Desolate Era

The nine black chains wrapped themselves around Ji Ning’s Heaven Punisher, which was hacking away with two divine swords against them to no avail, causing just a few spatial ripples.

“Not good.” Ning saw True Immortal Crimsonjoy pull out that red jade bottle from afar. Ning didn’t hesitate at all.

“Come out!” Ning had originally been planning to continue to hide his full power in the hopes of finding an opportunity to deliver the Seamless Gate a vicious less, but he could no longer afford to do that. Although he could call out senior Redsnow and the rest of the seven Empyrean Gods at any time, that was a waste of their tremendous power. Once they joined forces to form the Seven Planets God, only True Gods or Daofathers could suppress them. A force like theirs could completely change the entire course of the war for the Grand Xia. Until things were absolutely critical, Ning wasn’t willing to use them.

Swish! Swish!

Two Immortal swords suddenly appeared out of nowhere, manifesting within Ning’s Heaven Punisher’s hands. These were two of the top-grade Pure Yang ‘Ananda World-Swords’. These were true Immortal swords, unlike the ‘Splitter’ artifacts that merely transformed into that shape. As a result, they were somewhat more powerful when one used sword-arts. At the same time, and for the first time, Ning applied his heartforce to his soul.

Rumble…

His heartforce served as the commander, with the power of his soul as its soldiers. In a very harmonious manner, all of the potential power of the soul was summoned and applied, and his control over the Heaven Punisher and the amount of power it could unleash was instantly increased.

Ning’s Heaven Punisher instantly more than tripled in strength…and this was with Ning having yet to even reach the ‘expert’ level in soul heartforce.

“Break! BREAK!” Ning’s Heaven Punisher wielded the two Ananda World-Swords with full power as he chopped downwards with them, transforming them into dazzling streaks of bloody light that transformed into a divine blood dragon. The two Immortal swords, now appearing to be two enormous bloody dragons, wildly assaulted the assaulting black chains.

The eleventh stance of the [Three-Foot Sword] – Dragons Warring in the Wild!

This stance encompassed the profound insights Ning had gained into the Dao of the Sword.

This stance encompassed the eighteen years of wild battles he had experienced in the Nihilum Zone.

This stance also encompassed all of the determination and decisiveness Ning had gained over the course of three years of war on the behalf of the Grand Xia.

All these things came together in the eleventh stance of the [Three-Foot Sword]…Ning’s most powerful sword-art to date! Self-created skills were the best skills for one’s self, because one would fully understand all the intricacies and secrets of those skills, as well as be able to unleash them to an absolutely perfect level. As for sword-arts of others? Even if you mastered them, you wouldn’t be able to reach a truly, absolutely perfect level in them.

True perfection was only possible for the creator!

Boom! Boom! Boom! The two Immortal swords chopped down in the form of divine blood dragons, assaulting the attacking chains.

If one watched this scene with the naked eye, it looked as though more than ten blood dragons were fighting against the countless black chains. Prior to this, the black chains had carried an aura of unstoppable power. In the face of that power, Ning had exploded forth with his own full power. Although the chains remained intact and continued to circle around Ning, they were now no longer capable of completely binding him and causing him to be unable to fight back.

“Get in here, now!” The distant True Immortal Crimsonjoy lifted up his red jade bottle, pointing its opening towards Ning.

Rumble…

A powerful sucking force was instantly applied to Ning’s Heaven Punisher.

“Hmph.” Ning just flexed his knees slightly, putting himself into a stabler stance. The total amount of power he controlled had just tripled; how could the jade bottle possibly be able to absorb him away? It couldn’t shake him at all! If he had been completely bound by and rendered helpless by those black chains, then the end result would have been him being sucked away, but this was no longer the case; although the chains remained powerful, he was able to fight back against them.

“What?!” True Immortal Crimsonjoy stared at Ning from afar, his face a mask of shock. “He actually…actually was hiding his own power as well? What a Ji Ning!”

In a life-and-death battle, one of the things to be feared the most was when an enemy was hiding his true power.

Only when you fully knew all of your foe’s secrets could you lay down a good plan for dealing with him! If the foe was much more powerful than anticipated, the plan would be destroyed.

