Desolate Era (Book 19 - Book 21)

Coppersong stared at them. “I had to do that because none of you have tough enough divine bodies. In the past, I served as the vanguard because I had no other choice, and was just barely up to the task. However, Ji Ning’s divine body is even tougher than mine. That’s the Ninth Cycle of the [Eight-Nine Arcane Art] we are talking about! His body is akin to a supreme Pure Yang Treasure. Even a True God or Daofather would find it difficult to destroy such a body.”


“In both the Primordial Era and the era of the Three Realms, very few have been able to reach the Ninth Cycle of the [Eight-Nine Arcane Art]. Every single person who succeeded was not only tremendously talented but also doted upon heavily by a True God or Daofather. There’s no need for someone like that to enter Undermoon Lake, right?”

“That’s true.”

“There really is no need for someone who a Daofather holds in such favor to enter Undermoon Lake.”

All of them were quite puzzled.

Generally speaking, the people who entered Undermoon Lake during the Primordial Era and the era of the Three Realms were people who felt that they had no chance of becoming a True God or Daofather. This was why they were willing to risk everything here in Undermoon Lake. In addition, not even emerging from Undermoon Lake was a guarantee that one would succeed. Buddha Jueming, for example; a long time passed after his departure from Undermoon Lake before he became a Buddha.

Thus, Undermoon Lake really didn’t make much of a difference! Everyone who came in was just gambling with their lives. As for the truly supreme geniuses like Lu Dongbin, Redsnow, and Sun Wukong, none of them would actually enter such a place.

But of course, although the likes of Feiyou, Oddwitch, and the others had been fairly ordinary in strength when they had entered, thanks to Undermoon Lake, they had been trained to the point where they all verily gleamed with talent and power. The nine of them had all reached the fourth level of forces such as taiji-force. In the Three Realms, they would be viewed with great importance by the True Gods and Daofathers. From this, one could see how effective Undermoon Lake’s training regime was.

BOOM!

Suddenly, a colossal explosion could be heard. The shockwave caused the earth to crack like the shell of a turtle, and the nearest mountain began to tremble as well, causing many boulders to fall down.

The power of this collision caused all the distant spectators to be badly shocked.

“How fierce!” Feiyou retreated a long distance, staring towards Ning in shock.

“You blocked it?!” Ning was shocked as well.

“What happened just now? Y-you…how did you suddenly make your sword-arts increase in power by that much?” Feiyou was shocked.

“Just now, I filled my sword with fourth-stage heartforce,” Ning explained. “With heartforce supporting my attack, the strength naturally increased dramatically.”

Buyou was stunned. “Fourth-stage heartforce? You’ve not only reached the fourth stage of swordforce, but also the fourth stage of heartforce? And…but…even if you have reached the fourth stage of heartforce, how could you pour it into your sword? Did you come up with a heartforce sword-technique?”

Heartforce was an invisible, ephemeral thing. Even major powers were often bedeviled by the question of how to apply it.

“And you?” Ning was puzzled as well. “Just now, your halberd techniques…” He clearly had released a maximum-strength blow; he had unleashed swordforce, heartforce, and even the [Starseizing Hand]. Although he had knocked Feiyou backwards, Feiyou had still successfully blocked the attack. Ning had seen the blurry image of a taiji diagram appear before Feiyou, and it felt as though his attack had been trapped into an endless vortex.

“That’s a new technique that I just came up with,” Feiyou said with a laugh. “My infiniforce has reached the fourth stage, while my taiji-force has only reached the second stage. However…the infinite Wuji gives birth to the supreme Taiji. Infiniforce and taiji-force can be joined together, and so I came up with this technique that does just that, which is why it is so defensively powerful.” [1. This phrase, ‘Wuji births Taiji’, is one of the most famous phrases in Daoism, and you can find out more in the ‘basic primer to Daoism’ on Wuxiaworld. Wuji means ‘infinity’ or ‘limitless’, while Taiji means ‘the supreme’. The full saying is, Wuji gives birth to Taiji, which gives birth to (the duality of) Liangyi. The duality is known as Yin and Yang, and the transformations of Yin and Yang are known as the (four phenomenon) Sixiang, which are reflected within the world as the (eight trigrams) Bagua. You can think of it as 0 => 1 => 2 => 4 => 8]

Ning couldn’t help but sigh in awe. Impressive.

He naturally knew that some of the supreme types of force could be merged together. For example, timeforce and spaceforce could join together. Redsnow had managed to join them together into spacetime-force, which was why Subhuti was so delighted with him and had taken him on as his disciple.

However, only certain matching, suitable forces could be joined together.

For example, there would be no way to join swordforce together with saberforce. They simply didn’t have anything to do with each other; there was no way to forcibly join them together.

Wuji gave birth to Taiji, and so the two could join together perfectly. Even though Feiyou had only reached the second stage of taiji-force, upon joining these two types of force together the results were quite shocking.

“That’s why I said that I was the stablest and most unshakable of the nine. I can withstand even the attacks of Empyrean God Zhenbu, who has the most ferocious attacks of us all.” Feiyou looked at Ning, then let out an amazed sigh. “But in terms of ferociousness, you are a bit superior to even Zhenbu. Impressive, quite impressive.”

Ning said hurriedly, “Heartforce is different from other types of energy. There’s no way to sustainably attack using heartforce; if I attacked repeatedly with it, I would only be able to launch a bit over ten attacks.”

“Oh…” Feiyou now understood. He shook his head. “A pity…”

“Still, your power surpasses my expectations. We need to make some careful arrangements…and then, the only thing for us to do is wait. Roughly ten days or so from now, the demon army of Undermoon Lake will attack.” Feiyou let out a laugh. “When the time comes, then ten of us shall work together to engage our foes!”





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Book 20, Chapter 19 - An Army of Demons


The sparring match Ji Ning engaged in after arriving at Myriad Mountains Island resulted in Oddwitch, Zhenbu, and the others being filled with joy. Although all of them looked quite relaxed and carefree, the truth was that they all knew a calamity was about to arrive…and it was almost guaranteed that at least one of them would die. They all felt an invisible form of pressure in their hearts.

At a time like this, the stronger Ning proved himself to be, the happier they would be!

Time flowed on, one day at a time.

The ten Empyrean Gods all prepared quietly for the battle.

Ning and the nine Empyrean Gods were currently discussing battle strategies within a palace.

“What? We aren’t allowed to use formations?” Ning was shocked.

“Of course not.” Oddwitch said calmly, “If you use formations, the demon army will use formations as well. They vastly outnumber us, which means we’ll be at a major disadvantage! This is hard-earned experience, taught to us by those who came before us. If we don’t use formations, the demon armies won’t use formations either.”

“How strange.” Ning was puzzled. Why was it that if they didn’t use formations, the demons wouldn’t use formations either?

“Why is this?” Ning didn’t understand.