Destiny in Cinders

The Keensight Bell, a terrestrial-vein divine armament, was crafted from a seed copper ore extracted from True Martial Mountain and refined at Forgegod Peak. Copper was the origin of all human currency and a common material used for all sorts of tools and equipment. It was omnipresent in daily life and the ideal material to use for regulating terrestrial-vein qi.

All four sides of the bell were engraved with talisman script, depicting the many sights of human life. The inner walls detailed the flow and direction of the terrestrial veins that the central pivot protected.

Even while dormant, the Keensight Bell was like a beating heart, sucking in terrestrial-vein qi from all directions and resonating at a regular frequency, once more distributing the terrestrial-vein qi in a much denser, purer form. As the beating heart of the major terrestrial-vein formation, it sucked in the refined terrestrial-vein qi in a continuous feedback cycle, constantly reinforcing and improving itself. The terrestrial veins of Keensight seemed like parts of a living being. Merely by taking in and exhausting the qi, the divine armament breathed life into it.

"Is this what terrestrial veins that are reinforced by divine armaments look like?" It was the first time he had seen a central pivot of a major terrestrial-vein formation, especially one of the Void Divine Treasures Class. The moment he entered, he and Yvelbane both committed everything to their memories so that they could reproduce it in jade slips and pass on these insights to Huo Qing and others. "We can't waste this chance! We have to milk it as much as we can!"

Even though An Jing didn't know much about formations, he could sense a huge difference between terrestrial veins that were secured by divine armaments and those that weren't. While the latter could also circulate their energy, it would be a much slower process.

Planting and growing spirit items near terrestrial veins that weren't secured by formations could risk draining the veins completely, making the surrounding area a wasteland. It would take decades to a century for it to recover. While that span of time was nothing in the grand scale of things, this was a whole lifetime for most people.

With a formation secured by a divine armament, the energy consumed from planting spirit items could be restored using spirit qi from the surroundings by the formation's controller. It still consumed lots of energy, but at the very least, it wouldn't drain an area clean of it completely. The energy that was used up would also recover much quicker.

Terrestrial-vein formations themselves could also promote the growth of spirit items by generating proliferation qi, which would result in the growth of many common plants, creating ecosystems with ideal conditions. This way, spirit items could be planted year after year without risk of draining terrestrial veins completely on top of having up to a hundred times more harvest.

Is fertilizer still necessary if we have terrestrial-vein formations? That odd thought was the first thing that popped into his mind, but he shook his head to snap out of it. Fertilizer would definitely make the earth more nutrient rich, but Void Embrace was a world with supernatural properties at the end of the day. It was one thing for the energy from terrestrial veins to act as fertilizers and promote growth of common plants, but whether normal fertilizer could be used to nurture spirit plants was a different question completely.

"Young Hero Jing, wait here a moment while I grant you the privilege." Zheng Mo focused on operating the grand seal to draw out the talisman script from the terrestrial veins and form it into a talisman.

An Jing's eyes glowed faintly silver as he quietly observed everything. He added Yvelbane's perception to his vision to increase the granularity of what he could see. He watched the dense and majestic streams of black and gold coagulated and flowed through the many thread-like paths in the network of capillaries. The streams seemed to vary in amount across the entire network. When An Jing focused on them, it felt like the streams themselves stood out more than the divine armament or the terrestrial veins.

What is that? He knew the answer almost right away when he felt the imperial blood droplet from You Ruhui vibrate within his sea of consciousness. This was clearly dragon qi! He tapped into the sense of familiarity coming from the blood droplet and saw the true essence of the black-gold streams.

People's hearts across the land corresponded to life-giving proliferation qi. The Celestial Ocean resonated with the supreme, giving rise to bountiful clearspirit qi of the nine firmaments! The mountains, rivers and streams corresponded with the bearing qi of the eight wildernesses! The true nature of the imperial dao dragon qi was the combination of the three types of fundamental qi, those of heaven, earth and man!

An Jing turned to look at the grand seal and the divine armament where the dragon qi gathered. The streams of dragon qi within the terrestrial veins were also being refined by the divine artifact. It was no wonder the longer an area was under imperial rule, the more powerful their divine armaments and officials' grand seal became. The empire of Grand Chen never ceased to strengthen their foundations by relying on the people and natural energy in their territories. They were truly a force to be reckoned with.

"Looks like this is also the core of heavenly and earthly mandates." An Jing was quite sensitive to dragon qi due to the imperial blood droplet, so he was able to detect a hint of dragon qi within Zheng Mo. That thread of dragon qi was unlike the rest, being of the highest purity. The dragon qi from the terrestrial veins were like unrefined gold ore whereas the thread in Zheng Mo was gold with a fineness of six nines![1] The incredibly pure dragon qi took the form of a complicated talisman that was fused together with the soul of the mandated official, guiding spirit qi from the surrounding environment into his body.

"Heaven, earth, man. Celestial destiny, earthly position, human agency..." The silver glow in his eyes gradually faded away. He had seen all the deepest mysteries there were to see. "I see. The heavenly and earthly mandates of Grand Chen are akin to lifearcs granted by celestial destiny. It builds a foundation using an official position and dragon qi granted by the imperial court, coupled with man's own efforts."

"It is done." Zheng Mo managed to manifest a talisman slip with the power of the terrestrial veins. He turned around gleefully and handed it to An Jing. "This will allow you to observe the divine armament from up close and study its divine mysteries!"

An Jing sensed that the whole formation had relaxed its grip around him once he got the privilege. The mysterious forces that bound him gradually disappeared. He could finally take a step forward to touch the Keensight Bell.

"Behold. See it for yourself." Zheng Mo stepped aside after An Jing thanked him and stepped ahead impatiently.

Unbeknownst to others, An Jing hadn't actually gained insight into the dao by observing the operation of the Keensight Bell. He wasn't actually a genius of the yang aspect, so he didn't count on actually gaining any insight from seeing it up close at all. However, he sensed his Qiform Arsenal ability stirring somewhat.

Human dao qi, terrestrial-vein qi and celestial-ocean qi were the three parts that made up dragon qi. Even though divine armaments weren't bodies of qi and had corporeal forms, the way the imperial court of Grand Chen nurtured them with dragon qi and operated grand seals seemed related to Qiform Arsenal's function of forming qi into weapons.

"If I see my body as a miniature world, the weapons that I form with the qi in my body are divine armaments in a sense. The ability itself would be like the formation. Just like how heaven and earth are forges that temper all things in existence, my body is a forge that tempers my abilities."

An Jing felt that this was a process that he could adapt for himself. Once he got a hang of it, he would be able to mimic the process of strengthening divine armaments with dragon qi by using his Evenstar lethal qi or other kinds of spirit material to temper the weapons in his body. He had a feeling that once he mastered this technique fully, the weapons that he could forge within his body would be on a whole new level. Perhaps that was when his Evenstar ability would awaken too!

1. Nines is an informal unit for gold purity. See more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nines_(notation) ☜