Chapter 132: A Dangerous Position
Despite all the knowledge of formations that had been crammed into Benton’s head, he’d never actually created one. From experience, he knew that converting the System’s downloaded skills into actual concrete abilities meant practicing. To that end, he acquired some scrap Orange Vigor Spirit Wood left over from building the sect wall.
Before the planks and posts were assembled into sections, each piece had to be alchemically treated. Thankfully, the baths for that purpose were reusable, and the village still had a large supply from the days of the Righteous Rain Sect. Apparently, the sect cultivators had made absolutely huge batches of the stuff at once because they all hated having to deliver it to the village.
Their laziness was Benton’s gain. At some point, of course, they’d run out, and he’d have to recreate the formula and have his own Alchemy Pavilion begin producing the stuff. They were fine for a while, though, definitely long enough to complete the wall around the initial five acres he had planned.
The wood was already highly resistant to physical damage in its natural state, and the treatment greatly enhanced its resistance to damage caused by qi-based attacks. And unfortunately, the wood considered any attempt to mar its surface as an attack, including inscribing it for the purpose of creating a formation.
Thus, even with the high-quality inscribing tool provided by the System, even making a mark on the wood was a bit of a pain, requiring a great deal of constant pressure. Any deviation in the depth or width of the inscription caused an inefficiency in the formation, and enough inefficiencies might result in the formation being too easy to defeat or for it not to work at all.
The problem was that he had around three thousand linear feet to inscribe, and close didn’t count. If he didn’t complete the full circuit of the wall, the entire effort was worthless. By the same token, a formation that was too inefficient risked failing completely.
Benton quickly came to realize that his chosen endeavor was going to be a massive pain in the butt, requiring him to meticulously carve twenty-four hours a day for almost a week. He wouldn’t say he typically struggled with immersing himself in a task or keeping his attention on something for a long time, but the extreme intensity and length of focus required to inscribe a formation around the entire village was a bit much.
There was no help for it, though. Unless the coming beast tide was the weakest, lamest one in history, the area surrounding the village wall would be simply teeming with beasts, all seeking to kill the people within.
The formation was the only way to keep his sect members and the villagers safe.
So, he practiced. And practiced. And practiced.
By sunset, he could consistently create defensive formations on the scrap wood that his Analyze skill judged to be low earth grade. Which wasn’t bad. He couldn’t have honestly expected to pick up the skill in a day and produce heaven grade results. Even if he figured on a slight degradation to his giant formation due to fatigue and boredom, he should still be able to hit low to mid profound grade, which should perform in a perfectly acceptable manner.
Okay. With that goal in mind, he started toward the gate. Only to stop suddenly.