As Wu Long and the twins stepped out from the mist in the Crow King’s Nest, they were greeted by the sight of a massive glowing formation.

It grew almost twice in size and multiple times over in complexity from the last time Wu Long saw it a few days ago, it’s various individual array patterns and symbols moving with precise timing, like thousands upon thousands of differently sized gears in an intricate mechanical contraption - some in long continuous movement, some in short ticks, and all with different speeds to somehow end up creating a harmonious and matching overall movement.

The twins were slightly overwhelmed by the sight, while Wu Long showed intense interest.

"You’re here!", Lian Zhiqiu turned away from looking at the formation and to them, with excitement in her eyes, coming closer to Wu Long for a kiss.

As their lips parted, Wu Long started asking Lian Zhiqiu a few questions about the formation that didn’t make any sense to the twins, but somehow made her incredibly excited as she answered, providing explanations and pointing to various parts of the formation.

He also provided a few technical comments that seemed to give Lian Zhiqiu new ideas.

Hong Ye and Hong Yue exchanged a look, and silently agreed to not even try understanding that conversation, trying to not even listen to it as they simply admired the grand display.

As their conversation seemed to wind down with Wu Long praising Lian Zhiqiu, and giving her another kiss, Hong Yue finally saw a moment to insert a comment, "So... this is the formation Daoist Wu said was hard to deal with? It really looks... intense"

"What? No, this is my formation that helps me decipher and analyze other arrays and formations", Lian Zhiqiu first showed a confused look, and then chuckled as she understood the white-haired beauty’s misunderstanding.

"Take a seat, let me show you", she then made an inviting gesture to a small table in the room, and as they took seats around it, Hong Ye on Wu Long’s lap while Hong Yue sat opposite them, both slightly turning to the side to look at the formation, with Lian Zhiqiu sitting opposite the formation so she could manipulate it.

Her hands gracefully stretched toward the formation, rings of flowing symbols appearing around her lower arms, wrists, palms and all 10 fingers of her hands, and a disk of glowing patterns appeared in front, and as she turned her left hand a bit, the rings around it turned in complex trajectories, while the disk of patterns in front resembled a circular puzzle, its parts turning in response to the movements of her fingers, her eyes glowing with reddish-orange.

The formation immediately reacted, its centermost parts both stretching in major diameter and at the same time shrinking in minor diameters of all parts to create empty spherical space in the center.

Lian Zhiqiu’s visualized Symbol Qi naturally had a reddish-orange color, but the glow subsided and faded and the color paled to become almost transparent yellow.

And then, a new formation pattern in vivid color began appearing in the emptied center, and though both Hong Ye and Hong Yue didn’t have any understanding of formations, they could immediately somehow tell it had a different feel to it, the structure felt foreign to the formation they saw before. And there was also one other detail that was apparent to both - it was incomplete, parts of it missing here and there.

"This is the formation of the Crow King’s Nest", Lian Zhiqiu smiled, "At least what I managed to analyze so far"

"It... seems a bit... simple? Compared to Sister Zhiqiu’s formation, it feels much less complex and not as powerful", Hong Ye raised her eyebrow, since this didn’t look all that impressive to make even Wu Long take note of it.

"Complexity does not always mean power or functionality - the ancient formations baffle us precisely because they look very simple, so simple we don’t see any clues as to how they actually work, let alone produce the profound effects they have", Lian Zhiqiu shook her head with a smile, "Not to mention, this is the decoded version of the formation, stripped of all protective layers of obfuscation and secrecy that guard the formation from being understood and hijacked"

She turned her right hand with her fingers grabbing something invisible, as if turning a dial, and as the glowing symbols around it shifted and moved, the barely visible pale formation moved in some profound ways, and the formation floating in the center began to change its structure and components.

It looked like a straightforward diagram before, but it broke into hundreds of disjointed parts that dispersed to various corners, and then began turning and changing in all three dimensions. New layers appeared on top, merging with or altering the previous ones, the whole becoming more obscure, as some simple symbols and lines turned into a complex mass of arrays that then scattered to become different parts that appeared to have no relation to each other. And then new connections grew between the disjoined pieces, that turned them once again into one unified structure, constantly shifting and turning as it grew in mass and complexity even more.

Within half a second, it became a massive, incredibly complex formation - not even the shadow of the simple decrypted version from before visible from this one, making both assassin sisters widen their eyes as they understood, or rather could imagine without being able to truly understand, how much effort, knowledge, and mental capacity it took to strip down this version to the one that they saw initially. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

Lian Zhiqiu didn’t fully revert the formation to the final form that she faced though, since she only wanted to demonstrate her point - not impress them. What she showed, was only about a third of complexity added back in, before immediately turning her hand in the opposite direction, as if once again returning the dial back to its previous position - this reversed the process, and within another half a second the simplified form of the Crow King’s Nest formation appeared in front of their eyes again.

