Desolate Era

by RWX

  “Kill! Kill!” She continued to growl this single word as she reached out once more, her fingers moving like a blur to latch onto yet another Silver Goldhorn. Her long, slender white fingers once more clenched tightly, shattering that second Silver Goldhorn.

  She was going to kill and destroy everything she saw. By now, she no longer had any clarity of mind; she had gone completely mad. In fact, she had been driven mad and transformed into a creature that only lived for murder even before she had been sealed away by the Daoguard Tower.

  “Poor woman.” Ning watched silently from afar as he continued to use his sword-light to keep the Silver Goldhorns at bay.

  Time flowed on. Some of the Silver Goldhorns began to flee, but the Sword Dao Domain gave them nowhere to run. Ning drove each and every one of them towards the nagapede, which crushed all of them! There was no point in him subduing and collecting them, after all, to this very day, the cultivators were still unable to find a method for controlling the Silver Goldhorns.

  Crunch! Crunch! Crunch! One of the stone pythons was captured by the nagapede, which latched onto it with both hands and tugged at it fiercely to no avail. The nagapede then lowered her head to bite the stone python. CRUNCH! This time, the stone python was broken into two halves.

  After roughly the time needed to boil a kettle of tea, all of the Silver Goldhorns and both of the stone pythons had been slain by the titanic nagapede. As for Ning, thus far he had merely maintained his Sword Dao Domain without actually exchanging blows against the creature.

  “Kill!” The nagapede focused her full attention upon the distant Ning and the Paragon of Pills. They were the only living creatures left in the region.

  “Mistress, please enter my estate-world for a short while,” Ning said.

  The Paragon knew that she couldn’t afford to be a distraction to Ning. She immediately said, “Be careful.” This was definitely the most terrifying creature she had ever seen. She had thought that the Silver Goldhorns were tough, but this giant ‘nagapede’ had crushed them like bugs.

  “Don’t worry.” Ning waved his hand, collecting the Paragon into his estate-world.

  “Kill! KILL! KILL!!!” the titanic nagapede howled, charging towards Ning. There was simply no way for the Sword Dao Domain to hold her back.

  Clang! Ning drew a Northbow sword, then murmured softly to himself, “I hope I’m lucky enough to be able to get rid of her within three strikes.”

  The giant nagapede scuttled forwards towards Ning, emanating an aura of earth-shaking power that was far more baleful than even the Blazesun Ruler’s. In the Infinite Void outside the Chaosverses, she had annihilated an entire celestial body in just this manner. She definitely stood at the very apex of power amongst the creatures that resided in the Infinite Void, but upon being captured she had been converted into an insane beast that lived for slaughter.

  Unfortunately for Ning, being in this Chaosverse hadn’t lessened her power at all! This was because her power came from her own body, rather than the power of the Dao. As a result, there was virtually no difference in power between when she was in the Infinite Void and when she was in a Chaosverse.

  Swoosh! A streak of dazzling golden sword-light appeared, swiping forwards in a completely unblockable manner. It pierced straight into the titanic nagapede’s body, which was unable to impede it despite being extremely tough.

  Slash! Slash! Slash! Sword-light appeared a total of six times inside of her body. Finally, she trembled and her eyes turned dim. Her gigantic body quickly began to shrink as it came to a halt in midair. A streak of light flew out from the injury to her chest. It was Ning, Northbow sword in hand.

  “I had to attack a total of six times before I was able to land a fatal blow.” Clink! Ning resheathed the Northbow sword back into the scabbard.

  “Every part of this creature is an absolute treasure and has many uses.” Ning waved his hand, pulling the giant body of the nagapede into his estate-world. Next, he released Azurefiend and the Paragon of Pills.

  “Darknorth, just now I believe I saw the nagapede’s corpse appear within your estate-world.” The Paragon of Pills had a look of surprise and delight on her face when she appeared. She immediately inspected Ning carefully. “You disposed of it quite quickly. It seems you truly have reached an unfathomable level of power.”

  “Long ago, the Autarchs informed me of the weak spots these creatures possess. That made it much easier for me to deal with this one,” Ning said. Only a fool would’ve engaged the creature in a ‘proper’ battle. These creatures all had weak spots inside their bodies, but their outer shells were so tough that only Ning and the Autarchs were able to dispose of them with ease.

