Desolate Era (Book 19 - Book 21)

Ning stood before the black stone stele, staring at the flame diagram. Soon, his mind was drawn into it.

Within a blurry region, a human-shaped creature was brandishing two halberds. The creature started with elementary stances, but slowly began to advance through the many deeper variations on the twin halberds technique. It started simple and became complicated; started slow and became fast. In the end, it formed into the most terrifying stance which the Purgatory God had.

A long time later, Ning’s mind escaped the stone stele. He revealed a look of approval on his face. “I gained quite a bit from viewing the entire technique, from start to finish. My twin swords are still a bit inferior by comparison.” Ning had gained certain insights that would allow him to perfect the [Brightmoon] sword-art further.

“First, Myriad Mountains Island.” Ning swept it with his gaze.

This vast island was filled with mountains. Some pierced high into the clouds, some were as slender and sharp as knives, some were short, some were strange-looking. There were at least ten thousand mountains here, and none of the mountains were linked together. To see more than ten thousand solitary mountains…this truly was a strange sight.

“I wonder which Empyrean Gods are on this island.” Ning immediately walked towards the depths of the island.





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Book 20, Chapter 17 - Relentless Until Dead


“According to what the Purgatory God said, this island is named ‘Myriad Mountains Island’.” Ji Ning smiled, the Seven Dragon Gods and Empyrean God Roughpeak by his side.

“Myriad Mountains Island? Not bad, not bad.” Empyrean God Tyranodragon stared with his large bronze eyes towards the surrounding area. “These mountains are like spears that are jabbing towards the heavens. Interesting, interesting. Myriad Mountains Island…a fine name!”

Roughpeak had returned to his normal, relaxed, graceful demeanor. Looking at his surroundings, he said with delight, “I didn’t expect that I’d be able to see the third island so soon. I had thought that I would be satisfied with just seeing the second island. Haha…perhaps, junior apprentice-brother Darknorth, you’ll be able to make it all the way out in one try.”

“He just might.”

“Brother Darknorth, we believe in you.”

They all chortled with laughter.

Ning, however, didn’t dare to make any boasts. The nine of them walked forward together. Although the island was quite large, they were able to advance through it at tremendous speed, thanks to spatial compression techniques they used. After walking for just a short while, they had already travelled millions of kilometers. They could vaguely make out the sound of laughter and jesting in the distance.

This caused Ning and the rest of the nine to exchange curious looks.

“It seems as though there are quite a few people here.”

“Let’s go take a look.”

They immediately headed towards the direction of the voices, and as they drew nearer the voices became clearer.

“Excellent, excellent! Big brother Feiyou, your song was excellent. Let me sing as well!”

“Undermoon Lake, how truly carefree,

Drinking fine wine, how truly sublime,

No worries at all, no worries at all,

A nap I’ll take, and I’ll sleep till I wake!”

The coarse, rough voice boomed out like thunder, carrying a certain cadence and tempo to it. Upon hearing this, Ning couldn’t help but blink. This was ‘singing’? What a perfectly awful song!

Soon, Ning and the rest of the nine reached the region where the voices were coming from. They saw a bonfire blazing in the midst of a desolate, wild area, and skinned haunches of animal meat were currently being roasted above the bonfire. A large amount of glistening oil dripped down from the meat, falling into the flames and emitting crackling sounds. The fragrance of the meat had long ago wafted out to the nine.

Dozens of animals were being roasted in unison, and around the bonfire there were men and women who were either sitting or standing and singing. Most of them were dressed in furs, and they all looked quite relaxed and content. There were also some dressed in robes, but they looked similarly casual and relaxed. They were all either holding wine gourds or wine bottles in their arms as they gulped down wine and chomped away at their meat, laughing and shouting with abandon.

“Ahaha, you guys truly do have it sublime. You even have meat to eat!” Empyrean God Witherdragon laughed loudly and charged towards them.

“I knew that it had to be big brother Feiyou over there. All of you who followed big brother Feiyou have had meat to eat and wine to drink. I, on the other hand, have been starving!” Empyrean God Tyranodragon charged over as well.

All of the Seven Dragon Gods ran over, with Ning and Roughpeak following behind them.

“Why are there so many Empyrean Gods here?” Ning was secretly shocked. He saw nearly a hundred Empyrean Gods present!

“The Seven Dragon Gods? You’ve all finally arrived!”

“The seven of you insisted on waiting at Volcano Island for so long, saying that you were going to rely on yourselves to make it here. What, have you finally succeeded?”

“Ahahaha, brother Witherdragon! Come, eat!”

The lively Empyrean Gods joyfully welcomed the seven. The Seven Dragon Gods had been on Volcano Island for a very long period of time, nearly an entire chaos cycle. Thus, all of the Empyrean Gods present knew the seven of them! More than half recognized Empyrean God Roughpeak as well. As for Ji Ning…none here knew him!

“Let me make the introductions,” Witherdragon said in a loud voice. “This is my good friend, Darknorth! I’m quite ashamed to say this, but we relied on brother Darknorth to make it here from Volcano Island. As soon as he entered Undermoon Lake, he charged straight through all impediments to make it to this location, battling through all three guardians.”

“Oh?”

“Come, brother Darknorth! Let me toast you!”

“You were able to battle your way to Myriad Mountains Island in one try? Admirable!” Instantly, the many Empyrean Gods all turned to look towards Ning. They all had a different look in their eyes, and each of them voluntarily offered Ning a toast.

Ning began to drink and chat with these Empyrean Gods. Slowly, he began to understand what was going on here. Aside from the nine of them who had just entered, there had been a total of ninety-eight Empyrean God present. However, the vast majority of them had followed other Empyrean Gods to this location. They had all given up their hopes of making it through Undermoon Lake on their own, which was why they had chosen to follow others.

Only nine of the ninety-eight had truly relied on their own power to make it to this place.

These nine were ‘Skyriver’, ‘Oddwitch’, ‘Cloudscar’, ‘Feiyou’, ‘Eastvoid’, ‘Seasonstep’, ‘Coppersong’, ‘Zhenbu’, and ‘Autumnwing’. These nine Empyrean Gods had all mastered the likes of taiji-force, infiniforce, thunderforce, sharpforce, and other forces to the fourth level. They were powerful enough to make it past the Purgatory God, which was why quite a few Empyrean Gods were willing to follow them.

“This is my old friend Feiyou.” Witherdragon led Ning over to meet with Feiyou.