After using nearly ten minutes to suppress her euphoria, she used Earth Burrow to reach the surface.

As soon as Xiao Hong popped out of the ground, she noticed a large number of disciples flying around urgently, doing something or the other. 

Xiao Hong did not waste her time and directly sent a message to the Formation Masters through her Communication Jade, “{Fellow Formation Masters, please gather. We have a lot of work ahead of us.}”

She received several replies almost immediately - apparently, they had been waiting for her, “{We’ll be there!}”

As she waited for them to come, she closed her eyes and began to derive the Formation based on the mental map she had of the area.

‘Looking at the effectiveness of the Undead Wood Life Protecting Array Formation, we can say it is quite powerful. I can use some parts of its foundation to create a whole new Formation. I do have to tweak it since the chaos in the Wood Element has mostly calmed down.

‘Other Elements are mostly the same as last time.’ Xiao Hong could not help but frown. ‘I cannot use the chaos of the Wood Element nor can I use the numerous deaths that have occurred here since it has been too long…

‘And it’s too late to forge Formation Flags.

‘I also can’t use the Sun and Moon as Major Astral Positions anymore. The few moments of weakness, when the Astral Positions shift from Sun to Moon, will definitely be noticed by a Nirvana StageTrue Demon.’

In fact, even 8th Disaster Cultivators could notice it. But the thing was that they could not really break it even if they attacked it with all their might - even Xue Hun’s strongest attack would not be able to break the Undead Wood Life Protecting Formation in its weakest state. This was why Xiao Hong felt confident when she used them as Astral Positions - even if they really camped outside the Formation, they would not be able to do a thing.

But this would not be the case if a True Demon was involved - they were simply way too powerful.

‘I might have to forgo the use of stars completely.’ She did not dare to take such chances - that was truly courting death. 

‘According to the time, Bai Hao should be able to breakthrough in a day or two. 

‘But the problem is… would a pseudo-Grade 3 Formation last that long under the siege of a Nirvana Stage True Demon?’ Xiao Hong felt rather uncertain. ‘There is no real benchmark to compare to at all.’

She had never really seen a Nirvana Stage being in action, so she really had no idea what to expect and was therefore afraid that she might underestimate them.

‘Let’s just go all out then!’ She decisively chose to create the strongest Formation she could with her current circumstances.

Xiao Hong directly shot up into the skies and surveyed the land from her higher perspective. Reflected in her eyes was a magnificent sea of Purple-leaved Spirit Birch trees. The tall Birches swayed with the wind, rippling ever so slightly.

Yet in that magnificent sea, there was an ugly bald spot with no trees. 

‘It’s like that damned barber again!’ Xiao Hong was inexplicably reminded of the time when he was in high school and the barber had left a tiny bald spot on his otherwise perfectly-trimmed hair and never told him. He was then ruthlessly teased by his classmates. It was to the point he had to take a month off to let his hair grow back!

‘I hope he is still living a miserable life!’ She cursed the barber for the umpteenth time in her two lives before turning her attention to the forest below, trying to figure out how to harness the greatest strength she could from the terrain.

‘The Purple-leaved Spirit Birch forest is a great source of Wood Elemental Power.

‘However, this is useless since the Wood Element is only so-so in terms of defensive power.’

This powerful Wood Element was the reason the Purple Spirit Sect set up their base here in the first place. The Wood Element here was great for Recovery and Healing Formations. This allowed for the disciples of the Sect to create the perfect Home Base. But it was kinda useless and even detrimental in their current circumstances.

‘If only Fire was good at defence…’ Xiao Hong lamented. ‘With Elemental interaction of Wood feeds Fire, I could set up a Formation with immense attack power.’ 

Unfortunately, while an attack of that level could indeed injure a Nirvana expert, the speed of attack itself was too slow to actually be of any use - unless the Nirvana Expert was dumb enough to stand there and let himself be used as target practice.

‘The “Wood stabilises Earth” interaction is what I need to use to strengthen the defensive power,’ Xiao Hong frowned, ‘but the expenditure might be too much.’

The Wood Element here was too strong and the Earth Element would become much harder to move under the ‘Wood stabilises Earth’ interaction. To extract the power of the Earth Element as well as maintain it, would require tremendous expenditure of energy and Essence - the kind they simply could not produce. It wasn’t the total amount of energy that mattered, but the energy delivered per unit of time that mattered. 

‘How to reduce the expenditure, then…?’ Xiao Hong’s frown deepened. 

Just as she was pondering, she ‘saw’ a pair of disciples arguing at the edge of her Divine Sense. She picked up on their argument because one of the disciples - who was evidently female - forgot to use Qi transmission because of how agitated she was, “Brother, how could you even entertain the idea of abandoning our sect mates?!”

“Because I don’t fucking care about them!” the other disciple - a man - snapped back angrily. “I don’t care if they are killed, captured or torn apart and fed to the dogs! I care about you - my little sister!”

Then he jolted to his senses and scanned the area with his Divine Sense before sighing in relief and continuing to argue with his little sister with qi transmission, who was adamant about her stance and walked away with a determined expression.

“Dammit!” the elder brother slammed his fist into a nearby tree, snapping it in half. “Dammit!” He kicked the remaining stump, uprooting it along a large amount of soil. After venting his anger, he took a deep breath and turned towards the direction his sister had walked with determination.

Xiao Hong who was watching all this did not marvel at how similar the siblings’ determined expressions were. Instead, her eyes were glowing with a brilliant light as she stared at the tree stump that was lying on the ground, with clumps of wet mud clinging to its roots.

Because a new idea had struck her at the moment! A dangerous and audacious idea - a notion as daring as a mouse tempting fate by nibbling at the cheese in a mouse trap!

Just then, the several figures rushed towards her at full speed and stopped right before her. “Formation Master Xiao, we’re here!”

Xiao Hong snapped out of her thoughts and looked at the six Junior Brothers and Sisters before, “Get ready, we have a lot of work to do!”

***

An hour later, Xiao Hong had just finished refining the Control Token for the Formation, when her head snapped towards the distance.

Gu Ran, Jun Meiling, and Qiao Xuan also turned their heads in the same direction. The four of them revealed unprecedentedly serious expressions, their gazes fixated on a distant point. Even the other disciples stopped meditating to recover and stared in the same direction, their expressions a mixture of solemnity, fear and helplessness.

Because, at this moment, they could sense a titanic, insurmountable aura surging towards them at a speed none of them could hope to match! 

It was an aura that tainted the very air with a horrible sense of malice, hatred and a violent storm of negative emotions. The sheer intensity of the aura made them feel pressured despite the distance, despite the protective barrier of the Formation. The aura pressed down on their bodies like a mountain, making it hard for weaker cultivators to even muster the thought of resistance.

A red spot expanded rapidly, closing in on them at a speed that Xiao Hong could not achieve even with her perfected level of Earth Burrow.

In just several dozen breaths, the red spot had turned into the figures of five men and two women. Three of Xiao Hong recognised - it was Mo Qingzhu and her two lackeys. Another young man stood beside them, looking down at the Formation below with an interested gaze.

However, neither of them held her attention for long, because right in front of the other four was an expressionless, ordinary-looking, middle-aged man in luxurious robes. 

This man was the epicentre titanic aura that now pressed down on them like the might of the World.

The True Demon had arrived!