  The short creature who had been in control of the Daoguard Tower had hoped that the powerful creature would be able to exhaust Ning and cause his death in such a manner. In truth, he couldn’t be blamed for this belief. Amongst the Sithe, he was a low status servant who had never before encountered a Daolord who had failed the Daomerge yet was in control of an Eternal Omega Dao. He was operating on guesswork when he believed that the nagapede would be able to exhaust Ning, and indeed if Ning knew nothing at all about the nagapede then she really would’ve proven to be rather troublesome. The nagapede had been the short creature’s only hope of dealing with Darknorth… but it had fallen far short.

  “Darknorth, is it time to rescue Annihilation?” the Paragon of Pills asked.

  “Not just yet. Right now, it’ll be quite hard to break through those dimensions to rescue them,” Ning said. The sealed dimensions had been rearranged to form the Dimensional Hallway Chains, which were extremely difficult to break through. “These dimensions were all extremely stable because they drew power from the Daoguard Tower. Now that the Daoguard Tower has been destroyed, they will be like rivers which are running dry. They won’t be able to replenish any of the energy which they have used up. Eventually, they’ll transform back into ordinary space which can be torn through with ease.”

  “Now… let’s go take a look at what’s inside the ruins of the Daoguard Tower.” As Ning spoke, he began to fly towards the shattered remnants of the toppled Daoguard Tower.

  * * *

  Book 41, Chapter 9 - Sweeping the Loot

  Ji Ning, the Paragon of Pills, and Azurefiend flew over together. All eight floors of the tower had already crumbled apart, with the shattered remnants of the tower forming a pile of rubble atop a foundation of dirt that hovered there in space.

  “Darknorth, why is it that the Daoguard Tower crumbled without you even attacking it?” The Paragon of Pills was puzzled. “I distinctly remember that it collapsed on its own.”

  “This Daoguard Tower wasn’t all that strong; I expect that its owner was just a Hegemon,” Ning said. “It would be too difficult for him to personally subdue a nagapede like that, and so he used the entire Daoguard Tower to keep it sealed and suppressed! So long as the tower was in good shape, the creature would be unable to break free… but once the tower began to crumble, the nagapede would appear and massacre everything around it.”

  The Paragon of Pills nodded slowly.

  “Now, if this was an Exalt’s Daoguard Tower, we really would’ve been in much more trouble.” Ning let out a sigh. “Still, we’re merely in the outer perimeter of the Sithelands. Almost all of the Daoguard Towers owned by Sithe Exalts are located in the heartland.”

  “The Sithe heartland?” The Paragon said, “I’ve visited the Sithelands on many occasions. I could sense that spacetime was in a state of complete disorder and that there were many places that were unexplored.”

  “Those places were never meant for cultivators to challenge,” Ning said. Very few knew the true details and secrets behind the Dawn War. The Paragon of Pills naturally didn’t know the secrets either. Yes, she had learned a few things thanks to her crazy, repeated adventures within the Sithelands, but the heartland was a place which not even the Autarchs would dare trespass lightly.

  Rumble… as Ning flew towards the toppled tower
, his Sword Dao Domain rippled outwards, brushing away the pieces of rubble as he closely inspected the remains of the tower.

  “Now this is a fun little toy.” Ning removed a dark red globe which had been affixed to one of the top floors. This globe was the object which had unleashed that terrifying attack of light.

  “Once it accumulates and stores enough energy, it can unleash an attack of incredible power.” Ning chuckled. “This is a decent Sithe weapon, Mistress. Azurefiend, help me search through the rubble. I want to sweep this place clean.”

  “Heh heh, my pleasure! Master, perhaps you would be willing to bestow some of the treasures you are uninterested in upon me,” Azurefiend said, a look of utter shamelessness on his wizened old features.

  “Depends on my mood.” Ning chuckled. He wasn’t just going to give this shameless old man what he wanted.

  “I’ve never encountered a Daoguard Tower before. In fact, I’ve never even heard of it before you mentioned it.” The Paragon of Pills was filled with curiosity as well. The dangers she had experienced here, especially the terrifying nagapede, had all served to ensure that she understood that this site was very different from the other Sithe ruins she had visited in the past.

