Chapter 386: The Hidden Formation

This hundred-acre spiritual field, connected as one continuous expanse, might itself be a formation!

Mo Hua suddenly understood.

He had previously been confined to the forms of formations, limited to partial formation patterns, seeing only the surface patterns, thus blinded by a single leaf and failing to perceive the whole.

The Soil-Nourishing Formation, and all other formations, were merely minor branches and leaves—not the true body of the ultimate formation.

The ultimate formation itself was the spiritual field.

Mo Hua then felt some doubt.

If the spiritual field was the formation, then what were the formation medium, formation patterns, formation pivot, and formation eye upon which it relied?

Mo Hua sat back down on the ground and began to ponder carefully.

If the spiritual field was the formation, then the formation medium would not be the stone Tian Geng, but rather the soil in which the spiritual rice was planted.

Soil is generally difficult to serve as a formation medium.

Because its texture is either too loose or too damp, and because it erodes due to drying and wind, it lacks fixed form and is hard to imprint with formation patterns.

"Why would this ultimate formation use soil as its formation medium?"

"Or is this itself the profound mystery of the ultimate formation?"

Mo Hua thought for a moment, found no answer, and temporarily set it aside to continue his reasoning.

If soil was the formation medium, then the formation patterns must be the Tian Geng crisscrossing and dividing the spiritual field.

The formation pivot would be the entire layout of the spiritual field's divisions.

Then what was the formation eye?

How was the entire formation sustained?

Within the spiritual field, there was no special location suitable as a formation eye.

Mo Hua looked up, gazing at the rippling spiritual field and the intersecting Tian Geng, and suddenly froze.

This was not a grand formation or a compound formation—it was merely a single formation.

There was no special Spirit-Collecting Formation or Spirit-Collecting Compound Formation providing spiritual energy.

The spiritual energy source of a single formation was its own formation patterns.

The natural absorption of spiritual energy by the formation patterns supplied power for the single formation's operation.

In other words, these intersecting Tian Geng were both formation patterns and formation eyes.

But how was spiritual energy supplied?

Mo Hua furrowed his brow, thought briefly, and then understood.

It was the Soil-Nourishing Formation!

The function of a single formation is relatively singular.

Even an ultimate formation, no matter how powerful, cannot cover every aspect.

Thus, supplementary formations are needed to enhance its effect.

The Soil-Nourishing Formation was such a supplementary formation, used to assist the ultimate formation by nourishing the soil.

But if the Soil-Nourishing Formation were built together with the ultimate formation, it would become a compound formation containing the ultimate formation.

Such formations require high spiritual awareness, complex patterns, and once damaged, only the Sun Clan's Ancestor could repair them—no one else could, nor would anyone know how.

Thus, the Sun Clan's Ancestor, through unique insight, separated the two types of formations while keeping them interlinked.

These Soil-Nourishing Formations were drawn separately, not connected to the compound formation, easy to draw and easy to repair.

Even the Sun Clan's junior disciples, mediocre formation experts as they were, could repair them.

Yet at the same time, they were connected to the ultimate formation.

Whenever the spiritual farmers supplied spiritual energy to the Soil-Nourishing Formations, a portion of that energy naturally overflowed and flowed into the large ultimate formation.

Thus, the Soil-Nourishing Formation was both a supplementary formation and a kind of "ultimate formation eye."

The spiritual energy provided by the Soil-Nourishing Formation was minimal.

But this ultimate formation was a soil-nourishing formation, not focused on destruction or trapping powerful enemies.

It required only a steady, slow trickle of spiritual energy—small, sustained, long-term supply was sufficient.

From another perspective, the Sun Clan's Ancestor did this to help the spiritual farmers conserve spirit stones.

Mo Hua could not help but feel admiration.

The Sun Clan's Ancestor's profound understanding of formations, his ingenious application, and his character and heart were all extraordinary.

No wonder for centuries, the cultivators of Qianjia Town had cherished his benevolence.

To comprehend the Dao and benefit all living beings.

This, perhaps, is what a true formation master truly is…

Mo Hua felt deeply moved.

Beside him, Ding Miao, seeing Mo Hua lost in thought, silent for a long time, whispered softly:

"Brother?"

Mo Hua came back to himself, smiled, and patted Miao's head.

"Thank you."

Without Miao's simple sketch, I would never have noticed the clue.

The true master never loses his childlike heart.

The more innocent a child is, the more naturally pure their gaze—colorless, unclouded—and thus more likely to see the true nature.

Miao tilted her small head, puzzled:

"Did I help?"

Mo Hua praised: "You helped greatly."

Ding Miao immediately brightened, though he didn't know what help he had actually given.

Mo Hua gave him another piece of pastry.

Ding Miao clenched it in both hands and ate it with perfect contentment.

"Brother said I did a great deed, so this time I'm not eating for free."

Ding Miao nodded, silently thinking to himself.

……

Knowing the essence of the array, one must find a way to reconstruct the array diagram.

Mo Hua told Ding Miao not to wander off, then walked to the high peak and took in the spirit fields below.

He then began, with an array master's mindset and the brushwork of array inscriptions, to recalculate the spirit fields—built according to an array—back into their original array form, based on their layout.

As he calculated, Mo Hua stopped again.

Something was off.

He couldn't calculate it anymore…

Mo Hua frowned.

Many of the spirit field layouts were too Fang Zheng, orderly and neat—but not arranged according to any array.

