The Desolate Era

Book 24, Chapter 40 - Ji Ning and the Mindlord

“The restrictive spells covering the imperial capital are no longer a threat to us.” Immortal Abyssus smiled.

“Agreed.” The Starlord of Fogstone nodded. “Everyone, our seven thousand Elder Gods and Ancestral Immortals have already entered combat. It is time for us to join them. Blacklotus and the rest of the six are inside the city. There’s no way they can avoid my astral light. Let everything proceed as according to plan.”

“Excellent.”

“Let’s go.”

“Attack.”

Flickers of killing intent appeared in the eyes of the World Gods and Chaos Immortals.

“Ji Ning, your squad of Elder Gods is responsible for protecting Immortal Overguard.” The Starlord’s voice rang out by Ning’s ears.

Rumble...

An enormous number of icy blades were howling through the air towards him. The titanic Ning wielded two swords in his hands, using them to hack with abandon and knock the blades aside. All of the formations and restrictive spells protecting the imperial capital had been activated, resulting in a furious flurry of attacks being directed at the seven thousand Elder Gods and Ancestral Immortals.

“Yes, Starlord.” Ning immediately acknowledged the order, then sent out an order of his own. “Captain Mountain Eater, lead your 110 Elder Gods to protect Immortal Overguard.”

Ning had a total of nine squads under his command. Elder God Mountain Eater’s squad was located closest to Immortal Overguard.

“Acknowledged.”

The hundred-plus Elder Gods under Mountain Eater’s command immediately moved into a defensive perimeter around Chaos Immortal Overguard.

“Follow me.” Chaos Immortal Overguard stood atop an enormous formation-diagram which was covered with four different streams of colored light that emanated an aura of awesome power. As for Mountain Eater and his hundred, they were all scattered around him in a protective stance. Once any attacks from the defensive formation and spells appeared, they would immediately go forward to block them.

Although Ning’s army of a thousand Elder Gods were scattered across various corners of the castle, they remained joined together in one unit!

A grand formation like the ‘Minor Thousand Elder Gods Formation’ could be maintained across great distances. Even if all of them were spread throughout an entire chaosworld, they would still be able to keep the formation active. But of course, if they continued to expand it too much beyond that, there would be no way for the formation to remain active.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

The nine World-level experts broke apart into six squads, each of which was protected by over a hundred Elder Gods. The six squads launched attacks against the six World-level experts of the Blacklotus Empire.

Finally, the World-level experts of both chaos empires were about to clash.

“Owlsoar.” The handsome, astral-robed Starlord stared coldly towards the distant jade-eyed elder. The old man’s eyes were closed as he took out a treasure that looked like a ritual tower. The ritual tower emanated the screams and calls of countless souls. Weaker individuals who heard the terrifying cries emanating from a sin-weapon like this could very well suffer a mental breakdown.

“The Starlord of Fogstone.” Immortal Owlsoar held the ritual tower in his hands, staring coldly at the Starlord and the black-robed, black-haired man next to him. “Two of you against me? You honor me too much.”

“Owlsoar.” World God Blackmist said calmly, “Today, you shall definitely die.”

“Oh, is that so?” Immortal Owlsoar let out a cold laugh, then waved his hands. Suddenly, a large group of figures appeared out of nowhere next to him. There were exactly a thousand Elder Gods, and they all emanated the same ripples of World-energy.

“A Minor Thousand Elder Gods Formation?” The Starlord’s face changed.

He didn’t expect that Immortal Owlsoar would actually have a thousand Elder Gods with him, as well as a Minor Thousand Elder Gods Formation of his own. This was going to be tricky. Everyone knew how defensively formidable these formations were. When he joined forces with World God Blackmist, he had thought that it would be easy for them to deal with Owlsoar. Similarly, if they were just dealing with a thousand Elder Gods in formation, it wouldn’t be too difficult. But to deal with both at the same time...this was going to be tough.

“Eh?” The Starlord frowned. His astral light was spread throughout the city, and thus he saw that a Minor Thousand Elder Gods Formation had suddenly appeared next to God Emperor Blacklotus as well.

“They actually have two of their own?” The Starlord was surprised.

“Be careful, everyone. The Blacklotus Empire has two Minor Thousand Elder Gods Formations of their own. One is protecting God Emperor Blacklotus while the other is protecting Chaos Immortal Owlsoar,” the Starlord sent mentally.

“How can this be?”

“Why do they have two of their own?”

“Was our attack leaked by someone to them?”

“Impossible. If it was leaked, the Blacklotus Empire would’ve paid any price necessary to acquire more of these formations. They wouldn’t just have two.”

“If there was no leak...this means they are always carrying two thousand Elder Gods with them at all times?”

The World-level powers of the Fogstone Dominion conversed mentally amongst themselves, growing more vigilant and wary.

They all knew exactly what these two additional formations represented.

