To master hundreds of pages of formation diagrams in a short time, Zhang Yu’s first thought was naturally the Taiqing Realm, where he could benefit from a full 20-fold thought acceleration.

“True Lord Magnet must also expect me to use the Spirit Realm’s thought acceleration service to study. After all, which student in the Artifact Forging Department doesn’t use it?”

In an instant, Zhang Yu’s consciousness traversed the Spirit Realm, arriving at a cave abode named Taiqing Realm.

Upon arriving, Zhang Yu saw Zhang Pianpian, who was engrossed in studying charms.

Zhang Pianpian glanced at Zhang Yu and asked, “You contacted me in such a hurry; what exactly is the matter?”

Zhang Yu briefly explained how he had received guidance from True Lord Magnet during the competition and that he needed to decipher Su Yanyang’s formation.

Speaking without many reservations in the Taiqing Realm, Zhang Yu said directly, “Sis, I need your help preparing tools to break the formation within the intelligent building. You should be quite familiar with this.”

Zhang Pianpian nodded. “Alright, I’ll go prepare them for you. You hurry up and learn the formation diagrams.”

During this time, Zhang Yu also messaged the competition group, asking them to help prepare a few things.

Then, before he began studying, he also requested a Daoist spell service that granted photographic memory.

Under 20-fold thought acceleration, Zhang Yu first quickly memorized the meridian connection files of Su Yanyang’s Dharma-skeleton.

He then divided his mind into four, with three of them separately studying the formation diagrams for the Two Realms Separation Grand Formation, the Ten Thousand Ghosts Delusion Grand Formation, and the Thousand Mountains Heavy Peak Grand Formation.

The fourth mind focused on how these three grand formations nested and controlled one another.

“It’s a pity that the thought acceleration in the Spirit Realm can’t be superimposed with the Time-Shattered Demonic Eye in the real world; otherwise, my efficiency would be even higher.”

Even so, Zhang Yu’s learning efficiency at that moment far surpassed ordinary people. He finally managed to memorize all the content of the formation diagrams before the break ended, just barely considering himself to have learned them.

“Fortunately, True Lord Magnet marked out the key points to be used in this practical combat. Otherwise, if I just studied it once like this, it would probably still be difficult to apply directly in actual combat.”

Outside the arena.

Shi Huaiyu and the others, seeing Zhang Yu finally arrive, quickly asked, “What happened? Why do you suddenly need us to prepare those things?”

To encourage his classmates, Zhang Yu directly invoked Director Gao.

“Director Gao specifically sent an expert to guide me, hoping we can perform well in the next round.”

“That expert has profound cultivation, and his knowledge in the art of formations is even deeper. He has already guided me on how to break the formation.”

Hearing Zhang Yu’s words, everyone present was visibly shaken, especially after hearing him invoke Director Gao. Unconsciously, they felt an extra surge of confidence.

Moreover, Zhang Yu was already an informal disciple of Director Gao, which made his words even more credible.

As Zhang Yu went on to describe the specific tactics and methods for breaking the formation, everyone present nodded repeatedly, their confidence growing bit by bit.

And the thought that they might defeat Su Yanyang and secure a top-seven spot in the departmental competition, even if it was just a possibility, secretly thrilled Shi Huaiyu, Che Yufei, and the others.

As the second half of the competition officially began.

Within the Spirit Realm space, the teachers once again observed the situations in the various arenas.

True Lord Jiao Lei, Zhang Yu’s class advisor, was naturally more curious about Zhang Yu’s situation.

When he saw Zhang Yu’s six-person team all charge together towards Su Yanyang’s construction site at the start of the match, True Lord Jiao Lei was somewhat surprised. “After the defeat in the first half, are they still so spirited in the second half?”

However, the subsequent actions of the six made True Lord Jiao Lei even more surprised.

True Lord Jiao Lei thought to himself, “What they’re holding… is baleful qi pollutants? Thrown directly into the spot where Su Yanyang’s team was going to set up their formation?”

A teacher nearby immediately chuckled, “They actually used this environmental pollution trick! If Su Yanyang doesn’t clean this up, they won’t be able to lay down the spiritual circuits to complete the formation.”

Lang Yougong praised, “It’s not just simple environmental pollution. They polluted the area where Su Yanyang was going to set up his formation but hadn’t yet had time to. This indicates they’ve already learned Su Yanyang’s formation diagrams, allowing them to seize the initiative.”

“It seems they didn’t waste this break time.”

Lang Yougong then saw on the screen that Shi Huaiyu and Tian Yang had joined forces, using Small Three Harmony in conjunction with the Great Wind Heaven Dust Palm. They swept a sky-filling cloud of baleful qi-contaminated sand and dust towards Su Yanyang’s construction site.

