Desolate Era (Book 36 - Book 40)

……

Although he wasn’t quite familiar with the Terror Starsea, Hegemon Oldgem truly was a formidable figure when it came to travelling. It took him merely a century or so to arrive outside the Jadefire Realm.

“The Jadefire Realm. How beautiful.” Hegemon Oldgem stared at the enormous vortex of flames before them, each of the flames looking like the petal of a flower. “Supposedly, this was a nightmare for our people during the Dawn War. Many major powers were imprisoned in here, and all those who went inside perished.”

“Everyone, we’ve already collected quite a bit of information regarding the Jadefire Realm. Based on what we know, entering is easy but leaving is difficult.” Hegemon Dawnruler said in a cold voice, “Daolord Darknorth went in a fairly short while ago. I imagine he probably hasn’t been able to flee just yet. Shall we wait for him outside or shall we go inside?”

“Go inside of course,” Hegemon Azurefiend said, a glimmer of terrifying red light flashing in his eyes. “We were the first to arrive here. If we waste any time, Hegemon Fogsun’s realmship will probably arrive with another batch of Emperors. By then, we’ll have lost our first-mover advantage and it’ll be even harder to acquire the realmship. The more time we waste, the more Emperors will arrive and the more difficult things will become.”

“Right.” A bald, grim-looking red-robed man nodded slowly.

“I agree that we should all go in together right away as well,” a silver-haired elder with a stone sword on his back agreed.

Since the five Hegemons were all in occurrence, the other four Emperors simply exchanged glances but said nothing.

“Haha… what a pity! I hear that the most powerful figure in the Flamedragon Realmverse is Hegemon Brightshore. He should know quite a bit about this Jadefire Realm, but he wasn’t willing to tell us anything about it at all.” Hegemon Azurefiend chortled. “Still… we were able to accumulate quite a good amount of intelligence. It should be enough. The Jadefire Realm was shattered long ago and should no longer pose of much a danger to us. Come, come! Let’s go inside.”

Hegemon Azurefiend immediately transformed into a streak of light and flew inside.

“Let’s go,” Hegemon Oldgem said.

“All together now.”

“Let’s go.” The nine Emperors began to charge into the vast vortex of flames, either singly or in pairs. Soon, all of them had entered the Jadefire Realm.

“There are this many flaming passageways?” After entering the Jadefire Realm, the Emperors saw the countless flaming tunnels off in the distance.

“Which one should we choose?”

“We? Gentlemen, are we still planning to travel together? Haha, I’m more accustomed to moving by myself. I’ll go in first. If I’m the first one to find Daolord Darknorth, the realmship will be mine,” Hegemon Azurefiend laughed wickedly. He immediately charged into one of the flaming passageways next to him. He was the most powerful member of this group of Emperors and thus naturally wasn’t interested in working together with the others.

He refused to believe that he wasn’t able to kill a mere Daolord!

“Let’s go.” Hegemon Dawnruler scanned the area with his three eyes, then took a single step forwards and transformed into golden light that burrowed in a distant flaming passageway.

“Let it all be up to fate.” The bald, grim-faced man dressed in red robes revealed a hint of a smile as he flew into one of the flaming passageways as well.

“Brother Oldgem, let’s travel together?” the silver-haired elder with the ancient stone sword on his back asked.

“Let’s.” Hegemon Oldgem smiled. These two Hegemons flew towards one of the flaming passageways together. These two came from the same realmverse and were on extremely good terms with each other; if they acquired the realmship, they would share it. It wouldn’t really matter who owned it.

“The five Hegemons have all gone inside. We should go as well.” The four remaining Emperors exchanged glances. Soon, they formed into two squads of two which flew into the flaming passageways as well.

……

The hidden control region within the Jadefire Realm. Ning remained seated in midair above the altar, scanning the surrounding area with his gaze. The area around him manifested projections of the flaming passageways of the Jadefire Realm, as well as the nine figures making their way through those passageways. These nine figures had entered the Jadefire Realm together, then had separately entered different passageways. Ning had watched all of this carefully.

“Have they come?” Ning murmured softly, “This first batch is already putting me under quite a bit of pressure.”





* * *





Book 37, Chapter 14 - Bait


Since Ji Ning knew that a host of major powers was coming from the various realmverses for him, he had naturally acquired quite a bit of material and information on his foes. Hegemon Brightshore and Emperor Goldisle had been particularly helpful, introducing detailed information regarding the most famous Hegemons and extremely powerful Emperors of the Sixteen Realmverses Alliance to Ning.

Thus, when Ning ‘saw’ those nine figures appear through the formation-diagram, he was able to recognize them at one go.

“Five of these nine are Hegemons. Hegemon Oldgem and the Paragon of Swords are actually working together? They are all being extremely cautious.” Ning shook his head slowly. “Hegemon Dawnruler… Hegemon Everworry… hey, this should be Hegemon Azurefiend.”

Ning’s gaze focused upon the figure of the latter. Hegemon Azurefiend was flying carefully through the flaming passageways, his eyes glowing with cold light as he carefully scanned the area in front of him. Hegemon Azurefiend was even using a pair of rope-type magic treasures to scout the path ahead for himself.

“Supposedly, Hegemon Azurefiend is one of the several foreign Hegemons taking part in this escapade.” Ning carefully scrutinized Hegemon Azurefiend. Based on what he knew, there were differences in power between Hegemons; Hegemon Brightshore, for example, was the number one Hegemon of the Flamedragon Realmverse! Even in the Sixteen Realmverses Alliance, Hegemon Brightshore was powerful enough to rank in the top five.

But of course, there was no way to rank anyone in greater detail than that, as most of the Hegemons had never actually battled each other. Rough rankings could only be based on the performance they had shown in the past, which was why Realmslord Windgrace was acknowledged to be the absolute strongest. Next came the likes of Hegemon Brightshore.

Hegemon Windrain and Hegemon Netherlily were considered fairly ‘ordinary’ Hegemons in the Sixteen Realmverses Alliance.

“Hegemon Azurefiend is extremely famous! Supposedly, he was born a Chaos Godbeast and has a strange temperament. He’s extremely powerful and ranks highly even amongst Hegemons,” Ning mused. “Based on what the intelligence reports tell me, he should be even stronger than Hegemon Netherlily and Hegemon Windrain. He should be the strongest of the five Hegemons in this batch.”

In the Sixteen Realmverses Alliance, there were only a few figures capable of suppressing Hegemon Azurefiend in power! “Hegemon Azurefiend, eh?” Several thoughts flickered through Ning’s mind.

“I’ll feign weakness first. These five Hegemons only constitute a small percentage of the Hegemons who will be coming, after all. The only trump card I have up my sleeve is my control over the flaming passageways; once I reveal it, the Hegemons and Emperors who arrive later will only be even more careful. They might even all travel together. That’ll make things very troublesome for me,” Ning mused.