Sage Monarch (Sage Emperor)

Yang Qi immediately benefited from assimilating the quintessence of the Great Necropolis. The necropolis could bury the legion of gods, and the god world as a whole. In fact, it could bury anything and everything. The truth was that the necropolis wasn’t made from stone, but rather the quintessence of ‘burying’. And theoretically speaking, it was actually stronger than the Mahātmā Jade.

In the hopes of pulling Yang Qi into a trap, Proud Heaven had actually refined the quintessence of the necropolis into the form of a medicinal pill.

But in the end, he had actually helped Yang Qi.

The quintessence of the necropolis was boosting Yang Qi’s psychic scale in a way that was similar to the Mahātmā Jade.

His psychic scale reached eighty billion, and kept climbing. At the same time, deep in his mind, his connection to the necropolis grew stronger, improving his ability to control it.

‘The Great Necropolis is currently in the Central Dynasty. I haven’t seen King Immortal-Slayer in quite a while, which means he must be struggling to maintain control. He’s powerful, but he's stuck in the necropolis, besieged by Proud Central and countless Paramount Gods. Not only that, but he also has to deal with the destiny of the Central Dynasty. For now, he’s not going anywhere. But now that I can tap into the essence of the Halls of Heaven to improve my destiny, I can start working on a plan to rescue him.’

Using the power provided by the Lord of the Sword Dao, he had taken the Heaven-Burying God Pill for himself, turning a trap set by Proud Central and Proud Heaven into a major windfall.

They had given their enemy a wife and lost soldiers to him as well. [1]

As Yang Qi’s cultivation base rose, the Lord of the Sword Dao was clashing with Proud Central. As it turned out, the Lord of the Sword Dao was a bit stronger. Eventually, the projection of Proud Central shivered and started fading out of existence. As he did, his voice echoed out, “Incredible, Lord of the Sword Dao. You’re strong. But I won’t let you live in the end!”

BAM!

Unleashing one final blow, Proud Central sent the Lord of the Sword Dao flying backward into the bronze wall, his aura in chaos. His sword even fell out of his hand and clattered to the ground. Obviously, if they were on the outside, the Lord of the Sword Dao couldn’t actually match up to Proud Central.

Proud Central had been stronger than him even in the ancient era. After the Sovereign Lord perished, and Proud Central founded a dynasty, he got access to massive destiny, so he was even stronger than before. In fact, it was possible that Proud Central was already in the half-Annulled level.

However, at the moment, Proud Central was so focused on struggling with King Immortal-Slayer that he couldn't spare the effort or energy to try to take over the god world. If it weren’t for the current state of affairs, the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty would likely be in great danger.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi shivered as he fully recovered from his injuries. Now that he was surrounded by the Great Necropolis, he was so powerful that nothing here could possibly harm him.

Smiling, he walked over to the Lord of the Sword Dao and said, “You thought you hurt me? Sorry, you were mistaken. It was a big trap, and you fell right into it. I used you to assimilate that pill, which contained the quintessence of the Great Necropolis. Now my psychic scale is at eighty billion. Plus, I can call on the Great Necropolis to defend myself any time I want. Your sword technique simply isn’t good enough to hurt me. What's your stance now, Lord of the Sword Dao?”

“So, it turns out you’re a real force of nature,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, slowly rising to his feet. Although he didn’t appear to be wounded, Yang Qi knew that his clash with Proud Central’s will must have been very taxing.

Were it not for the Lord of the Sword Dao, he never would have been able to assimilate the Heaven-Burying God Pill. In the end, the Lord of the Sword Dao suffered the ill effects he would have suffered had he tried.

“You came out on top in every way imaginable,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said coldly. “You benefited from that pill, you hurt me, you hurt Proud Central, you boosted your cultivation base, and now your psychic scale and godhood rating are at eighty billion. On top of it all, you have the protection of the Great Necropolis. You’re right. I can’t hurt you. Despite all that, you still won’t be able to overcome me. So just leave.”

“Leave?” Yang Qi said. “Is that supposed to be a joke? You’re hurt, and I'm getting stronger by the moment. I've already surpassed you, and you think I'm just going to leave? No. Instead, I’ll kick you while you’re down.”

“You can’t subjugate me, young one. I advise you to just turn and walk away. The most important thing in the world is your own life, and it would be stupid to throw it away in the hopes of achieving a minor gain.”

“Minor gain? You count for much more than that. I know you have other tricks up your sleeve, Lord of the Sword Dao. I'm sure you could keep fighting me for quite some time. But do you think I'm out of tricks already? Thanks to your clash with Proud Central, I can rest assured he won't come for my empire anytime soon. So now I’ll show you what I’ve been holding in reserve this entire time. Exalted Purrling, please, come forth!”

Purr. Purr....

