Desolate Era

The flying shuttle flew through the clouds with Ji Ning seated on the deck, going through the treasures he had just acquired.

“It is actually…” Ning stared at the Mirrorsnow Painting in his hands. This painting was a painting of a beautiful palace. This palace was slightly different from the painting of a palace which Ning had already acquired, but Ning immediately recognized it as being painted by Emperor Mirrorsnow… partially because of how ugly it was, but also because no one could imitate his distinct sword-intent.

“A painting of a palace? Is this another copy of the first painting?” Ning nodded slowly. “It makes sense. I would have to have stupid good luck in order to find the fourth painting right away.”

Ning wasn’t too surprised by the fact that this painting wasn’t the fourth painting.

“Still… at least this painting can be sold for roughly a hundred or two hundred thousand cubes of chaos nectar. In fact, someone who desperately needs it would probably be willing to pay even more.” Ning was in quite a good mood. These paintings were popular, valuable items. Generally speaking, those who acquired the paintings wouldn’t divulge it to others! Given that there were only forty of them in all the Endless Territories, and given that some might have multiple copies of each…

It certainly wasn’t going to be easy for him to just randomly encounter the exact piece he needed. For him to even find a copy of the first one here in the Brightshore Kingdom was already a stroke of great luck.

“After I go to the Palace of the Sword, I’ll ask the Twelve Palaces to help me locate the fourth painting,” Ning mused to himself.

The Twelve Palaces of the Brightshore Kingdom were on the same general level of power as the Dao Alliance.

Last time, Ning had asked Daolord Badlands to help him buy Mirrorsnow Paintings, and Daolord Badlands had sought out the Dao Alliance to carry out this task. Because they were on a tight time schedule, the Dao Alliance didn’t really carry a large-scale search. The Twelve Palaces, however, was itself an incredibly powerful organization that held cultivators, Aeonians, and other Aberrants.

In the future, Ji Ning would be one of their links to the Dao Alliance.

In the future, Gorho would be one of their links to the Aeonians.

As a result, the Twelve Palaces of Brightshore were on very good terms with many of the organizations of the Endless Territories. It might be hard for the Twelve Palaces to immediately procure a copy of the fourth Mirrorsnow Painting, but if they were given enough time they stood an extremely good chance of succeeding. But of course… that was only if you were willing to pay the price!

Ning sent out a strand of his divine power into his new copy of the first painting, creating a divine clone within it.

Within the palace inside the painting. A golden-robed emperor manifested atop the royal throne within the palace.

Ning sighed upon seeing this. “Although there are slight differences, I can sense that he is similar to the golden-robed emperor within my original first painting.”

“Oh. A while ago, it was World God Azurekai who met with me. Did you kill Azurekai?” The golden-robed emperor looked downwards at Ning.

“Yes.” Ning nodded. “I already acquired other Mirrorsnow Paintings in the past. Do all ten copies of the first Mirrorsnow Painting created by Emperor Mirrorsnow hold the exact same ‘type’ of person?”

“They do.” The golden-robed emperor smiled and nodded. He didn’t really care about Azurekai’s death. He existed for the sake of completing the Eternal Emperor’s mission, and for someone to be able to kill Azurekai meant that this person should be even stronger.

“Let’s have a little competition,” Ning said.

“Azurekai was never able to defeat me.” The golden-robed emperor produced a golden greatsword in his hands as he walked down the stairs towards Ning. “You said you already have other Mirrorsnow Paintings. You should know the rules.”

“I know them.” Ning nodded.

After a brief battle, Ning defeated the golden-robed emperor.

Aboard the flying vessel, the true Ning revealed a look of resignation. “Although there are slight differences in the sword-arts they use, the two golden-robed emperors really do belong to the exact same ‘school’. This is of no use to my sword-arts whatsoever.”

“What else is there?” Ning began to go through the rest of his spoils of war.

World God Azurekai didn’t have any particularly good treasures aside from the painting. He did have an azure sword which was an Eternal weapon, but Ning was quickly able to judge that it was merely a low-grade Eternal weapon that was actually weaker than his Violetjewels! And there was only one Eternal weapon. As for the other treasures, they were negligible.

“He did have two decent techniques.” Ning glanced through them. “Useless to me, but I can transmit them to the Three Realms.”

“I wonder what World God Dragonking had?” Ning scanned through these treasures as well. World God Dragonking was a spear-wielder, but his spear was also merely a low-grade Eternal treasure.

The Brightshore Kingdom was a place filled with many dangers but also many treasures and legacies. So long as you were willing to brave the dangers, you would have a good chance of acquiring powerful treasures and legacies. Some of the more powerful World-level cultivators were thus able to acquire Eternal weapons, but most of those weapons were merely low-grade.

“The almighty Hegemony is such a cheapskate. I bet most of the Eternal weapons he scattered throughout the Brightshore Kingdom are just low-grade,” Ning muttered to himself. “The Dao Alliance is better. In the rest of the Endless Territories, Eternal weapons are quite rare and hard to obtain, but the ones that you do find are usually pretty good. In fact, some ruins might even hold top-grade Eternal weapons.”

