Desolate Era

by RWX

  The black-caped warriors were merely at the level of Celestial Immortals Deadwood or Goldclock, but this violet-caped warrior was far more powerful than even Celestial Immortal Infatuation! Even the [Starseizing Hand], Ning’s proudest technique, was insufficient in the face of this foe. As for speed and sword-arts, Ning was clearly inferior in these regards as well.

  Fortunately, only close combat was possible within the Nihilum Zone, which was why his [Eight-Nine Arcane Art] was able to be used to maximum effect. Within the Three Realms, Celestial Immortals on the level of this violet-caped warrior would probably be very close to Pure Yang True Immortals in power…their magic artifacts and formations alone would be enough to make Ning feel hopeless. However, in this place, only close combat was possible; thus, he still had a hint of a chance.

  Clang! Clang! Clang! Ning used both the [Three Heads, Six Arms] and the [Starseizing Hand] simultaneously. As for the violet-caped warrior, his four arms clutched four silver whips which struck out long long serpents, wildly assaulting Ning.

  Ning’s six arms strove mightily to defend.

  In fact, every so often he would borrow the force of the collision to flee and dodge. Ning had been continuously searching for a way out, for a chance to counter-attack.

  “I’m being completely suppressed by him. There’s no way for me to even go close to him. What should I do?” Ning was frantically pondering what to do. The foe’s long silver whip was rendering him incapable of drawing within fifteen thousand meters of the man, much less wound him.

  ……

  “He clearly is using some sort of technique that allows him to increase his strength dramatically.” The violet-caped warrior, by contrast, was much more relaxed; he was in complete control of this fight. “Only his arms are capable of releasing such power; his legs and kicks are far weaker. I trust that there is a price to this ability; he shouldn’t be able to maintain it for too long.”

  All things came at a cost.

  For a human that was less than two meters tall to become the size of a three thousand meter Fiendgod came at a cost, and so too did having three heads and six arms. The cost of using the [Starseizing Hand] was even higher.

  Crack! Crack! Crack!

  The four long silver whips danced out like dragons, wildly lashing out at Ning again and again. Ning had to completely focus on defending them at all times. If he failed a single time…the whips would probably entangle him and completely bind him.

  If the whips attacked quickly, Ning had to block quickly as well.

  His six arms strove to defend as best they could. The more times they blocked, however, the more times he had to use the [Starseizing Hand], which meant the more divine power would be used up.

  Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

  His divine power was frantically depleting. Even though he had reached the sixteenth stage of the [Crimsonbright Diagram of the Nine Heavens], the Fourth Cycle of the [Starseizing Hand] used up so much divine power than in just a short period of time, more than half of Ning’s divine power had been used up. He hadn’t used up nearly as much in the earlier fight, despite it lasting much longer.

  “Less than a third.”

  “Less than a sixth.”

  He was faced with the whip-strikes which came from every direction. Ning seemed to have become trapped within a net of whip-strikes; he was unable to dodge, and his only option was to block, resulting in his divine power depleting further and further.

  When his divine power was completely used up…Ning would be completely subdued and captured.

  ……

  Within the underwater estate. Within an undefined, void-like region.

  The giant yellow bear was here. Next to him were seven figures, including a child with a necklace, a bald elder, a beautiful woman…

  The seven figures all emanated incomparably powerful auras, and amongst them was the red-haired Fiendgod which Ning had previously battled.

  “Big bear, the young master is in a crisis in the outside world. Are we supposed to just wait here and watch?” The beautiful woman, dressed in black leather armor, spoke out with a frown. Her eyebrows were snow-white, while her eyes looked just like a viper’s.

  “I watched as this little kid, Ji Ning, grew up step by step. Do you think I care about him less than you lot do?” The giant yellow bear said angrily, “I’m under instructions from Master to find a successor for him. Ji Ning is the best successor yet; I wouldn’t dare be careless!”