Tuli Shan nodded and said, “Baleful qi pollution plus dust pollution. Now Su Yanyang’s team will have to spend a lot of effort cleaning this up.”

Su Yanyang spread his hands, and with the enhancement of his Dharma-skeleton, the Small Three Harmony suddenly activated. He instantly erected layers of earthen barriers to block the smoke and dust. Even so, many spots were still contaminated by the baleful qi-laden smoke and dust, requiring personnel to be dispatched for cleanup.

Wei Huai said calmly, “It will only slow down their progress a bit. Su Yanyang is best at setting up grand formations and fighting tough battles. The foundation of their central formation is already complete. All they need to do now is gradually clean up and expand outwards. Zhang Yu and his team won’t be able to stop them.”

No sooner had he spoken than Su Yanyang was indeed seen controlling the earth, building bunkers and expanding the formation outwards with the coordinated efforts of his teammates.

On the competition field.

Su Yanyang looked at the distant, sky-filling baleful qi smoke and dust and thought to himself, “Hmph, they actually managed to come up with a trick.”

“As a team of the ‘old, weak, young, and poor,’ you really have tried hard.”

“But this year… no one will stop me from obtaining the Seven Absolutes.”

Su Yanyang clasped his hands together, controlling the barriers to turn into mud and sand, carrying the contaminated portions away into the distance. Then he controlled the uncontaminated earth to fill the gaps, repeatedly cleaning up the pollutants in this manner.

Just then, Su Yanyang received a report from the formation spirit: over ten individuals had intruded into the formation. They had already used Sky-Patrolling Flying Swords to break open the Two Realms Separation Grand Formation and were now under attack by the Ten Thousand Ghosts Delusion Grand Formation.

Within the Spirit Realm space.

Tuli Shan’s eyes lit up slightly. “Taking advantage of the formation being hastily set up and its functions not yet perfected, they actually brought in a bunch of ‘eye-skeletons’?”

Watching Zhang Yu and the others remotely control a pile of eye-skeletons with their Gang Qi, scattering them into the formation, Tuli Shan understood that this was to cause identification errors within the formation.

Each pair of these eye-skeletons, subjected to the visual and information distortions of the Ten Thousand Ghosts Delusion Grand Formation, would be mistakenly identified by the formation spirit as an enemy.

These eye-skeletons were precisely what Zhang Yu had asked Shi Huaiyu and others to prepare; they were all cheap, discarded, generic eye-skeletons.

A trace of indifference flashed in Wei Huai’s eyes as he thought to himself, “By intercepting the information, it should be very easy to figure out which eye-skeleton belongs to a real body and which are fake.”

Inside the arena.

Su Yanyang’s gaze swept across, and he saw the messages being exchanged between the various eye-skeletons.

He coldly ordered the formation spirit, “Don’t give me these messy records directly.”

“Organize them by communication order and format, then give them to me.”

Under the effect of the Ten Thousand Ghosts Delusion Grand Formation, messages sent and received by intruders would be distorted and naturally intercepted by the formation spirit.

Su Yanyang thought to himself, “They couldn’t possibly not know their messages would be intercepted… What devious tricks are they trying now?”

Just as the formation spirit finished organizing and was about to resend the intercepted call records, another formation spirit sent a message: “I’ve intercepted their transmitted battle plan.”

Seeing this, Su Yanyang let out a cold laugh. “Idiots! This must be a file they deliberately let you intercept. Delete it immediately!”

But the next moment, Su Yanyang’s expression changed. “Who opened it?!”

Within the Spirit Realm space.

Tuli Shan’s eyes grew brighter and brighter. “This kid Zhang Yu actually managed to find the formation’s Spirit Realm interface directly and connect the discarded eye-skeletons to it?”

“And it seems there’s a soul cultivator inside? Did that soul cultivator infiltrate the grand formation and help Su Yanyang’s team open the so-called file?”

The next moment, layers upon layers of advertisements appeared within the eye-skeletons of Su Yanyang and his team.

Information about various financial loans appeared endlessly. Whenever Su Yanyang and his team’s eye-skeletons even twitched, new loan advertisements would pop up.

Director Gao looked at this scene and smiled faintly. “Heh, is that the Finance Department’s ‘shake-to-see’ ads? Someone skilled in charms must have sealed them inside and disguised them as files, right?”

“It’s also because Su Yanyang’s formation setup time was too short and too rushed, allowing Zhang Yu to find a flaw.”

“But… does this kid Zhang Yu know any students from the Charm Department?”

He remembered that among the students who moved into the dormitory with Zhang Yu, there seemed to be an excellent student from the Charm Department who appeared to have a good relationship with him.