  The previous ruins she had scoured had been unoccupied. This time, she ran into one with a controller. If it hadn’t been for Ning, she truly would’ve been doomed this time.

  Boom! Bang! Rip! Ning, Azurefiend, and the Paragon of Pills happily dismantled the remainders of the Daoguard Tower, taking out all usable Sithe artifacts and even a few unusable ones.

  ……

  Daoguard Towers were exclusively employed by extremely powerful Sithe, who placed many of their treasures inside the towers. Some of the weapons could even come together in incredibly powerful combinations.

  During the previous battle, Ning hadn’t even entered the Daoguard tower. As a result, many of the powerful internal defenses hadn’t even been used! None of the external weapons were capable of killing Ning from a distance of a billion kilometers. At this distance, Ning was able to dodge with ease even the quickest of attacks. Otherverse Lords might not be able to dodge, but Ning was a different story.

  “Not bad.”

  “This one is decent.”

  “Now this hammer is scary powerful.” Ning and the other two continued to loot the tower, with Azurefiend and the Paragon of Pills occasionally testing out the items they found.

  The Paragon of Pills was fairly blasé, as she had adventured through the Sithelands many times and already owned multiple Sithe weapons. Azurefiend, however, didn’t own any Sithe weapons at all. Even the suppressive black chains were merely on loan from Ning, who had yet to actually ‘gift’ them.

  After spending a full hour combing through the ruins, the team completely looted the area clean. They even took many fragments which were completely unusable. They found a total of twenty-one usable Sithe weapons, and they all had different effects. Some were actually used to scry and scan.

  “That is a lot of fine weapons,” Azurefiend said excitedly.

  “We found so much treasure from this one site.” The Paragon of Pills was delighted as well.

  Ning, however, was rather disappointed. “Is this it? This is much less than what I expected. We didn’t find a single major artifact at all.”

  Realmslord Windgrace’s ‘Blacksun’, the castle that was used to defend the Three Realms, the city of Houwu in the Blazesun Domain, the Blazesun Ruler’s giant warship… all these counted as ‘major artifacts’. In contrast, the treasures which Ning had acquired after combing through the tower were all quite mediocre. There wasn’t even a single major artifact. All of the treasures combined were probably just barely on par with the Blacksun in value.

  “This is already a good haul,” the Paragon of Pills said.

  “No. According to the Autarchs’ records, even the most ordinary of Daoguard Towers would have more than this,” Ning said. “I suspected early on that the original owner of the Daoguard Tower had slipped away long ago. Now, I’m sure of it. The original owner must have taken the most valuable treasures out of the Daoguard Tower, leaving behind just the ones he was unable to physically remove from the tower itself.”

  The Paragon of Pills cast a puzzled glance at the armor and items left behind by the deceased short creature. “Isn’t that dead Sithe the owner?”

  “Probably not,” Ning said. “A mere roar from the nagapede was enough to transform him into dust. He probably wasn’t at the Hegemon level of power! Mistress, you might not know this, but amongst the Sithe only Hegemons can build Daoguard Towers. And, to be more precise, only an incredibly small fraction of Hegemons are qualified to do this.”

  In the Sithe Chaosverse, weak Eternal Emperors were all permitted to build their own Daoguard towers… but here, they were invaders! They had invaded Ning’s Chaosverse, and their resources were extremely limited. Building Daoguard Towers was extremely difficult, and erecting a weak one was pointless. Thus, only the most supreme of Sithe Hegemons as well as the Sithe Exalts were permitted to build Daoguard Towers, which they used as focal points for massacring unsuspecting cultivators.

  “Azurefiend, go and bind the estate-world that Sithe left behind. Let’s see if there are any interesting treasures inside of it,” Ning said.

  “Right on.” Azurefiend excitedly flew over and began to bind the estate-world. Right now, he was on his absolute best behavior in front of Ning. This was partially due to Ning’s overwhelming power, partially to convince Ning to give him more pointers, and partially because he hoped that he might be lucky enough to receive a Sithe treasure reward from Ning.

