Chapter 18 – A Wandering Life

Book 40, The Five Autarchs, Chapter 18 – A Wandering Life

After the banquet came to an end, Ji Ning led Nuwa and Subhuti out to begin assembling the formation! Ning’s Primaltwin had already assembled roughly 90% of the formation, and it only really needed the powerful castle to merge together with the formation and become its core and command center. This would allow the power of the formation to skyrocket.

No one save for the Autarchs would stand a chance at breaking apart a formation like this. Even the most powerful Sourcewalkers like the Blazesun Ruler would probably find it very difficult to breach this formation. It could be described as truly impregnable!

Clack clack clack… the castle slowly slid into position, moving to become the very center of the entire Three Realms Region. The leaves at its bottom layer began to manifest green ley-lines that looked like the veins of a tree leaf. These green ley-lines reached out of the leaves themselves, stretching out into empty space and then completely disappearing. They had completely linked up to the rest of the grand formation.

Nuwa maintained control over the fort while Ning made the necessary adjustments. After three days, they finally completed the great project.

Boom! The entire castle itself vanished into thin air, as did the formations surrounding the Three Realms. They had all turned invisible, but their power had just skyrocketed to a brand new level.

“I’ll arrange for a golem to stand here and keep watch, ensuring that nothing within the range of the formation’s scanners can avoid detection,” Nuwa said. “If it finds anything, I’ll instantly enter the castle and take control over it.”

Ning revealed a smile. The nearby Subhuti couldn’t help but turn to glance at Ning. He knew just how much this disciple of his had done for the Three Realms. Ning wanted to do everything he could before he passed away.

“Oh, right. Master,” Ning suddenly said, “I’m planning to spend some time with Brightmoon and my parents. I’m going to wander about the Chaosverse with them, seeing the many marvels of the cosmos and allowing them to better understand the Dao. Master, Windfiend, would you like to join me?”

“Wonderful!” Subhuti revealed a delighted look, then asked, “But wouldn’t we be disturbing your family trip?”

“Haha, it’s fine. My retainers will be taking part as well. It’ll make this trip more fun,” Ning said with a laugh. He was planning to spend his remaining years cultivating, but just staying in seclusion and training in isolation was pointless. He didn’t have much time left; he was going to spend at least some of it visiting the marvelous sights of the Chaosverse. Many of those places might be ‘dangerous’, but there were no dangers that concerned him in the slightest!

In the Chaosverse, any naturally-occurring dangers were no longer any threat to him at all; he was on the same level of power as the Autarchs, after all! Even the Eight Domains and the prime essence sea were nothing to him. The only place that Ning felt any true dread of was the Sithelands. There were numerous locations even in the outer perimeter of the Sithelands, which had already been breached by the Autarchs, which were capable of posing a threat to him.

This was because even the Autarchs had to put tremendous effort into breaching the outer perimeter. There were a number of places the Autarchs didn’t actually go inside and had instead simply sealed off. Thus, there were many cultivators who would go exploring the outer reaches of the Sithelands! That was a truly dangerous place, and it was filled with all sorts of Sithe relics, treasures, and traps. Ning didn’t feel that it was a suitable choice for his parents and his daughter to visit.

He’d go take a look when his life was nearing its end. For now, he was going to engage in cultivation instead. He had to infuse all the other Daos into his Eternal Omega Sword Dao, and he was also going to view many of the natural wonders of the Chaosverse! This would actually be helpful for him in comprehending the Dao. Besides, this was a good chance for him to show his daughter and his parents some truly dangerous places. There were some places where not even Otherverse Lords would dare tread, but for him it wouldn’t be a problem.

“Perhaps Brightmoon will be able to make a breakthrough as a result,” Ning mused. There was no chance his parents would improve any further on the path of cultivation, as they had to rely on pills just to reach the World level. Brightmoon had spent 5 years and 2 months in Yu Wei’s belly before being born, and she was born with such incredible talent that she reached the Celestial Immortal level with ease. Although her path to the World level had been rather bumpy, Ning had patiently and attentively instructed her, ensuring that she was able to succeed without needing to use any pills. Ning had certain expectations of his daughter; he wasn’t going to just let her take the easy way.

……

Ning’s final decision was to bring his family members, his retainers, and the duo of Subhuti and Windfiend! Windfiend was rather hesitant about this, as his relationship with Ning couldn’t quite compare to that of Subhuti’s. However, he was now a member of the Three Realms. The future of the Three Realms would be up to Nuwa, Subhuti, and Windfiend. Ning wanted to help his master and Windfiend as best he could.

“Haha, we’ve finally left the Flamedragon Realmverse!” Brightmoon was quite excited as she stared from within the realmship. Everyone in this realmship was like an elder family member, and so she was able to act in a much more relaxed manner. “I’ve never left the Flamedragon Realmverse before. I hear that realmverses are all extremely far from each other.”