  “But you are letting him remain trapped in a dire situation!” The black-armored, beautiful woman said angrily.

  “Do you seven think that you can protect him?” The giant yellow bear asked angrily. “Do you know who he has run afoul of this time? Foes from the Snaphorn world of the Primordial Ruinworld. The Primordial Ruinworld! They are one of remnant forces left behind from that ancient war! Anyone capable of controlling an entire world has most likely survived from that war, and anyone capable of surviving that war…even if they are weak, they can’t be too weak. They might be at the level of a Daofather or a True God! Even if you all go out to rescue him, do you really think you can block a Daofather or a True God?

  The black-armored woman turned silent.

  “Snow Scorpion.” The red-haired Fiendgod spoke out, “The big bear is right. Even if we intervene, we might not be able to overcome this Snaphorn world.”

  “Big bear, you idiot…why didn’t you notify us when Ji Ning was faced with the descent of karmic sinflames?” The black-armored woman couldn’t help but berate him.

  “Am I supposed to have you intervene whenever he encounters danger?” The giant yellow bear said angrily, “Per Master’s orders, until he becomes an Empyrean God, he can’t be truly considered Master’s disciple. No matter what sort of trials he has to endure, they can only be considered tests for him…and if he fails and dies, he has no one to blame but his lack of skills or his bad luck. Although we all like him and view him as having tremendous potential and a very good chance of becoming an Empyrean God…how was I supposed to know that the Youngflame clan had an ability like this, to teleport him straight into the Nihilum Zone of the Primordial Ruinworld? I thought that even if things did turn dangerous, we’d still be able to rescue him, which is why I let him face dangers as needed to temper him…but how can everything in life go as expected?! Ugh!”

  “Let’s take Ji Ning into the underwater estate and hide him within our world. Even if the enemy binds the underwater estate, it’ll only be an elementary binding; they probably won’t be able to find our world,” the beautiful woman, Snow Scorpion, said.

  “They might not find it…but it’s also possible that they might find it.” The bald elder suddenly spoke out in a hoarse voice.

  The underwater estate did indeed have many secrets.

  Immortal Juhua had always felt that there were secrets present within it. Ning had also felt that there were parts of the underwater estate that were not under his control…but he wasn’t able to find those parts!

  But just because Ning wasn’t able to find them…didn’t mean that the master of the Snaphorn world wouldn’t be able to find out!

  The red-haired man said in a gravelly voice, “No matter what…if Ji Ning dies, the Starseizing Manor will fall into the hands of the master of the Snaphorn world. If the master of the Snaphorn world is at the level of a True God or Daofather, he will definitely be able to find our world through the Starseizing Manor…at which point, our only option will be to fight with him. If the Snaphorn world’s master is not yet at the True God or Daofather level, then he won’t be able to defeat the formation which protects our world.”

  “Since, no matter what, we will still have to end up fighting with the master of the Snaphorn world…we might as well rescue Ji Ning and bring him into our world. Although the Godking did indeed say that his disciple could only enter our world after becoming an Empyrean God, we are left with no other options.”

  “Right.” The giant yellow bear nodded. “Since we can’t escape…we
are indeed left with no other options. Make your preparations. Once we bring Ji Ning into our world, we’ll need to be ready for the Snaphorn world’s attack. I hope their master is weak; ideally, he won’t even be able to find our world.”

  “Right.”

  “Let’s prepare.”

  The seven figures all had solemn looks on their faces.

  The child, who had remained silent this entire time, suddenly spoke out: “Long ago, Father instructed us to leave him and stay out of that war. We’ve been waiting long enough…and so let’s have a good fight with the Snaphorn world.”

  “Let’s have a good fight.”

  “Let’s fight!”

  Everyone present had flames of war within their eyes.

  ……

  Within the emptiness of the Nihilum Zone. Enormous ships that were ten thousand kilometers long moved like streaks of light, advancing at high speed. The giant spaceships were tightly clustered together…and there seemed to be no end of them. Within the center of those giant ships, there was a golden warship.

