Desolate Era (Book 41 - Book 45)

The black-robed Ning was alongside the avatars of Autarch Titanos and Autarch Mogg. They had been searching for many years for a way to break into the hidden dimension. During this period of time, all the other Autarchs had also come over to give it a try, but none of them were able to lock onto the exact location of that hidden dimension.

“Autarch Titanos. Autarch Mogg.” Ning asked hurriedly, “Autarchs, have you heard of nine special techniques which the Sithe once bestowed upon their progeny?”

“We know of this, yes.” Autarch Titanos nodded slowly. “During the Dawn War, we actually fought against a number of Sithe descendants during our war against the Sithe. All of them were completely loyal to the Sithe and they fought like rabid dogs. Most of us were filled with bloodlust at the time and showed them no mercy at all. The only one who actually held back and captured a few of them was Autarch Skyfeeder. When she reviewed their memories, she came to learn that the Sithe had once transmitted nine special techniques to them, but all of those techniques were failures.”

The nearby Autarch Mogg nodded. “Most likely, the Sithe wanted to mass-produce a large number of Hegemons or perhaps even Autarchs! They could have their descendants swear lifeblood oaths to never rebel against them, after all. If they succeeded, they would be able to draw power from our Chaosverse… at which point, they could murder those descendants and steal their power, weakening our Chaosverse.”

Ning nodded.

“But they failed. As for those nine techniques, we wanted to find them to see if there was anything which might inspire us,” Autarch Titanos said, “But after the Dawn War concluded, we were unable to find any traces of Sithe descendants, and so we had nowhere to start.”

“What about the ones Autarch Skyfeeder captured?” Ning asked.

“All of them swore lifeblood oaths to never transmit those techniques. When we tried to forcibly rip the techniques out of their memories, their truesouls crumbled apart.” Autarch Titanos shook his head. “Given that we were unable to find any more Sithe progeny after this, we let the matter rest.”

Ning quickly understood. Sithe progeny were quite rare, and it was also fairly hard to recognize them at a glance. They looked just like ordinary cultivators, after all! The Autarchs couldn’t just spend their time wandering the cosmos and flipping through the memories of cultivators at random, right?

“The Sithe descendants.” Ning knew that many of the weaker Sithe descendants in the hidden dimension had never even heard of those nine techniques, much less studied them! The only ones who might truly know those techniques were the high-status Sithe who had been along for a long period of time. Those were generally at the Emperor level.

“I have to spend some time searching this hidden dimension and do my best to find those nine techniques,” Ning mused.

……

The Sacred Realm. The Elder Hall.

The blue-haired Exalt remained seated upon his throne, with a large number of Emperors and Hegemons gathered before him. Some of them were true Sithe, while some had been raised and trained over the course of countless years within this enormous hidden region. The Sithe had put quite a bit of effort into rearing these descendants, and their success rates were significantly higher than what the native cultivators were used to.

“Ever since the Dawn War ended… I, Exalt Bowenya, have been stationed in this dimension. I have been here for a very, very long time.” The blue-haired Exalt stared downwards, then continued slowly, “I feel a sense of deep attachment to this dimension, and I truly do not wish for trouble to occur here. In fact, I don’t even wish for a second war to begin against the cultivators.”

“However… that isn’t a choice I can make! Nor is that a choice any of you can make!” The blue-haired youth stared downwards at them. “A terrifying Daolord has arisen amongst the cultivators, and we have only one choice available to us… kill him!”

“If we can kill him, even sacrificing this entire dimension would be worth it.” The blue-haired youth let out a sigh. “I know that this place is home for many of you Hegemons… and I view it as home as well. I’ve spent the majority of my long life here. Life here has been peaceful and gentle. I don’t want to give it up.”

“But once this Daolord came here, our peaceful life came to an end.” The blue-haired youth’s voice rang out within the Elder Hall, and all of the silent Hegemons and Emperors began to emanate a murderous aura.

Some wanted to kill the Daolord for the great rewards they would be given… but most hated the fact that he had come here and embroiled them in war once more! They didn’t want to fight… but not even Exalts would dare to violate the standing orders of the most supreme Sithe!”





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Book 42, Chapter 1 - Hawkfang


“Exalt, who in the world is this white-robed Daolord? Why must we sacrifice everything for the sake of killing him?” One of the many Hegemons below the Exalt, a Sithe descendant, couldn’t help but ask this question. To this very day, the Sithe descendants had no idea what ‘a Daolord who has mastered an Eternal Omega Dao’ truly represented for the Sithe. In truth, the Sithe didn’t dare to tell their descendants too much either!

In the end, their descendants were native to this Chaosverse and had grown up here. Strictly speaking, it was destined for them to be unable to walk the same path together, and so they were purposefully kept in the dark regarding many things. As a result, they now felt that this was completely incomprehensible and not worth them losing their lives over!

“Right, Exalt! We had thought that killing him would be very easy, but Purgatory was defeated even after we gave it a pair of Apocalypse-class treasures. This Daolord is too powerful! Aside from the three Elder Halls, we don’t have any treasures that are superior to the ones we already sent down, but the three Elder Halls are immobile. If we want to proactively attack him, we’ll be at a huge disadvantage. Many of us will probably die.”

“We can simply keep him exiled in Purgatory and wait for his truesoul to collapse. He’ll still die, right? Why is it necessary for us to pay such an enormous price?”

“Why do we have to fight with him to the death?”

“Is such an enormous price truly worth it?” The Sithe descendants voiced their arguments, one by one. The true Sithe were silent. They knew the details behind this, but they didn’t dare to expose them! They had been ordered long ago to restrict the amount of contact between them and their descendants, for fear of their descendants learning the ‘truth’ and losing faith.

“Worth it?” The blue-haired youth, ‘Exalt Bowenya’, let out a soft sigh from atop his throne. “Yes… I, too, feel that it isn’t worth it.” Exalt Bowenya stared downwards. “But I’ve already told you everything I can. The things I have left unsaid, I have done so because I am not permitted to! If I told you the truth, I would be violating Sithe laws and my truesoul would be annihilated.”

“All you need to know is this! Our dimension may seem large, but we are nothing more than a small part of the Sithe race and empire. This is nothing more than a small part of Sithe territory.” Exalt Bowenya waved a finger, causing an image to appear in midair of the white-robed Daolord. “As for him… he is of grave importance to the entire Sithe civilization. We have to destroy him and then capture his truesoul. This will be an enormous accomplishment for our race! Sacrificing our entire hidden dimension will be worth it, yes. Even if the sacrifice was greater, it would still be worth it.”

Everyone below fell silent. The Sithe descendants also knew that they were nothing more than a small part of the massive Sithe empire as a whole.