護花近衛 - 第3527章 鍛造天階兵器 - 翰墨軒

Kang Jingming threw Wei Zhao a glance, knew himself no match for him, and left with his head lowered, saying nothing more.

Wei Zhao paid him no mind. He hurried back to his room and began studying the forging of divine weapons.

Once inside, he went into the inner chamber of his suite, took out from the jade pendant's space the copy he had transcribed of the "Art of Forging Heaven-Tier Divine Weapons," and began to study it.

According to the text, forging a Heaven-Tier divine weapon made specifically for use with the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art required the following materials: refined mystic iron, black mystic iron, colored steel, crow-charcoal stone, pure yellow jade, blue crystal powder, and the blood of the Five-Bane Dragon.

It was a great many materials—far more than the refinement of the jade pendant's space or the essence necklace had required. Yet apart from the Five-Bane Dragon's blood, which he had only just obtained, Wei Zhao had gathered all the rest some time ago. During the days when he was refining Qi-Gathering Pills, he had swept up a share of everything alongside the pill ingredients, shaken out of those ancient sects and hidden clans. Now he had spare quantities of every material.

So if Wei Zhao began forging now, he had more than enough to work with.

What rankled him was that he had obtained the Five-Bane Dragon's blood too late. Had it come earlier—early enough to forge a divine weapon sooner—he could have used it throughout his entire Heaven-Tier stage.

Now he was on the verge of advancing to the Heavenly Dao stage. Whether a Heaven-Tier divine weapon could still be used above the Heavenly Dao, and whether it would retain such power if used, were all unknowns.

Still, to open the stone door of the Xuanyuan Cave Mansion, he had to forge it. That too was a kind of trial the stone door set for him.

The materials were now all assembled. Wei Zhao read on through the latter part of the forging art. It turned out that the divine weapon suited to the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art was a staff, which required cylindrical refined mystic iron as its vessel—just as refining the essence necklace had required a jade pendant as its vessel.

Refined mystic iron? Wei Zhao could not help thinking of the refined mystic iron rod—the one Zhong Yongliang had given him. The fellow had done nothing but hand him fine things. Might as well keep him around, Wei Zhao mused; he might still prove useful down the road.

With the materials in hand, Wei Zhao set about puzzling out the refining method. As for the forging fire, after his two previous trials he could already command it with complete proficiency. There was no difficulty there.

What came next was more practice in earnest.

Only after reading through the forging steps for a Heaven-Tier divine weapon several times did Wei Zhao carefully arrange fixed proportions of black mystic iron, colored steel, crow-charcoal stone, pure yellow jade, blue crystal powder, and Five-Bane Dragon's blood around the refined mystic iron rod. Then he formally began forging his Heaven-Tier divine weapon.

He started by condensing the forging fire. The steps that followed were in fact very much like the methods for refining the jade pendant's space and the essence necklace.

With the experience of those two prior attempts, this condensing went remarkably smoothly. Wei Zhao's hands worked ceaselessly, condensing the forging fire, and every so often he had to reshape and reform the auxiliary materials with his hands, fusing them into the refined mystic iron rod on the ground.

One after another, the whole process went smoothly. After some time, he finally reached the most important step in forging this weapon.

This step was the most critical of all, and the one for which Wei Zhao had the least material. For the materials condensed thus far, he basically had backups in hand—but the final step was the injection of the Five-Bane Dragon's blood.