Qiong Xiao, in Lin Feng's arms, was still trembling faintly.
It was not from the pain of her injuries, nor from the lingering fear of surviving a calamity.
It was an uncontrollable shudder that rose from the deepest depths of her soul.
In her mind, it was as if an ancient Scroll Painting had been scratched beyond recognition, replaying the unbelievable scene from moments ago over and over again.
One snap of his fingers.
Heaven and earth changed color, and a great array formed on its own.
Another snap.
Sword energy rose like a forest, and powerful enemies were reduced to ashes.
The entire process had been smooth and effortless, elegant to the extreme. It had seemed less like a life-and-death battle and more like wielding a brush to create a breathtaking landscape painting.
But Qiong Xiao herself was a master of arrays. More than anyone, she knew that had not been a painting!
She tried to analyze what had happened in that instant with everything she had learned in her life.
Where were the array flags?
There were none.
Where was the array plate?
There was none.
What about even the slightest Mana Fluctuation, the faintest trace of drawing upon the spiritual energy of heaven and earth?
There was still nothing!
That peerless great array, capable of destroying heaven and earth, which had toyed with four Golden Immortals and annihilated them with a flick of a finger, had simply appeared out of thin air.
There was no reason, no logic. It completely defied everything she knew about arrays.
This was no longer an array.
This was a divine decree!
It was the most direct and tyrannical command issued to heaven and earth!
Qiong Xiao came from an extraordinary background. She was a disciple of the Saint of the Interception Sect and an Innate Being, so her knowledge far surpassed that of ordinary cultivators.
Among those ancient Dao scriptures and secret tomes yellowed with age, she had once seen a few scattered records.
Legend had it that the lofty Saints, who looked down upon all living beings, possessed the Supreme Power of Words Manifest as Law.
With a single word, they could determine life and death. With a single thought, they could alter the Heavenly Secrets.
Their will was the will of heaven and earth. Their decrees were the decrees of the Great Dao!
This man before her clearly did not possess even the slightest Mana Fluctuation. He looked like an utterly ordinary mortal, powerless enough to be unable to truss a chicken.
Yet everything he had just done was so similar to the methods of the Saints described in legend!
No, it was even more terrifying and far more tangible than the legends!
The only explanation was that his realm had reached a level she could neither comprehend nor glimpse.
That kind of height was not the gap between a Golden Immortal and a Great Luo, nor even the chasm between a Great Luo and a Quasi-Saint.
It was suppression at the level of life itself, the gaze of a higher-dimensional existence upon lesser beings.
Return to Simplicity!
Those four words exploded through Qiong Xiao's spiritual sea like thunder!
An absurdly terrifying speculation, one that nonetheless felt incomparably real, began to grow wildly from the deepest recesses of her heart.
He...
Could he be a Saint walking the mortal world?
The instant that thought arose, a bone-deep chill swept through her entire body, making her trembling figure suddenly stiffen.
It was the awe and fear born from the instinct of life itself when facing the unknown, when facing a supreme existence.
But immediately afterward, an even more violent and surging heat rose from every corner of her limbs and bones, instantly washing away that chill.
Her breathtakingly beautiful face, pale from blood loss, flushed crimson as though it might drip blood.
If... if he truly was a Saint...
Then being forced to become his maid did not seem... so unacceptable after all.
No!
How could it merely be acceptable?
This was an immense opportunity that countless beings—even those Great Powers and Quasi-Saints who commanded the Primordial World—could only dream of after exhausting the fortune of countless ages!
Serving as a Saint's maid?
If word got out, who knew how many goddesses and immortal maidens throughout the Primordial Three Realms would go mad with envy!
Once she understood this, the last trace of humiliation in Qiong Xiao's heart, that tiny unwillingness to become a maid against her will, vanished completely.
What replaced it was a dizzying surge of wild joy and relief.
Lin Feng lowered his head and took in every change in the immortal maiden's expressive face.
From her initial shock and confusion, to her later fearful speculation, and now to this shyness and ecstasy...
The corners of his mouth curled upward slightly, forming an amused smile.
The feeling of personally overturning a top goddess's Worldview seemed... rather nice.
He released the arm around Qiong Xiao's slender waist and let her stand on her own.
When that warm, solid embrace suddenly vanished, Qiong Xiao's heart inexplicably felt empty, and she even experienced a faint sense of loss.
Somewhat flustered, she lowered her head and did not dare meet Lin Feng's eyes. Her jade-like hands twisted together nervously like a child who had done something wrong.
Just then, Lin Feng's calm voice sounded beside her ear.
"The array you used earlier to trap that black tiger had three fatal flaws."
Boom!
Qiong Xiao's mind buzzed. She abruptly raised her head, her beautiful eyes filled with disbelief.
That was a defensive array she had painstakingly developed over tens of thousands of years based on her own divine abilities. She had never used it before outsiders. How... how did he know?
"First, you should not have used Earth Vein Malevolent Energy as the foundation of the array." Lin Feng's voice carried no emotion, as though he were stating the simplest fact. "Malevolent Energy is fierce, but mixed and impure. It clashes with your own Immortal Spiritual Energy, causing at least thirty percent of the array's power to be lost to internal depletion while it operates. It appears imposing, but it is strong on the outside and weak within."
Qiong Xiao's body swayed sharply, and her face instantly turned deathly pale.
Cold sweat broke out all over her body!
She had always believed drawing upon Malevolent Energy was a stroke of genius that could increase her array's power. Yet she had never considered the internal depletion caused by conflicting attributes.
"Second, you hid your Array Core too deliberately." Lin Feng extended a finger and lightly tapped the air. "You forcibly switched the gate of life and the gate of death. It may seem unexpected, but in the eyes of a true expert, the least likely place is instead the most conspicuous. As long as someone breaks the gate of death with one strike, your entire array will collapse instantly, and you will suffer backlash as well."
Qiong Xiao's breathing suddenly stopped.
Her back was instantly soaked in cold sweat!
She had always regarded that move as her proudest trump card. She never imagined that, in his eyes, it was such a crude and laughable trick.
"As for the third flaw..."
Lin Feng paused, his gaze finally settling on Qiong Xiao's anxious, pretty face. There was a hint of amusement in his eyes.
"It is also the stupidest one."
"You should not have used your own Dao foundation as the catalyst to forcibly activate the array. An array is an external object, a tool, yet you made yourself part of that tool. Once the array is forcibly broken by an outside force, your Dao foundation will bear the brunt and shatter on the spot. Even if you manage to survive by luck, you will never make further progress."
"To gamble the future of your Dao path merely to trap a cultivator of the same realm—if that is not stupidity, what is?"
Every word Lin Feng spoke was like an invisible heavy hammer smashing ruthlessly into Qiong Xiao's heart.
Each word drenched her in cold sweat and left her limbs icy cold.
The array techniques she had always been proud of, the methods she had relied on to survive, were utterly riddled with flaws and foolish beyond measure in his mouth.
Yet she could not summon even the slightest anger at being humiliated.
Because she knew that everything he said was correct!
Moreover, he had used the simplest and most straightforward language, yet what he explained were the most profound and fundamental principles of arrays!
What was a foundation? What was an Array Core? What was essential, and what was secondary?
The barriers she had pondered for countless ages without understanding were instantly exposed by Lin Feng's few casual words, leaving her suddenly enlightened!
In that instant, the insight she gained was deeper and more thorough than listening to a Saint expound the Dao for three thousand years!
Qiong Xiao stared blankly at the man before her. The shock in her heart could no longer be described with words.
A few casual pointers surpassed even a Saint's teachings.
Was this man... truly merely a Saint?
Before you continue