Desolate Era (Book 31 - Book 35)

“Ninedust…?” Ning glanced around, only to find that he was still alone.

“Your friend? He’s still outside battling against those Emperor-class golems. He looks as though he’s improved quite a bit; a few more breakthroughs and he might actually be able to capture one of them.” The black-robed man smiled. “Darknorth, per my master’s instructions, every single person who came in here to meditate will be given a treasure based on how well they performed.”

“Bestowed a treasure?” Ning’s eyes lit up.

“My master, Autarch Bolin, did this because he was worried about being defeated. As a result, he spared no expense in arranging for later generations of cultivators to rise to power,” the black-robed man said. “Go ahead into the outside world and battle against those golems the Sithe left behind. Let me see how strong you have grown. The better your performance is, the better a treasure I will give you.”

Ning began to feel rather excited.

“Go. Show me just how powerful a ‘mere’ Daolord can become,” the black-robed man said quite eagerly. After a person forcibly memorized the physical manifestation of an Autarch’s Dao, he would be able to rapidly make actual use of those insights in combat. After 120 million years of memorization, it was time for an explosive period of growth in power.

Still… as the black-robed man saw it, given how strong Daolord Darknorth was, the man was most likely extremely close to his lifespan limit. He probably wouldn’t have grown all that much.

“I’ll definitely do my absolute best,” Ning said.

Whoosh. The black-robed man waved his arm, causing a spatial ripple to surround Ning and deliver him out of this beastworld and into the Sithe ruins outside.





* * *





Book 34, Chapter 28 - The Emperor Golems


The palace ruins stretched far off into the horizon. There seemed to be no end to them.

“More than thirty thousand true Sithe once lived here.” Ji Ning stared at the ruins, rather moved. “I really wonder how different the Sithe civilization was from our cultivator civilization.”

“Darknorth.” A delight cry rang out from far away as a streak of light quickly shot towards Ning and descended. It was Ninedust.

“You finally came out. I’ve been fighting like an idiot for millions of years, all by myself,” Ninedust said with an overjoyed look on his face.

“You really disappoint me. All this time, and you haven’t caught a single Emperor-class golem?” Ning said.

“Hey, don’t blame me for that. I managed to make some improvements after inspecting those claw-marks left behind in the palace ruins, but…” Ninedust said anxiously, “But there are more than a hundred of those Emperor-class golems, and they all hide behind the remaining barriers set up by the Sithe. There’s no way for me to force them out at all. My only choice is to wait for a chance. One time, I damn near caught one of those things, but the other golems jumped into help the first one out.”

Ning now understood. The golems weren’t so foolish as to fight in solo combat! When the situation turned grim for one of them, the others would step in to help out! This was why the three great clans had labored for so long to capture Emperor-class golems, and yet only had a few in each clan.

“I have an idea.” Ning mentally transmitted his suggestion to Ninedust.

Ninedust’s eyes lit up when he heard this. “Haha…”

“That’s the only real thing I can do. If you STILL cannot capture an Emperor-class golem, there’s nothing else I can do,” Ning sent mentally.

“Don’t worry.” Ninedust suddenly thought of something. He said hurriedly, “Oh, right. I almost forgot! I’ve been battling in these ruins for countless years and have discovered quite a few dangerous regions within it. Fortunately, I have an invulnerable aquaform; otherwise, I would’ve died long ago. Here’s a map of all the danger zones I’ve discovered thus far. I prepared it for you long ago; I was just waiting for you to come out.” As Ninedust spoke, he tossed a rolled map to Ning.

Ning accepted it and gave it a glance. There was a detailed map of the palace ruins here, with markings for the various danger zones. Ning revealed a delighted smile. Without this map, he would have to carefully explore for a very long period of time if he wanted to get a sense of what dangers lay here.

“Come, let’s go catch us some golems,” Ning said.

“Let’s go.” Ninedust was filled with eagerness as well.

……

After a full month, Ninedust found another chance to engage an Emperor-class golem in a battle.

Whoosh. A vast wave swept out to encompass an area of over a million kilometers. The Ninedust Sectlord’s upper body was visible and utterly massive. He wielded that longstaff in his hands, smashing it outwards like a stream of water that completely embodied the essence of the word ‘entangle’.

No matter how the golem struggled, Ninedust’s longstaff continued to circle around it, preventing it from fleeing no matter how it tried.

“In the past, Ninestaff’s staff-arts were more explosive and dominating; now, they are much softer.” Ning was hiding off in the distance using his Shadowless evasion-art, and he nodded at what he saw. If one was capable of both hard and soft techniques, one would be able to unleash still-greater power in combat.

“Although he’s not able to completely defeat that golem, he can at least ensure the golem won’t be able to flee. After enough time passes, the golem’s energy reserves will run low. That’s when it will be defeated.” Ning could already guess what was about to happen.

A short while later… “Help!” The Emperor-class golem finally let out a furious call for aid.

Swoosh. Swoosh. The battle had long ago attracted the attention of quite a few golems. Upon hearing their comrade plea for aid, two Emperor-class golems immediately charged over towards Ninedust.

Ning cracked a smile. “Here they come.” Ning transformed into a streak of light, clearly moving faster than a hundred times the speed of light as he flew towards the two golems. Prior to receiving the guidance of the Autarch’s Dao, Ning had already been at the limit of a hundred times of speed of light. Ever since his Blood Drop stance broke through to the fourth level, the power of his Omega Sword Dao – Blood Drop had doubled. This upgrading of his Dao resulted in Ning understanding many new things, and so his flying speed was also able to break past the bottleneck of a hundred times the speed of light.

“Who is that?”

“Where did he suddenly come from?” The two Emperor-class golem reinforcements were shocked. Ning had been maintaining the Shadowless evasion art the entire time and thus they hadn’t noticed him.

“Fight!” “Attack!”

“Friends, come and help out.” Although the two Emperor-class golems were shocked at first, they quickly calmed down. It was hard for even the three clan leaders to catch them when all three were working together; what did they have to fear? Instantly, all of the other watching golems charged towards them as well.

Whoosh. Ning had already reached the two Emperor-class golems, [Three Heads, Six Arms] active and six Northbow swords at the ready.

Swish! Swish! Swish!

Streaks of mist-formed sword energy struck out with terrifying speed. Now that the Blood Drop stance’s power had doubled yet again, the attack was even faster than it had been before! The two Emperor-class golems frantically tried to defend, but they weren’t even able to touch Ning’s sword before it gently coiled around them and bound them in multiple layers.

“In you go, and you too.” These two Emperor-class golems didn’t have invulnerable aquaforms, and so they were easily taken away forcibly by Ning.

“What?!” “How is this possible?!” The other five Emperor-class golems who had been charging over to reinforce their comrades were all terrified, as was the golem which was battling against Ninedust.