After explaining several times,
and ensuring Jiang Ding understood most of it, and had recorded the instructions using the microcomputer built into his camouflage combat suit, Zhang Dingjun left.
The Qi Practicing Squad needed him elsewhere.
After a session of questioning and answering, Jiang Ding had an epiphany about the "Minor Concealing Breath Technique," instinctively circulating his inner energy through his meridians to form complex structures.
Everything flowed smoothly, without any magic structure collapsing unexpectedly.
Jiang Ding had a thought and controlled the military drone built into his camouflage suit to project its view onto his location.
Nothing was found.
After searching around, he could see Li Junhao, Sun Xiao, and others, even making out freckles on faces when zooming in, but he couldn't find anyone called Jiang Ding.
Jiang Ding issued a command, and the military drone scanned the small area with its micro radar repeatedly for a full minute before a blurry human silhouette finally appeared at a firing position.
'Is it really that strong?'
Jiang Ding was startled, then he realized the reason.
[Scout Camouflage-1]
A top-grade special magic tool, interwoven with a first-order Concealment Formation, requires the use of the "Minor Concealing Breath Technique." When practiced to a minor degree of proficiency, it can shield from the Divine Sense Scanning of a cultivator at the ninth level of Qi Practicing Phase, and can also somewhat shield from the scanning of a tank's first-order infantry radar to a certain extent.
The suit he was wearing was not an ordinary Frontline Infantry camouflage; combined with the Art of Small Concealment, it was terrifyingly effective.
Of course, this was just in terms of mortals.
For the time being, within the range of a cultivator's Divine Sense in the Xianmen Sect, controlling tanks equipped with Spirit sonar and using the "Electromagnetic Induction Wave Technique" for reconnaissance, this form of invisibility was almost indistinguishable from not being there at all.
Jiang Ding gained insight.
Upon closely feeling the Art of Small Concealment enhanced by the Scout Camouflage, numerous insights surged into his heart, and many magic structures he had found difficult to understand and had only replicated previously now became clear in principle.
He didn't know how much time had passed.
Boom~
Boom, boom~
From the horizon, the heavy rumble of tank engines could be heard as a group of sandy-yellow camouflaged steel fortresses approached from the distance, a dozen or so, advancing in clusters with an overwhelming momentum.
Upon closer inspection, on top of each tank sat a Qi Practicing Realm student in a lotus position.
"Everyone, assemble."
Zhang Dingjun jumped down from a tank, clapped his hands, and announced, "The content of this lesson is about tanks and accompanying infantry. The role of the tank is to provide cover, firepower support, and precision strikes."
"Six accompanying infantry troops are responsible for breaking Formation Methods with heavy machine gun fire, eliminating enemy warriors and low-level cultivators with poor mobility and assisting the tanks with suppressing fire to take down high-value targets or to help exhaust the mana of ultra-high-value targets with firepower."
"First Squad, you are responsible for following Hua Bing's tank."
Zhang Dingjun pointed with his hand.
"Yes, Sir!"
Sun Xiao and the others replied loudly, their faces showing a hint of excitement.
Training with early-stage Qi Practitioners and late-stage Qi Practitioners was certainly different.
As the tanks moved away, Sun Xiao and the other six students followed closely behind, perfectly parallel to the tanks, in a standard marching formation.
Jiang Ding and the others watched attentively.
He noticed that Hua Bing, sitting cross-legged on the tank, pinched a Mana Technique, and a green breeze appeared around Sun Xiao and the others, making their steps much lighter.
First-order Swift Wind Technique, with a group Army Formation enhancement.
This skilled display of group magic reflected her high proficiency in casting techniques. Not even the direct disciples of Golden Pill Sects from the Outer Realm might be able to do the same.
"Battle formation!" Zhang Dingjun yelled.
Behind the tank, Sun Xiao and his team of six dispersed, forming two small trianglular formations on the rear flanks, each maintaining a distance of over twenty meters from the others.
