Chapter 226
The edge of the round black jade plate was densely encircled by hexagonal borders resembling a tortoise shell.
Inside, faintly hidden were the lines dividing the Nine Palaces and the symbols of the Eight Trigrams.
Depending on the direction of the light, countless glyphs appeared and disappeared beneath the black jade.
Even from its exterior, its quality and bearing were clearly different from those of an ordinary formation disc.
It looked like a formidable formation artifact worthy of being supported by the Tortoise Dragon statue.
‘Is it a trap?’
Baek Cheong withdrew the hand extended toward the black jade plate.
The eight palaces she had examined in the Tortoise Dragon’s dwelling had been so damaged that it was difficult to find a single intact place.
The formation eyes were broken, the formation flags had vanished, and even the spiritual-energy channels had been severed in places.
The dozens of formation discs hanging on the walls had also been damaged internally, leaving not a single usable one.
Yet in such ruins, a valuable object had remained perfectly intact.
It would not have been strange if someone had placed it there as bait, waiting for a cultivator to come and claim the treasure.
Baek Cheong stepped back and spread divine sense across the entire Central Palace.
She swept from the stone slabs on the floor to the walls and ceiling, searching for hidden mechanisms.
She even traced the invisible flows of spiritual energy backward several times.
Divine sense was carefully extended beneath the Tortoise Dragon statue’s four feet and shell.
The dragon’s mouth and eyes were examined for hidden mechanisms, and every inch of the place where the formation disc rested was checked.
However, nowhere could she detect any trace leading to a trap.
She retraced the passage through which the Central Palace had been entered, but nothing changed.
Even after a long while, the stone chamber remained as quiet as when she had first entered.
‘Is it not a trap?’
Baek Cheong stood before the passage and glared at the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.
The black jade plate itself was far too suspicious for the absence of nearby mechanisms to be reassuring.
High-grade dharma treasures sometimes housed artifact spirits.
Abominations like that had been seen several times in the Nameless Room—creatures that swallowed their owners’ divine senses or seized the bodies of cultivators who tried to refine them.
There was no way to determine from the outside what might be sleeping inside the formation disc.
‘It is suspicious, but...’
Under normal circumstances, Baek Cheong would have abandoned the idea and turned back.
She was not so desperate for treasures as to reach for an object of unknown identity that appeared dangerous.
But this time, she could not bring herself to leave.
The turtle demonic beast had come looking for her right after the first merit was obtained.
The turtle had led her deep into Yeonha, and the belly shell had opened the door to a hidden ruin.
After spending a high-grade spirit stone to cross the teleportation formation, Baek Cheong had discovered the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.
Considering the events that had followed one another, there was a high chance this was the genuine fortuitous opportunity that the merit had finally brought.
If she gave up with it right before her eyes, the regret would likely last a lifetime.
‘What should I do?’
Baek Cheong first considered how to take the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc without touching it.
If it were pulled over with spiritual energy, it would be difficult to notice immediately how the formation disc reacted.
Wrapping it in a dharma treasure would be just as dangerous.
Then she remembered discovering the Cloud Spirit Pearl in the Cloud Sea Secret Realm.
Even then, without discovering what it was, she had sent Baek-roe out first.
‘I completely forgot about that.’
Baek Cheong immediately left the Central Palace and retreated to the far end of the passage.
After putting enough distance between herself and the formation disc, she took a snow-white puppet out of the spatial treasure.
Baek-roe was the sturdiest of the five puppets of the Five Elements.
The scorch marks left by the Heavenly Tribulation had also been completely removed by Yuk-muk’s hands.
When divine sense was connected to the divine sense stone inside Baek-roe’s head, its closed eyes glowed blue.
Baek Cheong also gripped the One-Star Sword hanging at the waist.
Only after all preparations had been completed did she send Baek-roe into the Central Palace.
Baek-roe stepped across the stone floor and approached the Tortoise Dragon statue.
Every time it moved, she used divine sense to check for changes in the surroundings.
Even after Baek-roe reached the front of the Tortoise Dragon statue, the hidden formation did not awaken.
The glyphs faintly visible on the stone statue looked no different from before.
‘Let’s try picking it up first.’
Baek-roe raised both hands and grasped the left and right sides of the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.
Its fingers touched the black jade, but nothing changed.
Even when Baek-roe tightened its grip, the formation disc remained quiet, like an object lost in sleep.
Without lowering her guard, Baek Cheong had Baek-roe raise its arms.
Click.
The Heavenly Armor Formation Disc lightly detached from the Tortoise Dragon statue’s shell.
The Tortoise Dragon statue did not move, nor did the floor collapse.
Nothing could be sensed from the walls in any direction, either.
‘Nothing happened even after that?’
Baek Cheong controlled Baek-roe to cradle the formation disc and return.
Supporting the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc in its arms, Baek-roe slowly headed toward the passage.
Thinking the stone chamber might overturn at any moment, Baek Cheong infused the One-Star Sword with spiritual energy.
Soon, Baek-roe was three steps away from the Tortoise Dragon statue.
But nothing happened.
Even as it crossed the center of the Central Palace and reached the entrance, the stone chamber remained quiet.
At last, Baek-roe completely left the Central Palace.
Even then, no change appeared on the floor or walls.
Wondering if it might be a delayed trap, Baek Cheong waited where she was.
For a quarter of an hour, the only sound was the faint flow of spiritual energy running through Baek-roe.
‘Is there really no trap?’
