Volume Four | Paragon

The crimson and white gateway opened up within the air, widening until ten people could pass through it at once. Although it was somewhat under her control, Wei Yi chose not to model it on what she saw at the entrance of the Kong Holy Grounds, as that not only made her think of the wrong thing all that time ago, when women were not so prominently on her mind as they could be now, but also didn’t seem like the optimal method of approach.

Instead, she decided to have a plain, flat gateway that linked to the centre of the prison realm and could only be accessed from one side in either realm, as it partially sealed off the entrance on the other side in the Planar Continents.

Having passed a notice in advance to the people of the Kong Prison Realm through Yi Shi Ming, the moment that the gateway opened, they were met with Meng Chu, Min Lian, Liu Lia Kun and a number of others. All of them stood by to witness this momentous event, and the moment that Great Dark and Great Light realised what they were seeing, their eyes widened, and they lost their ability to speak.

“Told you I’d manage something,” Wei Yi said to none of them in particular.

However, they were unable to respond, and some may have in fact been unable to hear her as they were too amazed by what they witnessed.

To the people in the prison realm, although they now had a false sun through her Endless Monolith and had gotten to witness an illusory sun and moon when Wei Yi practised with the Eclipse Split or Eclipse Ire, they had never expected to be brought out just in time to witness the setting sun shining into their eyes from the world outside. They didn’t think that the outside air would be entering their lungs, or that they would see sand that hadn’t been crimson only a short time ago, or that they would have such a wide gateway to travel through in such a near future.

Meanwhile the few people in the Planar Continents hadn’t expected that this great mystery of the Greats, the prison from which no man or woman has escaped, would not only be broken out of by a woman that was in the third realm just moments ago, but also seemingly stolen from the Greats.

It was an impossibility, and should have been one in every way imaginable, and yet, here they were.

They saw a foreign sky, showing a number of the same chains that Great Dark and Great Light had glimpsed within the core that appeared around Wei Yi, with a light that emerged from some point behind them, and felt a dense flood of planar energy surge towards them from within the prison realm that surpassed the Planar Continents quite significantly.

“Is this… is this why you had been unable to return for some time? Have you been preparing something like this?” Meng Chu asked, barely managing to finally say this after a long pause of silence.

“Partly. In truth, I had gotten into something rather unfortunate and needed to run off for a bit, but it took me in the right direction, so it was rather fortunate. I won’t tell you the details, but I will say that this gateway into the Paragon Fortress will remain for so long as the fortress itself stands. That means that you, the people with you, or anyone in the Kong Prison Realm can come and go whenever they like unless we fall,” she answered, “So long as we are not found and defeated, freedom is ours for the rest of our lives.”

“You mean…”

“Come on, walk through. From experience, this kind of thing should be harmless, not unpleasant, and not disorienting at all, provided that the gateway over at the Kong District wasn’t somehow superior to the work of the Master of Yi City himself.”

He was about to take a step when he realised what he’d heard and was stunned into silence once again. Luo Lia Kun managed to avoid that same fate, not that she had no questions to voice.

“This place has been constructed by the Master of Yi City? Is this something as extreme as the Kong Prison Realm itself, or was this one of his earlier constructions?” the vice-leader of the Remnants asked, recalling what Wei Yi had told her about the Master of Yi City some time ago, “If this is something created at the ninth realm, it might be entirely invincible…”

“I believe it was the seventh realm, but even if it had been his proudest work, that wouldn’t change the fact that the planar energy in the world has decreased, the fortress itself has been around for quite some time without care or maintenance, and that Kong Shi Meng himself isn’t here to utilise it. As such, the most that will be gotten out of it is significantly weaker than its initial state, although it will not only grow alongside the quantity of planar energy, but it also wouldn’t have been of any use against the strongest of Their number. Speaking of which… anyone wanna say Their name?”

“Is that even a good idea?”

