Chapter 347: Beyond Ten Patterns

Mo Hua returned home and couldn’t wait to start studying the jade slips of the Five Elements Demon-Slaying Grand Formation.

But he read all the way into the night and didn’t even finish one slip.

The entire set of the grand formation consisted of ten jade slips.

Mo Hua couldn’t help but sigh. A grand formation was truly a “grand” formation—the array was vast, and just the jade slips recording the construction methods were this numerous.

Time was urgent, but Mo Hua couldn’t rush.

The grand formation was too important; there could be not even a single mistake.

He had to be patient, studying seriously, without any carelessness.

One small error could trigger a chain reaction, causing the entire formation to collapse.

If he studied it this way, it would indeed take too long…

After some thought, Mo Hua decided to prioritize, focusing on the essentials and starting with the most important parts.

He first spent some time quickly browsing all ten jade slips from start to finish.

Then he extracted the core formation hubs and the array eyes, leaving the rest—such as array pattern layouts, compatibility of single arrays, and construction of formation mediums—for later consideration.

Mo Hua started with the formation hub.

The hub of a grand formation was far more difficult than the hubs of the complex arrays he had learned before.

Its difficulty had reached the pinnacle of first-grade array mastery.

Because it coordinated the entire grand formation and connected numerous single arrays, the hub had to be robust, resilient, stable, and capable of accommodating everything.

Inside the hub, it had to accommodate the trajectories of countless spiritual power flows, controlling their opening and closing, direction, start and stop, and circulation.

At the outer edge of the hub, it had to leave interfaces compatible with various single arrays with different effects.

If a single array was the network of meridians, the hub was the main conduit; if a single array was flesh and blood, the hub was the skeleton.

The hub was the trunk of the entire grand formation, the pivot of spiritual power flow.

Mo Hua had understood this in theory before, but actually practicing it now gave him a much deeper realization.

He first memorized part of the hub, then at night, sank his Divine-Sense into his Sea of Consciousness to practice on the Dao Monument.

After practicing twice, he discovered something incredible:

His Divine-Sense was far from enough!

He had only recorded part of the hub, yet even so, his Divine-Sense was depleted before he could finish drawing it.

The requirement for Divine-Sense intensity was absurd…

Is this really a first-grade, ten-pattern grand formation?

Mo Hua found it hard to believe.

But on reflection, if it weren’t this difficult, the grand formation could not be called an Absolute Formation, nor revered as the strongest array, nor regarded as a lifelong pursuit by array masters worldwide.

Since that was the case, the difficulty was justified.

Instead of complaining, he might as well practice more.

Array practice required perseverance; as long as one persisted, even a drip of water could wear through stone.

If he couldn’t do it once, he would draw it ten times; ten times, a hundred times…

Even if he ultimately failed, he would have no regrets.

Mo Hua forced himself to calm down.

Ignoring the difficulty and not worrying about whether he could master it, he began to learn bit by bit, practicing again and again.

He drew the hub until his Divine-Sense was exhausted, then erased it and continued drawing.

On the Dao Monument, from nothing to something and back again, he repeated the process over and over.

After some time, Mo Hua seemed to sense a faint, elusive Dao resonance from the Dao Monument.

This subtle resonance was indescribable, yet it brought calm and focus, gradually deepening his understanding of the hub.

Compared to complex arrays and single arrays, the grand formation hub shared the same origin but was entirely different.

Single-array hubs were extremely simple, sometimes just a few strokes.

Simpler hubs required no penwork at all; the structure of the array itself could serve as the hub.

Complex-array hubs were harder, requiring heavier strokes and more Divine-Sense.

The grand formation hub, however, was far more complex.

It was not a single stroke but countless fine strokes connected to form a unified pattern, creating the hub.

The unified pattern represented the hub’s direction, while the fine strokes represented the precise flow of spiritual power.

On the surface, it looked like a thicker stroke than a complex-array hub, but it was actually made of countless fine strokes, filled according to strict lengths, forms, and lines.

Like hemp fibers woven into a rope.

Each fiber had strict regulations for shape, angle, and connection.

