"Trying to tear down my platform?"

Su Ming remained seated cross-legged on the spot, not moving an inch.

His hands had long been pressed against the two auxiliary formation plates in front of him.

"Rise!"

With his low shout, his ten fingers flew across the edges of the formation plates like playing a piano.

The "Ice Condensation Formation" originally laid flat on the ground did not raise a shield like a conventional defense. Shields consumed too much spiritual energy and were easily punctured.

Instead, the dense, long-accumulated cold air around the Mysterious Ice Platform, guided by Su Ming, instantly condensed in mid-air.

Not into an ice wall, but into ice mirrors.

Seven smooth, hexagonal ice shields appeared abruptly in the air, each positioned at an extremely tricky, slanted angle.

The first wave of ice spikes spat by the demon bats slammed fiercely into these ice mirrors.

They did not shatter as expected.

The moment those ice spikes touched the smooth ice surface, the bizarre slanted angle deflected most of their force with a sharp "screech," sending them sliding to the side. A few were even directly reflected back, shooting towards the demon bat swarm behind.

"Thud! Thud!"

Two bats leading the charge were caught off guard, their wings pierced by their companions' ice spikes. They shrieked and plummeted to the ground.

The remaining bats clearly had never encountered such a tactic.

In their understanding, human formations were either rigid turtle shells or fiery, blazing killing arrays.

What was this slippery thing that could even bounce back attacks?

In that split second of their confusion.

Su Ming's fingers changed again.

"Gather Light."

The originally dim starlight and moonlight in the sky projected onto those seven ice mirrors.

Through Su Ming's precise angle calculations, the light from the seven mirrors converged instantly into a single point, forming a blinding white beam that shot straight into the center of the demon bat swarm.

For bats accustomed to darkness, intense light was akin to the most potent poison.

"Squeak, squeak, squeak—!"

The bat swarm instantly erupted into chaos, covering their eyes and crashing wildly in the air, their formation thrown into complete disarray.

"Now!"

Without needing Su Ming's reminder, Old Liu, who had been hiding in the shadows, moved.

He pulled a signal flare from his robe and crushed it fiercely.

Simultaneously, several sharp streaks of sword light shot up from the patrol battalion below.

Three Foundation Establishment patrol sword cultivators arrived flying on their swords.

Facing this swarm of low-level demon bats, now blinded and in disarray, it was practically a one-sided slaughter.

In just over a dozen breaths, the battle was over.

Apart from a dozen or so mutilated corpses and a scattering of ice shards on the ground, not even a single tile on the Mysterious Ice Platform was broken.

The lead sword cultivator sheathed his sword and landed. He glanced at the completely intact formation core, then at the several ice mirrors still hovering in mid-air, a flicker of surprise in his eyes.

The sword cultivator looked at Su Ming. "Which battalion are you from?"

"Reporting, Su Ming from the Formation Maintenance Battalion," Su Ming stood up and saluted, his expression calm. "I merely leveraged the terrain and slightly adjusted the elevation angle of the formation plates."

The sword cultivator nodded, asking no further questions. On the battlefield, solving problems with the smallest cost was a skill in itself.

"Clean this up and continue your watch. We'll note your merit."

The sword cultivator left with his men, carrying the demon bat corpses.

The Mysterious Ice Platform returned to its deathly silence.

Old Liu crawled out from behind the cover, patting the snow off his clothes. He walked up to Su Ming, staring at the slowly dissipating ice mirrors with a strange look in his eyes.

"Using their own force against them, reflecting light to blind them," Old Liu spat a bloody mouthful of saliva. "Kid, this isn't repairing a formation. You're using the formation as a hidden weapon."

Su Ming smiled slightly and sat back down on the meditation cushion. "Senior, formations are dead, but people are alive. As long as it kills demons, it's a good formation."

Old Liu fell silent for a moment, then suddenly pulled out a piece of somewhat dry and hard jerky from his robe and tossed it to Su Ming.

"Take it. Chew it to warm yourself up."

It was the old soldier's recognition.

Su Ming took the jerky, tore off a strip, and put it in his mouth. The meat was tough and very salty, but it became fragrant after chewing for a while.

Su Ming didn't close his eyes. He began circulating the Like Water Art again to restore his energy.

It was now the Chou hour, the darkest part of the night, when the cold was at its peak.

If it were before, Su Ming would definitely feel a stinging pain in his meridians at this moment.

But now, after that bout of precise formation manipulation, he suddenly realized the biting cold air around him seemed to have become somewhat more... familiar.

"Star Attraction Lines..."

The patterns on that bronze fragment surfaced in Su Ming's mind.

This Mysterious Ice Platform towered into the clouds, connecting with starlight above and drawing upon earth veins below. It was the perfect place to practice this rune.

He attempted to slightly adjust the circulation path of the Like Water Art, following the rhythm of the "Star Attraction Lines."

The originally smoothly flowing spiritual energy suddenly began to rotate and accelerate within his Dantian.

A strange suction force emanated from all the pores on his body.

The violent, previously difficult-to-refine icy spiritual energy around him actually became docile under the pull of this suction, transforming into strands of pure, cool energy that drilled into his meridians.

Hiss—

Su Ming couldn't help but shudder.

It was painful, but exhilarating.

That cold energy felt like countless tiny files, repeatedly scraping and tempering the inner walls of his meridians.

His originally somewhat ethereal spiritual energy was forced by this cold energy to compress to a higher density.

"Good lad," Lin Yu praised within the Consciousness Sea. "Using the astral killing energy from this high place to temper the resilience of your spiritual energy. This method is a bit masochistic, but the effect is truly excellent. One night's hard work here equals three days of cultivation down below."

Su Ming gritted his teeth, enduring the cyclical agony of his meridians freezing stiff and then being blasted open by spiritual energy.

He could clearly feel his spiritual energy undergoing a qualitative change. If his previous spiritual energy was like flowing water, then now, this flow was beginning to mix with fine shards of "ice."

Heavier, colder, and sharper.

When the first hint of pale light appeared on the eastern horizon.

Su Ming slowly opened his eyes.

A thick layer of white frost had formed on his eyelashes, but his pupils shone brighter than the cold stars in the sky.

"Hoo—"

He exhaled a turbid breath. The airflow didn't dissipate but shot out like a sharp arrow for three feet before slowly turning into white mist.

His token vibrated.

Su Ming looked down. The Military Merit value had jumped.

Fifty points for the basic night watch duty, plus five hundred for repelling the harassment.

Five hundred and fifty points of Military Merit.

"This deal was worth it," Su Ming's lips curved slightly upward. He stood up, stretching his somewhat stiff joints, which emitted a series of cracking sounds like popping beans.

Old Liu had already packed up his things and was preparing to hand over the watch.

As he passed by Su Ming, his steps paused briefly.

"Kid, that trick with the ice mirrors reflecting light... teach it to the brothers in the battalion later?" Old Liu didn't look at Su Ming, his gaze fixed on the distant, undulating black mountain range.

"No problem," Su Ming agreed readily. "But you'll have to buy me a drink."

"Deal," Old Liu waved his hand and strode down the mountain. "As long as we survive, drinks are on me."