Swallowing the Stars: 100x Return for Teaching Apprentices

Chapter 101: The Complete "Array of Time"

As the guests departed one by one, the Red Leaf Star Temple finally returned to tranquility.

Meanwhile, Mireya and Xuelan Changfeng, the two new disciples, officially settled down on Red Leaf Star after receiving various instructions from their ancestor.

The details of Qi Yuan hosting a separate banquet for his five current disciples after all the guests had left are self-evident.

The day after the banquet, Qi Yuan immediately summoned his newly accepted genius disciple, Mireya, to his side.

"You said you wanted to learn from me the knowledge involved in the trials of the Wonderful Pavilion."

Qi Yuan looked at the four-winged girl standing respectfully in front of him and asked with a smile, "Then do you know what that knowledge is?"

"this."

After a slight hesitation, the four-winged girl Mireya tentatively asked, somewhat uncertainly,

"Teacher, I feel like it looks a bit like a secret pattern? Yes, it is a secret pattern. The pattern on that metal engraving looks somewhat similar to the secret patterns on weapons."

"Oh? It seems you do have a good talent for this."

Qi Yuan smiled and nodded upon hearing this, "That's right, it's similar in meaning, but I prefer to call it 'array'."

"An array?" Mireya asked, slightly puzzled.

"Yes, a formation."

Qi Yuan casually explained,
"It's pretty much the same idea, just with a slightly different name. The origin of array formations is more ancient, and after continuous inheritance and evolution, it eventually led to the 'Mystic Rune Master' lineage. What you felt in the Wonderful Pavilion was a kind of 'Array Master' inheritance."

"Are array masters... the kind of people who fight by setting up large arrays?" Mireya asked curiously.

"Yes and no."

Qi Yuan smiled faintly, "Array formations and array patterns are the capture and application of traces of the rules of the universe. On a small scale, they can be used to change the course of a river and guide the flow according to the situation. On a large scale, they can be used to grasp the breath of the universe and apply the laws to oneself. All of these are examples of the existence and application of array formations."

A skilled array master's every gesture is imbued with the traces of array patterns, rather than simply mechanically setting up grand arrays for battle.

"Grasp the breath of the universe, and harness its laws for your own use."

Hearing Qi Yuan's incredibly sophisticated descriptions, the four-winged girl Mireya's eyes immediately lit up.

"Teacher, when will I be able to learn such powerful knowledge!"

She looked at Qi Yuan with great eagerness.

Seeing that the atmosphere had been set enough, Qi Yuan stopped dawdling and directly took out a silver-white crystalline jade stone.

This is a special crystal that can store a large amount of information, with a capacity even greater than some special chips.

This contains the entire contents of the "Eight Formations" Wind Secret Manual, which Qi Yuan had Xiao Ai scan and copy.

That's the advantage of using secret techniques as gifts. As long as the original technique is in one's possession, one can continuously create numerous copies and repeatedly pass them on to different disciples.

"This contains a set of array master inheritances that are enough to study up to the peak of the World Lord level. Although it is said that it can only reach the peak of the World Lord level, if you can fully comprehend its contents, it is estimated that it will not be difficult to rival an ordinary immortal."

Qi Yuan used his primal force to send her close to Mireya, smiling encouragingly.
"Now, I will pass on this set of 'Eight Formations' Wind Secrets to you, hoping that one day you can use your own abilities to perfect this inheritance to the level of immortality!"

"Yes, disciple will certainly live up to teacher's expectations!"

Mireya received the silver-white jade stone containing the secrets of the wind with great anticipation.

At the same time, the system notification sound finally came to Qi Yuan's mind.

[A gift of success to my disciple in passing down the "Eight Formations - Wind"!]

[Base return rate 53x, return begins.]

[The gifted item has brought great joy to the disciple, triggering a 90x critical hit reward, with a final return multiplier of 4770x!]

[Reward returned: One fragment of the "Array of Time" scroll.]

The reward has been stored in the system space and can be claimed at any time.

After reading the system's feedback, Qi Yuan couldn't help but feel a slight sense of regret.

The reason he laid so much groundwork beforehand was to try to pique Mireya's interest in formations, so that when he gave her the gift, he could evoke her emotions as much as possible, thereby triggering the perfect critical hit reward.

It's unclear whether it's because the Wind Manual can only be inherited at the peak level of the Realm Lord, or whether Qi Yuan's 'marketing' skills are still lacking.

Although the critical hit multiplier provided by Mireya this time is already extremely high, it is still a little short of a perfect critical hit.

As a result, Qi Yuan may very well miss out on the second fragment of the "True Explanation of the Dao of Formations".
However, his disappointment only lasted for a moment.

After all, as mentioned earlier, he could teach the same secret technique to different disciples repeatedly.

At worst, we can find another disciple suitable for the Wind Manual later. Cultivators have long lifespans, especially after becoming immortals. As long as they don't perish unexpectedly, they can even live until the Great Destruction of the Primordial Universe.

He has plenty of time to search and try.