“It’s good to know people from the Charm Department; it always comes in handy.”

Looking at the scene emerging on the screen, Director Gao knew that as soon as this type of advertisement was opened, it would display various loan recommendations based on Spirit Realm big data, with more loans leading to more relevant ads.

At this moment, Su Yanyang and his team, evidently burdened by numerous loans, found their entire Dharma-skeleton vision engulfed by advertisements. They had to keep their eye-skeletons perfectly still to close them one by one.

And even…

Looking at Su Yanyang’s competition group chat history, advertisements had started to appear there too, even crossing the Spirit Realm and on the verge of manifesting before the many teachers.

Director Gao thought to himself, “Hmph, Finance Department ads… widely publicized, pervasive in the Spirit Realm, they stick to you with just one look. Truly overbearing.”

“Old Lin, do you really think you can take advantage of such an overbearing Finance Department?”

Director Gao, however, did not block the advertisements from appearing. On one hand, he wanted everyone present to watch for a few more seconds and experience the overbearing nature of the Finance Department. On the other hand, True Lord Magnet had said he would handle it himself.

“This Magnet fellow, why does he suddenly want to show off? He hasn’t shown off any artifacts or anything similar for quite a while, has he?”

Just as Director Gao was pondering, a phantom pagoda appeared on True Lord Magnet’s text box beside him, emanating layers of divine light. Wherever it passed, it completely erased the advertisements before them into nothingness.

It wasn’t just the advertisements; many teachers present felt their Golden Core and Nascent Soul domains temporarily erased, and even their Spirit Realm projections began to become unstable.

But the next moment, as the pagoda phantom dissipated, everything returned to normal.

On the other side, Director Lin’s heart skipped a beat as he witnessed the scene. “Magnet’s Nine Heavens Primordial Yang Pagoda? It wards off ghosts and gods, and all evils cannot invade. It can eliminate all kinds of external information in the Spirit Realm, including making all sorts of advertisements vanish into nothingness.”

“And it’s directly summoned remotely by borrowing the Spirit Realm. This artifact is about to break through to Level 41 and transform into a Pure Yang Supreme Treasure, isn’t it?”

Director Lin knew that once it transformed into a Pure Yang Supreme Treasure, it would be an artifact that, in some aspects, could rival a God-Transformation Divine Lord.

With the appearance of the Nine Heavens Primordial Yang Pagoda, the atmosphere within the Spirit Realm space shifted, and the many teachers’ gazes towards True Lord Magnet gained a newfound respect.

Feeling the change in atmosphere, Director Gao thought to himself, “Is this Magnet fellow lending support to our War Faction? Doing something like this without extra pay… it seems our centuries-long friendship wasn’t in vain.”

True Lord Magnet thought to himself, “Old Gao, I hope you can clearly see the gap between us now. In the future, don’t make futile struggles and end up harming yourself.”

True Lord Magnet looked at the competition screen and thought to himself, “This kid Zhang Yu not only clearly remembered every detail in the formation diagrams in such a short time but also prepared the means to break the formation. His performance is even better than I originally expected.”

Meanwhile, within the arena.

Zhang Yu thought to himself, “True Lord Magnet was indeed right. The best time to break a formation is when the grand formation has not yet been fully set up.”

At the same time, he messaged, “Old Zhao, did you find it?”

Zhao Tianxing replied, “I’m currently searching in the direction you indicated…”

The soul cultivator Zhang Yu had hired was Zhao Tianxing. Zhang Yu had connected him to the formation of Su Yanyang’s intelligent building via the discarded eye-skeletons, thus initiating the advertisements.

Next, Zhang Yu, using his memory of the formation diagrams, guided Zhao Tianxing towards a specific direction within the formation to find the target location.

Just then, Zhao Tianxing said, “Found it! I’ll point you in the right direction.”

An arrow appeared in Zhang Yu’s eye-skeleton’s field of vision.

The next moment, Zhang Yu’s figure flickered repeatedly, and moments later, he plunged headfirst into a temporarily constructed warehouse.

But the warehouse was empty, with only Su Yanyang quietly floating in mid-air.

Su Yanyang looked at Zhang Yu and said coldly, “Such an important place for storing building materials, did you think I would carelessly leave it open for you?”

After saying that, he struck out with a palm. Under the enhancement of his entire Dharma-skeleton, the Level 20 Earth-Yellow Mountain-Suppressing Seal violently propelled the Level 20 Earth-Yellow Grand Hand Seal, and a torrent of profound yellow energy instantly engulfed Zhang Yu’s figure.

Amidst booming and bursting sounds, Zhang Yu’s body rapidly gained weight, and the ground beneath his feet continuously cracked and burst with each step.