That’s why the hub was so complex and why Divine-Sense consumption was so immense.

After understanding this principle, Mo Hua couldn’t help but marvel.

How could someone come up with such a method?

Or rather, could a human even conceive this?

If learning it was already so difficult, the array master who created this grand formation must have an incredible comprehension of the Dao and mastery of array techniques.

Mo Hua sighed in admiration.

The more one studied arrays, the more one realized their own ignorance. The greater the sense of inadequacy, the more one must study.

Mo Hua resolved to eliminate distractions and focus solely on the hub.

For the following days, he practiced day and night, neglecting sleep and food.

Even while eating, his hands sometimes moved unconsciously in gestures.

At times, he would stare blankly at his food, lost in thought, until it went cold.

Liu Ruhua could only reheat it for him.

Mo Shan quietly watched his son, not disturbing him.

Mo Shan and his companion were planning to relocate the city, taking the demon-hunting brothers and neighbors with them, but they couldn’t leave Mo Hua behind.

Mo Hua was their flesh and blood; no matter his choices or future, they wanted to stay by his side.

After several days, Mo Hua’s comprehension of the hub progressed significantly.

The reason was his Divine-Sense had grown, noticeably so.

Mo Hua realized why.

Mr. Zhuang had said Divine-Sense had limits.

The closer one approached the limit, the harder it was to grow.

For Qi-Refining stage, the limit was set by a first-grade, ten-pattern Foundation Establishment.

Previously, Mo Hua’s Divine-Sense had grown slowly from array practice alone.

But after consuming the Green-Faced Little Demon and absorbing the Divine-Sense of the Visualization Diagram, his Divine-Sense had reached the Foundation Establishment threshold, surpassing the ten-pattern limitation.

In other words, his Divine-Sense limit was now at the Foundation Establishment level.

He was still far from that limit.

Thus, practicing the complex grand formation still greatly enhanced his Divine-Sense!

Previously, the arrays he studied weren’t difficult enough, consuming too little Divine-Sense, so the training intensity was low and the growth slow.

Now, the grand formation was sufficiently difficult, consuming plenty of Divine-Sense, and naturally, his Divine-Sense grew rapidly.

At this pace, he could realistically master the Five Elements Demon-Slaying Grand Formation before the city relocation!

At this thought, his eyes lit up.

With hope, he trained even harder.

When he encountered difficulties, he asked Mr. Zhuang.

If Mr. Zhuang rested, Mo Hua would wait at the bamboo room entrance or under the great locust tree.

While waiting, he would practice the hub on paper with ink.

One day, while practicing under the great locust tree, Bai Zisheng, curious, put down his book and peeked at what Mo Hua was drawing, frowning.

“What is this?”

It looked dense and complicated.

Like casual brushwork, but not uniform, as if an array were being drawn—but he had never seen such an array.

“Hub,” Mo Hua replied, not looking up, fully focused on drawing.

Bai Zisheng was stunned.

Hub?

What kind of hub could be this complex?

He wanted to ask, but seeing Mo Hua so focused, he hesitated.

Still, curiosity won, and he continued watching.

Soon, Bai Zisheng covered his forehead, feeling dizzy. Inwardly he thought:

“This is bad, the Divine-Sense consumption is excessive…”

He quickly looked away and rested before recovering, then stared at Mo Hua in shock.

What exactly was he drawing?!

“I just looked a bit, and my Divine-Sense is already depleted?”

Bai Zisheng couldn’t believe it.

In a daze, he felt Mo Hua’s arrays were no longer anything like the arrays he knew…

Bai Zixi, seeing this, was also puzzled. She quietly stepped over, glanced at Mo Hua’s array, frowned, and then paused in thought, momentarily stunned.

“Zixi…”

Bai Zisheng wanted to speak, but Bai Zixi shook her head, signaling him not to disturb Mo Hua.

When Mo Hua finally exhausted his Divine-Sense and stopped, he noticed two pairs of beautiful eyes fixed on him.

One pair with sword-like brows and stellar gaze, the other bright and clear as water.