Chapter 395: Forming the Array
Bai Zisheng Tianxing was patrolling with the spirit farmers in high spirits, while Mo Hua sat quietly on the ridge, carefully drawing the Soil-Nurturing Array.
Bai Zixi was also helping Mo Hua with the array.
She squatted beside him, knees together, holding the brush in her fair hand with an elegant posture and serene demeanor. The array patterns she drew were delicate and beautiful, each stroke refined and graceful.
Mo Hua stole a few glances, utterly astonished, and couldn’t help but sigh:
“Little Senior Sister, your array patterns are really beautiful!”
“Beautiful?”
A hint of doubt flickered in Bai Zixi’s lovely eyes.
“Yes,” Mo Hua nodded.
Bai Zixi looked at her own patterns, then at Mo Hua’s, and curiously asked:
“Isn’t this almost the same?”
The array was the same, the patterns identical, and at a glance, the difference wasn’t obvious.
Mo Hua shook his head. “Not the same.”
The arrays he drew were orderly and confident, a result of his familiarity.
But his little senior sister’s work looked refined and elegant, the ink perfectly balanced between thick and thin.
Mo Hua secretly thought: as the saying goes, handwriting reflects the person—could it be that arrays do too? Is it because she’s graceful that her array is beautiful?
Seeing Mo Hua blinking curiously, Bai Zixi asked:
“What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing…”
She sensed he was hiding something, a flash of awareness crossing her eyes, but she said nothing.
Then she studied Mo Hua for a few moments and suddenly pointed to her own fair cheek.
Mo Hua was puzzled.
“You have dirt on your face,” Bai Zixi said.
“Dirt?” Mo Hua was slightly startled. “Ink?”
He wiped his face a few times, looked at his hand, and said confusedly:
“It’s not dirty…”
“Yes, it is,” Bai Zixi said firmly.
“No worries, I’ll wash it later,” Mo Hua replied.
Bai Zixi shook her head. “I’m your senior sister. I’ll wipe it for you.”
She reached out and gently wiped his cheek.
The motion was part pat, part smear, part rub…
Her fingers were cool and soft.
After finishing his right cheek, she moved to the left.
“Left cheek too?” Mo Hua asked, puzzled.
“Yes!” Bai Zixi nodded.
Mo Hua could only let her continue.
After a while, she finished and nodded:
“All clean!”
“Really?” Mo Hua asked suspiciously.
Bai Zixi’s lips curved slightly, her eyes calm:
“I’m your senior sister, I wouldn’t lie.”
Mo Hua nodded, reassured, and returned to focusing on the array.
But this time, he felt that his little senior sister was subtly watching him. Though her expression remained calm, her gaze occasionally carried a glint of amusement.
Mo Hua shook his head, thinking he must be mistaken. His little senior sister was usually serene and seldom showed emotion.
Distracted for a moment, he quickly refocused on drawing the array.
It wasn’t until evening, back at home, that Mo Hua realized something was off.
Seeing him, Master Zhuang couldn’t help but laugh.
Bai Zisheng was even more exaggerated, clutching his stomach, laughing uncontrollably, tears nearly spilling.
“What’s wrong?” Mo Hua asked, still confused.
Between laughter, Bai Zisheng managed to say:
“Haha… Big… big flower face!”
Mo Hua grabbed a mirror and froze.
Both sides of his face were smeared with ink, looking like a big spotted cat.
Who did this? Who could evade his Divine-Sense and doodle all over his face right under his nose?
Then it hit him. He turned to Bai Zixi.
His little senior sister had wiped his face!
Bai Zixi feigned composure, lips lightly pressed, clearly holding back laughter.
Mo Hua was stunned.
He never imagined his little senior sister could pull such a prank! Usually elegant and calm, she had revealed this mischievous side.
“Little Senior Sister!”
Mo Hua’s eyebrows shot up, his face painted like a big flower, making him look like an angry cat.
