Thirty-six: The First Attempt at Forging

After confirming that the vampire was of no further use, the two of them handed over four thousand spirit stones to send him away. The fellow claimed he was heading to Falling Maple Town and pestered them for more spirit stones, tearfully recounting the hardships of wandering penniless with his companions last time. A whole group of vampires without even a place to sleep, forced to burrow underground to hide from the sun, and one of them even pawned his iPad 4 just to get a taste of wine. There was nothing to be done—so, for the sake of peace and quiet, the two parted with their stones.

Qin Yue then spent another two days refining all the materials needed for crafting an artifact. The next step was the actual forging.

Luo Yu had also prepared a set of driving scripts for this first artifact. Based on the programs laid down by predecessors, he’d optimized and supplemented them, making the runes concise and omitting long stretches of redundant operational methods. Luo Yu was confident that these runes would at least double the artifact’s responsiveness. He’d also prepared separate attack and defense protocols, though the defense was only passive, incapable of reflecting attacks—reflection, after all, was too idealistic for such low-grade materials.

With everything in place, they chose the weekend to jointly forge a flying sword at the old house.

The primary material for the sword was a block of fire-aligned Crimson Flame Gold, retrieved from the storage pouch of Master Cherishing-Flowers. The quality was excellent—pure, gold-red, and had been refined by Qin Yue several times over.

They went out into the courtyard, where Luo Yu arranged a simple protective array around them, insulating them from ordinary disturbances: wind, falling bird droppings, sudden loud noises, and so on. Inside, he set up a small spirit-gathering array—after all, one can never have too much spiritual energy.

Selecting a spot about two meters apart, they sat down cross-legged, facing one another. They could no longer rely on the liquefaction furnace, as its temperature had become inadequate. Besides, Qin Yue insisted on using this opportunity to train her own control over spiritual power, refusing technological substitutes. With powerful spiritual senses as support, she was confident she could manage the fire well enough. Luo Yu, envious, had to admit his own cultivation was too low—the fire he could muster was insufficient, so he still depended on high-tech assistance.

In the tranquil courtyard, between the two cross-legged, handsome figures, a piece of material—neither wood nor metal—slowly rose and hovered about a meter above the ground.

Qin Yue raised her hand in a seal, sending a tongue of flame to envelop the material, carefully controlling the heat for evenness.

After some time, another piece of material slowly floated up, and she repeated the process, maintaining the fire.

This continued, with each new material rising in turn. Some required more heat, some less. Before long, a dozen or so fiery clusters of various sizes floated before them.

Luo Yu watched nervously. This was a slow process; he wondered if Qin Yue could endure it. They'd found two pills for replenishing spiritual power among Master Cherishing-Flowers’ stores, so he made a mental note to remind her to take one if needed.

Luo Yu’s own spiritual sense monitored the changes in the materials, occasionally offering advice on adjusting the heat.

This went on for an entire day. By nightfall, most of the materials had finally melted down.

Qin Yue began fusing them according to their respective weights and densities. Artifact forging required a fusion method distinct from pill refining, demanding far more spiritual power. The materials for artifact crafting were wildly varied—sometimes liquid, sometimes metal or stone—and getting water to blend with molten iron was impossible; it would evaporate on contact. At this step, spiritual power was used to harmonize the mixtures, a step that came earlier here than in pill making.

Fusion also required a certain order: start with the less dense materials, harmonize those of similar density, and then gradually add denser ones, so that the mixture could more easily integrate heavier elements.

By the time fusion was complete, dawn had broken.

Qin Yue controlled the resulting two lumps—a large golden-red one and a smaller black one—lengthening the former with spiritual power into the shape of a sword blank, and stretching the latter into a sword hilt. She then joined the two, using spiritual power to harmonize the join, and carefully lowered the heat, no longer using intense flame.

Once joined, the sword already began to take shape. Using spiritual sense and spiritual power in concert, Qin Yue molded it into the ideal form in her mind: a blade long and slender with a graceful curve, a small guard, and a long handle—ample for both hands to grip comfortably.

Luo Yu was dumbfounded at the sight: Wasn’t this basically a Japanese katana? Making a flying sword with such a curved blade would surely present aerodynamic challenges! Maintaining balance would be hard… but he had to admit, it looked beautiful.

