There was a third base formation in the formation plate. Meaning, there was one more thing the formation did that hadn't been apparent to anyone yet.
What was it? Was it an illusory formation? Maybe disorienting? It didn't look like the old man was very worried about sound when he started attacking, so it was likely that wasn't it.
Alex looked at the formation diagram and understood that he had never seen that formation before. So there really was nothing in his mind to immediately give him an answer.
The only way to tell what it did was to separate the 3 Base formations in the diagram as well as the extra strokes that connected them.
This was gonna take some time. He didn't know if he had any.
"Please hold on for a little longer," he softly begged his masters and immediately created a fire in mid-air. The fire immediately changed shape as it twisted and elongated to make a circle.
Alex then started putting in the strokes of the formation.
The reason for him creating an image of the formation rather than just looking at the one on the plate was so that he could erase and add the strokes as he likes.
Having a physical, visual diagram he could interact with made it all easier. He could've done it on the ground, but with his grown Flame Mastery Scripture, it was very much easier to just use fire instead.
Very quickly, Alex drew one stroke after another nearly finishing the formation. People had seen him draw the formation on the air, but no one had time to ask him what he was doing.
'A single line through the middle,' Alex thought and put in the final strokes of the formation.
Suddenly, a low humming sound was released from the diagram, as if he had just put the final piece of the puzzle. The hum lasted for maybe a second before it went away.
'What was that?' Alex thought, but he didn't have the time to think about it. He immediately started tinkering with the diagram.
They kept on going on the other side. Ma Rong kept her eyes on Alex at all times, not letting the old man ever get close to him.
The other fight however was at a standstill. Wen Cheng was all bloodied up at the moment. Due to many mistakes he had made during the fight, he had cuts all over his body, making it harder for him to fight.
He could easily tell that they were at a disadvantage against the woman, however, every time she got close to killing him, the Second Elder would interfere and she would get away.
It seemed she was still hesitant about killing him, despite what she proclaimed earlier.
Little green was helpful, perhaps the most of the three, but even the green snake couldn't withstand the strength of the woman. She had always been a fighter it seemed, and she had kept it hidden very well.
Ma Rong's fight against the old man wasn't going much better either. However, since she was stronger, she wasn't bloodied up like Wen Cheng was. It had been nearly 15 minutes since she started fighting, but she wasn't making much progress.
She was still waiting for that one moment when he wasn't attentive. That moment when he wasn't on guard. That one moment where she could hit him.
Suddenly, Alex shouted from behind her.
"Master, you need to defeat him quickly," Alex said. In front of him were 3 different formation diagrams. Of them, two looked identical, while the last one was different.
These first two were the barrier diagram, while the last one was…
"The formation is helping him recover his Qi he lost while fighting. As long as he is in the formation, he likely won't run out of Qi," he said. "You can't keep this chase going forever or you will lose."
The old man heard it and looked towards Alex in surprise. "Tsk, he figured it o—"
That one moment was here.
Ma Rong teleported for the first time since she was seriously fighting the old man. She appeared behind him and slashed her sword at his neck.
Unfortunately, the old man seemed to have more awareness than Ma Rong expected him to. He moved to the right, without employing any movement technique, to escape from the sword.
However, the cold aura slowed him down by a considerable amount. The sword hit the side of the old man's face, putting a crack on the mask he was wearing.
The old man was sent flying and he crashed into the walls of the house as the house came caving in on him.
Ma Rong got ready to attack when she noticed him come out of the rubble.
"Tsk. That was sneaky of you— What? What are you looking at?" the old man asked her daughter who had stopped fighting and was staring at her father. He then saw Wen Cheng, Ma Rong and Alex stare at him with wide eyes.
"Hmm?" he suddenly brought his hands onto his face and realized his mask was missing. He immediately brought out another mask and wore it again.
Alex was so stunned that he didn't even realize the man's mask was down.
"You…." He said. "You are that old man, from that beast attack," he said remembering the night when it rained for the first time in the game.
They had been on their way to the tournament when they stopped to help some people getting attacked by the beasts. After saving them, Ma Rong refused to take them with them saying that he was likely a fraud.
This old man had the same face.
Ma Rong didn't speak at all and instead started wondering just how far back this whole thing went. Still, it was clear to see that she was pretty shocked too.
However, neither of their shocks could match up to the shock Wen Cheng was feeling at the moment.
"Su Chen!" Wen Cheng said with eyes so wide that one could look into his soul to see how unreal the moment was feeling to him.
"Hmm… you actually recognize me, boy? Were you around back then?" the old man asked with a hint of intrigue.
"Yes," Wen Cheng said with a serious voice. "I was there. I was there to see the destruction you brought forth. The cries you evoked. The tears you made them bleed."
"I was there to watch the sect nearly get extinct on that day, the day the sect leader died and the day you were supposed to have died in your exile, Second elder," he said.
Alex's eyes went wide once more when he realized who the old man was. 'That old man that incited the Tiger Sect war back then? Wasn't he supposed to be dead?' he thought.
"Haha, you really were there. Since so many people died, I didn't think many would remember," the old man said. "They were stupid, weren't they? Thinking I would die just because they threw me out while I was wounded. Those cowards couldn't even kill me correctly."
"Wen Cheng, who is he?" Ma Rong asked.
"This is the Tiger sect's second elder, Su Chen, from over 50 years ago. He started a war with the sect leader of that time due to his greed for the sect leader position, leading to infighting that nearly wiped out the entire sect."
"Barely a few elders and disciples remained alive at the time," Wen Cheng said. He had his eyes on the old man the whole time, not taking them off even for a bit.
"How did you survive? You were near death back then," Wen Cheng asked.
"With my expertise and knowledge, it's easy for me to survive," the old man said. "Albeit, I had to destroy my cultivation base at the time and had to remain as a mortal for a few years before my meridians were all set back. However, it helped me rebuild my foundation and made me stronger than I would have been with my previous cultivation method."
"Why are you targeting my disciple now? Are you trying to take revenge for the past?" Wen Cheng asked.
"Tsk, another idiot. Did you not hear the boy say I was here for his body?" the old man asked in an annoyed voice. " I don't really care about the Tiger sect enough at the moment to take a revenge for the past. A single instruction to the bandit leaders was enough for it."
"Then what's your purpose?" Wen Cheng asked. "What do you want with my disciple's body?"
"Same thing I have wanted since I learned about it in the sect records way back then," the old man said. "That stupid Tian Chengong, I told him I was right about it, and that we could not let this new sect take over our ancestral grounds, and yet he never listened to me."
"Look at how they took it for their own, not a hint of the old Tiger sect left in this place," the old man said as he looked around.
"The…old tiger sect?" Wen Cheng and Ma Rong were both surprised. Wen Cheng looked around. "Was Tiger sect previously located in this place?" he asked with a hint of a shock to his voice.
For years, he had taken the incomplete information about the Tiger sect having relocated from someplace else. He went above and beyond trying to find that place, yet he never did. "So the Hong Wu sect took over where the Tiger Sect was previously?"