The ruins and relic sites of the Endless Territories were generally left behind by Daolords. It was only natural that they would hold excellent treasures. The equivalent places in the Brightshore Kingdom, however, were intentionally created by the almighty Hegemon! As a result, almost all of the treasures were ‘mere’ low-grade Eternal weapons at best.

“Eh?” A jade bottle suddenly appeared in Ning’s hands, causing him to reveal a look of surprise.

“A pureloop jade bottle? And it holds a Bloodfire Cloudfruit inside?” Ning willed the stopper of the bottle to pop out, allowing a fruit to emerge from within the bottle. This was a fruit that was completely crimson in color, and mist could be seen swirling in the air around it. Ning had noticed this bottle earlier in his estate-world when he had quickly scanned through World God Dragonking’s treasures, but only now did he realize what a treasure it was and what it held inside.

“Pureloop jade bottles can contain vast worlds within them. The vast world inside this one can form a mighty Pureloop Jade Formation that will draw upon all the chaos energy of that entire vast world, distilling it into chaos nectar.” Ning sighed in amazement. This pureloop jade bottle was far better at distilling chaos nectar than the prisonworlds created by World God Pangaea.

This pureloop jade bottle was able to distill a full cube of chaos nectar every chaos cycle. Still… even Daolords had finite lifespans. With each step they took, they walked the boundaries between life and death. Some would perish after living for a mere thousand chaos cycles. Thus, these bottles generally weren’t sold for too high a price. Most were collected by sects and would be sold for roughly ten thousand cubes of chaos nectar.

Aside from being used to distill chaos nectar, the bottle could also be used to hold some of the marvelous items that were birthed from the primordial chaos. There were certain treasures such as fruits or spirit-leaves that would quickly lose their efficacy if not stored in a proper manner. If you placed them within the heart of a Pureloop Jade Formation, the formation would be able to prevent any leakage at all. This formation was able to hold any type of energy, making it quite suitable for storing treasures.

“It actually held a Bloodfire Cloudfruit within it.” Ning mumbled to himself, “Did this guy even know how valuable this thing is?”

Ning had gained much information from Daolord Solesky, which was why he knew about more than 90% of the known treasures which existed in the Endless Territories. World God Dragonking hadn’t been given a similar legacy, and it really was possible that he didn’t know what a Bloodfire Cloudfruit was.

“Bloodfire Cloudfruit is incredibly valuable. These fruits are naturally born from the primordial chaos and are extremely few in number. A single cloudfruit can completely transform the divine body of a cultivator, converting it into a divine body that is completely formed from the element of fire. With this new body, the cultivator will find that training in the Dao of Fire will be much easier than it was before. He will also be able to merge and release Bloodfire, then use it to fly.” Ning was truly quite amazed.

Ning, for example, was able to control his [Novessence Thunder] and even had possession of Dao lightning, but there was no way for him to fully merge into those types of lightning. This was because there was simply no way for his body to connect with them.

The Golden Crows were able to ride Golden Solarfire because their divine bodies were able to perfectly join together with that fire.

Exalted Celestial Thundergod was unable to fly using Ninehorn Lightning Serpents because his divine body was unable to perfectly join together with them.

Ning had lost quite a few clones in order to transform his divine body, making it thunder-aligned and capable of using the lightning serpents to fly. However, Ninehorn Lightning Serpents were ranked as a type of Elder lightning. They weren’t even at the Chaos level! There was naturally no way for Ning’s body to take control over Chaos lightning and use it to fly. If there was, Ning would be moving at a truly astonishing speed.

However, Bloodfire Cloudfruits were suitable for controlling Bloodfire, a type of Chaos fire. If you used it to flee, the vast majority of Daolords would be unable to catch up to you.

This single fruit was worthy roughly a million cubes of chaos nectar… and it generally could not be found in the open market. These types of treasures that were born from the primordial chaos were incredibly rare, unlike Eternal weapons which could be forged.

“Or perhaps this World God Dragonking did know, but was afraid to reveal it?” Ning mused. “Did he know? Or didn’t he? Still, it doesn’t matter. This fruit is useless to me. If I encounter any treasures that I need, I can sell it off or trade it.” Ning was in no rush to sell it. This was a fine treasure for a Daolord who walked the Dao of Fire. If he waited for an opportune time, he would be able to sell it for a very high price.

“I really didn’t expect to be waylaid so many times after leaving the Astral Islands. I killed quite a few of those bandits, but unexpected my most valuable loot was this Bloodfire Cloudfruit rather than the Mirrorsnow Painting.” Ning hurriedly stored the fruit back into the pureloop jade bottle.

“Time to go.” Ning had quite a few valuable treasures on him already, and so he was quickly able to return to his usual calm.

After leaving the Royal Dragon Palace, Ning flew for more than two more months before finally reaching the place where Su Youji had secreted herself.

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