"My lord, formations are about drawing inferences — one must have spirit about it, rather than... rote memorization."

The Qingqiu Old Ancestor offered the reminder rather tactfully.

Shen Yi sat in the empty cave estate, rubbing hard at his brow.

Formation diagram after formation diagram flitted through his mind, leaving his spirit somewhat wilted.

After nearly two thousand years of derivation—

Shen Yi had finally mastered those seven formation books through and through.

With his present accomplishment in formations, he could just barely be called a master.

And yet, only once he began deriving the Xu Clan Complete Compendium of Formation Diagrams—

did he discover, to his astonishment, that all of that had been nothing more than an entry threshold.

The Xu Compendium recorded a total of one thousand three hundred formation diagrams.

The Dragon-Binding Formation alone could give rise to nearly a hundred variations — seemingly the most minute of adjustments, yet capable of producing entirely different results.

As the Qingqiu Old Ancestor put it, this thing came down to talent.

Master one law, and master ten thousand.

What it demanded was to follow one's heart freely — a formation with no fixed form.

Shen Yi genuinely could not feel this so-called "spirit," so he chose the crudest method available.

If he couldn't grasp it through insight, then he'd simply memorize it by brute force.

So long as he committed every last variation to memory, that would amount to having grasped it.

The Qingqiu Old Ancestor declared that it didn't understand, but that it was greatly shaken.

Its master had managed to study the exquisite art of formations into a kind of savage, primordial beauty.

And just as Shen Yi was persevering in pouring lifespan into it, the cave estate received two new faces.

"Congratulations on the Lion Emperor's great advance in cultivation!"

They were already calling out loudly before they'd even drawn near.

Word had it this lion had killed the Savage-Mountain Demon Emperor the moment it returned, then immediately seized the Dark-Tail Demon Emperor's spirit-treasure — the very picture of savagery and greed.

Best not to let…