“Calm down. We’re going to visit some of the nearby realmverses first, then we’ll head off to an extremely distant and dangerous place known as the ‘Flamesea Thunderfalls’. That place is highly suitable for training in the Dao of Lightning and the Dao of Fire.” Ning looked at his daughter. “Brightmoon, your greatest affinity is with the Dao of Fire. You’ll be able to meditate and gain keen insights there.”

“Father, didn’t you say that the Flamesea Thunderfalls is a place that can easily kill Emperors, and where even Hegemons would suffer heavy injuries?” Brightmoon asked.

“Yes. It is considered one of the thirty most dangerous locations of the entire Chaosverse,” Ning said.

The nearby Hegemon Azurefiend chuckled, “Little lady, with Master present you have nothing to fear. The Flamesea Thunderfalls is nothing to Master.”

“I’ll protect you too, Brightmoon!” the pudgy Flamewing said, pounding his chest.

Windfiend, Subhuti, Yichuan, and Snow all stared curiously towards the sights outside. None of them had left the Flamedragon Realmverse before.

……

Time continued to flow on. Ning’s group spent quite a bit of time wandering all of the realmverses in the Sixteen Realmverses Alliance; in total, they spent over thirty million years here. Ning happily accompanied his family in their wanderings, not worried in the slightest.

Finally, they left the Sixteen Realmverses Alliance and began to wander through the cosmos. They visited many unique locales where the local cultivators were often brutish, powerful, and eccentric. Generally speaking, they weren’t very welcoming of outsiders! But when they saw Ning, they all went on their absolute best behavior.

This was because Ning, to avoid unnecessary trouble, sent Flamewing ahead of them and ensured that the locals would all be sufficiently cowed by the time the realmship arrived. As soon as the locals saw Flamewing, they quickly understood that their visitor was Daolord Darknorth. Who would dare to be disrespectful to him?

“This planet is so beautiful. I’ve never seen a world as beautiful as this one.” Brightmoon loved this place. This was a unique world known as the Immortal Ravine, and Ning’s group ended up spending a million years living here because it truly was quite beautiful. Its lovely but alien environment was completely a product of nature.

“Father, buy this! And that! I want this one also!” Each time Ning reached a new place, he would ask the local powers to bring over some unique treasures which might be of use to his daughter or his parents. Once they found something of interest, Ning would pay a very high price to acquire the items. Thus, the major powers were quite eager to bring out all of the strange and odd treasures they had stored away. They all hoped for Daolord Darknorth to take a fancy to their treasures, as they knew that Daolord Darknorth wouldn’t be stingy in payment.

……

Brightmoon, Snow, Yichuan, Subhuti, and Windfiend all had their horizons expanded considerably. Even Su Youji saw much more than she had in the past. Although she had accompanied Ning to the Blazesun Domain, they hadn’t made any detours and so she hadn’t really seen much. This time, they were on what amounted to a leisurely excursion!

They toured through one place after another, and when they found some unique treasures or saw some unique sights, Ning would seize the opportunity to guide his daughter and help her in her cultivation.

But of course, Ning devoted the majority of his time to his own cultivation. His Primaltwin remained within the Azureflower Estate. Not only had he acquired a large number of Sithe cultivation techniques from the Autarchs, he had even acquired the Daos they used to reach Autarchy! Ning naturally wanted to spend his time analyzing them and perhaps find a way for himself to survive. Although the chances were quite low, he still had to give it a shot. Ning wasn’t the type to just sit there and wait for death.

“The Heart of Eternity.” Within the Azureflower Estate. The black-robed Ning waved his hand, causing the Heart of Eternity to appear and float in the air before him. It remained covered by layers of inscrutable runes.

“It’s been quite some time since I’ve tried to solve it. I should give it another shot.” Ning had reached a much higher level of comprehension, now that he had mastered the Eternal Omega Sword Dao. “I’m far more powerful than I was before I attempted the Daomerge. I should be able to solve more levels of it this time.”

Right now, Ning was mainly focusing on two goals in his training. The first was to infuse the other Daos into his Eternal Omega Dao, while the second was to create a perfect cultivation technique. In both cases, his chances for success were extremely slim! As for the Heart of Eternity, Autarch Awakener had poured his heart and soul into its creation. Ning felt certain that spending some more time analyzing it might be of benefit to him.

Crack! Crack! Crack! Ning began to attempt to break through the various layers, and the outermost layers quickly crumbled away before him. Now that Ning had reached a much higher level of insight, he was able to solve the seals much more quickly than before. He blew through the lower levels like rotting deadwood, reaching the fiftieth level almost instantly.

Level fifty. Level sixty. Level seventy…