Finally, Bai Zixi couldn’t hold it in and laughed out loud, a sound like a fleeting blossom opening.
Even with her makeup, she remained stunning.
Her smiling eyes were like lotus petals glistening with morning dew, or crystal-clear glass shimmering with light.
Master Zhuang looked slightly surprised.
Mo Hua was dumbfounded. It was his first time seeing Bai Zixi laugh like this.
Bai Zisheng was initially stunned, then felt a mix of relief and slight heartache. How long had it been since his sister laughed like this…
After the laughter, Bai Zixi personally washed Mo Hua’s face clean.
Mo Hua checked himself in the mirror several times, finally nodding.
Bai Zixi whispered, “Sorry…”
But her lips still held a faint smile.
Mo Hua sighed, feeling a little helpless.
Bai Zixi continued smiling all day. Every time she saw Mo Hua and thought of his cat-like, ink-smeared face, she couldn’t help but smile softly.
A day later, she returned to her usual calm, but her expression was brighter, eyes softer than before.
Mo Hua, for some reason, felt comforted too.
…
The Soil-Nurturing Array was simple, and Mo Hua worked quickly. With Bai Zixi’s help, the array in the spirit field was completed in a few days.
The layout of the spirit field, combined with the tireless labor of the spirit farmers, now harmonized perfectly with the Thick-Earth Array.
After finishing the Soil-Nurturing Array, Mo Hua began sketching the patterns for the Thick-Earth Array.
He needed to connect all the ridges with spiritual ink, making the entire array effective.
The hundred-acre spirit field, linked by the patterns, formed a massive Thick-Earth Array.
The brush required a large tip and a lot of spiritual ink, but the Divine-Sense consumption wasn’t much greater than for a smaller array.
Divine-Sense expenditure depends on the complexity of the array—the number of patterns—not its physical size.
Thus, to activate the Thick-Earth Array over the spirit field, the real challenge was not Divine-Sense but stamina and spiritual power.
An array must be completed in one go; the mind cannot waver.
While linking the Thick-Earth Array, Mo Hua had to traverse all the ridges, infusing the ink with spiritual energy and painting the patterns, so the array was seamless.
Looking over the vast spirit field, Mo Hua sighed.
This method was cumbersome and undignified for an array master.
But he had no other choice.
At his Qi-Refining stage, this was the only way to link a large single array.
“I wonder if after reaching Foundation Establishment, there will be easier ways to draw arrays…”
Mo Hua focused and began drawing the Thick-Earth Array in the spirit field, holding a large brush dipped in spiritual ink, following the patterns from his Sea of Consciousness.
It was a long process that couldn’t afford mistakes, or he’d have to start over.
Fortunately, he had rehearsed beforehand.
He had tried the routes many times and considered potential problems and solutions.
Overall, it went smoothly.
Bai Zisheng, Bai Zixi, Miao’er, and all the spirit farmers of Dongshan Village watched him.
Mo Hua walked continuously from morning to night, leaving a winding trail of mystical ink on the ridges.
The ink contained flowing spiritual energy.
As he painted more ridges, more patterns connected, linking more of the spirit field…
When he finally finished, drained of energy and spiritual power, he sat by the field gasping like a dehydrated fish.
At that moment, the spirit field shimmered.
A surge of vitality spread.
The entire field, unified, resonated through the patterns.
Endless earth energy rose, nourishing the soil and rice seedlings.
The spirit rice visibly grew stronger, emerald green.
…
All the spirit farmers watching were stunned into silence.
They knew the array was complex, but never expected it to be this profound.
Could this be the work of the Sun family’s ancestor…?
Elders of Dongshan Village, feeling the vitality in the field and seeing the seedlings, were overwhelmed with emotion, tears streaming.
Such fertile spirit fields, if preserved, would ensure their descendants never went hungry again…
Meanwhile, the Sun family head, leafing through the array manual, also sensed the strong vitality and stood up in shock, staring at the distant spirit field.
“Is this… an array?”
“Impossible…”