Chapter 360

The prospecting tower trembled.

Over a hundred zhang tall, pure metal construction, with a base longer and wider than twenty zhang, the tower's entire body was wreathed in light; countless runes spurted from its thick metal pillars, each like a relief, emitting blinding light.

Several Huajia master artisans scrambled, continually hauling huge pieces of yuan crystal into the tower's formation base.

Moreover, over a dozen Huajia guards with high cultivation sat cross-legged on specially prepared futons atop the tower, expending all their strength to pour into the tower, maintaining its full operation.

Black and red earth qi rose with a howl, forming a black and a red long dragon, intertwining and continually striking the tower.

Lu Yao's body trembled slightly as he exerted himself to drive the tower to suppress the earth qi; he had neither the mood nor the energy to answer Wu Tie's question.

Wu Tie fell silent, his arms crossed over his chest, standing beside the tower, bending over and peering, stretching his neck to stare fixedly at the thumb-wide earth fissures spewing from beneath the drill rod due to the earth qi.

The ground trembled slightly.

This drilled-through vein was clearly extraordinary; the impact force of the earth qi was outrageously strong.

Water mist rose from the ground, and Ren Shanwen together with the Ren family elders walked out from within it.

Seeing Wu Tie arrive earlier than them, Ren Shanwen and the others' faces twitched. Ren Shanwen rudely shouted at Wu Tie: "Officer Huo, what are you doing here? Could it be you intend to spy on the Huajia's forging secret technique?"

"I am an officer of the Divine Martial Army; I can enter the city lord's mansion, the prefectural office, the state office… In the Great Jin Divine State, unless a military ban forbids unauthorized entry, I can go anywhere."

Wu Tie likewise spoke bluntly: "Unless you produce a military ban, this Huajia survey site—what I want to do, can you control?"

Ren Shanwen's face stiffened slightly.

Ren Duxing stepped forward fiercely, raised his hand hard, and poked Wu Tie's nose with a finger.

Wu Tie instantly raised his hand, grabbed Ren Duxing's finger, snapped it with a 'crack', then kicked him in the abdomen, sending him flying over a hundred zhang away.

"Young Master Ren, you've forgotten again—I'm an official, you're a civilian…" Wu Tie gritted his teeth and sneered: "Do you believe me? I'll now send a message to the Divine Martial Army saying you assaulted and killed an officer, plotting rebellion?"

Ren Shanwen stepped sideways, blocking Wu Tie's gaze fixed on Ren Duxing.

"Officer Huo." Ren Shanwen let out a light sigh: "Young man, your temper is fierce; please, Officer Huo, for the sake of us all being locals, spare Duxing this once."

Drooping his eyelids, slightly bowing his head, Ren Shanwen spoke humbly: "Please, Officer Huo, understand that this matter is an excellent opportunity for my Ren family to ally with the Huajia; thus we, too, have exerted our utmost effort, not wishing to see any oversight or mistake."

"Duxing acted hastily, gave offense; afterward… my Ren family will certainly present a token of goodwill." Ren Shanwen bowed humbly with clasped hands to Wu Tie, then called out a few times, leading the Ren entourage away quickly.

Wu Tie furrowed his brows, glanced toward the direction Ren Shanwen and company departed, and lightly shook his head.

"Master Artisan Lu, what kind of vein lies below?" Wu Tie looked at Lu Yao with a bright smile.

"Perhaps… it is Yin-Yang Whirling Light Iron." Lu Yao strained to support the tower, gazing at Wu Tie who persisted in questioning him, helplessly squeezing out a few words from his mouth: "A kind of superb, precious material… in the forging secret technique I have newly developed, Yin-Yang Whirling Light Iron is one of the essential main ingredients."

"I see, congratulations, Master Artisan Lu." Wu Tie leaned forward to gaze at the base of the tower's drill rod, then suddenly laughed: "Why suppress this earth qi? If we just let it vent completely, wouldn't we be able to open the mine shaft and go mining?"

Lu Yao drew a difficult breath, fixing Wu Tie with a look as if he were an idiot: "The raw vein of Yin-Yang Whirling Light Iron is fluid; once it meets heavenly wind, it turns into yin and yang qi and disperses. Only by using a secret method to suppress it, letting it gradually cool and thicken in the heavenly wind into a mercury-like substance, can it be mined."

Lu Yao's eyes flickered as he looked at Wu Tie: "Our drill hole here likely only tapped a tiny branch of this vein, so the discharge pressure below is not great… but we also need to quickly set up a great suppressive formation to press it down, allowing the heavenly wind to slowly seep into the vein."