  “Whoah.” Azurefiend’s wizened old face suddenly twisted in shock, his eyes bulging out. “That is a LOT.”

  “Wipe that freaky look off your face. What treasures does it hold?” Ning laughed.

  “So all the treasures were hidden here! Master, take a look at all these treasures!” Azurefiend waved his hand, causing a series of treasures to appear and levitate in the air before them. Light shone from the Paragon of Pills’ eyes, and even the formerly-calm Ning revealed a look of shock.

  Twenty… twenty-one… twenty-two… a total of twenty-nine treasures appeared before them. There were even TWO realmships in this cache!

  “So all the good treasures were here.” The Paragon of Pills let out an amazed sigh, then turned to stare with shock at a gray spear that was covered with a fiery red floral pattern. “Isn’t that the Exterminatus Spear of the Almighty Seeker of Defeat?”

  “The Exterminatus Spear?” Azurefiend was shocked as well. He stared intently at the spear, then said, “Paragon, are you sure? Is it possible that this is another, similar weapon?”

  “There’s no way I’m wrong about this. When the Almighty Seeker of Defeat first acquired this spear, it didn’t have that red floral pattern on it. The Seeker added it later on. Supposedly, he put that fiery red floral pattern on every single weapon he used. The floral pattern probably had some sort of special meaning for him.” The Paragon of Pills shook her head. “He died long ago, and I heard he died in the Sithelands. I never would’ve thought that he actually died here.”

  Ning nodded. “That explains it all. Most of these treasures were probably left behind by the cultivators who invaded this place over the course of many aeons. That short Sithe collected all of their treasures after killing them. I was wondering why there were TWO realmships in that estate-world. It seems that they came from slain cultivators.”

  The Paragon of Pills let out a sigh.

  “Mistress, take whatever you need,” Ning said with a laugh.

  “To be honest, these are of no use to me.” The Paragon of Pills looked at Ning. “Darknorth, I think you know what I want above all else. As for these treasures? Even if I took all of them, they probably still wouldn’t be enough to convince an Autarch to help me out.”

  * * *

  Book 41, Chapter 10 - Space Sword Dao

  “I have a request to make. I know it is a bit ex
cessive, but I truly am out of options.” The Paragon of Pills looked at Ji Ning. “I have no choice but to shamelessly ask you to help me out, Darknorth. Please ask an Autarch to revive those three brothers of mine.”

  The Paragon of Pills rarely begged others. She was, by nature, an extremely proud person. However, reviving her three brothers was virtually her entire reason for existence, something which she wanted above everything else. It was much like how Ning desperately wished to be able to revive his wife Yu Wei!

  The Paragon of Pills had repeatedly risked her life in diving into the Sithe ruins, but she still wasn’t even close to having as much treasure as the Autarch had demanded for his aid. The Autarch had asked for a thousand realmships worth of treasure! This was an incredible request, so high as to cause her to feel despair. This was why she had become even more crazed in her pursuit of treasure.

  Now, she was able to sense hope when she looked at Ning. She viewed Ning as she would a son, and in her heart she truly didn’t want to ask this of him. However, she really was out of options. Thus, she had ‘shamelessly’ begged him for help.

  “Mistress.” Ning knew how the Paragon of Pills felt. He smiled. “Mistress, don’t worry. I’ll definitely go ask the Autarchs to help out. I can’t speak on their behalf, but I can say that there is a 90% chance they’ll agree.”

  “90% chance?” The Paragon’s heart swelled with indescribable excitement. Even her face turned ruddy.

  She had been waiting for far, far too long. For the sake of this goal, she had nearly driven herself insane. In pursuit of this goal, she had accomplished many things which were viewed as miracles. When she had first gained eternity, she was an ordinary Eternal Emperor, not a Hegemon… but she had managed to slowly train to the Hegemon level, then reach incredibly high levels of skill in many different Daos. All of this was for the sake of reviving her three brothers.

  Ning smiled upon seeing this. The reason why he had said there was a 90% chance was merely because he hadn’t actually asked any of the Autarchs yet. In truth, Ning knew that the Autarchs were desperately looking for ways to help him out in order to express their gratitude. Bring something back to life? This was a fairly minor ask. So long as it was possible, the Autarchs would definitely agree!