Desolate Era

Within the Azureflower Estate.

The elderly white-haired spirit of the estate watched silently, feeling both worried but hopeful: “I hope this kid can succeed. If he can succeed in the Daomerge with the Omega Sword Dao, he will have achieved something which no one has ever done before. Perhaps Master’s final wishes will then be completed.”

The Autarch’s wishes were simply too hard to achieve. After becoming an Autarch, Awakener had reached a level of tremendous insight and understanding, and he had many treasures aiding him. He had been alive for unfathomably more times longer than Ji Ning had, and he had reached incredible heights in his mastery of the Nine Chaos Seals.

There were a total of ninety-nine layers to the Heart of Eternity!

Even after having returned from the Icewind Sea, Ning had only been able to solve the first twenty-two layers of the Heart. He was far, far away from being able to completely solve it! In truth, the spirit of the estate also knew how unlikely it was that Ning would succeed, because even the other dazzling geniuses who had come before Ning had fallen far short of the mark of completing Autarch Awakener’s wishes.

“The Daomerge Firecloud Flower.” The black-robed Ning waved his hand, causing a jade box to appear before the stone dais. The jade box opened on its own, followed by a perfect Daomerge Firecloud Flower that was still attached to its roots and leaves to fly out.

“Let the Daomerge begin!” The black-robed Ning closed his eyes. Over in Vastheaven Palace, the white-robed Ning in Vastheaven Palace swallowed his own spirit-pills, activated the incense from the Stone Censer of Reunion, and then closed his eyes.

He began to visualize the inside of his divine body, formed from a total of 108,000 godgems. Each godgem contained his divine power, his soul, his truesoul, and more. They also contained Ning’s insights into his Omega Sword Dao.

Ning visualized the Dao-tree within his Jindan chaos region. The towering Dao-tree’s branches and leaves were the material representations of Ning’s insights. Countless insights began to resonate through his mind and soul.

What he needed to do was to gather together all of these insights, then transform them all and cause his Dao-tree to give birth to a beautiful Flower of Eternity! His divine body would then transform to become a truly eternal body. If he became an Eternal Emperor, every single one of his godgems would transform into a Worldheart, even if his truesoul was somehow extinguished. The godgems would forever give birth to new chaosworlds.

“The Flower of Eternity… an eternal body…” Ning exerted his will. Boom! Every single godgem in his body began to tremble. The godgems, previously coalesced with his fourth-step Daolord energies, began to disassemble and then advance to a completely new level of existence! The towering Dao-tree within his body was shaking as well, as all of the insights represented by those branches and leaves began to gather together.

If someone was standing nearby, that person would quickly discover that the white-robed Ning and the black-robed Ning were both beginning to glow with blurry sword-light. Countless streaks of sword-light emanated from Ning with such power as to cause even Hegemons to shudder. This was the light of the Dao! Or to be precise, this was the light of the Omega Sword Dao, and its power was covering him and protecting him.

Every single Daolord would emanate the light of the Dao when they began the Daomerge. This would be the most dazzling moment of their life, and it was only in this state that the Daomerge would even be possible. This was also the state one needed to be in order for the Daomerge Firecloud Flower to unleash its true potential.

“Arise.” The black-robed Ning opened his eyes, staring at the Daomerge Firecloud Flower within the jade box.

The blurry sword-light emanating from Ning’s entire body illuminated the Daomerge Firecloud Flower, causing it to levitate into the air. Guided by Ning’s will, the flower began to be surrounded by clouds of fire that gathered together into a half-translucent humanoid figure directly above the flower. This figure looked identical to Ning.

“My incarnation! The incarnation formed by the Daomerge Firecloud Flower.” Ning immediately took control over the flow of time, having the incarnation complete a simulated Daomerge as quickly as possible.

If a Daolord like Ninedust used the Daomerge Firecloud Flower, a total of nine incarnations would be formed. In other words, one would have nine chances to simulate a Daomerge! If one took control over the flow of time and accelerated time for the incarnations, these nine simulated Daomerges would at most take perhaps two or so hours, at which point the Daolord could begin the true Daomerge.

“I hope this incarnation can last long enough to attempt a complete Daomerge.” Ning felt hopeful. “Let’s begin.” The incarnation immediately initiated a simulated Daomerge, with a towering Dao-tree appearing within its body. The reason why it didn’t form a complete divine body was because Ning wanted to conserve power; there was a limit to how much energy the Daomerge Firecloud Flower held within it.

Time passed, one day after another. The incarnation continued to carefully carry out the Daomerge, with the Omega Sword Dao insights embodied by the Dao-tree all slowly gathering together. Finally, a series of thick trunks began to emerge from the very center of the Dao-tree. These trunks began to manifest a total of two new leaves. One of the two leaves emanated an incredibly profound and abstruse aura, while the other emanated an aura that was incredibly titanic and vast.

