New Year

This time he was eager to meet his father, tell him that he now had a chance to become the direct disciple of the sect, that he had now taken a rebirth pill and soon he would be a qi condensation realm cultivator, that he no longer needed him to send any resources his way as the sect was eager to throw their resources at him. Tell him that he was now competent.

When he finally announced his news, the entirety of Zhang Manor was moved to celebration. The festival was now centered around him. Everyone was eager to gain some points with him. But he kept his distance from all of them and spent his time with the only three people he considered family.

At the end of the festival Zhang Wuji reached the high stage of body refinement. It was an exhilarating feeling. With the qi burst provided, he could increase his speed and power by almost twice. If he were to clench his fist hard enough he could feel the accumulation of the qi. The lively feeling in his fist made him feel more alive than ever. At the same time the presence of something that was only a fantasy for his entire life, made him feel more real than ever.

Him reaching high stage along with his position in the sect moved the family elders. He couldn't ignore them like he had ignored the others. After a long afternoon, they had left and he was back to his routine. There was nothing they could offer to him. They only fawned over his father and increased the resources allocated to him.

Few days later he was back in the sect. The first thing he did was spar. He fought with anyone that was willing and had the time of his life. After he felt he got the hang of the burst qi, he challenged the Battle Tower. He beat the first three floors but the fourth was like an unbreakable wall to him. He felt even if he were to reach perfection in his martial arts he wouldn't be able to beat it. Disappointed he put his focus back on formations.

Now that he reached level seven, he could build formations. He was excited to make his very first formation. He went straight to Feng Xi and asked for a little guidance.

"You don't need to build formations right now. Learn as much as you can in this realm, you can start building formations when you reach qi condensation."

"What? Why?"

"You should know, in your realm you would have to do everything with your body, draw all patterns by hand, walk around to place the array down and you will also have to use assist tools. Once you reach qi condensation, everything will be done with qi. The time you spend now building formations will be completely wasted."

"But if I don't make and only design I wouldn't know of any problems that could arise during building. I would just be lame and inexperienced!"

"You got a point there but it still is not worth it. It's a waste of time. It will take you several minutes to make the simplest of formations and you will be consuming way more resources. You'd better gain experience as a qi condensation realm cultivator."

"But-"

"Alright alright. You youngsters need to learn patience. There's beginners books in the library. Choose any formation and go ahead. If you have any problems then ask that little friend of yours to help. I won't participate in this gross disrespect of time and resources." He waved his hand and threw Zhang Wuji out the window.

He landed right in front of the library of the Collage. He was now somewhat used to bring thrown out and just casually picked himself up greeted the onlookers with a nod, dusted his clothes and entered the library. He checked out a few books and went straight to his courtyard to start building formations. He had resources and as a body refinement realm cultivator, he had plenty of time. Attending classes was now optional to him and more often than not they weren't an option.

The next few days he was totally immersed in formations. Not only because he found them fun, but because he saw a method to beat the Battle Tower in them. And that method was talismans.

Talismans were strips of metal, beast hide, tree bark, herbs, paper and other base materials with a drawing on them that fulfilled a specific purpose. Common talismans were either made of paper or beast hide. The ink used is different for each purpose and must be infused with spiritual energy when drawn.

Talismans were of three kinds, weapon, symbol and pattern. Symbol was the one Zhang Wuji was most familiar with from his past life and was based on symbol formations. To make a fire talisman, one has to draw the symbol for fire and depending on one's understanding the power output of the talisman changes. Weapon talismans were more like weapons and were made by tool refiners and had nothing to do with formations.

Pattern talismans were part of pattern formations. The paper used when paired with a special component mixed with the ink allowed different talismans to link to make a formation. They were like flag formations, only difference being that they were active and consumables and flags were passive and can be reused multiple times before they were worn off.

These talismans can also be used individually. They were easy. A simple fire pattern talisman was a circle drawn with a fire attributed ink on corresponding talisman paper. As long as one has materials, any high stage body refinement realm cultivator can draw multiple of them. Once drawn, one has to wait for it to charge up. A spirit stone can be used to speed up the charging process. The ink attracts and stores fire spiritual energy.

As long as the circle drawn is smooth with no abrupt turns, the ink would last for long. Turns cause accumulation that would corrode the ink. The line must be made as thin as possible. thick lines would lead to corrosion due to faulty flow of spiritual energy. Concentric circles made of thin lines of ink with enough space between each other stores the most energy.

