The Desolate Era

Ji Ning continued his search for the Sithe throughout the Great Dark, his heart filled with sorrow and anxiety.

“Green Bamboo... there’s nothing your master can do. I cannot save you. You have to escape. You have to,” Ning murmured to himself.

With no Autarch nearby to render assistance, it was all-but guaranteed that the ‘Hiddencloud battlefront’ which Yang Quding was located in would be overwhelmed. When this happened, the Hegemons and Emperors wouldn’t be so foolish as to just fight to the bitter end. Once they knew that they were going to lose and that no help was forthcoming, they would begin to flee and focus on keeping themselves alive.

However, the Sithe had many Hegemons and even more treasures. The fleeing cultivator Hegemons would scatter in every direction, but they would be hunted down one-by-one. The number of Hegemons who managed to successfully escape could be counted on one hand, and in some cases none would escape.

Ning, however, still held out hope. His disciple ‘Green Bamboo’ had a perfect Dao-heart, was an Otherverse Lord, and had treasures which Ning had given him. He was absolutely one of the most powerful Hegemons around, far more powerful than the Lonely King had ever been. In fact, he was close to the Blazesun Ruler in power! Alas, no individual no matter how strong could possibly withstand an entire army. Still... Ning felt that there was some hope that this disciple of his would be able to escape and stay alive.

“Damn. Damn! If my avatar wasn’t trapped in that hive, it could also take responsibility over a zone. I might be closer to the Hiddencloud battlefront and able to rescue my disciple.” Ning felt rather resentful.

Right now, a total of thirteen Autarch-class combatants were scattered throughout the entire Chaosverse, each responsible for a specific zone. Ning’s avatar was also an Autarch-class combatant, but it was tied up in the Annihilation Hive.

Within the black tower at the nexus of the Annihilation Hive. The golden-robed Ning was seated in the lotus position in midair, his eyes closed in meditation.

Rumble... an awesome aura of energy was swirling around him in rippling layers. These circular ripples of power emanated the aura of the deep earth, of grass and vegetation, of flowing water, of blazing flames, of indestructible ores. All the different ripples were circling around Ning, and as they moved closer and closer towards him, they gradually began to transform into ripples of space and ripples of time... and at the very heart, on Ning himself, they transformed into ripples of terrifying destructive power. Everything near Ning was being devoured and then annihilated.

This was raw, pure annihilation! All types of energy were being annihilated, and not even the Chaosverse was able to resist this annihilatory power. The profound mysteries behind this power surpassed even the Destruction Daobirth Essence of Autarch Ekong, the Autarch of Annihilation. If Ning could truly and successfully master this technique, he would have gained access to a technique of absolutely incredible power.

“I’m still not quite there yet. It just isn’t quite right.” Ning had drawn upon his six million chaos cycles of training and the many insights he had gained from the sphere of annihilation, but he still felt that it was a bit too artificial and forced.

The Dao was, above all else, natural. Only a Dao which was complete and natural, not artificial, could be described as ‘perfect’. If you simply tried to artificially imitate this destructive power, which Ning called ‘Oblivion’, you would end up being far off from the real thing.

“Oblivion... it utterly destroys all things in its path. All forms of energy... the Five Elements... Yin and Yang... Darkness and Light... space and time... everything in the Chaosverse can be devoured and destroyed. This is what ‘Oblivion’ represents.

“I started with a foundation of the Five Elements, then drew upon the mysteries of Yin and Yang as well as that of the Cycle of Light and Dark, transforming them into pure spacetime which is then obliterated, producing fundamental particles where space and time no longer exist.” Ning continued to ponder this problem. He didn’t know what insights he was lacking, but this process had indeed resulted in him gaining a much deeper level of understanding in all of his Daos.

If it hadn’t been for him meditating on ‘Oblivion’, he never would’ve understood how the Five Elements could be completely converted into spacetime.

Space and time were two unique types of wave-particle energies. When the two acted upon each other, they gave birth to Yin and Yang, Light and Dark, and also the Five Elements which birthed countless other things.

“It lacks... a soul. It lacks that quintessential quality of being part of nature itself.” Ning continued to dissect many different Daos, ruminating over their connections to each other as he compared them to how the ‘sphere of annihilation’ operated...

......

Ning’s avatar continued to meditate on the Oblivion Sword Dao, and there was really nothing else it could do. Only when it learned how to destroy the ‘sphere of annihilation’ would it be able to leave this place. Until that happened the avatar would have to stay there, continuing to maintain the reverse-vortex formation.

The distant Hiddencloud battlefront. The native Hegemons and Emperors here suffered one defeat after another. They had already retreated to the final, most powerful defensive formation they had.

