Desolate Era (Book 41 - Book 45)

Slaaaash! Sword-light descended, annihilating all within its path. The upper body of the giant cyclopean bear was completely destroyed by this strike.

“Ahhh!” The giant cyclopean bear was completely terrified. Thankfully it had kept its life-core within its lower left leg, and its entire lower body remained within the ninth layer of clouds. As a result, it was sable to survive this strike. The three had only agreed to expose part of their giant bodies, precisely because their life-cores were what really mattered the most.

Swoosh! The vast sword stabbed straight into the ninth layer of gray clouds. It shuddered slightly, seeking to tear through the surrounding area and rip apart the hundreds of millions of kilometers of clouds.

“Eh?” Thanks to the divine sword, Ning immediately sensed a powerful force resisting him. “Bolin was right. The ninth and outermost layer of clouds is so incredibly durable that ordinary Autarchs have no chance of destroying it at all. Even though we’re joining our power together and summoning the might of the Chaosverse itself, we’d probably only be able to cut apart a hundred thousand kilometers of it.

Autarchs were completely unable to breach the ninth layer of clouds, while a full-force blow from this divine sword was able to break through a hundred thousand kilometers of it. This was a testament to the sword’s might! The more of the clouds you wanted to destroy, the more power was needed.

“Titanos, help me keep the rift in the clouds open,” Ning sent mentally.

“Leave that to me!” Titanos sent the black serpent in to cover the rift while sending back, “I’ll leave the attack against the world of grass to you!”

The towering black serpent slithered its way into the tear within the gray clouds, its five heads slowly swiveling around its body and keeping the tear open, preventing the gray clouds from covering it back up again! It must be understood that once the tear was closed, Ning’s squad wouldn’t even be able to sense the insides of the Grassland World, much less maintain the sword and continue to fuel it with their mana. They had to keep the tear open and prevent it from closing!

The black serpent was filled with unearthly power, but it was only able to just barely maintain a thousand-kilometer sized rift.

“Sever the connection to the outside world! Quick! Sever it!” the red-robed man shouted frantically. The Grassland World truly was a complete world unto itself and as such could be completely detached from the rest of the Chaosverse, making it impossible for the Chaosverse to sense and detect it. The two men and the woman inside the Grassland World were absolutely horrified at the power of that sword.

“There’s no way to break the link!” the silver-robed woman said frantically. “That black serpent is preventing the clouds from reforming. We can’t break the connection!”

“Not good! That sword is about to attack!” the black-robed man bellowed.

The giant black serpent continued to hold the gray clouds apart within the ninth layer, while the mighty sword transformed to become incomparably vast as it stabbed downwards.

Boom! The tip of the sword stabbed through the eighth layer, then the seventh layer, the sixth layer…

Clang! A violet-gold chain suddenly appeared out of nowhere. The dazzling iridescent chain flew towards the black serpent which was holding the rift in the clouds open, and it was quickly followed by yet another chain as well. The violet-gold chains launched continuous attacks against the giant black serpent. If they were able to destroy it, the clouds would close over and sever the tip of the sword from the outside world, preventing it from controlled and thus causing it to collapse on its own.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

More and more violet-gold chains appeared.

“Hm?” The hilt of the absolutely titanic sword remained within the ninth layer of clouds, while the tip of the sword continued to stab downwards.

“Break!” Ning caused a series of sharp surges of sword-ki to fly out from the hilt of the sword. Each stream of sword-ki was shaped like a fish, and a total of thirty-six swordfishes quickly flew out and took up blocking positions before the black serpent. They then began to swim together to form a whirlpool of sword-light which smashed outwards at the encroaching violet-gold chains.

These thirty-six streams of sword-ki merely represented 20% of the divine sword’s power, but this defensive sword-technique in the form of a vortex of sword-light was still enough to suppress all of the attacking chains.

By now, there were nine violet-gold chains which were furiously assaulting the whirlpool of sword-light, only to be unable to break through.

“Break! Break! Break!” The toughest layer of clouds was the ninth one. With the black serpent maintaining the tear, the other eight layers were now much easier for the gigantic sword to stab through.

Boom! Boom! Boom! The sword continued to penetrate one layer of clouds after another.

“This sword is too powerful! These native Autarchs must have come together and used something akin to a Daoguard Tower which allows them to summon the power of the Chaosverse, then had Emperor Darknorth merge all of these disparate energies together with his Omega Sword Dao. This sword is so powerful that not even all three of us working together can stop it!” The two men and the woman hidden in the center of the Grassland World began to grow a bit nervous.

“If I knew that this was going to happen, I would’ve had us rendezvous with Iyerre before coming here. Iyerre could’ve dealt with these problems,” the silver-robed woman said anxiously.

Iyerre had instructed them to go rescue the Sithe Exalts, while he himself was coming from a completely different region of the Chaosverse. As a result, their reunion was delayed.

“He was overconfident in his Grassland World,” the red-robed man said frantically. “That sword is about to pierce through the last layer of clouds!”

“We’re hidden here in the depths of the Grassland World, while the sword isn’t able to blink through the earth above us. There’s no way it’ll be able to injure us,” the black-robed man said coldly.

“But if we let them cause destruction unchecked, they might end up destroying some of the important components of the Grassland World. Once we lose this weapon, the upcoming battles will be even harder,” the red-robed man said.

“Hmph. That’s not our problem. Staying alive is what matters; losing a weapon is a minor matter. We’ve done our utmost,” the black-robed man said.

……

Ning’s sword was filled with the power of seven Autarch-class combatants. It started at the eighth layer of clouds and stabbed through one layer after another. The clouds sought to form whirlpools of defensive energy to resist, causing the sword to come under tremendous pressure, but it was still able to persevere… and so, just like that, it punched all the way through the first layer of clouds.

“Bolin, return immediately!” Ning sent mentally. Bolin’s true body was hidden within the first layer of clouds.





Book 44, Chapter 27 - Quintessence Ignition


The towering divine sword had stabbed through all eight layers of clouds. Mana flowed through the area immediately around it, blasting away at its surroundings. This was the combined mana of Ji Ning, Autarch Titanos, Autarch Bolin, and all of the others. For their mana to be there was equivalent to them being there in person, and they could use mana to scan and scry an area. Every single drop of mana contained parts of their soul and truesoul, after all. As their mana surged through the area, it quickly covered the area where Autarch Bolin’s true body was located.