The Desolate Era

Book 18, Chapter 37 - Seven Seniors, Please Assist

The city walls of the Eight Dragons Cloudcity. Daofather Crimsonbright was watching over the entire battlefield, his heart scorching with worry. He immediately saw how ugly the situation had become in the area where Ji Ning and the Xia Emperor were battling. Sword Immortal Evergreen had launched his traitorous attack there, causing a minor collapse in the battle lines of the Crimsonbright Realm. Fortunately, the Xia Emperor and Ji Ning had gone all out to hold their positions, allowing things to settle down...but the situation was still extremely grim.

“There’s nothing I can do. The many Empyrean God golems that just appeared on the Seamless Gate’s side are spread out throughout the battlefield. Multiple areas need reinforcements.” Daofather Crimsonbright stared at the battlefield. The distant divine archer, Eastbreak, was sending out arrows like needles from the God of Death. Every single arrow slew two or three White-Faced Flood Dragons, Zhuyan Apes, or other types of Terrorbeasts.

“I can only choose to give up Xiamang’s region for now.”

“Have Eastbreak keep his region suppressed.” Daofather Crimsonbright knew that he had to make his choice right away.

If he had Eastbreak suppress the entire battlefield...because of how bad the situation was for Ji Ning and the Xia Emperor’s area, they would still probably be at a disadvantage. As for the other regions...if Eastbreak wasn’t able to help them out enough, they would probably only be able to reach a stalemate.

Now, however...

With Eastbreak going berserk on a few select regions...although Ji Ning’s region was in trouble, the other seven regions temporarily gained the upper hand!

Eastbreak’s arrows were simply too terrifying. However, both Daofather Crimsonbright and Daofather Ink Bamboo knew very well that these terrifying arrows used up Daofruits of primordial chaos, with each Daofruit only sustaining two arrows. He wouldn’t be able to maintain this state for too long...and so he had to kill as many as he could, while he could!

“Xiamang, your region will have to rely on yourselves.” Daofather Crimsonbright hardened his heart. He had experienced the destruction of the Primordial World; he knew that sometimes, sacrifices had to be made for the sake of the bigger picture.

“EVERGREEN!!!”

Daofather Crimsonbright stared at the distant Sword Immortal Evergreen, cold light flaring from his eyes, his face completely ashen!

Humiliation!

He had been catastrophically deceived.

He had trusted Sword Immortal Evergreen too much; he hadn’t suspected him of being a spy at all. The main reason for this was because Evergreen normally didn’t have any friends; in fact, he was an extremely solitary person who focused completely on the Dao. Evergreen had lived in seclusion within that Daoist temple on his minor world for countless years, focusing on the Dao. It might be easy for a person to pretend for a period of time, but to pretend for their entire life...

Evergreen, however, was terrifying in this regard. In the past, Daofather Crimsonbright had rather admired Evergreen for his temperament and his complete dedication to pursuing the Dao. He had believed that of his many disciples, Evergreen had the best chance of becoming a Daofather.

“Evergreen is focused on pursuing the Dao, and his heart has no other desires; I definitely wasn’t wrong about this. When he killed Snowdance, he showed no mercy or hesitancy at all; he didn’t even show the slightest hint of doubt in his eyes. After killing her, he immediately destroyed her corpse. His heart is truly merciless. I wasn’t wrong...he is indeed incredibly dangerous.” Daofather Crimsonbright knew very well that such a decisive, merciless person would likely become an astonishing figure in the future.

One’s level of accomplishments had nothing to do with whether one was virtuous or vile.

The stronger one’s Dao-heart was, the easier it would be for one to travel a long distance on the Immortal path.

For the most vile of individuals, even when they did vile things, they wouldn’t truly believe themselves to be vile. A completely pure Dao-heart could be a terrifyingly powerful thing, even if that pureness was evil; not even demonheart tribulations and other such tribulations would have an effect on it. However, there were very, very few such ‘natural-born devils’. Prior to this, Daofather Crimsonbright hadn’t been able to tell that Evergreen was such a person...

......

The battlefield region where Ning and the Xia Emperor were located.

“Evergreen.” Ning was utterly enraged by what he was seeing.

“All-out attack!” The Daofather’s order came. The three Diremonster Gods of Mount Dragoneater temporarily paused their attacks, beginning to join together into a formation.