Crowds upon crowds of Huajia artisans had already swarmed in.

Many laborers began, following the artisans' orders, to dig channels on the side, smelt various metal lumps into alloy liquid, then pour and cast it into the channels.

All were cultivators; the various mana furnaces were indeed fiercely fiery, and in just half an hour, the area around the prospecting tower had been laid out with a massive formation three hundred sixty zhang in diameter.

Chunk after chunk of yuan crystal the size of a human head hovered above the formation base; the grand formation and the prospecting tower became one, a strong beam of light spraying from the tower, tightly sealing the drill hole below.

The black and red earth qi was thoroughly suppressed downward; only then did Lu Yao and the several master artisans relax their faces and laugh together.

"Next, we wait." Lu Yao smiled at Wu Tie: "Officer Huo, it will be about half a month—wait for the external heavenly wind to seep into the vein, letting it cool and thicken, then we can mine."

Here, there's nothing worth seeing. Go elsewhere, drill a few more exploratory wells—who knows, maybe we'll find something good. Lu Yue laughed brightly: "Colonel Huo, if you're interested in well‑drilling survey, why not go together and take a look? I'd also like to explain the wonders to Colonel Huo."

Oh, no, no, I'll just keep looking here. Wu Tie refused Lu Yue's suggestion: "Yin‑Yang Vortex Light Iron—this kind of treasure, I've never even heard of it… hehe, I'll look, I'll keep looking. Hmm, hmm, what if this tower collapses?"

Lu Yue's face turned extremely strange: "This tower has already merged with the suppressive formation; it cannot collapse."

Wu Tie looked at Lu Yue with a smile: "I'm just saying… what if?"

Lu Yue stared at Wu Tie without uttering a sound; after a long while, a long while, he finally said softly: "Colonel Huo, the Ren family are commoners—they can't do anything to you… but my Hua family is a proper noble clan; crushing a petty colonel is no trouble."

"You're not a Hua family member." Wu Tie reached out and patted Lu Yue's shoulder, which was almost three times his width: "Master Lu's words are a threat… I'm curious—what could be worth your threatening me?"

Lu Yue's face fell.

His several disciples, the burly master craftsmen, silently gathered around.

In the distance, the Hua family's guards stared at this scene, somewhat bewildered.

But soon the guards caught on—this was clearly a conflict between Lu Yue and Wu Tie. Wu Tie was an outsider, Lu Yue a high‑paid master craftsman hired by the Hua family; without doubt, they would side with Lu Yue.

Nearly a hundred Hua family guards surrounded them at once.

A guard leader said in a low voice: "Colonel Huo, my brothers also serve in the Divine Martial Army… so as long as you don't cause trouble for my Hua family, we won't lift a hand against you."

Wu Tie was about to speak when a commotion suddenly came from afar.

A flash of water light skimmed the treetops and rushed over; a Ren family guard fell from the branches, shouting loudly: "Colonel Huo Xiong, your men in the woods have been attacked by a cultivated poisonous python—they've all been poisoned and collapsed……"

The guard quickly approached Wu Tie, looked at him, and said bluntly: "The thirty Divine Martial Army soldiers and two hundred City Defense Corps you left in the main camp—all have gone down."

Wu Tie stared, then snapped: "I ordered them not to leave the main camp a single step—how could they be injured by the python?"

The guard spread his hands and sighed: "The python attacked the main camp… Young Master Hua Xin‑xin almost got hurt by the python, and Colonel Huo Xiong's men, truly brave fellows of the Kangjing region, charged forward to fight it—that's why they all fell."

The guard said in a low voice: "Now, that python is still rampaging in the camp……"

Wu Tie fixed his gaze on the guard, staring hard for a moment, then stamped his foot; a fierce gust surged from the ground, lifting him into the air and turning into a raging wind that flew toward the main camp.

Colonel Huo Xiong practices the Divine Martial Army's secret triple‑circulation Yuan Gong, focusing on body tempering while also cultivating spiritual power, emphasizing close combat and lightly using divine abilities; therefore his flight speed is quite ordinary—about five or six hundred li in an hour.

This outpost is a thousand li from the main camp; at Colonel Huo Xiong's speed, a round trip of two thousand li, plus the time needed to attend to the wounded soldiers there, means he won't be back in less than three to five hours.

"Follow him, watch him… watch her to death, allow no slack." Lu Yue said in a low voice: "The others, carry out the plan as arranged."

"Don't let that Huo Xiong cause trouble… quick, quick, quick!" Lu Yue's body trembled slightly: "The difference won't be more than a hundred li—it's within this hundred‑li radius."