Furthermore, although I didn't receive the most anticipated fragment of the "True Explanation of Array Formations," I unsurprisingly received another valuable reward I had been waiting for—

Fragments of the Array of Time!
Including the one he already had, he now had two fragments of the "Array of Time"!
This further solidified his initial suspicion—

By gifting the Wind, Thunder, and Light Formation Secret Manuals from the Eight Formations, you might be able to obtain a complete set of Time Formations as a reward, provided the return multiplier is high enough!
"The Array of Time," as the name suggests, is a powerful secret manual that involves the realm of the laws of time. Once it is fully completed, it will definitely become another trump card in Qi Yuan's hands!
"Not bad, not bad. Although we didn't trigger the critical hit reward, we've obtained the second fragment of the 'Time Array.' Now, it's up to Xue Lan Changfeng."

With the experience gained from Mireya's experience, Qi Yuan made more thorough preparations for returning Xue Lan and Chang Feng's supplies.

He did not blindly return the teachings, but only gave him some basic array information for him to study, which aroused his strong interest and anticipation for more profound content.

During this time, he also used his connection with that Xing Zhan to purchase an S-grade bloodline evolution agent for Xue Lan Changfeng.

After the second month's return opportunity cooled down, he still did not choose to teach the formation. Instead, he used this S-bloodline evolution agent as a gift, and while receiving a return reward of 155 drops of Dragon Essence, he also doubled Xue Lan Changfeng's base return rate again.

With the added effect of the drop of Dragon Essence recently bestowed upon him, Xue Lan Changfeng's base return rate has now been forcibly increased to 32 times.

Unfortunately, neither bloodline potions nor dragon essence are most effective the first time they are used; subsequent uses have negligible effects.

Otherwise, Qi Yuan would absolutely be willing to use all of the Dragon Essence as a price to further enhance Xue Lan Changfeng's aptitude.

At this point, with the channels Qi Yuan had access to, it was temporarily impossible to find a way to help Xue Lan Changfeng improve his qualifications in the short term.

He also stopped pursuing perfection.

When the opportunity to return the item cooled down again, he immediately gave it back as a gift, presenting it with the Secret Manual of Thunder from the Eight Formations.

This time, however, the fifth disciple, Xue Lan Changfeng, gave him a truly unexpected surprise!

Xue Lan Changfeng had been frustrated since childhood due to his poor aptitude for cultivation, but this time he finally found a path that was extremely suitable for him.

Coupled with Qi Yuan's 'cold shoulder' and groundwork laid in the previous two months, his expectation for Qi Yuan to bestow the inheritance naturally reached an astonishing level.

Furthermore, the Thunder Secret Manual is one of the four inheritances in the Eight Formations that can reach the immortal level, and its value is enough to shock and impress Xue Lan Changfeng.

Therefore, in this gift, Xue Lan Changfeng gave Qi Yuan a perfect critical hit, showing him great respect!
[A successful inheritance of the "Eight Formations - Thunder" is bestowed upon my disciple!]

[Base return rate 32x, return begins.]

[The gifted item has brought great joy to the disciple, triggering a 100x critical hit reward, with a final return multiplier of 3200x!]

[Reward returned: One fragment of "The Array of Time". This return has triggered a perfect critical hit, granting a special reward: One fragment of "The True Explanation of the Array Dao".]

The reward has been stored in the system space and can be claimed at any time.

In a certain cultivation space of the Heavenly Craft Tower.

Qi Yuan waved his hand, and suddenly, strangely shaped chips appeared in front of him.

There are a total of 5 strange chips, each chip being about one-third the size of a palm.

Three of them were almost transparent and colorless, while the other two were a dark and chaotic gray color.

The moment these chips appeared, a wondrous change began to occur—

First, the three transparent crystal chips attracted each other and quickly merged into a palm-sized transparent rhomboid crystal amidst a series of faint, misty lights.

Immediately afterwards, the two dark, chaotic crystal chips were drawn together by an unknown force.

Unlike the complete fusion of the transparent chip, this chaotic chip was merely 'docked' together, with almost no other changes in appearance except for a slight increase in size.

call!call!
Qi Yuan stretched out his hands and took the two transformed objects in his hands.

In his left hand, there was a rhombus-shaped crystal formed by the fusion of three transparent crystal chips. In addition to being transparent and colorless, its shape kept changing between appearing and disappearing, as if it did not belong to this space-time completely!
The slightly larger chaotic crystal in the right hand was as profound and mysterious as ever, captivating anyone who looked at it.

Qi Yuan hesitated slightly, but first probed his consciousness into the rhombus-shaped crystal—

The Crystal of Time is a strange crystal that contains the complete "Array of Time".

The moment Qi Yuan's consciousness probed in, wisps of delicate 'streams' containing countless profound and mysterious information began to flow into his mind.

Unlike the previous 'violent attack', this time, perhaps because the Time Crystal had been fully replenished, the entire information transmission process became unusually gentle.

Qi Yuan could even probe into it with his consciousness and autonomously search for and browse the content he wanted!

As he continued to peruse it, Qi Yuan's entire consciousness was gradually and completely awestruck and captivated by the profound contents contained within the Crystal of Time!

(End of this chapter)