Releasing the hand she held tightly with Mo He, Ban Ruo said calmly, "There must be other forces joining their united front. This time we are facing the combined product of at least three major military-grade groups. The power of the improved Ares Mark III can be imagined. Without making some adjustments, how could we stand against them!"

Mo He snorted in dissatisfaction, but he also knew Ban Ruo was right. He could only angrily slam a fist onto the ground: "Damn it, I hate these bastards who resort to petty tricks the most! If you have the guts, use your own strength. What kind of hero is it to gang up and bully someone?"

Gu Xie Chen excitedly rushed into the warehouse door. He didn't greet anyone, ran straight to the mirror bed, grabbed a great saber placed on the floor, and bolted out. Near the warehouse was a rest area for the night shift personnel. He ushered the company employees inside out, ordered them not to disturb him, then shut the doors and windows, settling down cross-legged on the floor.

Carefully recalling the marvelous techniques in the Three Scrolls of Artifact Refining left by Daoist Wo Chen, a faint stream of Taiyin Xuan Yan shot from his palm, swiftly sweeping across the great saber like lightning. With a series of 'Chah-chah' sounds, the saber disintegrated into countless minute, ghostly blue particles. A bone-chilling cold engulfed the entire resting room, thick frost coating the walls and floor. Following Daoist Wo Chen's refining formula, his massive spiritual energy meticulously enveloped the disintegrated saber, controlling the Taiyin Xuan Yan to transform into an extremely thin sheet of white light that integrated into the flowing, liquefied metal of the saber.

As the spiritual energy mixed with the Taiyin Xuan Yan entered the saber, Gu Xie Chen felt as if he were submerged in a chilling, azure ocean, surrounded by spherical objects of varying sizes. Each sphere was frozen solid by intense cold, and the gaps between them were slowly shrinking.

This was his first attempt at such a peculiar method, so Gu Xie Chen dared not be careless. He quickly directed the Taiyin Xuan Yan to sift through the entire body of the saber like a sieve, then rapidly withdrew the Taiyin Xuan Yan from within the blade. In that instant, Gu Xie Chen’s spiritual energy swept past billions of metallic particles. In a dazzling blur, before he could clearly perceive what was happening, his spiritual energy surged out of the great saber along with the Taiyin Xuan Yan. With a crisp 'Huala' sound, as the Taiyin Xuan Yan retracted into his body, a pile of extremely fine metal particulates fell to the ground, and the great saber in his hand had shrunk in volume by about the size of a thumb.

Every modern special alloy steel is made of dozens of metallic elements plus various additives. Gu Xie Chen was just beginning to study artifact refining, barely scratching the surface of the methods. Fortunately, his experience at the Gu Group had given him a good understanding of specialized alloys. What he had just extracted from the saber were impurities that were unevenly melted within the blade.

The great saber, which had originally radiated a dazzling gleam, was now even more chilling. A faint, cyan cold light flickered along the edge.

Casually taking a strand of his long hair and flicking it across the blade, not even a sound was made; the hair was cleaved in two by the blade's edge.

Watching the severed strands of hair drift down, Gu Xie Chen couldn't help but laugh out loud three times toward the sky. The original alloy saber definitely wasn't this sharp! That was a crude implement meant for cleaving battle chariots and various armors; who would be foolish enough to forge such a saber with an edge sharp enough to sever a hair in mid-air? Wouldn't it become dull in a few days?

Gleefully examining the refined saber, Gu Xie Chen recalled the dry and obscure incantations from the three scrolls. He gradually realized that these incantations were related to the Bagua and the Five Elements. He still couldn't grasp the subtleties, but he had some bold speculations about the most fundamental aspects.

Silently recalling the generating and overcoming cycles of the Post-Heaven Five Elements, and referencing the most basic section of the incantation, the Taiyin Xuan Yan erupted once more. Fine flames flickered in the air, and five points of firelight imprinted themselves mid-air onto the blade. Under the control of his spiritual energy, these five points of Taiyin Xuan Yan delicately differentiated into dozens of extremely fine fire patterns, outlining an exquisite regular pentagonal rune seal within the blade.

His internal Zhenqi quietly flowed into the saber, and a hazy cold mist instantly enveloped the blade's edge. Swinging it forward casually, a chilling saber aura, about a meter long, shot out, striking the wall of the resting room and leaving a sword mark about an inch deep. Fortunately, the Zhenqi poured into the saber wasn't too strong, or this wall would have been split open with one strike.

"So that's how it is. Daoist Wo Chen actually recorded the formations he knew in written form. But... Heavens above, who even studies the Lesser Eight Trigrams of the Five Elements anymore?"

Through his own comprehension and practice, Gu Xie Chen discovered this frustrating truth: Daoist Wo Chen had recorded the essence of the formations he understood entirely in writing, but anyone without a profound understanding of the Heavenly Cycles, Earthly Branches, and the Mysterious Qimen Bagua couldn't grasp the subtlety of his formations. However, the entry-level application of the formations he recorded was extremely easy; anyone with a basic grasp of the Five Elements' generating and overcoming cycles could execute them. But to truly master their methods? Who knew how many lifetimes it would take.

"Old Taoist, is this your way of seducing people into inheriting your legacy? No wonder you didn't even set up a formation to guard the gate! But aren't you afraid of passing it on to the wrong person?"

