Desolate Era (Book 36 - Book 40)

Rumble… an enormous earth-shaking boom rang out in the distance as the ground began to crack apart. A titanic mountain-sized ice humanoid emerged from the ground, using his two hands to tear through it as he rose from the depths.

Ning’s gaze narrowed. The ice here was so tough that if he didn’t use his Northbow swords, he’d need to use roughly 50% of his full power to break through it. Most likely, fairly powerful Archons would have to use 100% of their full power to just barely break through the ice. This person, however, had been able to instantly tear through the ground with his bare hands. This terrifying level of strength alone showed that this creature was vastly stronger than Hegemons. Most likely, he was at the Otherverse Lord level of power.

“That’s the Sourcewalker,” Ning sent mentally.

“Sourcewalker?” Azurefiend’s face turned pale.

“He finally came!” Flamewing, on the other hand, was excited. It really hated the Icewind Sea, as every single part of this place was filled with uncomfortable icy energy. When it saw the Sourcewalker, it instantly grew excited.

The Sourcewalker before them was covered in a layer of extremely thick ice which served as a form of icy armor which glowed with azure light. His head was covered with a helmet that had two icicles protruding from it, and he had long azure hair which fell down to his waist. He had a great deal of facial hair, and his gloomy azure eyes were filled with rage and violence.

“More of you thieves, come to steal my treasures!” The Sourcewalker let out a furious bellow, his voice transforming into a wind of terrifying power which swept out in every direction. The endless might in his voice alone caused Ning and Azurefiend to quail. The difference in power was simply too great.

“We ran into a Sourcewalker before we even found a Daomerge Firecloud Flower. What terrible luck.” Ning felt rather resigned. They hadn’t even gone into any of the vortexes or deep underground, where the treasures were more abundant and more valuable. That was where the Sourcewalkers usually resided.

“Sourcewalker,” Ning called out loudly, “We’ve come here just for the sake of finding a Daomerge Firecloud Flower! Its not all that valuable, and we’re willing to use our own treasures to trade for one. We’ll leave immediately after acquiring the flower.”

Daomerge Firecloud Flowers were incredible treasures for Daolords, but they were fairly ordinary when compared to the other treasures of the Icewind Sea. There were treasures here which would drive even Hegemons and Otherverse Lords mad with excitement.

“A Daomerge Firecloud Flower?” The ice-armored Sourcewalker was 540,000 meters tall. It stared downwards at Ning’s group and said angrily, “You can forget about taking away so much as a piece of ice from my turf! All you cultivators are nothing more than damnable thieves. This is my territory!”

“We can trade for it with our treasures!” Ning said frantically.

“Treasures? What use do I have for your miserable treasures?” The Sourcewalker took a furious step forwards, then shot forwards through the air: “Just die instead!”

Ning felt speechless. This Sourcewalker was just as Realmslord Windgrace had described; a berserker!

Whoosh. The Sourcewalker wielded a long frozen halberd which gleamed with azure light, sweeping it towards Ning’s group with such power that Ning had no choice but to instruct Flamewing to defend. “Flamewing, go!”

“Haha… I was at the verge of losing my patience!” The chubby Flamewing instantly let out an excited cry as it reverted to its true form, transforming into the titanic Flamewing God. Its giant flaming wings spread out fully as its body became bathed in furious flames that were so powerful, even the frigid energy of the surrounding area was pushed away. Everything within ten billion kilometers began to grow blazingly hot.

Otherverses had their own prime essences, as did the Icewind Sea… and in a sense, the Flamewing God itself had its own prime essences! Its energy levels truly were virtually inexhaustible, and its body was virtually indestructible. Ever since it was born, it had wandered the Chaosverse and had devoured entire realmverses with ease. Truly, its power was inconceivable. Its only weakness was that its level of insight was extremely, extremely low. If it was just a bit more clever, it would be able to massacre even Otherverse Lords with ease.

Still, all things came in balance. There was no way even the prime essences of the Chaosverse could give birth to creatures as powerful as Chaos Primordials which also had the comprehension skills of Sourcewalkers. This was completely impossible.

“A Chaos Primordial?” The attacking Sourcewalker was rather stunned when it saw those vast wings unfurl and the flames spread out in every direction around the Flamewing God.

“Haha, I’ve never eaten a Sourcewalker before!” Flamewing howled through the skies, while Ning, Azurefiend, and Whitethaw all immediately moved to hide within the realmship. They weren’t qualified to get involved in a battle of this magnitude.

“This is my first time meeting a Chaos Primordial as well. Let’s do this!” The Sourcewalker was just as eager to do battle, and he valiantly charged forwards with his halberd at the ready.

Swoosh! His halberd suddenly pierced forwards, howling through the skies with incredible speed… but Flamewing was even faster! The strike missed, just barely managing to scrape past Flamewing’s claws but not injuring Flamewing in the slightest.

“Up you go!” The Sourcewalker suddenly changed his stance. Previously, he had been using the halberd to ‘stab’ at Flamewing; now, he suddenly lifted it upwards!

This was a strike that seemed to split even the heavens in two. Not even Flamewing was able to avoid this strike… but of course, Flamewing wouldn’t deign to do so.

Boom! Flamewing had already been flying through the air; this strike sent it stumbling a few hundred kilometers higher.

The Sourcewalker was shocked. When he had used this killer technique against the cultivator Otherverse Lords he had fought, they had all been knocked backwards and suffered heavy injuries. The Chaos Primordial had merely stumbled a bit?

“Grwaaaar!” Flamewing excitedly flapped its wings, instantly charging downwards while using its enormous and thick claws to strike at the Sourcewalker. The Sourcewalker hurriedly brandished his halberd, spinning it into a circle that defended against the approaching attack.

Flamewing completely ignored the profundity of his opponent’s attack, just striking down with its claws in an absolutely savage blow. BOOM! An enormous collision rang out as the earth itself began to split apart. As for the Sourcewalker, half of its body had just been hammered into the ground from this collision.

“I ablated over 90% of its power, but it still suppressed me completely?” The Sourcewalker was rather speechless at this result. Moments later, the look within its eyes grew even more frenzied. “Again!”

Boom. Boom. Boom! The Sourcewalker was incredibly valiant. At first, it chose to meet all of Flamewing’s attacks head on, but later on it began to choose to dodge instead in an effort to win through technique. In terms of comprehension, it was already at the Archon level of insight. Due to its innate gifts, this level of insight was already enough for it to unleash the Otherverse Lord level of power in battle! Supposedly, the legendary Sourcewalkers who could fight even Sithe Exalts were actually just at the Hegemonic level of insight.

Then again, the Hegemonic level of insight was an incredibly high level. Realmslord Windgrace, the Lonely King, and the other major powers were all at this level of insight. The only thing above this level was Autarchy.