A single such formation required roughly three hundred cubes of chaos nectar! It must be understand that even after selling off so many treasures, Ning had only been able to acquire a bit over a hundred cubes. This was already roughly equivalent to the entire networth of most World-level experts. More powerful World-level experts might have perhaps five hundred cubes worth of treasures, but almost none of them would be willing to sell off three hundred cubes worth of treasures in order to purchase a single formation.

In the Fogstone Dominion, the only person who personally owned one of those formations was Chaos Immortal Abyssus, who had adventured in the primordial chaos for many years and was unfathomably powerful. None of the other eight owned any of these formations in their own right! The Fogstone Dominion itself had three of these formations, but those belonged to the Fogstone lineage, not the Starlord of Fogstone himself. This time, they had then paid an utterly enormous price, selling off quite a few of the Dominion’s treasures in order to buy an additional three sets.

Seven total sets. Six belonged to the Fogstone lineage, one was on loan from Chaos Immortal Abyssus. From this, one could see how rare and valuable these formations were.

But the Blacklotus Empire?

God Emperor Blacklotus had personally established the entire empire; he had no lineage or backing. As for the other five World-level experts, they were just temporary vassals and none of them were particularly outstanding. Logically speaking, they shouldn’t be wealthy enough to waste money on one of these formations, as none of them should’ve even had that many Elder God slaves.

So...where did these two formations come from?

“None of the other World-level experts have a thousand Elder God slaves with them.”

“Only God Emperor Blacklotus might have that many. Although he didn’t have that many slaves, he did have an army with thousands of Elder Gods. Those two formations probably came from him...but he built up the Blacklotus Empire all on his own with no outside backing. How could he possibly afford two of those formations all by himself?” This was why all nine of the World-level experts of Fogstone had grown wary.

God Emperor Blacklotus stood in place, an enormous black lotus with nine petals beneath his feet. The lotus flower swiveled slowly as its petals spread outwards.

Beyond the perimeter of the lotus flowers stood a thousand Elder Gods.

“Blacklotus, it seems all of us have underestimated you.” Immortal Abyssus, Immortal Skyram, and World God Goldcloud stood there in midair, each surrounded by a hundred Elder Gods who were helping them block the enemy defensive spells.

The Fogstone Dominion had a total of nine World-level experts.

Three of them had been sent to deal with God Emperor Blacklotus!

Two were dealing with Immortal Owlsoar.

The others were all fighting in single combat. The goal wasn’t to win; it was just to tie their foes down.

“Since you’ve decided to come onto my territory...you shall never leave again.” God Emperor Blacklotus swept them with a calm gaze. “Attack.”

“Attack!” The thousand Elder Gods around him all howled furiously as they charged forwards.

Ning could sense the six titanic shockwaves emanating throughout the city. These were the shockwaves coming from the battles against the six World-level experts.

Fortunately, this place was the imperial capital of Blacklotus! And fortunately, the astral light of Fogstone was suppressing the ripples of spacetime in this area.

Otherwise, a battle on this scale and level would’ve caused the entire chaosworld to break apart long ago.

“Things are much easier for us.” Ning and the seven thousand Elder Gods only had to focus on dealing with the defensive enemy spells and formations.

Rumble...

A streak of violet-golden thunderfire struck directly towards Ning.

Ning struck out with his sword, immediately breaking apart the streak of thunderfire. 99% of the power of the attack was absorbed by the invisible dimension protecting them, while the remaining 1% was jointly handled by the thousand Elder Gods.

Whoosh. Ning charged straight forwards. As the center of the entire formation, he had to stay within the city. So long as he did so, the formation would be fine. The other Elder Gods were assigned to various regions, but he, as the core, wasn’t given a specific assignment.

“The Starlord really is impressive.”

As Ning moved from place to place, suppressing the power of the defensive spells and formations, he also kept an eye on the various World-level experts. After watching two of them, he turned to watch the battle going on with the Starlord.

The Starlord was an extremely dazzling figure. Countless streams of astral light spread out from around him as though he was their sovereign and emperor. All by himself, he was able to tie down both Immortal Owlsoar and the formation of a thousand Elder Gods. World God Blackmist was helping out as well, but the tower-wielding Immortal Owlsoar and his formation of Elder Gods was still able resist their attacks. These formations were meant for defense, after all.

“Eh?” Ning was suddenly stunned.

He had just seen a gray-robed, black-haired old man amongst those thousand Elder Gods...and the man had seen Ning as well.

Sparks began to fly as their gazes met in midair.

“Old Man Yuan?” Ning had received a detailed intelligence report regarding the Mindlord long ago which included information about his appearance. He was able to recognize the man at a single glance...and the way in which that man looked at Ning made Ning feel completely certain that it was definitely Old Man Yuan!

“Ji Ning?” When the Mindlord saw that distant, blurry figure amongst the ranks of the Elder Gods of Fogstone, he was frightened quite badly.