Suddenly understanding Daoist Wo Chen's intention, Gu Xie Chen couldn't help but sigh deeply.

What did it matter? He had Zhao Yi, a formation master, right beside him. He didn't necessarily have to learn the core essence of Daoist Wo Chen's formations. If he recited all these formulas and incantations to Zhao Yi, maybe they could easily grasp the mysteries within? That would certainly be more straightforward than Gu Xie Chen studying them from scratch!

Excitedly carrying the refined long saber back to the warehouse, he snatched up the mirror bed. He tossed the freshly completed great saber to Mo He, who was standing nearby watching, and Gu Xie Chen swung his own refined long saber down in a chopping motion. "Mo He, see how powerful these two sabers are!" he shouted excitedly.

Mo He instinctively grasped the hilt with his backhand. Hearing Gu Xie Chen's call, he grinned and slashed backhand at the saber chopping down from above.

"Ow, I was just about to test it, but Big Brother won't let me!" Mo He's eyebrows were practically lifted by his smile.

With a 'Chih-chih' sound, as Mo He swung his saber, a very fine streak of lightning automatically ignited around the edge, and the saber body radiated a sharp gleam.

With a 'Wuwu' sound, Gu Xie Chen poured his Zhenqi into the great saber, and a meter-long cold light suddenly shot out from the edge.

Zhao Yi, who was diligently sketching formation diagrams, heard the sound of the saber wind and realized something was wrong. He abruptly turned his head to look at the long saber in Gu Xie Chen's hand. Xin Jia cried out almost simultaneously with him: "Low-Grade Magical Artifact? Huh? Huh? Huh? No, that's not right... The formation inside the saber is indeed Low-Grade, rotten to the core, but this blade body..."

With a 'Kengqiang' clash, the cold light spitting from Gu Xie Chen's blade was completely shattered by a streak of lightning. The electric light then lashed onto the ground, but it exploded into countless sparks, like an egg hitting a stone. The two great sabers crashed together violently. The saber in Mo He's hand broke into two pieces upon impact, while Gu Xie Chen's newly refined saber only sustained a sesame-seed-sized nick on its edge.

Mo He felt the lightness in his hand, and a flash of saber light crossed his vision. Scared, he quickly leaped back a dozen paces. Staring blankly at the long saber in his hands, Mo He exclaimed in shock to the big-bearded commander, "Uncle Hu Zi, I suspect someone in the company's weapons factory is skimming kickbacks! How can this saber be so weak?"

Xin Jia strode to Gu Xie Chen's side and took the saber to examine it closely. Hearing Mo He's complaint, Xin Jia repeatedly shook his head: "Little Monk, it's not that your saber is too poor; it's that the Honored One's saber is too good. Hey, Zhao Yi, come look!"

Zhao Yi took the saber and sent his divine sense into the blade to ponder it for a while, then slowly nodded: "A common Five Elements Profound Ice Formation. The formation is crude and utterly beyond reproach, and the method used to carve the formation is... unsightly! However, this blade body has an astonishing degree of condensation; it's at least at the Craftsman level technique. This saber can be considered a treasured blade... It's a real pity about the formation inside!"

Gu Xie Chen's old face flushed. He chuckled dryly, "Enough talk. Ignoring the formation inside, if all the great sabers and the armor of Ares Number One were refined once using this method, what would our chances of winning be?"

Bill Rocks and the other researchers also crowded over. They tested the various performances of the great saber with portable instruments, inevitably clicking their tongues in amazement.

After calculating for a while, Bill Rocks smiled and said, "If all the great sabers and the armor of Ares Number One could reach this standard, our winning probability could increase by at least ten percent."

"Fly!" After glancing at the large clock hanging on the warehouse wall, Gu Xie Chen said gravely, "There are only fifteen hours left until the duel against the improved Ares Mark III from the Gu Group. In these fifteen hours, I will use every ounce of my effort to modify the structural integrity of these standard-issue sabers and armors. Zhao Yi... you come help me!"

Everyone else continued to busy themselves. One of Zhao Yi's companions took over his work, continuing to carve formation diagrams onto the armors, though his proficiency in carving the diagrams was clearly much lower than Zhao Yi's.

Zhao Yi agreed enthusiastically. He squatted beside Gu Xie Chen, carefully murmuring quietly with him. Their eyes grew brighter and brighter, and gradually, they both burst into simultaneous laughter toward the sky.

Under Gu Xie Chen's orders, a large number of standard firearms for the Ares Number One armor were transported into the adjacent warehouse and neatly stacked together. These standard firearms were all energy weapons, but none had energy cells attached at the time; only the metal gun bodies were moved in.

Walking into the warehouse and closing the door, two masses of Taiyin Xuan Yan immediately erupted, rapidly refining all the firearms into ghostly blue, flowing liquid metal. Gu Xie Chen then used his newly enhanced, massive spiritual energy without reservation, exerting all his strength to condense these firearms, carefully refining the metal structure without damaging the basic design of the weapons. Through refinement by the Taiyin Xuan Yan, the strength of the gun bodies of these firearms was increased by at least a factor of two, and the amount of energy they could withstand also doubled.

If these firearms were fitted with higher-output energy cells, wouldn't their increased power be more than double?