“It all depends on whether he had foreseen something like this and blocked the method that They utilise. Judging by the fact that it had remained for however long, there are some obstructions methods being used here, but I don’t really know how much they cover,” Wei Yi admitted, “In essence, no.”

While they were conversing, Great Dark finally muttered, “Luo Lia Kun?”

“Hey, boss. I see you know Wei Yi as well,” the perpetual vice-leader smiled, “How have things been for you?”

“They… Not everything went according to plan… neither then nor now… I didn’t think that you would still be alive after They had captured you…” Great Dark said, his slow words combined with the constant dense aura of yin around him resulting in a rather dark and cold atmosphere, “Before my brother suggests this… should we move inside?”

“Nope, the people of the prison realm shall be going outside instead. While some, like Luo Lia Kun over there, haven’t suffered all that much while inside, others lived there their entire lives. It’s only right that everyone gets to see the world with their own eyes,” Wei Yi instructed, waving Luo Lia Kun and the others on that side in before heading inside on her own, “I’ll just bring this to the attention of a few others, and we can proceed to get this place active and fill it with life and all that.”

She didn’t say anything else before she leapt up onto one of the spires of the prison realm that separated the two halves for the moment, then amplified her voice via her methods so that it would be able to reach all of the world.

Most people had moved into either Sanctuary or Beast’s Rest by now, but there were still a few that were further out, and some that would venture out to seek out the mysteries of the rejuvenated land, as well as others that figured that the best place to plant the abundance of metal-type crops would be somewhere far away from the two main cities.

It was important to reach them all, and it wasn’t like she didn’t have energy to spare right now.

“People of the Kong Prison Realm. I, Wei Yi, announce that the gateway outside has finally opened. From now on, you may leave the realm freely, so long as you speak with more care once in the Planar Continents. Two gateways will open in the centres of Sanctuary and Beast’s Rest, and one is open now in the centre of the realm. If you wish to live in the Continents, or if your craft will be of greater use there, I encourage at least one visit to find a residence for yourself. Otherwise, it is your choice.”

The Planar Continents were a mythical place in the prison realm, even with all of the more recent arrivals, but that didn’t mean that everyone wanted to leave their lives in the Kong Prison Realm just to move there. Some would be satisfied with a look, although that could easily grow their interest, while others would have no interest at all due to the time and effort that they had already invested in setting up businesses and homes in one of the major cities. Not everyone was a combatant, either, even with the techniques that she had openly provided to the world, so it wouldn’t be safe for them to be out there if Paragon was to be discovered at some nearby point in time.

In addition, she didn’t intend to move everyone from the spatial realm and into the Planar Continents, and certainly not just into this one spot on the map that was smaller than a regular district. That would be equivalent to putting all of their eggs in one well-hidden basket and would result in all of the development done in the Kong Prison Realm to go to waste.

Instead, linking the two spaces seemed far wiser, as that would allow the use of far more space by the people of the prison realm, and would give them the chance to experience the outside world. The best situation would be if roughly half of the population of the Kong Prison Realm decided to settle down in Paragon, as they would then be able to develop families and grow into both environments, eventually filling them both with worthwhile individuals and talented people that would be of use to their places of residence and to the cause as a whole.

Once a foothold like this was established, and a group of people got used to the Planar Continents and the Kong Prison Realm alike, it would be easier to expand to any other district or location with a group that is already familiar with the challenges of the Northern Desert.

To allow everyone to travel back and forth, she naturally needed gateways for them to pass through, but the desert fortress was only able to support one, at least as far as she was aware. So, she instead made use of the existing gateway and split it into three, with all of them leading to nearly the same place in the fortress, allowing for two or three to pass through each one at once, but an opening was now present in the two cities she had mentioned.

In a way, this didn’t just make it easier to reach Paragon from within the prison realm, but also made travel between the individual cities and locations far quicker, since a single gateway would bring one from, for example, Beast’s Rest to Paragon, then either to the centre of the realm or Sanctuary, depending on which one was required. Since she anticipated such usage of the gateway, she was also aware that widening it or otherwise creating more would be invaluable and could eventually be made into a whole set of transit gateways just for going from one place to another. If it could be expanded all over Yi City, it would grant them all an immense advantage over regular merchants, mercenaries and, most importantly, the Great Families, who would struggle to travel as quickly regardless of their powers.