  Within the golden warship.

  Everyone present was standing at solemn attention. Leading them was a horned warrior with a golden cape with black trimmings, and behind him were eight hundred violet-caped warriors. These were the most valiant, most capable commanders of the First Army who often engaged in wars against other worlds.

  In front of them hovered an utterly enormous mirror. The images within the mirror were images of the commando squad of the Third Void Sector doing battle against Ji Ning.

  “Benair is actually joining the fight in person.” The golden-caped warrior snorted angrily, “How despicable. Since he’s joining the fight in person…doesn’t that mean our First Army has made this trip for nothing?”

  “This alien is quite tenacious and strong; he might be able to stay alive until we get there.”

  “This is on the orders of the Queen Mother. It should be us, the First Army, who captures this alien.”

  The almighty First Army…how could it possibly hold a small squad of the Third Void Sector in any regard?

  “Quick, quick, quick!”

  The general couldn’t help but urge them to move faster. “It has to be us that captures this alien!” It was rare for the Queen Mother to give an order; they naturally had to work hard to show their talents.

  ……

  Within the void of the underwater estate.

  “Ji Ning’s divine power has almost been completely used up. Once it is used up, he’ll fall into enemy hands. Red-hair, you personally intervene and wipe them all out, then return to our world and prepare to deal with the master of the Snaphorn world,” the giant yellow bear said.

  “Alright.”

  “Agreed.”

  They all nodded in concurrence.

  They all knew very well that falling into dire straits would truly temper one’s Dao-heart. However…they had no idea that Ning’s heartforce had already advanced from the second level, ‘iceheart’, into the third level, ‘ruler’.

  ……

  Within the empty space of the Nihilum Zone. A tight cluster of black-caped warriors watched from not too far away as their commander, the violet-caped warrior, was completely dominating this alien.

  “I’m almost done. I have less than a tenth of my divine power now.” Ning didn’t want to accept this. He truly didn’t. But…the serpentine whips were striking out against him from every direction.

  Was he truly out of options?

  * * *

  Book 16, Chapter 14 - Heartforce Manifests

  “Hmph.” The violet-caped commander could sense the alien growing frantic; he could sense that this was, perhaps, the last throes of his enemy’s resistance. “It seems…he can no longer hold on.”

  “Die!”

  Ning suddenly let out an enraged roar.

  He no longer held back at all on his divine power. Instead, he wildly poured it all into his arms at full force! The Void-level elemental ki in his body, through a secret art, was also immediately pushed into his arms. In this moment, Ning had only a single thought in his mind…no matter the cost, he was going to unleash his power to the maximum possible level.

  Actually…even going all-out like this only resulted in a 30% increase in power.

  “BREAK!”

  Ning’s six arms struck out as six streaks of sword-light.

  Ning’s calm eyes glowed with light, the light that came in the final instants of one’s life as it all blazed away. Ning’s heart and soul was completely poured into his swords.

  Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

  Simultaneous explosions rang out.

  Ning’s six sword-fingers stabbed out, four of them striking against the four silver whips. With explosive sounds, the silver whips…were actually knocked flying backwards. Ning’s fingers, however, continued to stab forward!

  “What?!” The violet-caped commander’s eyes turned completely round. “How can this be?”

  “Impossible!”

  The many black-caped warriors watching from far away were amazed at this sight. They could all sense that Ning was inches away from death. Previously, he had been completely suppressed…so how was it that right now, at the very end, he was actually able to unleash power that surpassed the power of their commander, knocking his weapon away?

  ……

  “What…how can this be?” Within the void-like region within the underwater estate, the giant yellow bear, who had been watching the battle outside this entire time, was completely surprised.

  The giant yellow bear was most likely the person with the deepest understanding of Ning’s power.