At this point, Qin Yue’s part was finished. Now it was Luo Yu’s turn.

Qin Yue signaled for him to begin. Suppressing his complaints, Luo Yu started engraving arrays on the hilt. As he worked, intricate patterns emerged: some like drifting clouds, some like blooming flowers, others like scattered stars. These motifs carried a distinct rhythm, reminiscent of the spirals of a conch shell or the rings of a great tree—orderly and natural, like the work of a master artist by design. These were the “array patterns,” the essential pathways for storing, flowing, and operating the array’s runic scripts.

The actual arrays—the “runes”—were written with spiritual power, a true “character language” said to have been bestowed upon ancient cultivators by divine beings, carrying unfathomable laws. The runes were hidden within the patterns, invisible under normal circumstances, only emerging when energized. Unlike stationary formations with a “core,” in artifact arrays, the artifact itself was the core.

After finishing the hilt, Luo Yu continued engraving incomplete arrays onto the blade. This time, though, the patterns vanished into the surface instead of remaining visible. This was a newly learned inscription method called “Shadow Runes.” Once inscribed, they merged into the material, a higher-level technique that required more spiritual power to harmonize and conceal. The visible ones were “Bright Runes.” In truth, both methods produced arrays of equal potency—the difference was a matter of aesthetic preference.

A few lines of shadow runes completed the array. As the final rune was inscribed, the “blade-sword” flashed with a sudden brilliance, which lasted four or five seconds before fading, startling the focused Luo Yu.

Seeing the inscription complete, Qin Yue gradually reduced the fire, letting the sword cool slowly.

When the sword returned to normal temperature, the blade had turned dark red, the hilt black—a combination both subdued and bold, reminiscent of Qin Yue herself.

Qin Yue was thoroughly satisfied. She picked it up, channeled spiritual power into it, and gave it a casual swing—a surge of searing energy erupted, and the sword’s aura gouged a half-inch-deep groove in the ground, wisps of smoke curling up.

“Ha! It actually turned out to be a high-grade artifact!” Qin Yue exclaimed in delight.

Luo Yu scoffed, “Well, we did use materials collected by a Foundation Establishment cultivator, and you refined them over and over. If it weren’t high quality, that would be shocking—not to mention my own contributions!” He continued, growing smug, “I’ve seen the high-grade artifacts in Falling Maple Town—their arrays cover the whole blade, yet only add an extra attack matrix. My artifact here has three arrays, occupying barely a third of the space. I really am a genius!”

Qin Yue smiled, her gaze electric as she looked at Luo Yu. “What shall we name it?”

Luo Yu was dazed for half a second before grumbling, “I didn’t dare interrupt you during the forging—so tell me, is this a sword or a saber?”

Lost in joy, Qin Yue stroked the blade, unconcerned with his fussing. “Does it matter whether it’s a saber or a sword?”

Luo Yu retorted, “A katana is designed for slashing, hence the curve. Making a flying sword look like a katana is a huge mistake!”

Qin Yue shot back, “This is clearly a Tang saber—I just made the blade longer, so it looks like a katana to you. Ignorant.”

“Tang sabers are straight! And is there really any difference between this and a katana?”

“There are curved Tang sabers, though they’re rare. The Tang saber is the katana’s father. My first artifact should be a father, not a son.”

Luo Yu was speechless for a long moment before asking, “So you made this saber to go out and fight people?”

Qin Yue gave him an innocent look. “Didn’t you ask me to practice martial techniques?”

Fine, Luo Yu thought, I surrender—but still!

“Why use an artifact for martial training? Wouldn’t an ordinary sword suffice?”

Expressionless, Qin Yue replied, “I’m used to extravagance.”

The two of them put their heads together, bickering animatedly for a while before finally naming the “Tang Saber” Crimson Abyss. Crimson Abyss was a high-grade fire-aligned artifact—the newly purchased “Burning Heavens” was immediately relegated to backup. High-grade artifacts featured distinct elemental attacks. For example, the mid-grade Burning Heavens wasn’t as sharp or resilient as Crimson Abyss, and its fire attack required channeling spiritual power, whereas a casual swing of Crimson Abyss could scorch the soil. Master Cherishing-Flowers’ old sword was also a high-grade wind artifact; otherwise, its blade aura could never have sliced Luo Yu’s arm from a distance.