Thus, the array he deduced was fragmented and incomplete.

Mo Hua sighed.

Troubles kept coming one after another…

He ran down the mountain and asked Ding Miao:

"Miao'er, who in your village lives the longest and knows the most?"

Ding Miao furrowed his small brows, then his eyes suddenly lit up.

"The Elder!"

Dongshan Village did have an Elder, but he was ancient and no longer managed affairs, and his cultivation was only Qi Refinement, not Foundation Establishment.

The villagers elected him as Elder because of his age and seniority, which earned their respect.

He was called Elder, but in truth he was more like a village chief.

Little Miao led Mo Hua to the Elder.

Mo Hua explained his purpose: he wished to ask a few questions.

The Elder, upon seeing Mo Hua, showed gratitude and said:

"Young Mr. has been kind to us. Ask anything—you may have my full answer."

"Elder, you are too kind."

Mo Hua exchanged a few pleasantries, then politely asked:

"Elder, has the layout of these spirit fields changed over the past few hundred years?"

The Elder paused in thought, then slowly nodded.

"It has changed."

"Why was it changed?" Mo Hua asked.

The Elder said: "We rarely alter ancestral land. This spirit field layout had been maintained for over a hundred years…"

"But later, the Sun family reorganized some of the fields to make them neat, so they could draw arrays more easily."

"Now many fields are arranged in a grid pattern, block after block, looking perfectly orderly."

"Did the spirit fields change after the reorganization?" Mo Hua asked.

"No major change, but the soil has grown poorer year by year."

The Elder sighed, "I'm old enough to feel this. The children born later in the village don't know anything at all."

"I still remember, when I was young, my grandfather told me that the soil hundreds of years ago was far richer than it is now."

The Elder's eyes grew dreamy, "Back then, people only needed to farm peacefully to have enough to eat…"

Mo Hua's emotions were complex; then his gaze darkened slightly, and he slowly understood.

This ultimate array's function must have been to enrich the soil and make the spirit fields fertile.

The layout of the spirit fields themselves was the array's core.

After the Sun family's ancestor passed away, his descendants—a pack of fools—reorganized the spirit fields to make drawing arrays easier, altering the field layout.

Thus, they disrupted the array's core, causing the ultimate array to gradually fail.

Later, the Sun family's descendants, seeking to exploit the spirit farmers, drew inferior arrays along the Tian Geng, repairing them constantly.

Because the arrays broke and were repaired often, the spirit farmers' offerings of spiritual energy to the soil-enriching array became intermittent.

As a result, the entire ultimate array's spiritual energy supply became unsustainable.

Over decades, even centuries, the ultimate array completely failed.

Mo Hua sighed.

The Sun family's ancestor had once established a family rule:

Any Sun family child who ever seized even a single plot of land from Qianjia Town would be stripped of their surname, erased from the clan register, and cast out of the family!

This rule served two purposes: first, to ensure spirit farmers had a means of livelihood;

second, to restrain descendants and prevent them from seizing spirit fields and altering their layout, thereby damaging the array's core.

But he never imagined his descendants would be this incompetent.

Out of greed, they committed so many foolish acts, cutting off the array's blessings and severing its transmission.

The spirit fields changed; the array's core shifted.

Thus, the complete array diagram could no longer be deduced.

Mo Hua frowned, then suddenly had a flash of insight and asked again:

"Elder, do you have the ancient acreage maps from a few hundred years ago?"

The Elder hesitated a moment, then nodded. "We do have them…."

"May I see them?"

The Elder looked troubled—these items were highly confidential and normally not shown to outsiders.

Mo Hua said: "I want to find the array drawn by the Sun Clan's Ancestor."

The Elder froze, his voice trembling:

"The Sun Clan's Ancestor… the array?"

Mo Hua nodded.

The Elder stammered: "But the Sun Clan's Ancestor was a Rank-Two Array Master…"

He stared at Mo Hua, eyes filled with disbelief.

Could this young Mr. really comprehend an array drawn by a Rank-Two Array Master?

Mo Hua replied: "The Sun Clan's Ancestor was Rank-Two, but the array he left behind is actually Rank-One—just extremely difficult to draw."

The Elder didn't understand, but was deeply shaken.

To comprehend such an array was already extraordinary.

After long thought, his gaze hardened. "Fine—I'll give you the acreage maps!"

If this young Mr. truly uncovers the array drawn by the Sun Clan's Ancestor, it would be a tremendous blessing for our Spirit Farmers—and an immense debt of gratitude.

What's the point of hoarding a few acreage maps when we can't even feed ourselves and are barely surviving?

The Elder walked into the inner room, opened the lowest box in the corner, then pulled from its bottom a stack of yellowed leather sheets and handed them to Mo Hua.

Mo Hua looked: each leather sheet was covered in patches of Spirit Fields, arranged like fish scales.

The Spirit Fields were naturally distributed, with Tian Geng intersecting in orderly patterns.

The sheets also recorded the Dao Calendar years.

Information on Spirit Farmer household rolls, land allocation, soil fertility… everything was clearly documented.

This was indeed confidential information.

No wonder the Elder had hesitated.

Mo Hua flipped through a few more pages, cross-referencing the maps, mentally reconstructing the ancient Feng Lingtian layouts—his eyes gradually brightened.

He had not been wrong.

The true ultimate array was hidden here, within these acreage maps, aged by centuries!

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