  He knew exactly what Ning was capable of. What Ning had displayed earlier represented his utmost limit of power; even if Ning went all out, he would at most be able to increase his power by 20% or 30%; he would still be considerably weaker than that violet-caped commander. How was it, then, that he had suddenly knocked the silver whip away?

  “How can this be?”

  “It doesn’t make sense.”

  “It…shouldn’t have happened.” The giant yellow bear couldn’t understand it. “This isn’t the Three Realms. There’s no way to sense the Dao here, so even if he suddenly gained a new insight into the Dao, it wouldn’t help him increase his power in any way. In addition, he is currently in a battle, and he’s used up an enormous amount of divine power. There’s no way he could’ve broken into the seventeenth level of the [Crimsonbright Diagram of the Nine Heavens] so soon…he just made it to the sixteenth level a short while ago.”

  A breakthrough in his divine body? Impossible.

  A breakthrough in the Dao? It wouldn’t make any difference.

  The [Starseizing Hand] was already at the Fourth Cycle!

  “How can this be?” The giant yellow bear didn’t understand.

  ……

  Not too far away, inside the golden warship of the First Army which was ensconced within those countless warships. The commanders of the First Army were staring at the images within the levitating mirror.

  “Eh?!”

  “Odd.”

  “What just happened? What ability did this alien just use?”

  None of them understood it.

  The golden-caped general, however, just laughed loudly. “Wonderful. The longer he can delay, the better; we’re almost there! Haha…it seems that in the end, it will still be us who captures this alien.”

  ……

  The experts of the Snaphorn world couldn’t understand it. Not even the giant yellow bear understood it. Nobody could think of a reason why this had just happened.

  But within the deep, dark reaches of the Void…

  Three minds were communicating with each other.

  “Second sister…what just happened?”

  “Elder sister, what happened?”

  The three Queen Mothers had given birth to many children; their children were the Firstborn! More than half of the commanders of the First Army were Firstborn; the three Queen Mothers co
uld see and sense everything the Firstborn could see and sense! Thus, they too saw everything which had just happened.

  The commander of the commando squad from the Third Void Sector, Benair, was the child of the second Queen Mother of the three Queen Mothers. When Benair fought with Ning, it was as though the second Queen Mother had personally fought against Ning.

  “That was…”

  “Heartforce?”

  “Yes, heartforce! It was heartforce!” The second Queen Mother’s powerful mind suddenly began to tremble with excitement. “This human’s attack just now was actually filled with heartforce!”

  “What? Heartforce?!”

  “Heartforce?! He’s actually in control of heartforce?!”

  The first and third Queen Mothers were both excited as well.

  “Yes. There’s no mistaking it; in fact, just now I completely focused a strand of my mind upon my child Benair.” The second Queen Mother said excitedly, “They just clashed again. There’s no mistaking it; this human’s attacks contain heartforce within them. His control over his heartforce isn’t perfect; it’s clearly quite rough. However, I can still sense the powerful, mysterious, profound heartforce at work.”

  “This is our chance!” The second Queen Mother was incomparably excited. “This human is able to focus his heartforce and knows how to apply it! That means he understands a heartforce technique! This is a truly supreme form of power; we can discover and distill the method for producing and applying heartforce from this human!”

  “Right. Now we can gain a heartforce technique!”

  “Yes, this is our chance!”

  The other two Queen Mothers were incomparably excited as well.

  They had experienced and survived that calamitous war; as survivors, they knew quite well that ‘heartforce’ was one of the truly supreme forms of power. Upon mastering heartforce, one could truly embark upon a path that would lead to them becoming the most supreme of existences within the primordial chaos! A path that led to surpassing even True Gods and Daofathers!

  “This is our chance, but we cannot be rash.” The first Queen Mother’s mind warned the other two minds, “Heartforce techniques are supreme techniques that are absolutely not taught to outsiders, even within the Three Realms. This human youth must have an extraordinary background, which is why he was able to learn a technique like this. Perhaps there is a self-destruction mechanism hidden within his soul.”