Taking advantage of the lull offered by the three Diremonster Gods pausing, the enraged Ji Ning charged straight towards Sword Immortal Evergreen.

“F*ck off!”

Ning swept out with his two arms. Boom! Boom! Boom! The Empyrean God golems that had been bothering him were all knocked flying backwards. The difference in power was simply too great.

“Quick, stop him!”

“Stop him.”

A Bifang Crane commanded by an Empyrean God golem flew forward towards him.. This particular Terrorbeast looked like an Immortal crane. Its body was completely azure, and it was bathed in fiery flames as its blazing wings flapped. It only had a single claw, but this claw was enormous and pitch-black. As the Bifang Crane flew forward, its claw ripped forward towards Ning.

As for Ning, he reached out with both arms.

Whoosh!

He grabbed that giant claw with his hands. The Bifang Crane suddenly manifested a black wing in front of it, smashing it down towards Ning.

“Die.”

‘Wielding’ the claw with both hands, Ning smashed the Bifang Crane towards a White-Faced Flood Dragon in front of him. As for the black wing...Ning just gritted his teeth and endured the blow. In this moment, he unleashed all of the power of his soul heartforce technique. By now, he had nearly reached the ‘expert’ level in the soul heartforce technique; the increase in power was quite noticeable.

This made it so that he was able to take control over increasingly greater amounts of the flood of natural energy being generated by the Heaven Punisher. His body quickly began even stronger and even more resilient.

Boom! Boom! Boom! The black wing slammed against Ning, but it only left behind a small wound.

“How did his strength just...” The Bifang Crane was shocked.

BOOM!

The Bifang Crane was slammed straight down against a White-Faced Flood Dragon, knocking it flying away. Ning kept one hand around the claw of the Bifang Crane, manifesting an incredibly sharp sword within his other hand. Tightening his grip around the sword, he viciously stabbed it towards Bifang Crane’s body.

Slash! Slash!

Two lightning-fast sword-strikes passed straight through the Bifang Crane’s boddy, causing it to instantly begin to break apart. Many Celestial Immortals and Loose Immortals began to run, with the Pure Yang True Immortal commander the first to flee in terror.

“Die.” Two massive shields appeared within Ning’s hands, and he smashed them towards each other, with the fleeing Pure Yang True Immortal caught between them!

BOOM!

When the two shields slammed together, countless Loose Immortals and Celestial Immortals perished. The True Immortal simultaneously used an evasive technique as well as magic treasures to resist, but Ning had already unleashed his true power. His soul heartforce had nearly reached the expert level, and the amount of power he now unleashed was simply astonishing.

“How could this...” The True Immortal felt a great power sweep through his magic treasures like a sword sweeping through rotted wood. And then...boom! He was completely disintegrated by the collision of the two massive, mountain-like shields.

“Kill him.”

“Kill this Ji Ning!”

Off in the distance, the three Diremonster Gods of Mount Dragoneater had already transformed into the Three-Eyed Demon.

They were stunned and furious. They hadn’t expected that during the short period of time when they had paused their attacks, Ji Ning would have wiped out one of their Immortal armies. And even more importantly...he had even killed the True Immortal commander! They thought that the deceased True Immortal was to blame for his carelessness; they had no idea that Ji Ning, upon seeing Evergreen turn traitor, had known that the situation was grim and so had finally unleashed his full power.

The power of Ning’s Heaven Punisher had instantly increased several times over.

If the nine-headed lion, the ‘Great Sage Who Devours the Skies’, was to once more fight head-on against Ning...he would lose even more disastrously than last time.

“Kill!” The Three-Eyed Demon charged towards Ning.

“Block it.”

“Tie it down.”

The True Immortals and Raindragons were all going all-out.

Ning knew that he had no time to continue his slaughter of the fleeing Immortals. He immediately turned and charged straight towards the Three-Eyed Demon. While charging forward, Ning launched a kick towards a nearby Zhuyan Ape. BOOM! The Zhuyan Ape was not only knocked flying, it also blew apart in midair.

“Die.”

Chains...black dragons...golden light...snow flowers...vines...tendrils...strange runes...all sorts of spells and magic treasures landed on the body of the Three-Eyed Demon.