The Heavenly Armor Formation Disc was now only a few steps away.
Even so, Baek Cheong could not bring herself to reach out.
It was possible that the artifact spirit would awaken only after it had left the surrounding area.
A trap that would lunge at her after using her body or spiritual energy as bait was also entirely possible.
She had Baek-roe turn the formation disc over and tap it in various places, but it still showed no reaction.
She waited another long while before the silent black jade plate.
The endless suspicion gradually gnawed away even at her patience.
‘I came all the way here thanks to my merit.’
Baek Cheong nibbled at her lip, then approached Baek-roe.
After concentrating the Five Elements Shield around the arm, she reached out and grasped the edge of the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.
She had planned to pull the arm back if anything strange was sensed the instant it was touched, but all that reached the fingertips was the smooth texture of black jade.
Even when she lifted it by gripping it with the palm, nothing like an artifact spirit came rushing out.
Nor were divine sense or spiritual energy sucked inside.
Baek Cheong examined the body and even checked the dantian, but nothing was wrong anywhere.
Nothing happened at all, making all the worries harbored until then seem pointless.
“What?”
Embarrassed at having tensed up for no reason, Baek Cheong stuck out her lips in a pout.
Even though no one was watching, she felt slightly embarrassed at making such a fuss alone.
But when she lowered her gaze to the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc in hand, the embarrassment quickly vanished.
The absence of a trap meant the treasure before her could be taken without holding anything back.
A pleased smile spread across her lips as the black jade plate was lifted with both hands.
‘At last, a proper fortuitous opportunity.’
Filled with anticipation, Baek Cheong began infusing the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc with spiritual energy little by little.
The black jade plate, which had remained quiet at first, began to hum as though awakening from a long sleep.
Black light spread from the hexagonal border around its edge, while the inner lines rose in a pale golden glow.
The sections dividing the Nine Palaces moved in sequence and switched places.
The symbols of the Eight Trigrams, including Qian, Dui, Li, and Zhen, also revolved along the round edge.
In the spaces between them, countless glyphs appeared, joined together, and then scattered apart.
When more spiritual energy was added, the vibration traveled from the palm up to the arm.
However, no sign of danger could be sensed.
‘Let’s see...’
When divine sense was cautiously extended to it, the usage of the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc flowed into the mind.
The Nine Palaces governed the nine cells where the center of a formation and its formation eyes were placed.
The Eight Trigrams determined the directions through which qi entered and exited, as well as the nature of its changes.
When glyphs were placed in their respective positions and their flows connected to one another, a formation was completed.
By rotating the arrangement of the Nine Palaces, changing the order of the Eight Trigrams, and combining the glyphs differently, entirely different formations could be operated.
The possible combinations numbered in the tens of millions.
A formation’s structure could be changed with the single formation disc without carving formation eyes or planting flags in advance.
It could contain everything from formations that gathered qi, such as the Spirit-Gathering Formation, to formations for protection, sealing, and illusions.
It even had space for glyphs of heaven and earth, glyphs of the Heavenly Dao, and law glyphs.
‘This is...’
When Baek Cheong directed divine sense toward that section, a distant emptiness was felt, as though facing a blank wall.
Although law glyphs could be perceived, their meaning could neither be read nor manipulated directly.
No matter how exceptional the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc was, if law glyphs could not be inscribed, it was merely a pie in the sky for now.
‘So it’s just a slightly more complicated Five-Element Banner.’
Baek Cheong settled on an easier way to understand the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc’s function.
The Five-Element Banner was also an artifact that stored glyphs and qi and instantly deployed formations.
The difference was that the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc could move the Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams, combine far more glyphs, and change formations.
Its ability to contain law glyphs was useless for now, so she decided to set that aside temporarily.
Once thoughts had been organized in a way that made sense, the artifact that had seemed difficult to use felt considerably more familiar.
‘Even so, it isn’t an ordinary object.’
However, the more closely the black jade plate was examined, the harder it became to take its origins lightly.
It was constructed from jade plates engraved with glyphs that pushed and rotated against one another, altering even the flow of laws.
The glyphs themselves were so rare that few formation masters in the current cultivation world even knew they existed.
There was no way anyone in this era could create an object that read their meanings, embedded them in an artifact, and transformed them into tens of millions of formations.
‘Is it an ancient-era relic?’
As the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc was examined again, Baek Cheong’s gaze naturally drifted beyond the Central Palace.
When she thought about it, the strange aspects did not end with the single formation disc.
There was the belly shell that opened only in the depths of Yeonha and the teleportation formation composed of law glyphs.
The destinations of the teleportation formation were divided among the dwellings of the Tortoise Dragon, Fish Dragon, Crouching Dragon, Earth Dragon, and Flood Dragon.
The Tortoise Dragon’s dwelling contained nine stone chambers modeled after the Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams, along with all kinds of formation facilities.
No matter where Baek Cheong looked, it was difficult to dismiss the place as an ordinary ruin.
‘Something doesn’t add up.’
Most suspicious of all was the style of the palace.
If this had been a place where demonic beasts lived, there was no reason for the beds, tables, and kitchen to be designed for humans.
Even the washroom and small garden were hardly different from the guest quarters of the cultivation world outside.
A dwelling named after dragons coexisted with a human way of life.
It was difficult even to guess who had built this place for the dragons.
Baek Cheong hugged the humming Heavenly Armor Formation Disc to her chest and gazed down the dark passage.
‘What on earth was this place used for?’