After laughing for a full incense stick's worth of time, Lu Changsheng finally let out all the fear and pent-up frustration he'd been holding inside.
He climbed to his feet, dusted off his backside, hummed an unknown little tune, and strode deeper into the cave with a swagger that said he didn't care who he offended.
Back on the White Jade Cloud Bed he'd made with his own hands, Lu Changsheng sat cross-legged and took a deep breath.
"It's time to take stock of what I gained on this trip."
He carefully unclasped the Storage Jade Box from around his neck.
Even so, he couldn't help feeling a pang over the sliver of Great Dao Merit origin that the Old Earth Dragon's stomach acid had forced out of him.
But when he opened the Jade Casket and saw the two treasures inside, both radiating terrifying spiritual energy, that little heartache was instantly cast to the far corners of the sky.
"Clack."
Lu Changsheng first took out the Half Beast Horn and set it on the white jade bed.
After the grand array had wiped away all its destructive will, this remnant horn of a Fierce Beast king had turned a crystalline, translucent dark red from end to end.
Dao patterns of Innate Pure Yang Fire flowed within it, and the heat it gave off was so intense that the air around it began to warp.
"This is absolutely top-grade material for forging a fire-attribute weapon of slaughter."
Lu Changsheng nodded in satisfaction.
But he had no intention of forging it into a magic treasure.
He was a man of the Dao of Cowardice. A magic treasure in hand meant having to fight people.
Once you fought, you risked getting hurt, and you risked spending merit.
That didn't fit his survival philosophy.
"The best defense is making sure no one can even get through my door."
Lu Changsheng set down the Beast Horn, then brought out the Earth Dragon Pearl, which was about the size of a fist.
The moment the Earth Dragon Pearl appeared, the gravity inside the cave seemed to multiply several times over.
Its dense, heavy aura of Origin of Earth made even Lu Changsheng, a True Immortal, feel short of breath.
"An Earth-attribute origin core at the Mystic Immortal level."
Lu Changsheng's eyes shone.
His mind was already racing through possible plans.
"My previous array had 1,863 layers. There were plenty of them, but the formation cores were all junk. If a Primordial Unity Golden Immortal really tried to force their way in, they'd only hold them off for a few hundred years at most."
"But if..."
Lu Changsheng held the Beast Horn in his left hand and cradled the Earth Dragon Pearl in his right.
"If I use this Earth Dragon Pearl as the absolute core of the entire mountain-protecting array, and fuse it with the Earth Vein of this Nameless Low Mountain..."
"Then my array won't be a tree without roots anymore. It'll become one with the earth for a hundred li in every direction!"
"As long as the land doesn't sink, my array won't break!"
"Besides, earth gives birth to all things and can bear anything. I'll use this Half Beast Horn as the eye of the killing array, and with the way of arrays, make the Origin of Earth and the Origin of Fire work in harmony."
"The outer layer will be an impregnable defense of solid earth, and the inner layer will be a Pure Yang Fire killing array that scorches the heavens. Anyone who dares to force their way in and break through the shell will be reduced to ash by the Pure Yang Fire!"
The more Lu Changsheng thought about it, the more excited he became.
He could already see a truly impregnable, peerless fortress taking shape in his hands.
"Let's do it!"
Lu Changsheng was a man of action, especially when it came to piling on layers of protection. His fervor and drive in that regard were beyond anything ordinary people could match.
He didn't rush to begin. Instead, he closed his eyes and spent a hundred years adjusting his True Immortal early-stage magic power until it was in peak condition.
Then he stepped down from the Cloud Bed and went to the deepest part of the cave, where the Earth Vein node of the Nameless Low Mountain lay.
"Go!"
Lu Changsheng formed a hand seal and tossed the Earth Dragon Pearl into the air.
Then he opened his mouth and spat out his True Immortal-level life-bound true fire, slowly refining the Mystic Immortal-level pearl, bit by bit.
