage pouch.

A longsword, a magic staff, and a purple beast egg.

The longsword was entirely silver, its blade exceptionally sharp; a light flick of the finger set it ringing with a clear sword cry. Truly worthy of a dwarven master’s craftsmanship.

Mo Fei gripped the staff, and immediately felt the magical elements around him grow more lively. Communication with the elements became easier. He was quite satisfied with the staff—he believed Mona would like it as well.

Lastly, the egg of the Violet Thunder Dragon remained. An adult Violet Thunder Dragon was a tier-eight magical beast; even its egg radiated the oppressive aura of a high-tier creature. Purple arcs of lightning flickered faintly across the eggshell, making it daunting to touch.

“How should this egg be hatched?” Mo Fei asked Cain.

“Master, most beast eggs require the absorption of corresponding magical elements to hatch successfully. The Violet Thunder Dragon’s egg is no exception, I imagine. But as a high-tier beast, it will require more than most. Without external assistance, it would take a very long time. And as for its growth, that too is slow—regular feeding with magic cores is needed for it to mature. Though you didn’t lose out buying this pet egg for four and a half million, raising it to the eighth tier would cost a fortune beyond imagination,” Cain patiently explained.

It made sense. An eighth-tier magical beast’s strength rivaled that of a human Sword Saint or Grand Magus. If raising one were easy, how could Mo Fei have acquired the egg so cheaply at the auction? Money might buy the egg, but without the resources to nurture it, it would be useless.

It seemed the dream of riding a Thunder Dragon across the continent was still far from reach.

...

In the days that followed, Mo Fei shuttled between the Magic Guild and the hotel. Covey kept his word and lent Mo Fei the Archmage’s journal.

Even Mo Fei, a cultivator, had to admire Ralph, the so-called Archmage. The journal contained many of Ralph’s insights into magic. Though some sections were missing, even in these incomplete records Mo Fei found common ground between magicians and cultivators.

For example, there was a passage on magic arrays, discussing how different elemental magic could be combined and connected through an array to create more powerful compound spells.

“Isn’t this just like our Five Elements formation in cultivation…” Mo Fei was startled by this thought. At last, he had found a solution to the problem that had troubled him.

In this world, with no spiritual energy in the heavens and earth, he could only use his divine sense to fuse different magical elements, transforming them into spiritual energy. Though this sufficed for cultivation, it consumed too much of his spirit, making his progress painfully slow. He had only just recovered to the late Qi Refining stage. At his current pace, who knew when he would reach the late Core Formation stage?

Now Ralph’s notes on magic arrays had inspired him. Essentially, the spiritual energy he needed was a compound of five magical elements. He could use a magic array to synthesize spiritual energy, thereby greatly improving his cultivation efficiency.

Though he knew little of this world’s magic arrays, the spatial array manual “Wandering the Heavens and Earth” contained many introductions to Five Elements formations. Mo Fei believed the principles between magic arrays and cultivation formations were fundamentally the same. He could use the logic of formation arrays to construct a magic spirit-gathering array.

To set up a spirit-gathering array, he first needed an array anchor. Back in the cultivation world, spiritual energy was abundant, and with a spirit-gathering array on Mount Jade Void, the spirit stones that ordinary cultivators relied upon were almost useless to Mo Fei, who had never left his sect. Thus, he had little stock of them, and they had all been consumed when setting up spatial arrays. If he had spirit stones, he wouldn’t be worrying about spiritual energy now.

Without spirit stones for array anchors, he would have to find a substitute. Mo Fei thought of the magic core embedded in the staff he had won at the auction. It was also a crystallization of energy, so it should be able to stand in for a spirit stone.

Spirit stones were condensed from the complete Five Elements spiritual energy, whereas magic cores contained only single-element magic.

“Why not set up five single-element spirit-gathering arrays, then merge them into one large compound array? Wouldn’t that achieve the same effect?” Mo Fei’s excitement soared as he worked out the solution; the next crucial step was to learn how to inscribe compound magic arrays.

Fortunately, Ralph’s journal recorded some information about inscribing compound arrays. Though incomplete, Mo Fei was able to deduce the principles from his own cultivation knowledge and familiarity with formation arrays.

Mo Fei sought Covey and purchased several low-tier magic cores of each element, along with a magic carving knife, and began to inscribe a compound array.

Inscribing magic arrays required extraordinary mental focus; any distraction could ruin the process. Mo Fei’s current magic stone slab had cracked just because his concentration had wavered during carving. Beside him, a heap of shattered failed slabs had already accumulated.

After dozens of attempts and failures, Mo Fei gradually found his rhythm. Focused intently on the slab before him, his hand guided the carving knife steadily along predetermined paths, etching lines into the stone. At last, when the final line was finished, a multicolored glow flashed across the slab, signaling the successful inscription of a Five Element compound array.

Having expended prolonged mental effort, Mo Fei collapsed into a chair almost in exhaustion.

Half an hour later, he recovered his strength and picked up the slab for closer inspection. The array’s lines formed a pentagonal pattern; at each of the five corners lay a recess, with lines extending from each recess to converge at the center.

Mo Fei took five first-tier magic cores of different elements from his pouch, placing them in the five recesses. The lines on the slab each glowed in their respective colors, and finally a compound energy, blending all five magical elements, formed at the center.

Mo Fei circulated “Jade Void Technique,” absorbing and refining this energy. It flowed through his meridians, completed a cycle, and gathered at his dantian.

Success! The compound magical energy from the array could indeed be absorbed like spiritual energy. Because he used only low-tier cores, the amount of compound energy produced was limited.

Once Mo Fei finished absorbing the energy, the array’s glow faded.

The next step would be to establish five large elemental spirit-gathering arrays to supply the compound array with a steady stream of magical elements, thus ensuring an endless supply of spiritual energy.

It seemed he would need to acquire his own territory to build such a large magic array. The day the array was established would mark his true foothold in this continent.

A surge of heroism rose in Mo Fei’s heart. The rules of this world could no longer bind him. He would show the people of this strange continent the might of a cultivator, and see just how formidable their so-called god-ranked experts truly were.

He would carve out a legacy that would be praised for generations, making his journey in this world worthwhile.