Desolate Era (Book 19 - Book 21)

It was extremely difficult to completely memorize all nine of the Nine Chaos Seals. Daoist Three Purities had spent an enormous amount of effort before succeeding, and had only been able to master seven of the seals. Prior to becoming a World God, Mother Nuwa had only been able to master eight of the seals. There was simply no way that Ning could possibly memorize these incredibly profound and arcane chaos seals; he had to keep the goldstar beads by his side in order to train in them. The reason why he hadn’t taken them into Undermoon Lake was because he was afraid that if he died in Undermoon Lake, the beads would be lost as well.

Even if just a single one of the 3600 beads was lost, the set would become incomplete and there would be no way for them to join together into the Thirty-Six Heavens in the future.

“Form.” The black-robed Ning willed it, and the 3600 dazzling goldstar beads in the skies joined together, rapidly merging into 360 stars, then further merging together into the Thirty-Six Heavens.

The Thirty-Six Heavens hoverered around Ning, and Ning could vaguely sense that were somehow connecting to the workings of fate. Ning had a sudden thought, and he immediately barked out, “Change!”

Whoosh. The thirty-six dazzling, glowing globes suddenly transformed into a series of ancient, unadorned mirrors. These mirrors all had bronze borders to them. Some of the mirrors had stellar diagrams of the sun and the moon on the bronze, while others had diagrams of fish, bugs, birds, and other beasts on them. Others were covered with flowers, trees, and other vegetation…

Every single mirror seemed quite extraordinary.

“Eh?” Ning stared carefully at these thirty-six levitating bronze mirrors with curiosity.

The Thirty-Six Heavens could transform into anything. The reason why they had changed into mirrors just now was because Ning had mastered the second chaos seal. Upon doing so, Ning felt a vague, hidden connection between them and the hidden workings of fate, and so he allowed them to go with the flow and transform as they pleased…and they became mirrors. Their current appearance was the most suitable appearance for unleashing the power of the Thirty-Six Heavens when using the second chaos seal.

Ning’s Immortal energy quickly filled into them.

“So that’s how it works. They are actually able to scry the workings of fate itself,” Ning murmured to himself. “They can view the past, the present…and the future?”

There weren’t many treasures in the Three Realms that were capable of touching upon the workings of fate, but there were a few. The number one such treasure was the Book of Life and Death!

The Book of Life and Death was one of the most mysterious, arcane treasures that existed. It recorded the details of the past and present lives of countless living creatures. It was capable of recording hundreds or even thousands of lives for each person. The Book of Life and Death was so powerful that just by scribbling a few extra markings onto it, a person who was destined to live just thirty years could instead be given a lifespan of three hundred years! It could be used to effortlessly change the workings of fate. It truly was an utterly heaven-defying treasure.

The Celestial Court, Buddhist Sangha, Daoist Path, and the Three Sovereigns all had treasures of their own that could also scry on the workings of fate. They had also developed various fate-scrying methods and techniques as well.

Another example was the ‘Stone of Three Lives’ that lay by the side of the River of Forgetfulness. The Stone of Three Lives was similarly capable of illuminating the past, present, and future lives of a person.

“My Thirty-Six Heavens are quite similar to the Stone of Three Lives.” Ning nodded slowly. “If that’s the case…then since it has the appearance of mirrors, let them be known as the Mirrors of the Heavens.”

There were only so many fate-scrying treasures in the Three Realms, and each of them had been created by major powers. This was the first time that an Empyrean God/True Immortal like Ji Ning had acquired a treasure like this. But of course, Ning hadn’t created it on his own; he didn’t have that ability! He had relied on on the power of the Nine Chaos Seals, unconsciously applying them through the goldstar beads and transforming them into the Mirrors of the Heavens.

“They are capable of scanning one’s past, present, and future. In addition, these thirty-six mirrors are shaped like rectangles; they are perfect for defense. In fact, it should even be possible to use them to reflect an enemy’s attacks.” Ning carefully expected his treasures, quickly coming to this conclusion regarding their uniqueness.

In the past, the goldstar beads had mainly been useful because of their extremely high quality, which was why Ning would use them in the form of various weapons. But now, thanks to the chaos seals, they had gained certain special powers as well.

After mastering the second chaos seal, Ning continued to wander the Three Realms as he had before. He watched many mortals, seeing their joys, their sorrows, their farewells, their reunions, their love, their hate, their debts, their grudges.

Love…love was the hardest one to truly fathom.

No expert, no matter how powerful, would be able to claim that he had truly transcended beyond this word, ‘love’. Ning couldn’t, despite having mastered the fourth stage of heartforce. Not even Houyi, who had mastered the fifth stage of heartforce, could make that claim.

One year passed after the other. Ning continued to wander the vast world…

……

Rumble…

A towering palace began to collapse as a flood of hatred, malevolence, and death energy soared into the heavens.

Two armies of Immortal cultivators were battling each other, as were many mortals.

“Is this what things have come to on the eve of apocalypse?” The midair Ning stared downwards at the slaughter proceeding. He shook his head. He couldn’t, wouldn’t get involved. This sight was incredibly common these days in the Three Realms.

“Who can compare to the Seamless Gate when it comes to manipulating the hearts of men?”

“Why must they cause the entire Three Realms to be thrown into such a state of turmoil?” Ning felt quite powerless. Not even the major powers could stop this, to say nothing of him.

Even if he stopped this particular battle, as soon as he left the war would continue. During his journey across the Three Realms, Ning had long ago discovered that all of these disputes were caused by the secret machinations of the Seamless Gate. Aside from the more mundane methods of incitement they used, the Seamless Gate had a particularly powerful tool at their disposal…the Heavenly Dao of Heart!

The Seamless Chaosworld had originally had six Heavenly Daos; the Heavenly Daos of Earth, Fire, Water, Wind, Heart, and Primordial Chaos.

The Pangu Chaosworld had ten Heavenly Daos; the Heavenly Daos of Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, Earth, Yin, Yang, Destruction, Life, and Primordial Chaos.

But then, the Primordial Era had come to an end. Under the guidance of Mother Nuwa, the Three Realms was founded using the Pangu Chaosworld and its Daos as the foundation. The Heaven Realm, for example, had originally been one of the largest surviving pieces of the Pangu chaosworld. The Pangu Chaosworld had served as the core, while the Seamless Chaosworld had been used as a support structure. Thus, the Heavenly Daos remained those of the Pangu Chaosworld!

As a result there was no way to, for example, truly understand and master the Heavenly Dao of Wind. The Three Realms had a flawed Heavenly Dao of Wind that had been divided up into many different Grand Daos.

The Heavenly Dao of Heart similarly no longer existed in the Three Realms.

However, of the major powers of the Seamless Chaosworld who had been alive during the old days, such as the Godking, quite a few had very high levels of attainment in the Heavenly Dao of Heart. They were tremendously skilled in manipulating the hearts of men. With but a single gaze, they could cause some ordinary Immortal cultivators to immediately fall to their knees and willingly become slaves.

The Seamless Gate had many who had gained insight into the Heavenly Dao of Heart early on, including many who were Empyrean Gods and True Immortals. They used their many clones to cause trouble throughout the Three Realms, and there was nothing the Nuwa Alliance could do about it.

Time continued to flow on.