“Whitepole, Azurefox, hurry up and join in,” True Immortal Crimsonjoy sent mentally. “This Ji Ning was hiding his full power. Even after I consumed some of my own Jindan essence, I’m only able to temporarily keep him locked down. I’m unable to suck him away into the bottle. Now, the rest is up to you.”

The Seamless Gate had made a very meticulous plan this time.

If True Immortal Crimsonjoy had succeeded, that would be well.

But if he failed…his abilities would most likely still have caused the Grand Xia’s side to be put at a great disadvantage. This allowed the other members of the Seamless Gate to launch a truly ferocious strike against them! They would seize the opportunity to deal the Grand Xia a heavy blow; in fact, if the blow was heavy enough, the Grand Xia might no longer be able to fight back at all.

“Attack.”

True Immortal Whitepole had been quietly preparing amidst an army of Seamless Gate soldiers within a minor world treasure. He immediately roared out the command.

Boom!

Instantly, the mighty army of the Seamless Gate appeared in the air.

Everyone appeared. The Empyrean Gods, the True Immortals, the likes of Gatemaster Azurefox…even True Immortal Whitepole himself appeared for the first time! At the same time, two types of towering, thirty thousand meter Empyrean God golems appeared as well. The first was the ordinary, often-used Empyrean God golem that was completely black and horned, the one which Ning’s side had as well. As for the second, it was semi-translucent, glowed with a dull bloody light, and was slightly thinner.

Six of the old black Empyrean God golems emerged.

Sixteen of the new blood-colored Empyrean God golems emerged.

“Kill!”

“Wipe them out!”

True Immortal Whitepole’s white eyebrows were fluttering about. His grim face looked even colder than usual, but his eyes were filled with madness. He gave the order coldly, and his voice echoed within the heavens.

“What?!”

“How can this be?!”

“So many Empyrean God golems?!”

The Grand Xia’s side was completely stunned.

Although they had guessed that the Seamless Gate was holding back, they hadn’t expected for the Seamless Gate to be holding back such a terrifying force for so long! Six black Empyrean God golems and sixteen blood-red Empyrean God golems…how terrifying a force was this?

It must be understood that the Xia Emperor himself had just barely been able to procure three such golems, and only of the black variant at that. He hadn’t acquired a single one of the blood-colored golems, which were on a higher level.

Clang! Clang! Clang! Ning wielded his Ananda World-Swords, still struggling against the black chains.

The most powerful of the seven Heaven Punishers, the Darknorth Heaven Punisher, had been completely locked down!

……

It wasn’t just Ji Ning who was stunned. Celestial Immortal Unity and the other Heaven Punishers…even the Xia Emperor was stunned.

Upon seeing that Ning was in danger, the Xia Emperor had been extremely worried, and so he had immediately sent out his forces to assist. Although all seven Heaven Punishers were important, the one they could least afford to lose was Ji Ning’s. Ji Ning’s sole Heaven Punisher was worth two or three other Heaven Punishers! In addition, once Ning overcame the Empyrean Tribulation, he would possess tremendous influence. A peerless genius who was capable of reaching the Empyrean God level of power as a Void-level Fiendgod…once he made his breakthrough, how powerful would he be?

Thus, the Xia Emperor absolutely would not permit him to be lost. He personally entered the field of battle!

But…

As soon as he appeared, before he even had a chance to help Ji Ning, he saw that Ji Ning had managed to stave off defeat by himself. “So Ji Ning was hiding his power? Excellent.” The Xia Emperor was delighted and surprised.

But right at that moment…

The main army of the Seamless Gate emerged.

“What?!” When the Xia Emperor looked at the awe-inspiring horde of Seamless Gate soldiers, his face couldn’t help but change.

He had guessed all along that the Seamless Gate had to have been hiding many Celestial Immortals, because three of the four White-Faced Flood Dragons had been formed from Celestial Immortals and Loose Immortals that had betrayed the Grand Xia! Most likely, only the one which Empyrean God Venomsong commanded consisted of the Seamless Gate’s own forces. Was that all the Seamless Gate had? Impossible!

But not even the Xia Emperor had expected so many Empyrean God golems to emerge.