"But you’re right, although I learned a lot from decoding it because of the techniques used, at its very essence, it is a truly simple and straightforward formation, and not in a profound kind of way - it shouldn’t have much power or functionality in of itself", she then added with a wry smile, "At first it baffled me too - why such a formation would be something that made Wu Long wary of it, but I finally figured out the secret"

Her eyes glinted at the very end of her words, and she then manipulated her formation to enlarge the center part of the simplified decoded Crow King’s Nest formation diagram, where all patterns seemed to connect to, revealing a missing central core part.

"This is it, there is no formation or array there at the very core", Lian Zhiqiu spoke while glancing at Wu Long to see if she found the right answer, "All the other parts of this formation are simply channeling the functionality of this core area, so I thought the secret to what made you wary of this formation was there. That’s the reason I wasn’t able to figure it out for so long - I thought that core area was also included and hidden in the overall formation which caused me to interpret many of the obfuscation and security layers wrong, but it’s truly missing, the core part is really not there"

"And what did that tell you?", Wu Long smiled, nodding.

"I cannot be completely sure yet, but I did figure out the possibility that I am nine tenths confident in. I never encountered it either in texts or personally, but this is the only thing that makes sense to me without relying on a tangent", Lian Zhiqiu made a wide grin, but didn’t reveal her answer yet.

Seeing her anticipation for a small dramatic reveal, he played along with a smile, "Alright then, since you’re nine tenths confident, let me ask you nine questions then. First, what made you question even the possibility that the core formation was missing?

"The very principle of a functioning formation. This formation only channels the power and functionality of the core, so without it, it would be an empty husk. If there was a core formation, I might not have been able to crack it, but I am completely sure it would’ve at least been recognizable since its functions have to come from somewhere", Lian Zhiqiu manipulated the formation to show possible ways a core formation could have been concealed but had to still be connected to the mainframe to transfer its functions to it.

"Alright, second question then", he nodded agreeing with her logic, "What about a detachable formation pattern? Like your block-based formation in the Yin Yang Unity Palace that had swappable entire blocks of formations. The core formation could be physically detached from the main formation, and connect at necessary moments"

Her eyes glinted as she shook her head, "That could be the answer, but the core functions of the formation are currently active, so it is connected and thus would have also been discoverable. And I wasn’t able to detect any hidden arrays or formations that could act as triggers for the main formation to connect to the detached core formation either - without those it would have to be manually connected which is not a good formation design"

"Third question. Natural Formation or unique phenomenon of the Spiritual Land?", Wu Long continued down the list of probable explanations.

"The chances of it being a Natural Formation or some kind of Spiritual Land-based unique trait are not high since I checked for those with all conventional and even all unconventional methods you taught me"

"Speaking of what I taught you, fourth question - I just introduced a concept of decentralized formation dispersed into the overall structure to you not long ago"

"Possible but not likely. It’s not only too high level of a technique for Boundless Profound World as you said when you gave me the introduction to it, but also has typical signs that allow its detection - none of the checks I did showed any of those signs"

"Fifth question, what about the possibility of an active ancient formation, or ruins containing one located underneath the Crow King’s Nest?"

"The formation pattern is a modern one from the Current Era, even if it was using an active ancient formation or ancient ruins as a core, some of the aura and unique qi flows from the ancient formation would have seeped into and mixed into the larger structure which is not the case. Active ancient ruins that could provide protection or serve some kind of useful function are also usually too precious for a small force to successfully occupy them, unless not a long time have passed since their discovery or the secret somehow managed to be kept, so although it is not impossible, given what we know, the probability goes down even further", Lian Zhiqiu shook her head.

"Hmm that last bit is a bit more shaky reasoning, but in this case you’re right - your first point about the aura and qi flows is sufficient enough proof", Wu Long smiled, nodding, "But this leads to the sixth question, how about a replicable ancient formation pattern?"

"Although also not impossible, the chances of that are also as low, if not even lower. You said that every ancient formation pattern that can be replicated by simply copying the design is so incredibly rare and so incalculably precious, that 99% were impossible to monopolize even by the most powerful people and organizations throughout history of the Seven Boundless Worlds, and thus are basically public knowledge. And all of them without exception are utility-based with unique functions that simply do not exist and are basically impossible to replicate with the Formations of the current era, rather than conventional protective formation types. And one that could obscure the core of a modern formation completely is currently not listed among the known replicable ancient formations. It would truly have to be an incredible coincidence to come across a newly discovered replicable ancient formation that is kept secret by a small local power and isn’t know to the rest of the cultivation world yet. So while I do not rule it out I will prioritize a more plausible explanation first"

Wu Long nodded to that answer, and then suddenly stopped asking questions, causing Hong Ye and Lian Zhiqiu to make wry smiles, exchanging a look that seemed to say ’so close...’. At some point, they even began wondering whether he was truly going to ask nine actual questions.

