Chapter 6670 Initiation Ritual Melkor struggled to make a single choice out of three promising and powerful qi cultivation methods. Each of them would have massive implications for his career as well as the Larkinson Clan if he could make a huge difference in a battle. The homebrew Design Spirit Contract Qi Cultivation Method pretty much guaranteed that Melkor would become powerful enough in his own way. He could channel the power of a contracted design spirit for a longer period of time and gradually become able to perform similar abilities by relying on his own strength. The Combat Spell Array Master Qi Cultivation Method would cause him to miss out on gaining more direct combat power, but he would gain the capability to affect the battlefield on a large scale, thereby allowing him to boost friendly units and debilitate enemy units en masse. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶 The most mysterious Clockwork Hollow Sect Timestream Magistrate Qi Cultivation Method promised to turn Melkor into a unique timeline guardian of sorts. It not only had great potential in manipulating the course of battles, but also enabled him to protect the clan from temporal assaults. The first method developed by the T Institute was by far the most economical one. The second one was demanding in terms of study load and hard work. The third was the riskiest one as it was derived from an ancient legacy text. If Melkor was anything like his far more successful cousin Ves, then he would have felt inclined to take a bet on becoming a timestream magistrate. As long as he was able to overcome the many risks and perils associated with practicing a method that could hide all kinds of traps and variables that did not fit the current environment, he would be able to play with time in all sorts of useful ways. Most notably, he saw enormous value in the ability to wind back the dial of a clockwork artifact, effectively allowing him to travel seconds or even minutes into the past! He also felt that the Larkinson Clan could use a guardian who especially monitored the timelines related to the Larkinson Clan or at least its most promising members. However, the latter might not be that relevant considering that it was incredibly difficult to comprehend time. Outside of the rare few that possessed an inherent talent in this E energy attribute, everyone else who attempted to cultivate the Clockwork Hollow Sect Timestream Magistrate Qi Cultivation Method would have to rely on insanely expensive resources that were aspected towards the time attribute! than space hyper materials. The Red Three and a few other major groups were able to produce the latter in reliable quantities by combining hyper technology with phasewater technology. If he committed to the latter, then he would have to compensate for his lack of talent in the time attribute by ingesting expensive elixirs and procuring rare time hyper materials to produce the signature artifacts of Clockwork Hollow. The latter was rumored to cost as much as a first-class expert mech, and that was just the minimum price estimate! Could Melkor truly impose these cost burdens on the Larkinson Clan? Perhaps. The clan was earning quite well these days, and Melkor should still have enough personal funds and merits left to afford a few nice goods. Yet what about later? Melkor did not want to become an enormous resource drain to the clan. He also did not want to end up stuck if the clan's income ever declined. Compared to the troublesome time-related qi cultivation method, any option from the Formation Master Series was a lot more affordable. The more powerful spell arrays could only be realized by constructing high-end formation anchors that were entirely comprised of high-grade hypers, but most of them were still a lot more affordable than any hyper material related to the time attribute! A classic formation master could even become a powerful earner for the clan. The ability to design custom spell arrays and produce the necessary formation anchors to deploy them on or off the battlefield all demanded specialized skills, knowledge and extraordinary capabilities that other cultivators could not replicate. Unfortunately, Melkor had no hope of earning money by doing this because he did not have the time, interest and brainpower to do all of this intellectually demanding work. Becoming a pure combat spell array master meant that he had to source his spell arrays from other formation masters. For the time being, the only existing formation masters were those raised by the Red Collective and several other major groups. The spell arrays they developed and released so far were fairly basic but also expensive due to their scarcity. What made Melkor more optimistic about becoming a spell array master was that the market for these new and exotic products would probably drop over time. As more and more formation masters emerged, the market for spell arrays would probably develop in a similar way to the market for mechs. The spell arrays would get more reasonable ranges. Having learned all of the amazing effects that spell arrays could produce, Melkor was incredibly optimistic about this market. He believed that formation masters would become a profession that possessed prestige similar to mech designers. Meanwhile, combat spell array masters that were able to quickly and proficiently deploy spell arrays would become high-value combat assets similar to high-ranking mech pilots. Their methods and capabilities may be completely different, but their impact on the battlefield were probably on the same level! Wasn't this what Melkor wanted all along? Even if he was not able to become an expert pilot, he at least wanted to become recognized as a powerful combatant. At this point, Melkor did not care too much whether he became a supportive asset rather than a direct combat asset. The clan