“It seems they really do view my Grand Xia with great importance. They actually sent out so many of their precious Empyrean God golems. There’s even sixteen of those incredibly difficult-to-deal-with Bloodcloud golems.” The Xia Emperor’s gaze turned cold. “If that’s the case…then let’s fight.”

“Empyrean God Coldsavage, Empyrean God Kindwater, Empyrean God Northwatch, emerge!” The Xia Emperor ordered.

The Xia Emperor had an extremely high status. His Grand Xia could be considered the most powerful major world under the command of Daofather Crimsonbright! He also had the Primordial Imperial Clan and Daofather Raindragon behind him, and was himself quite powerful as well. After having ruled for so many years, how could his own forces possibly be weak? It must be understood that the even likes of the Mount Stele major world, which had been conquered long ago, had three to five Empyrean Gods and True Immortals within it.

Even the likes of Empyrean God Kindwater, who had always been rather disrespectful towards the Xia Emperor, had long ago moved to stand by his side.

Empyrean God Coldsavage was the Empyrean God that had arisen amongst the ranks of the native Fiendgods of the Grand Xia. He had signed a pact with the Xia Emperor to serve him in battle for a hundred thousand years.

Empyrean God Northwatch was a transcendent figure. Much like how the Xia Emperor had helped Ji Ning out, the Xia Emperor had also once helped out Empyrean God Northwatch. Now that Northwatch was an Empyrean God, he naturally wanted to repay his debt and show his gratitude. At a critical moment like this, he chose to stand firmly on the side of the Xia Emperor.

Within an extremely vast world.

This was the world of flames where the countless Fiendgods had been imprisoned for many years. However, the world of flames no longer delivered any punishments to them. Over the past period of time, the countless Fiendgods had all been focusing on training in a truly ancient Fiendgod formation…the Pangu War-Formation!

The Pangu War-formation was the most ancient and most complicated of Fiendgod formations.

After Pangu had established the universe and perished, all of the surviving major powers such as Mother Nuwa had felt utter veneration towards him. Back then, Mother Nuwa had been far from reaching Pangu’s level. Due to the veneration the Fiendgods felt towards Pangu, as well as the gratitude they felt towards him for his establishment of the universe, many of the war-formations which the Fiendgods used when they engaged in battle ended up being named ‘Pangu War-Formation’.

There were many different Pangu War-Formations, and many other major powers would often work to improve and perfect them.

In the end, Mother Nuwa had herself broken through to Pangu’s level and further improved a Pangu War-Formation. Only then was it truly perfected! Only the few elite major powers knew all of the marvelous secrets of this war-formation, and the total number could be counted with just two hands. Amongst that number were Suiren and Fuxi of the Primordial Imperial Clan, as well as a few of the other extremely ancient Human Sovereigns.

The version the Xia Emperor had acquired was naturally a simplified version. However, the simplified version was more than enough for this army of mere Void-level Fiendgods and Primal Fiendgods, commanded by a single Empyrean God. They wouldn’t be able to properly use the more profound versions, after all.

The countless Fiendgods were under the command of Empyrean God Coldsavage, Empyrean God Northwatch, and Empyrean God Kindwater!

They could form into three mighty Pangu War-Formations!

“Empyrean Gods Coldsavage, Kindwater, and Northwatch, make your move.” The Xia Emperor’s voice rang out within the world of flames.

“Time for us to act.” Empyrean God Coldsavage instantly grew excited. Raising his head, he let out a heroic roar.

“FIGHT!” “FIGHT!” “FIGHT!”

Instantly, countless Fiendgods grew so excited that their eyes turned red.

They were Fiendgods. They were born to battle against Heaven and Earth; the desire to do battle was bred into the bones of each and every one of them. After having been imprisoned for countless ages, they were absolutely thirsting for a fight.

“EMERGE!”

An awe-inspiring flood of Fiendgods began to move, divided up into three armies. In the air above each army began to appear an enormous, seemingly-solid manifestation of a barefoot, loose-haired figure with an utterly enormous greataxe. This was the most ancient of primordial divinities…Pangu!

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The countless Fiendgods were all teleported out of this world to the field of battle.