Desolate Era (Book 25 - Book 27)

The sixth stage, ‘world’. This was the highest level of heartforce!

“After your heartforce reaches the stage of ‘truth’, you will be able to see through the truth of all things. Your heartforce will transform, allowing all your thoughts and desires to coalesce into a sea of consciousness. You will then be able to establish your own heartworld,” Ning murmured softly to himself.

Finally, he understood.

Prior to reaching the sixth stage, heartforce could only be used in fairly crude ways. In the Endless Territories, Old Man Yuan would be considered a Heartforce Cultivator by Elder Gods and Ancestral Immortals, but technically speaking he wasn’t a true Heartforce Cultivator. He was just someone who understood certain heartforce secret arts, but those arts were enough for quite a few Elder Gods and Ancestral Immortals to refer to him as a Heartforce Cultivator.

Actually World-level Heartforce Cultivators were incredibly rare. There was simply no way for someone like Old Man Yuan to rely on heartforce to reach the World level.

Once your heartforce reached the sixth stage, all of your heartforce would pool together within that sea of consciousness. If your heartforce was strong enough, it could affect reality itself, forming a singularity where what was real and what was false would collide. A single grain of sand could become an entire real world.

“Ki Refiners cultivate Immortal ki and the Dao-tree in their bodies will continuously grow taller.

“Fiendgod Body Refiners cultivate divine power and their divine bodies will continuously grow stronger.

“Heartforce Cultivators cultivate their worlds. They need to establish their heartworlds, with their insights into the Dao perfecting those worlds and making them more and more real.”

Ning murmured softly, “Heartforce Cultivators truly are unique.”

These were three completely different paths of cultivation.

By comparison, Heartforce Cultivators didn’t need to gain incredibly profound insights into the Dao. What they needed to do was to slowly build up their heartworlds, allowing their heartworlds to become increasingly like real worlds. Only when their heartworlds became sufficiently stable could they be expanded… but it was possible for heartworlds to become greater than entire territories in size. In fact, they could become greater than a hundred territories!

The larger a heartworld was, the more powerful a Heartforce Cultivator was! This was because all the World energy within this heartworld would be available to the Heartforce Cultivator to command. If the heartworld was the size of a territory, then its ‘heartworld projection’ alone would be able to crush Verge-level Daolords to death, to say nothing of someone like Ning.

“When I fought against Bertulu, he caused the area around us to transform into a world of grassy plains and tall mountains. I thought that was all just an illusion… but it was actually his heartworld projection.” Ning finally understood.

The manifestation of a heartworld projection was a symbol of all the power of an entire world being brought to bear! Even Ning felt constricted and restrained by its power. If it had been an ordinary master-class World God, that person probably would’ve been crushed straight to death! Even Ning was forced to use his Elementum Waterflame Gourd in order to hold on.

The difference in power was simply too great.

Both Fiendgods and Ki Refiners had to pursue increasingly greater heights in the Dao, but Heartforce Cultivators focused on greater stability in their heartworlds. Only with great stability would they be able to expand the size of their heartworld. As a result, Daos that were excessively oriented in a certain direction were actually unsuitable for inclusion in a heartworld! What heartworlds truly needed were highly stable and balanced Daos.

“To make the false real, to make the real false. The goal of Heartforce Cultivators is to make their heartworlds into true worlds, to make that which is illusory into something which is real.”

“Once they reach that level… with but a thought, a Heartforce Cultivator can produce a hundred Eternal weapons within his heartworld, and those Eternal weapons will all be real. He will be able to pull them out and use them in battle. With but a thought, he would be able to produce powerful pills, golems…” Ning was frightened just thinking about it.

Still, according to the heartforce legacy this only happened at the absolute apex of power. In addition, it didn’t contain any instructions on how to actually reach this level.

“I haven’t even reached the fifth stage of heartforce yet.” Ning shook his head, putting away the white plume. He had to reach the sixth stage of heartforce before he would even have his own heartworld. Only then would he be able to use the guidance of this legacy, which would teach him how to quickly and stably expand his own heartworld.

“No wonder there are so few Heartforce Cultivators. To reach the sixth stage of heartforce is impossibly difficult.” Ning shook his head. Even Houyi himself had most likely failed to reach the sixth stage of heartforce. The only person Ning knew of who had reached the sixth stage of heartforce was Bertulu.

One day later, Ning challenged Kilostar.

“Take it.” Ning handed the white plume to Kilostar. “Bertulu asked me to transfer this to you.”

“I knew it. I knew he had to have thrown the fight.” Kilostar looked at Ning. “Oh, right. What weapons did he use?”

“Hammers,” Ning said.

“You actually forced him to use his hammers? Oh! Did you see his true form?” Kilostar was quite curious. Although he was on decent terms with Bertulu, he had never been able to get Bertulu to show his true form.

“No.” Ning shook his head. “Now that I’ve given you this legacy, my business here is done. Kilostar, if you ever want to meet me you can go to the Palace of the Sword.”

“You are leaving? So soon?” Kilostar was quite surprised.

“Yes.” Ning nodded.

“Alright. I’ll be leaving soon as well. You will be in the Sword Palace while I will be in the Saber Palace.” Kilostar nodded. “Let’s see which of us will be the first to become a Samsara Daolord.”

“Alright. Let’s see who makes it first!”

After Ning bid Kilostar farewell, he shattered the talisman which a Daolord of the Sword Palace had given him. The only members of the Twelve Palaces who had come to visit Ning had been from the Sword Palace or the Thunder Palace.





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Book 26, Chapter 47 - Departure


Ji Ning stood within his astral island by himself, staring at the emptiness around his island. The island which had represented Bertulu had already descended into the dark abyss, because Bertulu had already left.

Whoosh.

A streak of light suddenly flew towards him from afar.

Ning immediately turned to look. The person who had flown over was an azure-armored alien Daolord. This man was fairly ugly, and his skin was a coarse, dark-red color. Although he looked rather frightening, Ning knew that this man, Daolord Grayvast, was actually a very good man who was easy to get along with.

“Brother Darknorth.” The azure-armored, muscular-looking Daolord Grayvast landed on the island, then laughed. “You are planning to leave so soon?”

“Yes.” Ning nodded. “My sword-arts have reached a bottleneck. It’ll probably be quite some time before I can improve any further. In addition, I understand more than half of the more powerful experts are planning to leave as well.”

Bertulu had left, Kilostar was leaving, and many of the old timers were leaving as well.