With the fortress uncovered, the method for setting up one gigantic superstructure that was able to support a gateway like this nearly permanently was also in her hands, so long as she took a little time to research it and understand exactly how and why it functioned, and setting up similar gateway stones in other places would only be a matter of time after that.

The bigger challenge would be to ensure that they couldn’t be used by their enemies, or by anyone intending to invade their prison realm through one such gateway, since that could easily lead the Greats to realising just what had happened to their precious prison realm and what it was being used for, at which point all one of the second or first generation Great Family members would need to do was disguise themselves and make it into the prison realm with a second to do as they like.

From there, using the ability of the seventh realm to meddle with space, it might not be impossible for them to forcefully reclaim the Kong Prison Realm, although recapture would be a more suitable term.

Once she had enough gateways and enough risk of such a thing occurring, she would probably create a large transit point where all gateways would end up, from where they would then need to travel to the gateway that they wish to go to. It wouldn’t prevent something like this from happening, but if the prison realm wasn’t the first place one ended up, those travelling through it might not realise the importance of just three of however many gateways she would have at that point. Ideally, it would be watched over constantly as to prevent anyone with multiple anchors or any oddities – effectively, any otherworldly demon or wierdo – from proceeding, and the problem could be mitigated, even if the solution still had many flaws.

Her biggest problem had been her own abilities so far, and while she did not yet have the power to freely and fully control the Kong Prison Realm with just her mind, the breakthrough did deliver some immensely useful developments that would lead her far closer to being able to put up a genuine fight against any forces that might seek to go against her.

The dantian had once more received an unexpected refinement, jumping from a pure white tone to almost resembling liquid that had been frozen in mid-air by some unknown means. As before, this lead to an increase in her natural energy sensitivity, benefitting all of her forms of energy in various ways.

Her new core provided her Endless Monolith with additional defence and empowered her by an immense degree, not just due to the increase in her planar energy’s effectiveness, but also due to most of her otherworldly gifts relying on her cultivation in order to show some semblance of their original power. The House of Gold had grown up to three cubic metres at this point, having gained an additional ten centimetres at some point in the same way that cultivation stage benefits tended to occur a total of ten times despite there being only nine of them, leading to those in the second realm having three times their original power rather than 2.9.

The Realm of Potential had not befitted much, as it seemed to be more tied to the prison realm than her, but she did sense a slightly larger amount of energy within it, meaning that it might lead to quicker results than before. Since she was going to need to improve quite a few techniques soon, that was highly useful for her, and it also meant that there was a slight chance of some new great development occurring, just like with the momentary image that had easily boosted her understand and cultivation.

Other than that, she also gained quite a few more years of life through the fourth realm, and the ability to externalise solid planar energy and stabilise it whenever and however she wanted.

While it was immediately obvious that it could be used in order to replace her killing will or spiritual will in the creation of arrays, although those forms of energy would also benefit from the core, she did not intend to make use of that, and instead wanted the ability to create weapons from her most powerful form of energy that would be able to endure it.

In theory, her planar energy should be able to endure itself, and she would thus finally obtain a weapon that didn’t explode whenever she injected her cosmic energy into it, giving her another great advantage through something so simple. She didn’t use weapons all that much, not after gaining the killing will state, but nothing prohibited her from creating artefact channels inside of her claw gauntlets via her planar energy and turning them into pseudo artefacts with that method instead, boosting the attacks from both hands easily.

However, the quickest benefit of all that she would experience from her new realm would be the greater balance of her five states of cultivation, as well as the ease with which she will be able to boost her bloodline power up to an appropriate standard. In theory, once she had all of her five meridian networks and forms of energy up to the same stage and realm, she could advance them all together and receive greater benefits through their careful collaboration.