Finally, they took the saber for a test flight, hacking the withered old tree in the courtyard to pieces. Surprisingly, the curved design had little effect on high-speed control—perhaps such minor issues were negligible for cultivators.

Qin Yue added martial training to his schedule, and next, he and Luo Yu discussed where to acquire martial arts manuals. They decided to buy some from bookstores and “borrow” the rest from famous martial schools.

Ordinary cultivators believed that, in the world, only “power” and “speed” mattered. They looked down on mundane martial arts: no matter how exquisite the technique, a flying sword wielded with overwhelming force and speed was unstoppable. But Luo Yu and Qin Yue believed practicing techniques could hone “combat instinct” throughout the body. For example, when an ordinary person is faced with a sword thrust to the chest, he might only dodge backward or sideways. A martial arts expert, however, might flip back and rebound with a counter-attack—dramatically increasing reaction speed and catching the opponent off guard. Thus, when facing cultivators of equal level, such reflexes might save one’s life.

With that decided, the task of collecting books fell to Qin Yue. With his current cultivation, even if he were caught, he could use spiritual sense to compel others to hand over what he wanted. For this mission, Qin Yue forged a batch of “jade books,” which could record the contents of the manuals for both of them to study. The jade books were convenient, though engraving them was a hassle—Qin Yue had to read the original, then inscribe the contents with spiritual power. Of course, with spiritual sense, it wasn’t hard—he could scan the pages ten lines at a glance. Once they reached Foundation Establishment, things would be simpler; with their spiritual sense and memory, they could commit books to memory with a single pass.

During the ten-plus days Qin Yue was “away on business,” the vampire returned. He brought back a trove of entry-level manuals for corpse-refining, as well as a bizarre assortment of materials—including items for both artifact and pill crafting, and even a storage pouch. Luo Yu strongly suspected he’d resorted to theft or murder—there was no way he’d acquired all that with just a few spirit stones.

Luo Yu demanded, “Did you break your promise to my father?”

The vampire cried out dramatically, “Oh, darling! Don’t doubt your mommy like that! You know I’m a pacifist. It’s just that a few idiots took issue with my appearance, so I had to exercise my right to self-defense.”

Luo Yu yelled, “You clearly went overboard! I’m reporting this to my father!”

The vampire hurriedly pleaded, “Sweetheart, that would only cause family discord and ruin our harmony… Fine, I admit my mistake. As compensation, take whatever you like from this haul. How about that?”

…

In the end, Luo Yu shamelessly succumbed to temptation.

When Qin Yue finally returned to the old house, he immediately sensed something was off in the courtyard: chills and sinister winds, faint shrieks and howls, interspersed with deranged, gleeful laughter.

Alarmed, Qin Yue rushed to the inner courtyard and found Luo Yu, dark circles under his eyes, squatting on the ground adjusting arrays.

Relieved, Qin Yue glanced toward the inner chambers. “What’s going on? What’s that guy up to?”

Luo Yu glared at him listlessly. “It’s all your fault! You told him about corpse-refining, and now he’s taken over the courtyard, raising zombies! It’s driving me crazy—the whole place is filled with yin energy!”

Qin Yue was frustrated too. “Didn’t you report his actions to Uncle Luo?”

Luo Yu rolled his eyes. “Don’t forget, we brought those zombies back with him. By the time I discovered what he was doing, it was too late to kick him out.”

Qin Yue frowned. “Are we just going to let him run wild?”

Head down, Luo Yu kept fiddling with the array. “He’s too strong for us to handle. I modified the spirit-locking array into a ‘yin-locking’ formation and am embedding a soundproofing system… Cleaning up after that lunatic! I swear, he’s a total maniac—he probably never studied necromancy before because it wasn’t twisted enough! Now his favorite pastime is burning those poor zombies just to hear them scream!”

—End of chapter: “Fellow Cultivators’ Chronicle,” Chapter 361, First Artifact Crafting Complete.