Instead of using their naked eyes to watch, Jiang Ding and his fellow spectators focused their attention on their military drones' perspectives.
Suddenly, from about four or five kilometers away, twelve paper decoys sprang up from the ground, skulking among the trees and underbrush, moving cautiously and accurately mimicking an Outer Realm Cultivator in the Middle Stage of Qi Practicing leading eleven Cultivators in the earlier stages of Qi Practicing in battle.
The training paper decoys, a product of Cultivation industrialization, had no offensive capabilities, but could simulate various enemies' speeds and movements, and cost dozens of times more than regular targets.
"(214, 22) area, volley fire."
Hua Bing's cool voice resonated through the first squad's communication channel. Jiang Ding and others could receive it but were unable to speak, meant for observation and learning purposes.
"Yes!"
Sun Xiao and his team fired without delay toward that area, a ten-shot burst.
In an instant, the perspective from the drones showed the forest engulfed by sixty rounds of heavy machine gun bullets with a faint Magic Arts-Breaking attribute, snapping the trees and sending wood chips flying everywhere.
The paper decoys representing the Qi Practitioners were torn to shreds in an instant—their shields were thinner than paper against a heavy machine gun.
Only the decoy representing a Cultivator with a Middle Stage Qi aura was vigilant enough to dodge most of the bullets.
Another set of papers representing defensive magic tools fluttered in the air, barely deflecting a bullet that was about to hit, and it narrowly survived, though the defensive magic tool was instantly destroyed.
The paper decoy hastened its retreat from the area.
"This script is exaggerated,"
someone complained on the public channel, "Middle Stage Qi Practitioners aren't that alert; their Divine Sense range of just thirty or forty meters hardly does anything."
"It's not necessarily so, according to battlefield recordings, there are occasionally Middle Stage Qi Practitioners who exhibit this kind of life and death instinctual awareness."
Jiang Ding didn't join the discussion, focusing intently on the paperman.
A Cultivator who could achieve such a setting, in any case, could be considered elite.
Bang Bang!
Two shots from the dual-purpose anti-air and anti-tank Magic Tool Machine Gun mounted on the vehicle rang out: sharp, staccato bursts that perfectly sealed the path of the Middle Stage Qi paper decoy, hitting every time, reducing it to a cloud of paper scraps.
"Good!"
The crowd couldn't help but cheer.
"Not bad."
Zhang Dingjun also praised on the public channel, "Students in the Qi Practicing Phase possess Divine Sense, capabilities in calculation and observation far beyond ordinary students, so these must be utilized to anticipate the gaps in the small team's firepower net, predicting where the enemy might escape from."
Next, the enemy types continually changed, growing stronger.
There were paper decoys exuding only martial auras, moving slowly, but in greater numbers, wielding swords, spears, halberds, bows, and other cold weapons, surrounding from all sides.
"This also needs attention."
Zhang Dingjun said coldly, "Outsiders from the Outer Realm have a huge gap between immortals and mortals; to describe them as ants wouldn't be enough. Both righteous and evil cultivators have examples of commanding large numbers of mortal warriors, and not just warriors, but women and children, too, who are simply mass-produced into zombies and ghosts and other monstrous creatures to exhaust our reserve munitions."
Many students showed a look of unease.
"All you need to remember is that, the people from the Outer Realm are unrelated to us; whether it's the enemy on the battlefield or civilians, what's wrong with killing them all if they stand in our way?"
Jiang Ding frowned.
In these words, he heard a tinge of blood as vast as the sea and mountains.
But he couldn't say anything, for Zhang Dingjun's words didn't align with the Xianmen Sect's political correctness of unity between immortals and mortals. If someone reported it, Zhang could be in some trouble, too. And that was the Reality.
Hua Bing's squad cut a swath through every challenge.
There was a squad of twelve Mid-term Cultivators, most of whom could cast spells like invisibility and earth tunneling, but they were still easily detected by the tank's built-in First-order Spirit sonar and obliterated with combined fire from the tank shells and anti-air Magic Tool Machine Guns and heavy machine guns.