Chapter 90 90 – Setting Up A Trap



"Ew, no!"

'One Step.'

Ken used that moment to appear next to the pups, but before he swung his sword, he noticed a palm covering the 5 scared little wolves, protecting them.

"What now, Henry?"

"He says he will take care of them."

Miles spoke for Henry. Ken sighed and backed off; he didn't want to sour his relationship with the monk over a few pups, and he didn't have anything against them anyway.

"I'm going to draw a formation to help us suppress the enemy cultivators. It should be effective against intermediate Soul Nascent Stage cultivators. As for high ones, they should be in the Inner Ring rather than be hunting here, unless they go solo. If they're solo, it should still be enough for us to win."

"You are also a formation master? That's awesome!"

Now Diana and Jane understood why the Sue patriarch valued Ken so highly. He was a genius fourth-rank alchemist and formation master at such a young age. Even if his fighting abilities were only average, he would be a huge asset to the family.

They assumed he was at the fourth rank because anything under wouldn't be enough to affect fifth-stage cultivators.

"Yes, I hope you can keep this secret for me."

Ken smiled at the two girls and went to build his formation in the cave. He placed the 3 corpses of the male disciples from the Divine Sword Sect on the ground and placed around them a few carcasses of wolves they hunted earlier. 

Since his teammates insisted on letting the pups live, he could use them to stage the place even better.

Thanks to all the strengthening and the Qi stored in the corpses, they took a long time to rot, and there was no bad smell yet.

He used blood from the carcasses of other beasts to decorate the cave as he ran a possible simulation of a battle in his head and left marks on the cave's walls according to the way he envisioned the battle to happen.

Under Ken's instructions, Henry enlarged the wolf's den to make more room for additional formations. 

Ken drew a few concealing formations on the ground at the end of the cave for himself and his allies. As long as they remained hidden inside, it'd be excessively hard for anyone to notice their presence. Coupled with his Concealing Pills, even powerful fifth-stage cultivators will have a hard time finding them.

In the clan's library, he found an interesting theory about formations. The formation master managed to create two formations, one on the ground and one on the ceiling, that complemented each other.

This way, he managed to make the Qi Gathering Formation twice as effective without changing the formation's rank. Since then, a few more combinations were created, but the method didn't work on every formation.

After meditating on it for a few days and experimenting with it for another few days, Ken managed to perfect this method for fourth-rank formations.

He drew a large suppressing formation on the ground, ceiling, and walls of the cave. This way, he used powerful fourth-rank formations to complement each other and create a triple effect.

Once he finished laying down the formations, he placed a few fifth-grade ores they collected earlier on the ground and used another self-created fourth-rank formation.

He called it the "Revealing Formation" because it was the opposite of the Concealing Formation. It made everything inside easily noticeable and made their aura scatter much further.

By placing inside it many fifth-rank ores, anyone with a decent detecting technique would sense it from 2 kilometers away easily. If a group traveled in the Outer Ring without a decent scouter, they probably didn't have anything worth robbing anyway.

"Everyone, place back your masks on."

Once the set-up was over, Ken placed a couple of thousands of Qi Stones inside the formations to activate them, and the effects kicked in. Everyone's presence was erased from the cave as if they didn't exist anymore and the ores' aura was so powerful that anyone would notice them.

The only sound that one would hear upon entering the cave was the scared whimpers of the now orphan pups that lay in the cave in a messy pile with their eyes closed.

As cultivators who could pass days in meditation and the arduous task of nourishing their cores and souls, the group of five didn't lack patience while they waited for prey to be lured inside.

After 3 hours of waiting, they finally heard a group coming. However, to everyone's surprise, it wasn't a single group. There were two groups, and they came from opposite sides.

--------

A group of 4 low fifth-stage cultivators wearing black robes walked in the mountains, looking for treasures when one of the four stopped the other three. On their shoulders was a small embroidery of a cloud, sun, leaf, and flower. It was the symbol of the Four Seasons Sect.

"Wait, I think I'm sensing something."

He was the scout of the group, and soon he turned left toward a mountainside. The group followed him curiously, hoping it was something good.

"Guys there's a very strong aura there, it seems like there are a few fifth-grade ores in this direction. It might be a trap, should we go?"

"It'd be a shame not to have a look at it after Fabian sensed something. What about just looking there and seeing if it's a stroke of luck?"

One of the girls said hurriedly with a hint of greed in her voice. While it might be a trap, it was worth taking the risk.

-------

"Dear, I sense some treasures piled up in the distance. Should we go?"

A woman told her lover while the two explored together the area. They were wearing yellow robes with embroidery of a sword on their shoulders, marking them as disciples of the Divine Sword Sect.

"Sure, let's have a look. If it seems dangerous, we can leave."

A pile of treasures meant a powerful beast or a trap, but one was an intermediate fifth-stage cultivator while the other was a low one, they felt safe.