Between these two leaves, an unremarkable little flower bud began to emerge as well. The flower bud began to slowly grow larger and larger…

“So far, so good. My path is the correct one. This is just how it should be.” Ning felt a tremendous sense of confidence in himself and how things were progressing. The Autarch’s stone dais and the Stonefire Pearl helped ensured that he was in absolute peak condition for this Daomerge, and he was in a prajna-like state of epiphany. All sorts of scattered insights were rapidly coming together to form a perfect whole, with no flaws that could be discerned whatsoever.

One year. Two years. Three years. By now, the flower was so large that it could no longer grow any further. All of Ning’s insights into the Omega Sword Dao, as well as the other scattered insights he had gained, had been infused into the flower bud.

“Time to let it bloom.” Ning knew that the blooming process was the most dangerous part of the Daomerge. Many, many Daolords had attempted to make the Flower of Eternity bloom, only to see it wither halfway through.

Suddenly, his incarnation began to tremble.

“Eh?” Ning’s face tightened slightly. Only now did he turn his attention to the Daomerge Firecloud Flower. He realized that the flaming clouds around it had almost all vanished. As the final cloud was depleted, the materialized incarnation suddenly vanished as well. As a result, the simulated Daomerge came to an end as well.

“Its over? The energies were all used up?” Although Ning was briefly startled, he quickly regained his equanimity. “Omega Daos truly are the hardest of Daos. I wasn’t even given a chance to attempt to cause the Flower of Eternity to bloom via a simulated Daomerge,” Ning mused. The Daomerge Firecloud Flower had enough power to allow a Daolord who had fused multiple Supreme Daos to simulate the Daomerge nine times, but he hadn’t even been able to do it a single time! This had at most been half of a simulated Daomerge… and strictly speaking, it was the simpler first half. Even if Ning hadn’t had a Daomerge Firecloud Flower, Ning wouldn’t have made any mistakes during the first part.

“However… it still helped me save three years of time.” Ning didn’t let himself feel dispirited. Saving three years of time meant that his chances at succeeding in the Daomerge had increased considerably.

“And so… let the true Daomerge begin!” Thanks to the wonders of temporal acceleration, the three years of time which the simulated Daomerge had taken had, in reality, been nothing more than a few minutes for Ning’s true body and Primaltwin.

The white-robed Ning and the black-robed Ning simultaneously began to speed up the Daomerge process. Whoosh! The transformation process of the godgems began to speed up rapidly, advancing in the blink of an eye.

As for the Dao-tree in his body, it began to give birth to a new trunk upon which two leaves grew. A flower bud quickly appeared and began to grow larger, and it quickly reached its maximum size in just a few seconds. Now, it was ready to bloom whenever Ning chose.

“Let it bloom…” Ning knew just how the Daomerge worked. The Flower of Eternity was safe when it was merely a bud. Once the initial blooming process began, it was extremely easy for cultivators to make mistakes… and a single mistake would result in a failure in the blooming process, causing the flower to wither away! That would represent the Daomerge having failed. The truesoul would immediately begin to crumble.

If the initial blooming process was successful, the flower would slowly bloom more and more. This middle part would be comparatively safer, and the Flower of Eternity would grow more and more beautiful. When it reached its most dazzlingly beautiful form, it would gain true eternity for itself! This final part of the blooming process was the most difficult part of the Daomerge.

Ning had met Daolord Laya in the Starflow River. When Daolord Laya had failed the Daomerge, he had failed during the initial blooming process; in other words, the Flower of Eternity hadn’t been able to bloom at all.

In truth, the blooming represented the process by which Daolords crossed beyond that final threshold to become Eternal Emperors! That moment when the Flower of Eternity reached maximum beauty was the moment in which both it and the Dao stabilized. This represented success, with the Daolord having become an Eternal Emperor.

Whoooosh. The petals slowly began to extend up the stem of the Flower of Eternity, laboriously seeking to reach out and bloom. As for Ning himself, he began the process of leaping into a new level of existence.

BOOM!!! The Dao-light surrounding both the white-robed Ning in Vastheaven Palace and the black-robed Azureflower Estate began to dramatically increase in intensity. The countless streaks of sword-light began to skyrocket in power, instantly ascending beyond Hegemony. In just the blink of an eye, it actually surpassed even the Otherverse Lord level of power!

Rumble…

This terrifying aura of power instantly swept through all that sought to contain it. The formations around Vastheaven Palace were completely incapable of containing this terrifying aura, a supreme aura of power that vastly surpassed that of Hegemons and even Otherverse Lords. This was the most terrifying aura generated by the Dao of the Sword which had ever appeared in the Chaosverse… the aura of an Eternal Omega Sword Dao!

Emperor Solesky, Su Youji, Pillsaint, Azurefiend, Whitethaw, and everyone else all felt so terrified by this aura that their hearts trembled. It was as though every single cell in their bodies were screaming in fear.

Even the Flamewing God felt a sense of fear when this mighty aura swept past it!