Death... and me

As Rean expected, he and Droman finished Router Formation Version 1.0 fifteen days later. Rean, of course, explained what he meant by 'version.' In the future, they would have to upgrade it, add different runes, etc. So for each new version, they should preserve the entire building process, guaranteeing that they knew exactly what they did in the past. 

Droman looked at the enormous formation and couldn't help but sigh in response, though.

"This thing ended up being a lot bigger than I wanted."

Rean just laughed out loud, though. He still remembered seeing a documentary about the first computers that occupied giant rooms. Their formation could be said to have more or less the same size, which Rean was already expecting.

"There's no helping it. For Version 1.0, this is already good enough. Besides, our sect won't find any issue in freeing enough space in the cities to use one of these guys. We had to do the runes this big so that we knew what was happening. If we used extremely tiny ones like those used in your Heaven Plate, it would be too difficult to tell what was occurring. For test purposes, this is the best we can do. In the future, once we find a more perfect combination of runes, we can start to shrink its size. Besides, I've been thinking about an entirely new concept of Electrical Formations that I plan to show you soon."

Droman's eyes lit up.

"A new concept of Electrical Formations? How does it work?"

Rean smiled and shook his head.

"That will be a surprise. Once I'm sure about its practical use, I'll show it to you."

Obviously, Rean was talking about the Circuitry Formations that he saw in the 'Introduction to Circuitry Formations' article. It was the one that appeared in the Electrical Formations Repository inside the Soul Gem Dimensional Realm. 

Rean then looked at Elder Droman before saying.

"I couldn't help much with the overall work since I don't understand most of the runes. Most of the work was done by Elder Droman alone."

Droman shook his head.

"Without you, I wouldn't ever think about such a thing. Anyway, let's stop with this sentimental crap. I already have all the building process recorded in the jade slips. I'll take the other high-level formations master of our Formations Hall and share the work with them. I want to have these formations ready to work in at most two months."

Rean nodded. The formation was very hard to make, and there would be a need for hundreds of it in the entire Dalamu Sect territory. Two months to build all the necessary ones for testing was already a quick result.

"That's good. I should be back from the Profound Abyss before the tests start, then."

Droman narrowed his eyes and warned Rean.

"The Vermilion Pools are great, but there is no need to put your life on the line for it. I'm sure that you will reach the Nascent Soul Realm with your and Roan's talents even without it. Make sure to put your lives above anything else. If the opponent is too strong, retreat immediately. There is no shame in living to see the next day."

Rean smiled after hearing that. He knew that Droman was just worried about him.

"Don't worry, Elder Droman. We know what we are doing."

Later that day, several Formation Masters of the Dalamu Sect flew out of the sect in several directions. Each one of them went to a different city to start building the new Router Formations.

The other sects and the royal family had been watching closely how the Dalamu Sect acted. They had given them the communication system for them to build. They also confirmed that it worked exactly as the reports said—instant communication over long distances. However, they noticed that the Dalamu Sect wasn't connecting any of the cables in the cities to the main ones leading to other cities. All cities were left with a big space for work that remained with nothing more than several wires disconnected.

Obviously, that was the space previously prepared for the construction of the Router Formations. All these wires were connected to the most important facilities of those cities like the city guards, the city office, etc. Once the formation was finished, those cables would be connected to it. Only then would two more cables leave it and connect to the main ones leading to other cities.

Still, it was too early to see whether they would work as well as in the tests. Rean would not see the results before leaving for the Profound Abyss anyway, so he put the matter behind his mind.

With that done, Rean began to issue challenges in the arenas as well. As Roan mentioned, the Inner Sect disciples would give him a golden opportunity to help stabilize his chaotic foundation and get used to his increase in combat power.

In the end, he just so happened to arrive when Roan finished another fight. The judge then raised his hand and stated.

"Winner, Roan Larks!"

*Wow!*

The public around went into another uproar.

"What position did he challenge this time?"

"It was the 743rd positioned disciple! Mirio Garland. He was at the Middle Stage of the Core Formation Realm, but he still lost to Roan."

"Roan is still at the Peak Stage of the Foundation Establishment Realm, right? Not to mention that he is only 13 this year. Mario, on the other hand, is already 25! Now I know what a real genius looks like."

"Yea, but Mirio is still considered a Genius of our Dalamu Sect. Look at Roan. He is full of injuries."

They were right. It turned out that the level of the Inner Sect disciples was a lot higher than Roan expected. He thought that he could still easily win against those at the Middle Stage, but it turned out that he had to go all out to do so. Of course, the injuries on his body were quite bad but of little concern. As soon as the battle finished, he connected to Rean's Light Element and began to heal his wounds with the Life Style Second Form.

For Rean, that was quite a funny thing. Several times while he was practicing formations under Droman's teaching or helping with the Router Formation, his hair would suddenly change colors without any warning. It couldn't be helped, though.

Nevertheless, Roan was delighted with that development. Mario was considered one of the weaker Middle Stage Core Formation Realm Inner Sect Disciples. Still, he already forced him to this state. That meant he would have plenty of practicing partners even before reaching the disciples at the Late Stage.

In front of everyone, Light Element began to gather around Roan as his hair changed into a mix of white and black colors. Just like that, his injuries began to close at high speeds. In just a minute, not even a scar remained.

"Sigh... There he goes, using his brother's Light Element again."

"Those who make the challenges will not get one-month of protection. Only those who were challenged can get it. Usually, someone would take the chance that Roan just finished a fight to challenge him and take his higher position. But now, no one dares to do so. Look at that. He is back into peak condition already."

"You should be thankful already. Thanks to the Inner Sect Rules, Roan can't get outside help during the fights for positions. Otherwise, he could simply heal himself while exchanging blows with others. That would really be a big problem."

Roan ignored all the comments and came down the arena. Finally, he noticed Rean looking at him in the corner.

'You finally here, uh? Did you finish the Router Formation?'

Rean nodded.

'The first version of it is done. Still, I will only know if it works or not once we come back from the Profound Abyss.'

Roan didn't mind, though.

'That's fine. We have exactly a month before we leave the sect for it. Take this time and challenge as many Inner Sect disciples as possible. Turns out that they are much stronger than I expect, so this is a good opportunity.'

Rean nodded and then left to talk with one of the disciples taking care of the arena.

"I want to challenge a higher ranked disciple."

That disciple nodded and passed Rean the list with each Inner Sect's disciple. But it was then that he noticed a familiar name there.

"What?! Inna Malaka?!"

Rean immediately contacted Roan through their Soul Connection.

'Why didn't you tell me that Malaka fought for one of the Inner Sect positions?'

'Why should I? You locked yourself with Droman during the past two weeks, so I simply thought you were too busy with that Router Formation. Besides, Malaka was more than strong enough to defeat some of the low-ranked ones. After all, she has my Death Style Manual.'

'Still, I would at least have taken the time to come to watch it.'

'That's not my problem.'

Although he was angry, Rean knew that insisting on this topic would be useless since Roan simply didn't care. 

"899th positioned one, Laco Hearan."

As one can imagine, the disciples who saw the 'White Demon' coming up gathered around immediately to watch. 

Too bad for that Laco guy, though. Rean was in a terrible mood, so he ended discounting everything on him. In the end, the judge had to intervene so that the bullying could stop.

"Winner, Rean Larks."

Rean noticed that he had gone a little overboard and healed that disciple before leaving the arena again.

'Sigh... whatever. I'll just spend the rest of the month challenging the Inner Sect Disciples like Roan is doing.'

Time passed in a flash. Finally, the last month before departure was gone. The Dalamu Sect's five disciples were ready to go to the Profound Abyss.