"Hmm, ehm...", Wu Long’s tone almost imperceptibly shifted, and without listing the number of the question this time, he added another one, "What about higher-lever esoteric obfuscation and codifying techniques and tricks that I didn’t tell you about yet, that are impossible to find with the level of detection techniques I gave you?"

"Hehehe~", Hong Ye sitting on his lap couldn’t help giggling with amusement, and even Hong Yue was surprised at this type of question which didn’t really fit in with the logical reasoning from before - it was basically ’what if you just can’t see it no matter what you do but it’s there’.

Lian Zhiqiu smiled as well, "If it truly was out of my reach due to technical limitations rather than logical reasoning, you would’ve either given me at least some kind of possibility or basic capability to arrive at that answer. And, since the already higher concept of decentralized formation core which you did teach me about is already unlikely to encounter in the Boundless Profound World, even higher level techniques than that which you don’t even introduce yet since it is too early to explore them, are even less likely"

"Ehem, I see you’ve thoroughly considered all the angles", Wu Long traced his chin with the hand that wasn’t wrapped around Hong Ye, while speaking that line very slowly, as his eyes revealed an enigmatic, unreadable look, and then narrowing his eyes "So I suppose you have considered my eighth question as well, we’ll skip it and go straight for the final ninth question then"

Hong Ye couldn’t hid her face as she hugged him tighter, shaking from soundless laughter while Lian Zhiqiu covered her mouth with a delicate fist and cleared her throat, suppressing a big smile, and Hong Yue’s eyebrows went further up with this unexpected twist, and the inexplicable reactions of the other two beauties.

"So...", Wu Long proceeded with a straight face, so focused on the conversation he seemed to not notice all that, "... what answer did you come up with?"

"Eh?", Hong Yue instinctively made a sound, while inwardly thinking, ’D-does that count as one of the nine questions...?’

"Hihihihihi~", Hong Ye’s soundless laughter turned into a suppressed breathless one.

"Hehe-...! ~khm", Lian Zhiqiu made a short giggle that ended as abruptly as it started as she cleared her throat, returning her expression to solemn one, and gave her answer, "That left me with two possibilities I have never considered before, but both would naturally not be part of the wider formation while being capable of acting as the core of the formation"

She then manipulated the formation to demonstrate her hypothesis.

"The first one is that it is a living Symbol Arts Cultivator that constantly maintains the Formation with their own cultivation base formation. This would make the formation almost impossible to hijack and turn against the owners of the formation. It would also make its core functions almost impossible to analyze, and on top of that make them capable of evolving as the cultivator’s abilities grow. However, there are also severe drawbacks - it requires a host to keep the formation active, so one person or a group of people taking turns would have to sacrifice enormous amounts of time to just maintain and operate the formation at all times. It also would mean that if there is only one cultivator the formation is limited to the lifespan of that cultivator, or if there is an organized effort of multiple taking shifts, it constantly requires the recruitment and training of new Symbol Arts Masters exclusively for one formation. It also seriously limits the power that the formation could exert since it would be a lot more linked to the strength of that cultivator even if they have a complex formation within their Crystal Core. All of these drawbacks made me think it is less probable for this to be the anwer... however..."

And then, her grin widened as she triumphantly revealed her true answer, "...if it was a Spiritual Treasure, or some other type of Artifact, that either has some profound secret arts, or has arrays and formations engraved inside of it, it would be able to itself act as a core of the formation just like a living cultivator, but without needing as much constant effort. It has different benefits and drawbacks, but I think overall is more logical than a living cultivator in case of the Crow King’s Nest. Of course it has to be a special type of Spiritual Treasure that could handle being not just as a focus like a regular Array Disc or Array Flag, stabilizing anchor point like a common Spiritual Treasure, or simple booster of functionalities like a regular attack or defense type Spiritual Treasure to enhance defense or attack of the formation, but technically as a whole formation all on its own, the formation of the Crow King’s Nest just spreads out its functions to a wider area"

"You are absolutely right, it is called a Formation Vessel Spiritual Treasure", Wu Long confirmed, causing Lian Zhiqiu to reveal a delighted and satisfied look. She was able to confirm her theory more and more as he was asking her questions, since he was specifically avoiding this possibility, but it still felt good to receive a direct confirmation.

Wu Long then chuckled, "Did you already pinpoint where it is?"

"Once I figured out the trick it was easy to track down the possible locations and then narrow it down to the most likely one. If my calculations are right, it is under the Death Arena’s fighting pit", Lian Zhiqiu nodded, "It seems to be constantly absorbing all the Bloodlust Aura, Death Aura, and all other manifestations that linger in a place with so much struggle, bloodlust, battles, killing and death"

Hong Ye and Hong Yue both had looks of realization as they remembered the interested look that Wu Long showed upon seeing the fighting pit of the Death Arena, particularly when he witnessed a fighter die there for the first time.

"Perfectly solved", Wu Long smiled, "Congratulations, Zhiqiu. And not only about figuring out the secret on your own, but also on evolving your own decoding and analyzing formation to this level"