Zhou Fan hoped that a hundred thousand planets worth of materials would be enough, but he wouldn't be that surprised if it wasn't.
He was confident that it would take more than a hundred thousand years just to discover the first god realm formation, but he wasn't sure how long it would take to comprehend all of the god realm formations.
If it was like the previous ranks, he believed that it would be another hundred thousand years, but there was no way to be sure.
After thinking a bit more and taking a deep breath, Zhou Fan was ready to continue his study of formations. He proceeded to sit down, cross his legs, and bring out the first ore.
150,000 years later, Zhou Fan invented the first god realm formation. It merely created a water shield, but it would now set the tone for the rest of the god realm formations. He was about halfway through his reserves, so he hoped that the remaining materials would be enough to become a 10th rank formation master.
Regardless of whether or not it was enough to become a master, he could be considered a tenth rank formation amatuer from the moment he created his first god realm formation.
After 260,000 more years and another round of collecting materials, Zhou Fan finally comprehended the last god realm formation. It was definitely a great struggle considering his cultivation level, but he was now a full fledged 10th rank formation master. Although it wasn't worth throwing a party over, he was definitely proud of himself for reaching such an achievement.
While it wasn't really that important considering no one else could compete with him, he was also the first person in the universe to become a 10th rank formation master.
Although he was done growing in rank, he was not done with formations quite yet. He had skipped many formations earlier on and needed to go back and fully understand them as well.
He still had some materials left over from his last collection, and he assumed that it would be enough to master the other ranks.
After a total of a week passed, Zhou Fan had mastered every single rank of formation from Qi gathering to the god realm.
After 200,000 years and another round of collecting materials, he had practiced his speed until he could carve god realm formations in half a second. Compared to the strength of his old formations before he started to study them again, the tenth rank formations were three times stronger.
Although he was finished with formations, he wasn't done with the arts. He still had alchemy, runes, forging, arrays, and talismans to study. He hadn't even made a single talisman before, so that was sure to be a fun experience.
As for the other arts, they should be relatively fun to do as well since, besides arrays, he hadn't really paid that much attention to them.
After some considerations, Zhou Fan decided to start with arrays since they were somewhat similar to formations and he already had a fairly good background in them.
One good thing about them is that they didn't have material requirements like formations. However, they were also often much more complicated and taxing.
Until he got to god realm arrays, he wouldn't even notice the loss in Qi, but at least he would expect it.
For the first time in a while, Zhou Fan jumped off of the tree and began to look around the world. He didn't plan on staying in a single place since the arrays would be written wherever he could write them.
He felt that, by the time he reached the tenth rank in arrays, the entire planet may be covered in them.
After flying for a while, Zhou Fan found a good place to start. It was in the middle of some plains with no animals or obstructions whatsoever.
Zhou Fan landed on the ground and began to think of arrays. Unlike the formations, he planned to start from the Qi gathering realm, or first rank, and work his way up from there.
There was a very limited number of arrays at the first rank and Zhou Fan had to think long and hard before he could think of even one.
It was an extremely small array that covered an area of about a foot. Within the area, wind Qi would be gathered slightly denser. As a result, wind attacks would cost slightly less Qi and be slightly stronger.
Even slightly was actually a fairly large overstatement. It was somewhere around a 1.01x increase. As he had said, there was barely any use to arrays at the Qi gathering realm.
It would actually be impressive if someone at the Qi gathering realm could even make an array. The Qi gathering realm was simply a basic introduction stage. At the very least, Zhou Fan hadn't even understood enough to think of arrays or formations. Perhaps it would happen when such knowledge is common, but it hadn't happened to Zhou Fan.
Zhou Fan spent three days inventing every 1st rank array, which wasn't many, before he was finished.
Next was a foundation establishment array. It had slightly more use than a Qi gathering array, but it was still pretty useless overall. If the 1st rank arrays gave a 1.01x increase, then the foundation establishment arrays gave a 1.35x increase. Regardless, these measurements were not set in stone and could be changed fairly easily by a more powerful person like Zhou Fan.
However, he was simply creating the arrays at the most basic level without using his superior realm. Therefore, they had the same effects as if they were created by a Qi gathering or a foundation establishment cultivator.
After 2 weeks of work, which was much longer compared to the formations since he didn't have the same amount of mastery, he invented the last foundation establishment array.
He had also made sure that his speed was fairly quick. Since arrays were harder, he was satisfied with a speed of one array a second.