‘Still, that is for later. For now, since those gateways are up, I can go back to the Continents.’

Hopping down from the mountain peaks, she quickly reached into the air and built a small array purely out of her cosmic energy, using it to light up this point in the prison realm for any that wished to travel to it instead of the two main cities to see the world outside.

It was just a little test of her strengthened energy, but it was able to confirm the differences and similarities between this kind of solidified energy and her usual combination of spiritual will and killing intent. In most aspects, these two energies were alike, save for the mental energy being notably weaker than her cosmic energy, but there was a notable difference when it came to using them in arrays. Most of her spiritual will-based creations would still draw on planar energy once in a place with rich ambient energy, but her cosmic energy array could utilise itself without requiring a typical flow and gathering process.

In fact, the array could simultaneously draw more energy from around it and expend itself to maintain itself for so long as it was within the range of her stabilisation field.

This did allow the arrays to be of significantly greater power than her standard killing will one, but it did not equalise them to the level of the spiritual will arrays created by the Spiritual Flow technique. That technique was simply too significant and too in tune with the nature of arrays to be substituted by an inferior power and realm.

Perhaps the best solution would be to merge the two once the realms are equalised, since that would permit the effectiveness of her spiritual will to be imbued with the overabundance of her cosmic energy to achieve powerful arrays that can operate for extreme periods of time. There would naturally be a few challenges in achieving a perfect mixture, but she didn’t consider it to be impossible. After all, planar energy birthed the other four paths, and the four paths could return to planar energy, so mixing them together was essentially combining two states of planar energy into one.

While that didn’t mean that it was particularly easy, she had been able to accomplish far stranger things and far more difficult tasks, so she would get onto it the moment that she had the time and ideas to spare. For the moment, there was no great rush.

On the other side of the gateway, Luo Lia Kun and the Great Earth twins had concluded their chat, although they clearly wanted to speak about far more things in private. Some of the descendants of those that fought in the War of Yin were also interested in conversing further, which wasn’t something that she would stop, only delay.

“Everyone, this fortress is our own. For now, settle in random residential areas and we can decide the proper arrangements later, and once we have any idea of what we’ll be doing out here, everyone will be able to speak with one another in their own time,” Wei Yi said, glancing back at the gateway behind her, “To help out with things, there’s someone that I would like to introduce to everyone who isn’t yet familiar with her.”

They all turned to the gateway section leading into the centre of the prison realm, and watched as a figure in a simple grey robe that modestly covered her body, with a head of crimson hair that flowed smoothly down her body and bright grey eyes, emerged from the prison realm.

Those who had been looking towards the gateway before this noted that they had been unable to see or detect this woman with any of their senses prior to this, and it was as if she had simply appeared while they were momentarily distracted by Wei Yi’s words. It was incredibly strange, especially for the Great Earth twins that were nearest to being able to feel even things like spatial fluctuations with great clarity, but in comparison to the gateway itself, a person appearing out of nowhere wasn’t really all that strange, especially if Wei Yi also controlled the spatial realm fully.

“Good evening, everyone. I am Yi Shi Ming, and while I do not have much administrative experience, I do have a good mind and the ability to observe this entire fortress, as well as the prison realm.”

“The entire realm… Wait, her realm-” Great Light blurted out before he was stopped by his brother.

However, that mention did bring to their attention that while the woman’s cultivation realm was partially obscured by some means, those in the fourth, fifth and sixth realms were able to sense the faint halos of energy that surrounded her, echoing from within the woman’s planar aperture. It was also strangely ethereal, as if it wasn’t quite there in reality.

While Yi Shi Ming was crossing through the gateway, she had visibly hesitated just before putting her foot through it the first time, but it had gone unnoticed by those that were distracted by her realm, and not understood by others that did manage to pay attention to her movements and expression.