An immense aura suddenly weighed down on the area.

Yet again, the purrling had come to the Halls of Heaven, and it obviously existed on a higher level than the Lord of the Sword Dao. The purrling had the respect of even King Immortal-Slayer, the reason being that it was truly capable of half-Annulled levels of power.

The downside was that its main interests seemed to be sleeping. And it generally didn't like fighting. For the most part, it viewed the conflicts of the world as having nothing to do with it, and it would only take action when Jadefall requested it. Thankfully, Yang Qi didn’t ask too many favors of it.

The purrling was actually curious about Yang Qi. After all, the two of them would occasionally communicate directly, therefore, it was interested in what happened to him. So when Yang Qi asked the purrling to come to the Halls of Heaven and help him deal with the Lord of the Sword Dao, it did.

Yang Qi didn’t normally ask for help from the purrling. For one thing, the purrling wasn’t his. Furthermore, he had no idea what karmic ramifications there could be when asking for its help. Also, there was also the possibility that he would ask for help only to be refused.

He had never even considered trying to subjugate it.

Most likely, even if the Sovereign Lord were to be resurrected, not even he would be able to subjugate the purrling.

“Exalted Purrling, allow me to introduce you to the Lord of the Sword Dao,” Yang Qi said in the purrling’s language.

It looked at the Lord of the Sword Dao and made a few purring sounds, which meant, “This human is strong. But he hasn’t taken the final step. He still has fetters binding his heart, an obstacle he has yet to transcend. That said, if you subjugate him, he’ll be very useful.”

“Exalted Purrling,” Yang Qi replied, continuing to use the purrling's language, “would you like to say something to the human? I can translate.”

“Fine,” the purrling said. Then it made a few purring sounds to the Lord of the Sword Dao, which Yang Qi translated.

“You should just surrender, human. You haven’t taken the final step, and you can’t beat me in a fight. Not that I'm interested in fighting. I’m with Yang Qi here. He has a unique fate, and I suspect that he might be able to survive the destruction of the god world. I’ve seen some signs of the trajectory of his fate, and the fact that he’s combined the God Legion Seal, the Mahātmā Jade, and numerous other magical treasures just goes to show that he's very unique. I might even need his help to fully transcend my own fate, and become truly lifeless and destructionless.”

“Who are you?” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, his expression serious. “And why would you speak such words to me?”

Given the level of his cultivation base, he could see how strong the purrling was, and knew that it was at a level of strength that he couldn’t contend with. And that wasn’t to mention the fact that Yang Qi was also present. Worst of all, he was stuck in the middle of the Halls of Heaven with no way out, and for that matter, no idea which way to go even if he did have the chance to escape.

“A mighty being such as yourself should achieve breakthroughs on your own merit,” he continued. “You shouldn’t be getting help from others. If you try that method, you’ll never make progress. I was wrong. You don’t have a truly mighty heart.”

Yang Qi translated for the purrling.

“Foolish human! There’s nothing wrong with using tools and resources to forge the perfect soul and the perfect will. True strength comes from using anything and everything necessary. The difference between humans and animals is that humans can use tools. Refusing help in getting strong might seem like perseverance, but it's really a sickness. A disease. In fact, that's why you haven’t achieved your own breakthrough. You have a soul disease that you haven’t excised. A devil.”

Yang Qi felt deeply shaken as he translated the words. It made perfect sense to use the term soul disease. On the one hand, relying on others could lead to dependency-devils. But refusing outside help could also lead to the devil of a soul disease.

The key to it all was achieving the right balance. The golden ratio between making progress alone, and relying on help. One needed the strongest will and the strongest soul possible to reach the half-Annulled level.

The Lord of the Sword Dao shivered as though he had just come to understand something. All of a sudden, he bowed deeply to the purrling. “Oh mighty one, many thanks for your reminders. However, I'm still not going to surrender and be subjugated. So, please show me how strong you are.”

“Fine, human. Make your move. You're still not convinced, so you want to challenge me to a fight. Truth be told, I like your attitude. And because Yang Qi wants to subjugate you, I won’t kill you. Besides, I don't like killing people. It's a blasphemy against life force, and creates an aura I find very distasteful. I love life, not the endless, dead void of ancient primal-chaos. Only the modern world is interesting and colorful.”

Swish!

Even as the words left the purrling’s mouth, a sword closed in on it.

1. I really don’t like it when authors put a whole bunch of idioms back-to-back for filler purposes, which is what happened here. I'm removing the following parts from the chapter because they are pure repetition, but the idioms are cool so I’ll explain them. He says they lost a child but didn’t trap the wolf, which is a twist on the saying you can’t expect to trap a wolf without (being willing to) sacrifice a child. The author then throws in another variation, saying they lost a wife without catching the gangster.