“How will you handle it? With what?”
Mo Xu's brow furrowed deeply, his tone filled with unconcealed disdain. In his half-lifetime of practicing medicine and forging artifacts, he had seen far too many hot-blooded youths who, armed only with a fearless impulse, dared to challenge the laws of the Heavenly Dao. But once their hot blood was dried by reality and their wings were broken by the wind and rain, they would suddenly realize that the vastness and cruelty of this world were far beyond what a mere obsession could shake.
Lu Yan's hands, hanging at his sides, quietly clenched. There was no retreat in his eyes as he stated the path he had already planned out: “I am going to the Central Continent.”
He had thought it through. If he was to linger in this world holding onto a heart that was already half-dead, there was no point in it. He might as well go wild.
He had long since witnessed the treacherous winds and waves of the outside world. In the past, his wings had been damaged, making him like a bird with broken wings, no longer able to fly high.
But now, he was piecing together and healing his scarred wings, all to fight for a possibility where the two of them could still live and smile in the future.
“The Central Continent?”
Before Mo Xu could speak, Fu Feng beside him grew anxious. He had gone to great lengths to recruit the last successor of the Ten Thousand Formations Sect into the Molten Heart Tower, offering him a salary and teaching privileges. Having finally secured such a top-tier talent of the Formation Dao, how could he let him step back into danger all by himself?
Fu Feng strode forward and grabbed Lu Yan's wrist, his voice filled with anxiety. “What are you going back to the Central Continent for? There is still an active bounty scroll out for you in the Central Continent. Going there is clearly throwing yourself onto the blade. Do you not want your life anymore?”
Saying that, he turned to Mo Xu as if seeking help, attempting to use the elder's words to dissuade Lu Yan. “Besides, a mechanical heart does not inherently have such fatal flaws! As long as a large amount of fire-attribute spiritual materials is incorporated during the forging, and Lu Yan personally engraves formation lines on the artifact body to balance the Five Elements, the side effects of replacing fire with metal can be suppressed to an absolute minimum. There is no need to risk going to the Central Continent at all.”
Fu Feng's words jolted Mo Xu. The old man's originally certain stance began to waver, and he rapidly calculated the entire forging scheme in his mind.
Fire overcomes metal. If they used a fire-attribute primary material to suppress the killing intent of Geng Metal, and then paired it with earth-attribute spiritual materials to harmonize the qi flow, the previously mentioned consequences—apathy of the soul, stagnation of liver qi, and cold toxins invading the kidneys—would merely be the worst-case scenario of using ordinary iron. If they were willing to pile on rare spiritual materials and meticulously arrange the structure, it was not impossible to suppress the damage to a tolerable range.
With this thought, Mo Xu immediately picked up the charcoal pencil, dissecting the structure layer by layer on the drawing, and began to draft the optimal plan without any regard for cost:
For the outer supporting frame, they would use Crimson Flame Yang Gold, which combined strength and flexibility. Its Five Elements attribute was fire, which could suppress the overflowing metal energy, and its outstanding ductility allowed it to expand and contract with the pulsing of vital energy.
The inner layer, simulating the thin wall of native cardiac muscle, would be forged from Living Silver, which was extremely soft and highly ductile. They would grind Huayang Jade, known for its warm and meridian-nourishing properties, into a fine powder and melt it into the silver material. This would ensure that repeated contraction and expansion would not cause cracking, while continuously and gently nourishing the spiritual energy throughout the body.
The internal opening and closing valves would be crafted from Celestial Melted Marrow. This material inherently carried a rich yang-fire aura, which could continuously replenish the heart's yang. The outer side of the valves would be plated with a high-carbon ink coating to prevent blood coagulation and blockage. The sharp metal essence naturally carried by the coating would be melted and neutralized by the yang fire of the Celestial Melted Marrow.
As for the power drive, they would engrave a miniature Spirit-Gathering Formation on the entire heart as a power core, abandoning the cumbersome design of an external spirit crystal. As long as the user continued to cultivate, they could mobilize their own cultivation and spiritual energy to directly drive the pulsation of this artificial heart.
Forged to these specifications, it would not only secure several decades of life, but the decay of the five organs' qi flow would also be significantly delayed.
In Mo Xu's eyes, the source of the materials was not a difficult problem. There was no need for Lu Yan to run around searching for them. Their own Young Sect Master, Fu Feng, possessed superb Grand Alchemy skills. As long as he was given the recipe, ordinary ores and iron could be refined into high-grade spiritual materials.
Yet, the cost was still terrifyingly high.
Even if they compressed the materials to the most economical standard, the spirit stones required just to refine and transform the raw materials would already exceed six figures, soaring toward seven figures. Furthermore, Fu Feng was accustomed to using the higher-quality Spirit-Infused Iron as a base when forging artifacts, which would only make the cost even more staggering.
Having deduced all the details, Mo Xu slowly raised his eyes. His tone carried a hint of rare excitement; he had rarely handled such a creation project that disregarded the budget and piled on materials with all its might in his lifetime.
“If we forge it according to this scheme, the production cycle will take at least half a year. As for the material expenses... the starting point is hundreds of thousands of spirit stones.”
Lu Yan fell into a long silence upon hearing this.
Half a year.
In other words, his time limit to raise this massive sum of funds was only a brief six months.
He could not spend all of his time running around to raise spirit stones. During this period, he also had to enter the Central Continent to find Jiang Ci's lost Glass Sword Heart, which was the ultimate treasure that could fundamentally mend the defect in her heart's meridians.
To his current self, hundreds of thousands of spirit stones were undoubtedly an astronomical figure. Even if he mortgaged the rest of his life to the Molten Heart Tower, he would be far from raising even a hundred thousand spirit stones.
Going to the Central Continent was both to search for the sword heart and to make a quick, life-saving fortune.
Seeing that his mind was made up, Fu Feng knew that no amount of persuasion would stop him. He could only sigh heavily and release his grip on Lu Yan's wrist. “Go if you must. I will start preparing and refining the necessary spiritual materials for you here first. Once you return from the Central Continent, the forging period can be compressed directly to three months.”
He did not want Lu Yan to bear such a heavy debt burden alone. The only thing he could do was refine the raw materials in advance. Even if Lu Yan failed to raise the full amount in the end, these high-grade spiritual materials, refined with so much effort, could still be remodeled into other high-end magic artifacts in the future, so his work would not be entirely in vain.
Looking at Fu Feng, who was considering his well-being in every aspect, a surge of burning warmth welled up in Lu Yan's heart. He bowed deeply, his voice choked with uncontrollable emotion. “Thank you.”
Fu Feng reached out to help him up. After exchanging a few more brief pleasantries, Lu Yan turned and left the Molten Heart Tower.
The moment he stepped out of the heavy tower doors, an invisible timer seemed to appear over his heart, silently counting down the remaining time with every beat.
At the end of the timer lay the promise he had made to Jiang Ci.
He would go back and tell her in person that he would definitely make sure she lived. He, Lu Yan, would never break this promise.
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