The Desolate Era

As a Hegemon, Dawnclear had an extraordinary Dao-heart. She had already discarded all of her previous concerns and had chosen to become Dao-companions with Sword Immortal Green Bamboo. How could she possibly fear death?

“If we delay, neither of us will escape,” Green Bamboo sent frantically. “Dawnclear, you aren’t strong enough to slow them down. Only I can do that! Don’t worry. After you flee, I’ll do my best to escape as well. If I cannot, I’ll choose to self-detonate. I’ll tell you a secret which you absolutely cannot share with anyone else – my master Darknorth has used the ‘Truesoul Everlasting’ technique and has redone the Daomerge. He’s now comparable to Autarchs in power. So long as any of my truesoul fragments remain, I’ll definitely be brought back in the future.”

Hegemon Dawnclear was startled. So the legendary Daolord Darknorth had actually successfully used that technique to repeat his Daomerge?

“In other words, even if I am forced to self-detonate I’ll still be brought back,” Green Bamboo said urgently. “And I have other tricks up my sleeve as well. I’ll stand a good chance of escaping on my own. Hurry up and go! If you die, there’d be no point in me living.”

“Fine.” Hegemon Dawnclear no longer hesitated. She knew that as she was much weaker, it would be harder for her truesoul fragments to escape the Sithe soul-eater technique.

Whoosh! Hegemon Dawnclear turned and immediately fled. After fleeing for a time, she managed to leave the reach of spacetime suppression. She turned to glance backwards, seeing Green Bamboo already engaged in a fight against the Sithe.

“We’ll definitely be together in the future.” Hegemon Dawnclear gritted her teeth, then immediately warped through spacetime and disappeared.

“Ahahaha!” Green Bamboo himself was in an excellent mood. A total of nine leaf-shaped treasures were around him, and he was able to use them to shockingly powerful effect with his perfect Dao-heart. Each of his strikes was comparable to attacks from the Blazesun Ruler!

Boom! Boom! Boom! The two sides continued to blast attacks at each other.

“The cultivator leader of this battlefront is really powerful. Given his might, I imagine he has a perfect Dao-heart.”

“Anyone who can gain a perfect Dao-heart in this backwards Chaosverse has to be one of its truly peerless geniuses.” The Sithe continued to launch attacks from their castle. They held the upper hand and it was clear that victory should be in their grasp... but somehow, it continued to elude them.

In truth, this was a strategy which Green Bamboo was using. He wanted to give these Sithe the feeling that they could kill him by themselves, and so they wouldn’t be in a hurry to report it to their higher-ups.

They battled for ten full seconds.

“Ugh. This cultivator leader is a pain to deal with. Hurry up and report it to our superiors. Who knows how long it would take for us to kill him? Hurry up and report it to them so we can hunt down that female cultivator next.” These warships were able to scan a realmverse-sized area in a twinkling! Even realmships would produce trails when flying that could be picked up by Sithe scanners, which was why escape was very difficult.

Green Bamboo felt rather relaxed. “It’s been over ten seconds. Dawnclear has probably escaped by now.” He had told Dawnclear that Darknorth would revive him so long as his truesoul fragments escaped, but that wasn’t the complete truth. Green Bamboo knew a great deal about this war. He knew that this was the last chance the Sithe had, and that they would battle to the bitter end. It was possible that even his master Darknorth would die! If that happened, Green Bamboo might not be brought back either.

Rumble... suddenly, a spacetime ripple manifested. A heartbeat later, a towering warship appeared as well, once more suppressing spacetime in the surrounding area.

“Not good.” Green Bamboo’s face tightened.

Boom! All nine leaf-type treasures instantly flew back to circle around Green Bamboo, ‘gripping’ him as they then transformed into a streak of light that flew away at incredible speeds.

“You think you’ll escape?” The Sithe immediately moved to pursue.

BOOM! The distant streak which was Green Bamboo suddenly blew apart into an enormous blast of light as he exploded.

Even as he self-detonated, he remained calm. A little smile was on his face to the very end. It was all worth it. So long as his beloved survived, everything was worth it.

“Another self-detonation. Ugh. How many of his truesoul fragments did we manage to capture?”

“Just part of it, I think. Almost all of these natives have chosen to self-detonate from afar. We’re usually only able to capture part of the fragments.”

“Continue the hunt. He had a woman with him.”

After forcing Green Bamboo to commit suicide, the Sithe immediately began to chase after Hegemon Dawnclear. Alas, no matter what they tried they were unable to find any traces of her.

......

Rumble...

An iridescent ring-shaped treasure was warping through spacetime with ease, moving just as fast as the Blacksun but with even greater secrecy. Ten seconds after its initial use, all traces of its activation would vanish. This had been Green Bamboo’s personal escape treasure. He had only trained for a short period of time but had a perfect Dao-heart. This meant that he was viewed as an incredibly talented prospect for this Chaosverse who could very well become an Autarch in the future.

This was why he had been given such a valuable treasure... but in the end, he had given it to Hegemon Dawnclear.

“No...” While fleeing, Hegemon Dawnclear suddenly turned to stare at the direction from where she had just fled. She could vaguely sense through the power of karma that the most important person in her life had just perished. The karma binding them together had fallen apart, leaving behind an empty feeling that tore at her heart. Her tears began to fall.

