Chapter 1277: 【Avoidance of Detection】 Magic Array

"Follow me!"

"Yes."

Following Yilisi to the supply warehouse, Xia Duo finally obtained a box containing six Arcane Crystals and two standard cubic Mithril Ingots, weighing about twenty pounds.

This was more than enough for making any Magic Item, but Xia Duo still felt it wasn't enough and kept asking Yilisi for more.

The pool of Mithril obtained earlier in the ruins of Seventon, while sufficient in quantity, had its state altered by chaotic Magic, and its purity was severely contaminated; after re-refining, its weight had shrunk significantly.

After completing the 【Summoning-Sealing Array】, there wasn't much Mithril left, only about ten pounds; if it were just for making some Magic Items, even one pound would have been enough.

But for a continuous, space-covering Avoidance of Detection Array higher than the 9th Circle, that might not be enough.

Xia Duo had never built such a complex and profound Magic Array before, and he also had to account for the redundancy needed for Mithril during the testing phase; compared to this, the six Arcane Crystals were truly enough.

But this time, Yilisi refused directly, "There is no more. With my Permission Level, I can only withdraw this much in advance. Don't forget, besides you, a bottle of Purification Potion was also exchanged. If Lord Xisi finds nothing in the Underground Passage, aren't you afraid of bearing a debt you can never pay off in your lifetime?"

Xia Duo wanted to say he wasn't afraid, but that certainly didn't fit the persona of "Maikade." In fact, what he was doing now was already a bit excessive, so he hesitated and ultimately did not insist further.

At worst, he would just waste a little less during the testing phase!

After returning to his room, Xia Duo pretended to rest, but in reality, he was designing the Avoidance of Detection Array in his mind. Due to his eagerness to see the 【Sword of Ruling】, he completed all the design work in just one night.

Next came the fabrication and testing.

But nothing done within the base could be hidden from Yilisi. Just as Xia Duo was pondering what excuse to use to leave the base, he suddenly received a Sending from Yilisi—

"Lord Xisi has already located the Underground Passage. I have received a mission from above and need to leave for a period of time. You can choose to stay in the base or continue with your previous mission."

Upon hearing this, Xia Duo was immediately overjoyed. What they say about "a pillow appearing just as one gets sleepy"—this was it!

If Yilisi left, he could use the Alchemy Array in the base at his leisure; this was far more convenient than leaving the base to perform alchemy by hand in the wild!

Thinking of this, Xia Duo immediately went out to the hall. Yilisi was not in the hall, and Xia Duo went to several other places where Yilisi might be, but he did not see the other party.

"It looks like they have left."

Xia Duo had considered that the other party might be testing him, but that possibility was now too small. Even if he really were a spy, what of it? He was the only person in the base, and even if he leaked this base to the Elf, it wouldn't cause much loss.

As for Xisi's whereabouts, half a day and a whole night had passed, and the timeliness had greatly diminished; it was simply unrealistic to use this information to ambush a Great Arcanist.

Xia Duo really couldn't think of any reason for Yilisi to test him. If nothing went wrong, it should be that Xisi had found the Underground Passage, or at least confirmed the existence of that Underground Passage in the Dragonspine Mountains.

Thinking of this, a sense of urgency that was hard to eliminate inevitably arose in Xia Duo's heart.

Once the Empire Remnants raided the Underground Passage, the commotion would certainly not be small, and perhaps Ilfaren Elves would participate directly, which would surely draw a considerable amount of Cormanthor's attention, favoring his summoning of the 【Sword of Ruling】.

Of course, his summoning of the 【Sword of Ruling】 was also beneficial to the Empire Remnants' raid on the Underground Passage, perhaps even more so.

After all, the Drow were the common enemy of all Elves, while the Sword of Ruling was a key token that the Crown King personally could not afford to lose.

It was just like that saying about robbing a bank—"The money belongs to the state, but your life is your own!"

Xia Duo could not know the specific time for the Empire Remnants' raid on the Underground Passage, but he believed it would be within these few days, yet his preparations for summoning the 【Sword of Ruling】 were not ready.

"Must hurry!"

Two days later, Xia Duo arrived at the boundary of the Cormanthor Mythallar again, using the entry and exit of the Mythallar to avoid any possible sight from the Empire Remnants.

Afterward, he brought the fabricated components of the Avoidance of Detection Array to the cave where he had previously built the 【Summoning-Sealing Array】.

The deep, lightless cave was very quiet; Xia Duo could even hear the sound of his own heartbeat. At this moment, his mood was also incomparably calm.

"First, open a secret chamber!"

The cave walls were not flat, which was unfavorable for the layout of the Avoidance of Detection Array. Xia Duo used Magic to control the Adamantine Knife to dig a small portal on a relatively flat cave wall.

Afterward, he further dug out a regular square space within the mountain, about three meters in length, width, and height, and then he began to lay out the Magic Array.

This process was actually similar to the construction of a Magic secret chamber.

Xia Duo first made several thin, long fixing holes in the walls, then used Magic to turn gold into a liquid state, letting it seep into the fixing holes and extend to all the walls, including the floor.

This made the square space more regular, and at the same time, this gold could serve as the base for the Mithril Components of the Magic Array.

The elemental stability of gold was beyond doubt, which to a certain extent could also delay the frequency of Elemental Transmutation in the Mithril Components.

Next, Xia Duo paid even more attention, controlling the prepared Mithril Components to adhere to the gold surface while continuing to brush a layer of liquid gold onto the walls.

This caused the fine Mithril threads of the Mithril Components to be completely encased in gold; this could be considered encapsulation with gold, and a pre-encapsulation that required even higher craftsmanship.

With a total of three layers of Mithril Components combined with gold encapsulation, Xia Duo had finally completed the main construction of the 【Long-term Space-Covering Avoidance of Detection Array】.

He still had plenty of gold, but he only had enough Mithril for one failure, so he needed to be extra careful.

Theoretically speaking, after repeated calculations, there were no errors in Xia Duo's Magic Array design, but in the actual construction process, the roots of failure could be buried.

This was where the influence of "human factors" lay.

After the main body was completed, Xia Duo used the dozen or so spare Mithril Components for testing and used empathy to test the overall state of the Magic Array's main body; the completion was quite high, and there was no abnormality in the flow of Arcane Energy.

Immediately after, he began to install the Energy Buffering core. Compared to the 【Summoning-Sealing Array】, which had no testing process and could not have one, the 【Avoidance of Detection Array】 was undoubtedly more important.

For this reason, Xia Duo specifically allocated four Arcane Crystals as the Energy Buffering core of the Magic Array, placing them at the four corners of the diagonal plane of this cubic space.

After doing all this, it was time for the final step of the Magic Array fabrication—Link Magic Web!