Zhao Ruyu had been gone a whole day. Liu Xiaolou really couldn’t hold back anymore. Gritting his teeth, he steeled himself and finally walked out of the crumbling main hall.

After all, what Zhao Ruyu had told him was “don’t wander around,” not “don’t leave the hall.” Stepping outside to catch a bit of sunlight didn’t really count as running around, did it?

He turned back and looked at the hall, its walls broken open in several places, and couldn’t help sighing to himself. It really had belonged to a great sect. The grandeur was different from ordinary places. Even though the hall was battered, the main structure still stood solid and imposing. With some repairs it could be used again, yet the Luofu Sect had simply abandoned it. Such a waste.

Circling around the hall, he picked up half of a shattered plaque lying in the weeds at the base of the wall. He shook off the thick layer of dirt and saw the character “Xuan” written on it. The rest of the plaque, though, was nowhere to be found.

He searched through the ruins nearby as well, but found nothing of real value. From the scattered remains he could roughly make out side halls, living quarters, pavilions, and a pond. Once upon a time, this must have been a refined and elegant estate. Now, after all these years, there was nothing left but overgrown weeds, creeping vines, and piles of rubble.

When he wandered to the road leading down the mountain, he forced down the urge to run away and turned back, returning to the hall to keep waiting.

The next day at noon, he once again came to the edge of the deep ravine. He looked across at the towering ancient pine on Jade Goose Peak, then peered down into the dark ravine below. No matter how he looked, he still couldn’t figure out why it was called “Yellow Dragon Ravine.”

Lost in thought, he suddenly heard a voice behind him: “What are you looking at?” It was Zhao Ruyu. He had returned.

“I was just wondering why this place is called Yellow Dragon Ravine,” Liu Xiaolou quickly replied.

Zhao Ruyu stepped up beside him and leaned forward to glance down as well. “According to the sect records, a flood dragon once appeared in these waters thousands of years ago…”

For a moment, Liu Xiaolou tried to picture it, but he just couldn’t. Zhao Ruyu saw right through him. “You don’t believe it? Honestly, I don’t either…”

Then he pointed across the ravine. “If you entered the formation outside of dawn, say, right now, do you think you could get out?”

Liu Xiaolou thought it over. “Hardly,” he said.

“So in other words,” Zhao Ruyu asked, “if the flaw in the formation was fixed, this trapping formation could still be used?”

“It’s fairly effective,” Liu Xiaolou said. “For anyone below Foundation Establishment, unless they’re trained in formations like we are, getting out would be nearly impossible. For someone at the early Foundation Establishment stage, breaking through would take real effort. It could hold them for a day or two, which would be more than enough time for your patrol stewards to arrive. As for mid or late Foundation Establishment, the formation might still delay them for several hours, but with my shallow cultivation I can’t say for sure. High-level cultivators may have methods I can’t even imagine, so I wouldn’t dare make a rash judgment.”

Zhao Ruyu fell silent for a moment. “Go in once more,” he finally said. He undid the Eightfold Restriction Cord binding Liu Xiaolou and tossed him toward the opposite side of Yellow Dragon Ravine.

It was not dawn this time. The Earth Gate Formation was running at full strength, and the moment Liu Xiaolou entered he was hit with overwhelming pressure, completely different from the night before. Earthen ridges surged forward like waves, slamming into him with a force greater than the ocean itself. Hidden within that force was a strange adhesive pull, indescribable yet inescapable, that dragged at him until he felt trapped in place.

The instant he stepped into the formation, a chill of fear seized him. Last night, when he had entered at dawn, the formation had seemed loose and ordinary, its power at its weakest. But now, with the formation fully active, he found it almost unbearable.

Had he been just an ordinary Qi Refinement cultivator, he would already have lost his footing, unable to escape, pinned inside until the Luofu Sect arrived to capture him. And if his cultivation had been even two layers lower, the sheer force and stickiness of the formation might have torn him apart on the spot.

Fortunately, he was a formation master, and he had already entered the Earth Gate Formation once before. He had grasped at least sixty percent of its workings. At once he used the Dipper Pivot Step to maneuver, leaping over the surging waves of earth underfoot. All the while his fingers moved in rapid calculations, and once he deduced a position, he used the Innate Dipper Step to land precisely on the key joints of the earthen waves.

Ever since learning the formation-walking steps from Liu Daoran, he had spent more time studying them than actually practicing. And when he did practice, it had only been within his own portable Abyssal Blackstone Formation, which offered little challenge. His only real combat experience had been two nights ago, and even then the formation had been at its weakest. Confronting a fully operational formation head-on like this was a genuine first for him.