Within a beautiful world of flowers and grass. An azure-robed man was staring into the skies... and the skies were trembling. Dimensional cracks could be seen.

“Green Bamboo, any news?”

“Sword Immortal Green Bamboo, will the Autarchs come and save us?” Behind him was a host of Hegemons and Emperors. Thus far, over 70% of their original forces were still alive! This was because they had all sacrificed their avatars during the most dangerous parts of the battle. Now, their avatars had all been destroyed. Even Sword Immortal Green Bamboo’s avatar had died in battle!

They had already retreated to the back lines. So long their final defenses remained, they could keep fighting... but once their defenses were breached, they would all be massacred.

“Calm down. I’ve already asked for aid,” Sword Immortal Green Bamboo said.

The other Hegemons and Emperors were waiting anxiously as they maintained the defensive formation. Sword Immortal Green Bamboo was the disciple of the legendary Daolord Darknorth, and was someone favored by Autarch Ekong. Even though the fact that Ning had succeeded in his second Daomerge and become an Emperor remained a hidden secret, many felt certain that the Autarchs would come to save Green Bamboo so long as they could make it in time.

Suddenly, Sword Immortal Green Bamboo’s face turned grim. “The Autarchs won’t be able to make it in time.” He swept his gaze across the other Hegemons and Emperors, all of whom turned pale. The hope they had felt instantly vanished, with many revealing looks of despair.

“We’re out of options. We’ll have to fend for ourselves,” Green Bamboo said. “The ‘microworld’ formations protecting this grand formation have all been defeated. Even if we keep fighting, we’ll only be able to last another two or three days before being completely overwhelmed. By then, none of us will be able to escape.”

All the Hegemons and Emperors present agreed with this assessment.

“Thus... we should begin coming up with ideas for how we can escape,” Green Bamboo said.

The supreme leaders of the cultivators had long ago given them their orders – if they couldn’t win, they were to flee! Every single survivor counted! If they died in battle, they would see their truesouls devoured by that soul-eater technique. Their very Chaosverse itself would be weakened by this! In other words, just surviving was a form of victory.

“The Sithe have set up many scanning formations, and they have even more Hegemons and Emperors than we do. Even if we scatter and flee, our chances are very low,” an Emperor said worriedly.

“There’s always a chance,” Green Bamboo said. “Let’s do our best to deceive the Sithe and force them to disperse their forces. Every single survivor counts as a victory to me.”

“We can use many of the other formations and treasures scattered throughout the Hiddencloud battlefront which we previously abandoned to slow the Sithe down.”

“I myself am very skilled in using illusions and creating dopplegangers. Given the right treasures, I can make it difficult for the Sithe to know where our real members have gone.”

The various Hegemons and Emperors all had their own specialties, and they all began to propose ideas. However, they all knew that the Sithe had their own specialties as well. The Sithe warship was a particular problem. It was so fast that it was on par with the Blacksun. Only Autarchs were able to catch them and destroy them! The warships also were outfitted with extremely sensitive tracking formations as well. Thus, very few of them would probably be able to escape its pursuit.

“Green Bamboo.” There were four men and women standing next to Green Bamboo. One of them, a muscular and crimson-armored man, said in an awkward voice: “It’s all my fault. I was the one to invite you to join us here at the Hiddencloud battlefront. If you were alongside Nuwa, Realmslord Windgrace, and the Paragon of Pills in their battlefront, you wouldn’t be in this situation.”

The battlefields were all divided up according to rank and status. The Sixteen Realmverses Alliance and the otherverse the Paragon of Pills lived in were all very close to each other, and so they were grouped together into a single battlefront. That was the battlefront which would protect the homeland of ‘Daolord Darknorth’, a first-class battlefront which would be very difficult to overcome.

The only reason Green Bamboo had come here was for the sake of his lifelong friends who had also come here.

“It’s fine. To live and die amongst my friends is a blessing. What is there to fear?” Green Bamboo smiled as he looked at these four dear friends of his.

“Green Bamboo.” A red-robed maiden looked at Green Bamboo, then suddenly reached out to take his hand in her own.

Green Bamboo immediately revealed an excited, happy look as he gazed at the red-robed woman. “Dawnclear...”

This woman was the real reason why Green Bamboo had chosen to come to this battlefield. He had wooed Hegemon Dawnclear for many years now, but she had always hesitated. Now that she had taken him by the hand, she had clearly chosen to truly accept him.

“Hahaha... death holds no fear for me!” Green Bamboo laughed loudly, deliriously excited and happy.