“Green Bamboo, you promised me that you’d be able to escape. You promised.” Tears blurred Hegemon Dawnclear’s vision. “I’m sure they’ll bring you back. You are senior Darknorth’s disciple. They definitely will.”

In the end, Hegemon Dawnclear was the only person to survive the battle at the Hiddencloud battlefront. Everyone else died.

......

Ning was soaring through the Great Dark, searching for Sithe and destroying them when he found them. Suddenly, he turned pale and his heart trembled.

Ning turned to stare towards the direction of the incredibly distant Hiddencloud battlefront. “Green Bamboo!” Ning could sense through the power of karma that his disciple was gone. He had vanished from this Chaosverse. Clearly, his truesoul had been destroyed.

“Not even someone as powerful as Green Bamboo was able to escape?” Ning was filled with agony.

In truth, if Green Bamboo had fled on his own he would’ve had a 30% - 40% chance of escaping. Instead, he had given this chance to Hegemon Dawnclear and had gone to delay their foes.

“SITHE!!!” Ning cast away his pain, replacing it with a cold and hard determination. This was war... a war which would determine the destinies of two different civilizations! Many, many Hegemons had died and would die in this war. Green Bamboo was just one of them.

“DIE!” Ning knew that all he could do was to annihilate as many Sithe as he could.

......

Time continued to flow on, and the war only grew increasingly deadly. Four years of frenzied warfare went by in the blink of an eye. The initial wave of frenzied Sithe attacks finally began to ebb, as they suffered so many casualties that they were unable to continue assaulting all of the various battlefields.

During these four years, Ning and the rest of the thirteen Autarch-class combatants had been hunting them down nonstop. They had annihilated so many Sithe that in many areas, the remaining Sithe Hegemons and Emperors were only able to pose low levels of danger.

“All of you shall die.” Autarch Ekong descended upon a battlefront, immediately blinking inside the towering Sithe warship.

“Die, die, die!” Autarch Ekong was the Autarch of Annihilation, and he used his awesome power to completely massacre the many Hegemons and Emperors within the warship.

Right at this moment, Autarch Ekong’s face suddenly turned grim. He immediately blinked outside the warship, only to see that the battlefield had just changed completely.

An absolutely massive temple complex had just appeared in the area, and he was inside the complex. The warship he had just destroyed was miniscule by comparison! The vast temple had a total of seven miniature temples surrounding it, and within each of the temples was a figure seated in the lotus position. Judging from their auras, all of them were Sithe Exalts.

“So the Sithe Exalts have finally shown themselves... seven at one go!” Autarch Ekong turned pale. He could sense the incredible threat they posed to him. They could kill him. This vast temple was entirely capable of destroying him!

“Autarch Ekong, I presume? You won’t be able to escape.”

“Prepare to die.” The seven Sithe Exalts had frenzied looks in their eyes. They knew just how powerful Autarchs were, and so they had made plentiful preparations for this battle.

Autarch Ekong immediately sent word to Ning and the other five Autarchs. Four years after the war had erupted, the Sithe Exalts were finally making their move. The Sithe had finally revealed their fangs!

During the Dawn War, the Autarchs had also encountered multiple dangerous situations. They didn’t even dare to truly assault the heart of the Sithelands and instead chose to simply seal away the outer perimeters! Creatures like the giant tree, which Autarch Titanos and Autarch Mogg had spent a fairly long period of time to kill, was just one of many tools the Sithe had prepared for this war.

The Annihilation Hive had shown without the shadow of a doubt that the Sithe were terrifyingly powerful. They were more than strong enough to threaten the Autarchs now.

If the Autarchs were truly invincible, Ning and the others could’ve simply gathered all the Hegemons and placed them into their own estate-worlds. If the seven of them just stayed together in one place they would be guaranteed to win, right?

But the truth was that the Autarchs weren’t truly invincible... and they knew it. It was possible that they could be killed, which was why they had the Hegemons be scattered across the Chaosverse. This would at least ensure that they weren’t destroyed in a single alpha strike! Even if the cultivators lost a few battles, they would still be able to recover in the future.

“After four years of war, the Sithe Hegemons and Emperors are no longer much of a threat to us. The Sithe have finally begun to mobilize their elites,” Autarch Titanos sent mentally. “This will be the last great war we shall face! If we win, we’ll be able to grow so powerful that we’ll never need to fear any invaders ever again. We’ll be truly free... but first, we have to win this war.”

“This will be the final war, the Dusk War. Let us fight! In victory, we shall be without worries for all of time. If we fail, we may never recover.”

Ning and the six Autarchs all understood this concept. Their hearts were filled with unprecedented resolve. There was nothing and no one capable of shaking their will for battle. They would fight!

Now that the weaker Hegemons and Emperors were no longer a threat, the Sithe Exalts had joined the fray. The final battle had begun!

“If we win, I might be able to one day revive Yu Wei and my friends and disciples. If we lose, everything will be lost. My parents, Brightmoon, my teacher... they’ll all be gone. All of civilization will be gone.”

“The war to reclaim our destinies has now truly begun.” Ning’s eyes were blazing with determination.

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