"Don't let that Huo Xiong cause trouble… quick, quick, quick!"

The Hua family's survey team brought over a thousand heavy‑duty carts—these are the more than a hundred prospecting towers.

When the prospecting was previously done, Lu Yue had his workers use only half of the towers; now, with a single order, the remaining dozens of towers were quickly erected by his craftsmen, using the earlier tower as the center, and prospecting rapidly began within a hundred‑li radius.

Streams of black‑and‑red earth‑qi kept gushing out, only to be swiftly suppressed by the towers.

Lu Yan quickly issued orders; at the same time, he and several disciples took out strangely shaped Dharma implements and began to survey the earth veins.

Ren Shanwen, Ren Duxing, and the other Ren Clan members, under the command of a disciple of Lu Yan, dug one big pit after another in the surrounding mountains and forests, buried the formation implements, and began to set up a grand formation covering over a hundred li.

The Ren Clan mobilized over ten thousand people, and this grand formation had apparently been drilled countless times.

In just half an hour, the grand formation was already set up.

The nine Ren Clan elders with the highest cultivation sat at the core of the grand formation; although the formation was completed, it was not activated, so it produced no abnormal movements or phenomena.

After the grand formation was completed, under Lu Yan's orders, a large unit of Hua Clan guards formed a battle array and held the sub‑camp, while the Ren Clan guards went into the mountains in groups of three or two, swiftly scouting the surroundings, ready to eliminate any suspicious persons.

Zhao Yu and Zhao Wu, who had been hiding in the mountains and secretly meeting Wu Tie from time to time these past days, were found immediately; at first a dozen Ren Clan guards pursued them, but soon they were surrounded and beaten by over two hundred guards led by seven Fetal Storage Realm cultivators.

Zhao Wu and Zhao Yu's injuries from the past few days had not yet healed, and they were beaten until they vomited blood; cursing, they used a secret technique to break out of the encirclement, but under pursuit by the Ren Clan guards they fled in a sorry state into the depths of unfamiliar mountains.

Wu Tie rushed toward the direction of Hua Xinxin's big camp for over a hundred li, then he suddenly stopped.

The Ren Clan guard delivering the message behind him stopped his escape technique in surprise: "Colonel Huo Xiong, how… did you stop?"

Wu Tie looked at the guard with a half‑smile: "Luring the tiger away from the mountain? This scheme… is rather crude."

Wu Tie shook his head and said in a deep voice: "Those comrades of the Divine Martial Army—I doubt you Ren Clan would dare to kill them. At least, you wouldn't dare to do so before you've gained enough benefits."

"So at most they're unharmed despite the scare." Wu Tie said with a smile: "I'm still interested in what Lu Yan is looking for."

Wu Tie narrowed his eyes and said in a deep voice: "What could require extensive surveying of the earth veins and drilling down thousands of zhang to find?"

"What is worth your expending so much effort?"

"And there are so many artisans and servants……"

"Around Flower Insect City, there's no talk of any blessed caves or heavenly treasures, nor any ancient dwellings. So what exactly are you looking for?"

Wu Tie looked at the Ren Clan guard whose face had changed dramatically and said softly: "These past days, Clerk Li has not been idle either; he consulted local records and questioned some elders of Flower Insect City, and only then did he learn that three hundred years ago the Ren Clan suffered a calamity, the main line was slaughtered overnight, and a side branch took over."

"Three hundred years—if you say that this side branch's seizure of power was prepared just for today…… three hundred years, what is worth your preparing for three hundred years?"

In the distant mountains, a dozen streaks of water light mixed with three strands of black smoke shot up into the sky and swiftly flew toward Wu Tie.

The speed of the three black smokes was obviously more than ten times that of the dozen water lights; in the blink of an eye they reached Wu Tie's face. As the black smoke dissipated, three gaunt‑looking old men in black robes were revealed.

"Although we were prepared to be discovered, being pestered by you brats like flies for so many days…… I have countless times thought of tearing you apart bit by bit." A black‑clothed old man stared at Wu Tie and sneered: "You should actually go back to that big camp; if you obediently return, go heal your subordinates, and we won't come out to kill you."

"I'm curious—what are you looking for?" Wu Tie stared fixedly at the black‑clothed old man: "You've spent so much effort…… even the shortage of personnel in the Forbidden Demon Hall is your doing, right?"

The black‑clothed old man pondered for a moment, then nodded with a smile: "In any case, since we've made a move, you're as good as dead. So let me tell you what we're looking for: it's an innate spiritual treasure that our senior happened to discover, forged by heaven and earth……."