When activated, the talisman releases all the energy accumulated and fiery explosion. Energy stored in concentric circles could deal a maximum damage of an average attack from a first gate qi condensation realm cultivator. The materials were too costly to be wasted like this. If properly utilized with a good design, a much more lethal talisman could be made out of them.

Talismans in the same grade were thus divided into three qualities depending on the design, low, mid and high. Anyone could draw low and mid quality talismans, but high quality talismans require a lot of experience to draw. The quality of the talisman determined the power. Low mid high quality grade one talismans were as powerful as low mid high stage qi condensation realm cultivators respectively.

Learning about this great weapon he went straight to Shen Li.

"Are you stupid? Such things are not allowed in the Tower. They are not part of your strength."

"But I'll make them myself!"

"You are stupid. If that were allowed, first class disciples would be full of rich kids. Sigh. Look, if you are so eager to fight with formations in the Tower, there is an option in the weapon selection that would allow you to do so. You'll be given thirty minutes head start to prepare a formation."

"What can I do in thirty minutes?! Just running around to draw a pattern will take me that much time!"

"Make an array, use talismans and flags."

"Senior Shen you are the greatest formation master in your generation, could you help a junior out and lend me some materials? I promise to retur-"

"Get off!" Shen Li kicked him off and straightened his clothes before continuing "The materials are supplied by the Battle Tower formation."

"Oh." He got up and dusted his clothes off before asking with a stoic face "How many and what is available?"

Shen Li stared at him strangely and answered "There is no limit and all grade one materials that the sect ever came across are available."

"What?! Then I would just make a qi restraining formation or something and level the field. Maybe I could use those rare space element materials and restrain him. No I should.." His voice got more and more excited as he thought of the multiple exotic formations he could make with no material restriction.

"Oi oi get your head out of the clouds. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to handle qi restraining materials? How difficult it is to make a formation out of them when you can't even stimulate them with energy? Also those formations are exotic not only because the materials are rare but also because they require special care, that which can not be achieved in your realm. Go home and think of something realistic." Shen Li slapped the back of his head and brought him out of his reverie.

"Brother Shen, are the previous challenges to the Battle Tower recorded?"

"They are but you'll be disappointed. Only the fifth floor battles are recorded. That too only when the challenger is special. But no one has ever reached the fifth floor using formations."

"No one?!"

"Yeah, although there are no material restrictions, thirty minutes is not enough to prepare something against someone in the qi condensation realm as a body refinement realm formation master. Also illusions of any kind, misdirection, nothing works on the illusion opponent created by the Battle Tower formation. That's virtually crippling a lower realm formation master. So as far as formation masters are concerned, fourth level of Battle Tower is more challenging than the fifth."

Seeing Zhang Wuji fall in deep thought Shen Li patted his shoulder and left him alone.

....

In the following days Zhang Wuji forgot all about Battle Tower and went about making formations. Since he was still in body refinement, he had to use assisting tools to make them. These tools cut a deep hole in his pocket. Everything he had was spent on refreshing his tools.

Most of his gold was spent on spirit stones. Given that he himself had no qi to take note of, he had to use spirit stones to compensate for it. Spiritual energy was the basis of formations. Without some kind of spiritual energy formations could not be made. Spirit stones were spiritual energy receptive stones that had been filled with spiritual energy over a long period of immersion in spiritual energy rich areas.

Depending on the kind of stones different kinds of impurities are added. Such impurities shorten the life of patterns and usually a filtering pattern is added in one of the layers of the formation.

There are other deposits of spiritual energy that do not have this level of impurities like spirit crystals, spirit springs and others. But none were things Zhang Wuji could get a hold of. Even if he did, he wouldn't waste them for practice.

Spirit stones and the like are very useful in cultivating. Even with the purification process added, cultivating with a spirit stone was much faster than absorbing spiritual energy from the surroundings.

He had a tool that looked like a pen for drawing patterns. It came with a finger segment size slot for a spirit stone. The little qi that he had was used to activate the pen and the energy from the stone was used to draw.

For arrays he similarly needed tools to place and activate them properly. Only some were reusable. Another reason why he concentrated more on patterns.

Time passed. Although Feng Xi was not supportive of Zhang Wuji making formations in this realm, he didn't stop teaching. In fact he taught more and more. In one of these lessons, he introduced the many formations in the sect including Battle Tower. And that lesson renewed Zhang Wuji's hope.

He started planning his visit to the tower. He looked through multiple books on formations useful in fights and formation materials and slowly a complete picture formed in his mind.