Chapter 4787 — The Starfall Formation

"Pfft!" Wei Zhao nearly burst out laughing. With a sly, teasing grin, he spoke through his primal-soul link: "Senior, this thing's looking for you. Should I go out and say hello on your behalf?"

"..." The ghostly creature was momentarily speechless. After a long, choked pause, it finally said: "If I went out there, I'd likely scare him to death. Better leave this one to you, kid. The thing you've run into this time is no small fry—and as it happens, it's a distant relative of mine."

"A relative? Don't tell me it's a spirit beast?" Wei Zhao started in alarm.

"Not that, no. It's a proper sea beast, through and through. Who ever said I couldn't be related to sea beasts?" the ghostly creature said with a dismissive curl of its lip.

"Uh... your family connections really do run wide—related to sea beasts and all. I'm impressed, truly." Wei Zhao shook his head, at a loss for words, then asked: "So what do I do now? Take you over to meet the relative?"

"Go right ahead if you've got a death wish—I certainly won't stop you," the ghostly creature cackled. Never mind that this was a sea beast so distant in the family tree it barely counted; in its present state, it wouldn't dare claim kinship even with a true spirit beast of its own clan—it might well end up as the other's nutritional supplement.

"Then what do we do? Can this Starfall Formation beat your relative?" Wei Zhao asked.

"The power's barely passable, but you'll have to be the one commanding it for us to have any chance. Otherwise I guarantee they won't land a single hair on it. Once three hours pass, you can all sit tight and wait to die," the ghostly creature said scornfully.

"Me? Command it?" Wei Zhao was taken aback. Watching Oda Ba pacing in circles over there, he shook his head again and again: "I'm not their captain. Hand a life-or-death matter like this to some clueless outsider like me? How could that possibly work—unless their brains are waterlogged!"

Before this, Oda Ba had regarded him with undisguised hostility, just waiting for him to slip up so he could kick him while he was down. Though his attitude had shifted somewhat by now, getting him to hand over command would be a pipe dream. If Wei Zhao dared to say such a thing, he'd be flung out to feed the sea beasts within a minute.

"Heh heh. I'm not telling you to demand command right now. Wait until they've tasted some hardship and are at their wits' end—then you open your mouth, and it's done," the ghostly creature said with a laugh.

"All right." Wei Zhao nodded and watched Oda Ba's next move. By now, the man seemed to have made up his mind.

"Since it refuses to come out, this captain will blast it out. Hear my command: lock onto the four Mountain-Opening sea beasts. Starfall Formation—fire!" As Oda Ba's words fell, his four fingers traced a light stroke across the luminous star chart before him, and the four star points he touched blazed with renewed brilliance.

BOOM! Four colossal beams of light descended from the sky once more, in an instant crashing down upon the four Mountain-Opening sea beasts. Ten thousand feet of white radiance, waves towering to the heavens—the sheer momentum set the ancient warship shuddering back and forth. Once again, Wei Zhao felt that unprecedented shock to his core.

The light faded. Oda Ba and the others stared tensely at the sea ahead—but this time the result sent a chill through every heart. The four Mountain-Opening sea beasts had not gone the way of the Mount-Sea Whale as expected. Apart from the Thousand-Legged Tyrant Emperor Crab, whose speed was little better than the Mount-Sea Whale's, being blasted to fragments, the other three had come through completely unscathed.

Whether the Deep-Sea Frenzy Shark, the Netherworld Ghost Mother, or the Soul-Hooking Monster Fish—in the open sea, their speed was the stuff of phantoms. The Mount-Sea Whale and the Thousand-Legged Tyrant Emperor Crab had been unable to dodge the Starfall Formation's barrage, but these three could.

Watching the three Mountain-Opening sea beasts flicker back and forth across the water, Oda Ba's face went ashen. The Starfall Formation's power was beyond doubt—but it had one flaw: it required time to charge.

Even though that time had been compressed to the barest minimum, so short that the vast majority of sea beasts had no chance to react—a flaw was still a flaw. So long as it existed, there would come a day when it was exploited.

"Impossible! No Mountain-Opening sea beast, no matter how fast, could dodge that. There's never been such a thing before!" Oda Ba shook his head again and again in disbelief. In all the countless times before, the Starfall Formation had never once missed against Mountain-Opening sea beasts—and now it had missed three times at once. It was downright uncanny.

The others found it just as inconceivable. Only Wei Zhao was quietly shaking his head. In the past there had been no misses because those Mountain-Opening sea beasts had nothing more powerful pulling their strings. This time was different—the fact that all three had evaded the strike most likely meant the thing behind them had made them dodge in advance.

"This thing's useless. A perfectly good Starfall Formation in his hands, and he can't even bring out a tenth of its power—what a fool!" the ghostly creature suddenly said with contempt.

"Huh? This isn't the Starfall Formation's full power?" Wei Zhao was stunned on the spot. Could it get even stronger—ten times the power of what they'd just seen?!

"You could call it the full power, and yet not the full power," the ghostly creature said with an air of profound mystery.

"Senior, could you please speak plainly, in words a human can understand?" Wei Zhao said, exasperated.

"In terms of the beams' raw destructive force, this is of course the maximum—any stronger and these sea beasts wouldn't stand a chance at living at all," the ghostly creature said with a smile, then went on: "It's just a pity that something so mighty has fallen into a fool's hands. What good is power if you can't hit the target? If a true master were at the controls, even I in my prime would have to be wary of this Starfall Formation. But now a fool is running it, and he can't even handle a few Mountain-Opening sea beasts. If the one who designed it hasn't died yet, he's probably weeping unconscious in a latrine somewhere."

"Why is that? That charging time really is an obvious flaw, isn't it? So long as the opponent is strong and fast enough to notice and dodge in time, it shouldn't be too hard, should it?" Wei Zhao couldn't help but wonder.

"A flaw? Listen well, kid. In ancient times, the Starfall Formation was hailed as the supreme killing formation with no flaw at all. It's only that no one knows how to use it now—that's why its brilliance has been left to gather dust," the ghostly creature said with a sigh.

"The supreme killing formation with no flaw? Where does that come from?" Wei Zhao couldn't help but grimace. It clearly had a charging time—how could it be called a flawless supreme killing formation?

"Kid, look at that star chart of his. Doesn't it look a lot like a chessboard?" the ghostly creature asked in return, answering nothing.

At those words, Wei Zhao looked closely. He hadn't thought along those lines before, but with the ghostly creature's prompting, it suddenly did look like a chessboard—a chessboard of incomparable complexity and refinement.

"Legend has it the original designer of the Starfall Formation was a master of the game of chess, and the formation was inspired by the chessboard. Every falling star is a stone placed, and before each stone is placed, one must first calculate every escape route the opponent might take. Once all retreats are sealed off, what does it matter that there's a charging time? Where could they possibly flee?" the ghostly creature explained. (To be continued.)