However, Three-Eyed Demon’s aura wasn’t diminished in the slightest. It completely ignored the spells and magic treasures, focusing only on Ji Ning.

“Kill Evergreen.”

“Kill this traitor.”

“Kill him!”

The other Raindragons and Heaven Punishers had gone berserk as well. In fact, they ignored their own safety as they launched all-out assaults of their own.

Sword Immortal Evergreen had taken advantage of the earlier opening to lead the Seamless Gate army in wiping out a Raindragon, two Pangu War-Formations, and six Heaven Punishers. After the situation turned dangerous, he had immediately begun to flee towards the Three-Eyed Demon.

......

Although Ning and the others were going all-out in their efforts...the Three-Eyed Demon simply held too enormous of an advantage. The Seamless Gate had also sent out other Empyrean Gods, True Immortals, and armies as well. After Sword Immortal Evergreen had caused heavy casualties, more forces of the Seamless Gate had been freed up to assist the Three-Eyed Demon..

“The Seamless Gate is definitely going to win this battle.”

As Sword Immortal Evergreen flew towards the Three-Eyed Demon, he actually said aloud, “You should all join our Seamless Gate. You’ll be able to survive if you do.”

“Vile traitor, I swear I’ll kill you!” The Xia Emperor’s eyes were completely bloodshot.

“Despicable creature.”

“Foul thing!”

The Empyrean Gods and True Immortals of the Crimsonbright Realm were all enraged. They had been stabbed in the back at a critical moment by one of their ‘allies’; how could they not be angry? And their dearly beloved junior apprentice-sister Snowdance had also been killed as well!

BOOM!

Ning’s Heaven Punisher, the mightiest one of them all, finally clashed with the Three-Eyed Demon for the first time.

BANG!

Ning had been very cautious, choosing to use shields...but he was still knocked flying backwards.

“The difference in strength is too great.” Ning instantly realized this as he flew backwards. “The stories were true; the Three-Eyed Demon’s power has already reached the Daofather level.”

The three Diremonster Gods already possessed tremendous, overwhelming power. The Three-Eyed Demon they joined together to form had a qualitatively superior level of strength; it had reached the Daofather threshold. Perhaps Eastbreak, by relying on Daofruit of primordial chaos, was able to unleash arrows that were comparable or even slightly superior in strength...but the Three-Eyed Demon still definitely had a Daofather’s power. Ning was far from being a match for it.

......

“Hurry up and kill Ji Ning.” Atop the distant walls of the Seamless City, Daofather Ink Bamboo was sending a mental order to the three Diremonster Gods. “Ignore all else for now; get rid of Ji Ning!”

......

“Get rid of Ji Ning.” The Godking’s voice rang out within the minds of the three Diremonster Gods as well.

......

“Don’t worry.” The Three-Eyed Demon, filled with a terrifying unearthly aura, was staring at Ji Ning’s Heaven Punisher with all three of its eyes, watching as it was sent flying backwards. The Three-Eyed Demon bounded forward with large steps, ignoring all spells and magic treasures. Its charge simply couldn’t be stopped! Right now, the Three-Eyed Demon had only a single goal...to kill Ji Ning!

......

The underwater estate.

The calm Empyrean God Redsnow. The child-like Empyrean God Primalfire, whose eyes flashed with savage light. Empyrean God Snow Scorpion. Empyrean God Dovesnake. Empyrean God Ninefangs. Empyrean God Sunblaze. Empyrean God Darkmoon.

The six of them were watching the battle outside. The giant yellow bear, through his attunement to the scenes happening outside the estate, was revealing images of the battle in midair.

They saw the Three-Eyed Demon take form.

They also saw how Ji Ning’s Heaven Punisher was instantly knocked flying by the Three-Eyed Demon.

“Those three little brats of Mount Dragoneater...back then, they were nothing more than jokes. But now, they’ve become this powerful?” A desire for battle could be seen in Empyrean God Redsnow’s eyes.

“We’ve disappeared for far, far too long. Naturally, some powerful figures will have emerged...but the Three Realms have nearly forgotten how formidable our Starseizing Manor was.” The bald old man, Empyrean God Ninefangs, narrowed his eyes, a cold light flashing within them.

As for the nearby fur-clad Ji Ning, he bowed respectfully and said, “I’d like to ask you, seven seniors, to please assist.”