already had plenty of expert pilots and was gaining more ace pilots over time. What the Larkinsons did not have was a combat spell formation master. While other Larkinsons could become one as long as they had enough money and merits to spare, Melkor believed he could do a better job than most! As Melkor began to lean more and more towards becoming a formation master, he hesitated one last time. Was he willing to miss out on embodying the power of design spirits and becoming a timestream magistrate in order to deploy qi formations? "What do you think, Goldie?" "Nyaaaa." The Golden Cat manifested inside the cockpit and bathed Melkor in her warm and pleasant glow. "Nyaaaa nyaaa nyaaa." He smiled. "It is reassuring to hear that you are okay with each of my choices. If this is the case, then I will go ahead and try to become a combat spell formation master. You know, if I chose to practice the Design Spirit Contract Qi Cultivation Method, I strongly thought about forming a contract with you. As a Larkinson, I can think of no better choice." The Golden Cat tilted her head. "Nya?" "Oh, I am sure that forming a contract with the likes of Gaia, the Superior Mother, the Phase King, Lufa and so on will allow me to borrow and channel their powerful and useful capabilities, but I am not that close with any of them. They are all allies of the Larkinson Clan, but they are not bound to us in the same way. You on the other hand are the literal embodiment of the Larkinsons. You are the last spirit to abandon us. So even if you aren't the most powerful among your kind, I still trust you over anyone else." "Nyaaa~" Goldie could feel the sincerity in his words. She leaned in and rubbed her body against his head. The two would probably become great contract partners if Melkor practiced the most suitable method. Alas, the legion commander had already made a different choice. He would leave this responsibility to other Larkinson mech pilots that had given up on willpower cultivation. When Goldie left the cockpit, Melkor already began to adjust his mindset. He recalled the mantras and instructions that were necessary to become a combat spell array master. They were fairly simple as the Red Collective compiled the Formation Master Series from a clean slate. Several minutes passed by as Melkor underwent a partial transformation in spirit. "The first step is done." As a premium cultivation method, it took far more effort than this to become a formal qi cultivator. Getting started was one of the challenges of qi cultivation. The threshold of the more advanced methods were always high. The Red Collective had thought about that and was prepared to conduct a special ritual that should allow him to get started with greater ease than usual. He began to load a special software program into the operating system of his Fey Fianna. His mech soon gained a new function that benefited Melkor right away. "It's much easier for me to crunch the numbers this time!" Different from ancient formation masters, a modern combat spell array master could also be a mech pilot. This meant that as long as Melkor connected his mind to his mech, he could borrow the latter's incredibly formidable processing power! Drone mechs happened to possess more processing power than normal, so Melkor could offload a lot of tedious calculation and simulation work to his Fey Fianna in order to obtain results a lot faster than usual! Of course, a computer was not able to substitute a combat spell array master in its The more mysterious processes could only be performed by a cultivator that changed his spirit in a way that allowed them to do stuff that was otherwise impossible. Melkor did not understand the science behind it, but that was not important. He only knew that if he wanted to employ spell arrays the fullest, he needed to undergo a permanent transformation. "That is why I need to conduct a ritual." Similar to the ritual that would allow him to become a timestream magistrate, Melkor could also employ a similar shortcut to quickly become a combat spell array master! The so-called initiation ritual entailed personally deploying and controlling a simple debilitating spell array while remaining stationary. He also had to swallow an expensive elixir that was made out of ingredients that he couldn't understand while repeating a strange mantra. The more enemies affected by his spell array, the greater the feedback! There were several ways that this could go wrong. If the spell array and the mechs he brought to the upcoming fight were unable to contain the enemy phasefighters, then Melkor's Fey Fianna may be forced to move. Doing so would invalidate the ritual and waste the elixir that took a lot of effort for the Red Collective to make! If the native aliens also managed to capture or destroy the formation anchors, then Melkor would suffer an even greater loss! Aside from that, interrupting the ritual at a critical point might botch his transformation into a combat spell array master, resulting in cultivation deviation or worse outcomes! In other words, Melkor had to be completely confident in his battle plan. He also had to do a good job of anticipating the enemy's strength and moves. This test was part of the ritual. The more thorough his preparations, the more positive his mood became, which would subsequently affect his transformation in beneficial ways! "Im, let's make sure the enemy won't be able to outmaneuver my forces." He began to take another look at the gathered intelligence and began to make many different guesses and predictions. The fact that the enemy phasefighter force was led by an elite unit of puelmer phasefighters added a lot of complications. Every puelmer phasefighter was a technologically advanced black box. Human mech pilots always hated it when they had to fight against one because no one could ever predict what they might encounter!