The Earth Gate Formation was not as mighty as a sect’s grand mountain-protecting formation, but it was far beyond something like the Abyssal Blackstone Formation one could carry on the body. Inside it, Liu Xiaolou’s every step demanded absolute focus. He pressed forward, breaking through one node after another, yet it felt endless. Before long he had forgotten everything else, pouring his entire mind into calculating with his fingers and stepping without pause.

He could no longer say how many earthen waves he had leapt across, how many ridges he had crushed beneath his feet. Then, all of a sudden, a thought stirred in his heart. A line from the Five Talismans Scripture came to mind:

Water dies, and wood is imprisoned.

The Earth Gate Formation followed the path of earth as sovereign in the five elements. But its sovereignty was only surface. The real purpose was to imprison wood. Specifically, the ancient pine that had stood for ten thousand years. To break the prison of wood, one had to first enter the place of death. And the place of death was water.

“To escape death by substitution, and through substitution, to be reborn...” This was the guidance Diao Daoyi had once given him.

Inside the Earth Gate formation, it looked dry and barren, yet the mounds of soil surged like waves. That too was the nature of water.

He shifted his footing, stepping northwest to the Dui position, then drove southward down through Li and Zhen. From there, he angled up diagonally to his right to the Xun position, pivoted on his heel, and finally dropped down into the Kan position.

At last, he stepped right onto the core of the formation. His palms flipped and pressed inward, toes lifting lightly before his heels drove down with force.

A breeze swept through, stirring up yellow sand that filled the air. Liu Xiaolou had already walked out of the Earth Gate formation and now stood beneath the thousand-year-old ancient pine.

From entering to breaking free, it had taken him more than an hour. In that time his spirit was utterly drained, his consciousness more exhausted than ever before. Instinctively, he leaned against the old pine and sat cross-legged to restore his breath, shutting himself off from the outside world.

When he opened his eyes again, the sky was already filled with stars. Without realizing it, he had been meditating for ten full hours.

The study of formations easily scatters the mind, yet it is still one of the great paths of cultivation. To grasp formations is also to grasp the Dao of Heaven, and that understanding in turn nourishes one’s cultivation. This time, in forcing his way through the formation, Liu Xiaolou had poured out everything he had. At last, he opened the acupoint that had hindered him for over a month—Toulinqi. During his meditation afterward, he also unlocked Muchuang. The gains were considerable.”

Zhao Ruyu was sitting cross-legged across from him, studying him. “Recovered?” he asked.

Liu Xiaolou, his two acupoints now connected, felt full of energy and in high spirits. “Yes. This formation was far harder than I expected. If not for the flaw caused by the morning mist, I might not have managed at all.”

Zhao Ruyu shuffled over and plopped down beside him, casually slipping the Eightfold Restriction Cord back onto him. Liu Xiaolou’s good mood vanished on the spot.

“If you were asked to repair this formation,” Zhao Ruyu said, “could you do it?”

Liu Xiaolou froze, then hesitated. “I’m better with illusion formations. When it comes to trapping formations like this, I don’t have much experience.”

Zhao Ruyu clapped him on the shoulder. “This would be a great merit, you know. If you pull it off, I can report it to the sect. That way your crimes would be offset by your service. Not only would you be set free, but you could also take the pine resin essence you collected. Think it over.”

Liu Xiaolou’s heart stirred. “Materials for refining a formation disk…”

“Make me a list,” Zhao Ruyu said. “I’ll get them for you.”

“And when refining the formation disk,” Liu Xiaolou added, “I’ll need a constant supply of true qi.”

“I can’t take you into the Grotto-Heaven,” Zhao Ruyu said, “but I can get you some spirit stones.”

“Earth fire,” Liu Xiaolou added, “I need a source of earth fire.”

Zhao Ruyu stood up and beckoned. “Come with me.”

He hauled Liu Xiaolou back to Huashou Terrace. They made their way through the ruins until they entered a half-collapsed pavilion. With a tap of his finger, a soft glow lit up the space. In the very center was a dried-up well, sealed tight with an iron cover and secured with a heavy lock.

Zhao Ruyu pulled out a key and worked at the lock. He struggled to get the key into the hole, fumbled with it for quite a while, and still couldn’t open it. Finally he gave up, grabbed the lock with his hand, and snapped it clean off. “What a piece of junk,” he muttered.

The iron cover itself was intact, dark and unremarkable, but surprisingly heavy. Zhao Ruyu strained to pry it open. At once, a wave of hot air surged up from the well.

Liu Xiaolou leaned over to look inside. Faint crimson light glowed below, rising swiftly until it hovered three feet beneath the mouth of the well and stopped there.

“That’s Vermilion Flame Earth Fire,” Zhao Ruyu said. “Hasn’t been touched in centuries. See if it’ll serve your purpose.”