The Earth Dragon Pearl was simply too hard.
Even with Lu Changsheng's True Immortal cultivation, completely refining it and fusing it into the Earth Vein was a project so vast it could make anyone despair.
But time was the one thing he had plenty of.
Five hundred years.
A thousand years.
Two thousand years.
There was no day or night in the cave, only Lu Changsheng's figure, still as an old monk in meditation, and the Earth Dragon Pearl floating in midair as it slowly melted away.
A full three thousand years passed.
At the instant Lu Changsheng guided the last trace of earth-yellow origin power through the array patterns and drove it deep into the mountain's Earth Vein—
"Vmmm—!"
The entire Nameless Low Mountain, along with the land within a hundred li around it, let out a deep rumble.
It wasn't an earthquake, but a transformation of its very essence.
A faint earth-yellow glow appeared of its own accord across the cave walls.
The glow was indestructible. Lu Changsheng casually sent a True Immortal-level sword qi slashing into it, yet it didn't leave behind even a white mark.
"Done! Step one, the Earth Vein fusion is complete!"
Lu Changsheng wiped the sweat from his brow, his eyes burning with excitement.
He didn't stop.
Next, he picked up the Half Beast Horn, dark red from end to end, and began setting up the core killing array.
Fire arrays were wildly volatile; the slightest mistake could blow up the furnace.
Lu Changsheng had to carve one tiny array pattern after another into the horn with the care of an artisan engraving flowers, each pattern guiding the flow of spiritual energy.
That alone took another two thousand years.
Five thousand years.
A full five thousand years had passed since Lu Changsheng had fled back to his cave.
During those five thousand years, the fighting among the three clans in the Primordial Land had reached a fever pitch.
Countless mighty figures who'd once kept to seclusion had been dragged into the Tribulation of Measure, and countless heavenly treasures had appeared, only to be accompanied by bloody storms.
But in this remote corner, sealed away behind layers of arrays, Lu Changsheng had lived as peacefully as an outsider.
"Rise!"
One day in the five thousand and first year.
Lu Changsheng stood in the center of the cave and thrust both hands upward.
The Half Beast Horn, covered in densely packed array patterns, turned into a streak of red light, shot straight up to the cave ceiling, and disappeared inside a massive stalactite.
At the same time.
The countless array flags and array discs Lu Changsheng had set up around the area seemed to be strung together by an invisible thread.
"Boom!"
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-four layers.
One thousand nine hundred layers.
Two thousand five hundred layers.
Three thousand layers!
A full three thousand layers of arrays!
With the support of the two top-grade origin materials, the Beast Horn and the Earth Dragon Pearl, the arrays no longer piled up blindly as they had before. Instead, they fused together in a wondrous way.
The outer layers of illusion and enemy-trapping arrays drew on the Earth Dragon Pearl's spiritual energy, expanding their range tenfold. They could even easily twist the divine sense of a Primordial Unity Golden Immortal.
The middle layers of defensive arrays, infused with the Origin of Earth, became as solid as mountains and impossible to break.
The innermost killing array fused with the destructive power of Pure Yang Fire. Once triggered, it could turn even a Mystic Immortal to ash in an instant.
"It's done..."
Feeling the absolute control of it all around him—as though even a mosquito flying in would have to pass through three thousand security checks—Lu Changsheng let out a long breath of stale air.
He walked over to the white jade bed and flopped down on his back.
"I'm beat. This upgrade drained every last bit of my savings. I even melted down that lousy Refined Iron Heart-Protecting Mirror and used it as an array core."
"But it was worth it!"
Lu Changsheng gazed up at the cave ceiling and grinned like a fool who weighed two hundred pounds.
"With this three-thousand-layer Mysterious Yellow Pure Yang Array, even if that dead mudfish came back to life and brought its whole family to block my door, I wouldn't be afraid."
"Now this is what real security feels like!"
Before you continue