Desolate Era (Book 41 - Book 45)

He had an extremely strange personality and temperament. He was the undisputed hegemon of these sixty-three islands, and countless living beings had been tortured to death by him. He delighted in torture, in hearing their final screams and cries. This was what made him smile, and was the reason why he was known as the ‘Archfiend’.

A smile on his face, he watched the beautiful women dance while listening to the viperous curses and blubbering wails of his prisoners.

“Those fools. All of them ran off to the Sacred Realm, and for what? The Sacred Realm has many powerful experts there; we’d be nothing more than the crust on their boots,” Archfiend Huabo mused. “Staying behind is a much better decision. I’m virtually invincible here and can do whatever I want. Isn’t that wonderful? As for the Daomerge… hmph! Did they really think they would succeed in the Daomerge just because major powers in the Sacred Realm will provide them guidance? I hear that their success rates remain pitifully low.”

“Staying behind is definitely the better choice, ehehe… tomorrow, I’ll go capture a few more people. The ones in the prison have almost all died out by now.” Archfiend Huabo was in a superb mood. As for the beautiful dancers, all of them were quivering in fear, even if none of them dared to reveal it. They did their best to please the almighty Archfiend, for fear of being tortured to death as well.

Suddenly, a total of six people walked into the hall. The dance came to a halt, and the smile on Archfiend Huabo’s face suddenly froze. Even the steam coming from the cup of mulled wine by his side froze in midair. Time itself seemed to stop.

The six figures walking in were Ji Ning, the Paragon of Pills, Azurefiend, Hegemon Tia, Hegemon Flameleft, and Lord Annihilation.

Ning’s Sword Dao Domain had sealed down spacetime itself, causing time to freeze completely. The dancers and the Archfiend would have no recollection at all of what happened in this moment.

“Let’s take a look at their memories.” Ning was able to easily rifle through this Daolord’s memories. He finished after a few moments, then fell completely silent.

“How does it look?” The others all looked at Ning.

“This is going to be troublesome,” Ning said, then chuckled. “But we knew that from the beginning. Simply put, this Daolord’s memories indicate that this hidden dimension has a total of six ‘realms’ where mortals live, as well as an exalted ‘Sacred Realm’ and an evil, desolate ‘Purgatory’.”

“Together, the six mortal worlds, the Sacred Realm, and Purgatory form this entire hidden dimension,” Ning said. “At least, that’s what he believes and his memories indicate.”

“The six mortal realms are all extremely vast and are filled with countless mortals and many cultivators. However, only cultivators who become Samsara Daolords are qualified to enter the Sacred Realm! Of course, there are many Samsara Daolords who choose to stay behind in the six mortal realms instead, but if they DO succeed in the Daomerge and become Eternal Emperors, they are required to enter the Sacred Realm,” Ning said. “If they do not, then major powers shall descend from the Sacred Realm to capture and then punish them.”

The Paragon of Pills frowned: “It seems as though the ‘Sacred Realm’ is where all the major powers of this hidden dimension are gathered. What of this ‘Purgatory’, then?”

“The Purgatory is the place where extremely evil people and people who are being punished by the major powers shall be exiled to! That place is both dangerous and desolate,” Ning said. “My guess is that the most important parts of this dimension reside within the ‘Sacred Realm’!”

The most powerful people present in the six mortal realms were Daolords of the Fourth Step. The Sacred Realm was where the true major powers had gathered, which meant that there was a 99% chance that the core control mechanisms of this hidden dimension were located there as well.

“Are the countless living beings of this dimension truly Sithe progeny? And what is the history of this place?” Hegemon Flameleft asked.

“That’s not information a Daolord of the Fourth Step like him would know,” Ning said with a chuckle. “What we need to do is to head into the Sacred Realm!”

The Sacred Realm… it was undoubtedly filled with many major powers and terrifying Sithe traps. Ning wouldn’t be surprised if it had ten Daoguard Towers within it! Once they headed off to the Sacred Realm, a war would probably break out.

“How can we get there?” Azurefiend asked.

“Through the ‘Realmgate’,” Ning said. “However, now is not yet the time. Let’s wait for the Mistress’ three brothers to be revived before we head off to the Realmgate and enter the Sacred Realm.”

The Paragon of Pills smiled.

“Let’s go.” Ning glanced at Archfiend Huabo, who was still seated on his throne with a frozen grin on his face, then waved a finger. A streak of sword-light shot out, passing through the Archfiend’s skull and destroying his soul and truesoul. From this day forth, Archfiend Huabo, who had been the hegemon of these sixty-three islands for countless years, died as a result of people who literally came out of nowhere. Even as he died, he had no idea what was happening or who was killing him.

“M-master… you already looked through his memories. Why’d you kill him?” Azurefiend stared.

“It was precisely because I looked through his memories that I killed him.” Ning shook his head and muttered, “Absolutely filthy. I really couldn’t help myself.”

Ning’s group quietly slipped away, leaving behind a palace in a state of chaos.





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Book 41, Chapter 16 - Spacetime Reversal Resurrection


Roughly five months after Ji Ning’s group had first been sent into this hidden dimension, Autarch Skyfeeder brought the avatars of the Paragon of Pills and Lord Annihilation to the otherverse they resided in. It was time to begin the process of reversing spacetime and reviving those three Emperors.

Lord Annihilation’s otherverse. The Archaeus Region. The Prime Reaches of the Genesis Lands.

This was a place filled with corpses, all of whom had failed in the struggle over the control of this otherverse.

The gentle-eyed and slightly plump Autarch Skyfeeder glanced at the various Emperor-class corpses within the Prime Reaches as the avatars of the Paragon and Lord Annihilation stood respectfully to one side.

“Looks like this was quite a bitter battle,” Autarch Skyfeeder said. “This is an otherverse which I created extremely, extremely early on. I didn’t put it within the Eight Domains, which is why only a few Hegemons took part in this struggle.”

The Blazesun Domain and the rest of the Eight Domains had so many experts present that the members of most squads were usually at the Hegemonic level. Every so often, you would also see an Otherverse Lord or someone in control of a powerful Sithe weapon. Thus, when two competing teams found an otherverse to fight over, the battle would involve ten or so Hegemons!

However, the Prime Reaches here only held three Hegemonic corpses, as well as quite a few ordinary Eternal Emperors. It was indeed a bitter battle, but the power of the combatants involved was somewhat lower than what would be seen in the Eight Domains.