Out of everyone there, only Wei Yi was already aware of both her cultivation state and her identity as a spatial spirit, for whom it was difficult to leave the realm they were in unless there was a stable connection between it and the world outside. After having spent quite some time within the Kong Prison Realm, even if most of that time had been spent asleep, Yi Shi Ming must have been slightly afraid that she wouldn’t be able go to outside again, hence the hesitation in her movements.

Fortunately for all of them, nothing stopped the mother of the Master of Yi City from returning into the Planar Continents, from where she had originated, and after that first cautious step, she was able to proceed smoothly and stop on the other side, breathing a silent and disguised sigh of relief at her newfound freedom.

‘Wei Yi, do you intend to share it with them?’

‘I don’t see why not. Most of them can tell anyway, and having someone in the seventh realm to protect Paragon and the Kong Prison Realm alike should make them far more confident in our eventual ability to succeed in our goals,’ Wei Yi replied with their mental connection, then looked to the Great Earth twins, the vice-leader, and the other leaders of the opposition to the Greats, “As some of you might have already figured out, Yi Shi Ming is in the seventh realm. She also has a special talent relating to being able to observe specific spaces, so you can be sure that if someone or something was to sneak inside, she would be able to discover them quickly.”

“Indeed,” the mother of the Master of Yi City confirmed, “I can help anyone so long as I am not otherwise occupied, and if anyone would prefer privacy, I also understand when not to pay attention.”

“The seventh realm, that is the same one as the realm the patriarchs of Yi City are in, correct?”

The question raised by Meng Chu sounded somewhat silly, but not only was it hardly unusual for someone that had gotten into planar cultivation only a short time ago, it was also a reasonable one from a certain perspective. Depending on the exact nature of someone’s realm, they could be far stronger or weaker than someone else in the same realm, and even in another realm, with Wei Yi being the best example of such a thing.

It certainly could have been phrased better, but he was already the most refined and elegant individual in the prison realm until the appearance of the Remnants and the like, and even he barely knew about the realms beyond the fifth – Wei Yi hadn’t wanted to overwhelm them all at once, so she had only shared the specific details up to the fifth realm with them.

“To be more precise, I am in the seventh stage of the seventh realm. I do not know how that compares to most of the current patriarch, but so long as they have not reached the next realm, even in a half-step stage, I should be able to contend with them,” Yi Shi Ming stated, displaying a small sphere of dense, solid planar energy that was linked to an uncertain number of channels and surrounded by a vague image of several halos, although their quantity could also not be determined by a single person observing them, Wei Yi included, “As such, I can also assist any of you with any projects, so long as you require it.”

“I’d suggest we go right out there and attack the districts, capture them from Them, and-”

“Great Light, you and I should both understand that it wouldn’t be this simple,” his brother stopped him, “Forgive our rudeness… but you are not simply human, are you?”

The melancholy expression returned to the spatial spirit’s expression, “You are not incorrect, Great Dark. However, since you had said that in the first place, you must have understood that this was not something that I or Wei Yi had intended to say.”

“Her? Could I confirm… exactly who she is in relation to all of this?”

“Wei Yi is the current owner of my son’s Kong Prison Realm, and the leader of the faction that she has yet to name. That is all that I will say, and if you intend to get more out of me, you will be disappointed,” Yi Shi Ming stated, “You are aware that the technique you practise had been specifically prohibited long ago, yet you had done a lot of damage in order to acquire it, and now try to unveil things in public when they should clearly be discussed in private. That is not a good impression to make.”

The twins’ eyes widened, but they could hardly discuss whatever the spatial spirit had brought up as publicly as her identity, nor was that the most prominent thing in their mind after her words.

Although none of the participants in the War of Yin had known the name of the Master of Yi City, nor did any of them know that he had made the Kong Prison Realm, they did know that the realm that could be seen through the gateway behind her was a high quality spatial realm, and that someone who had been only in the third realm minutes ago wasn’t exactly the usual person to control a domain like that.

Furthermore, Shun Liu Min and those like her that had not yet gotten to know Wei Yi’s position within the unnamed faction of the prison realm were even more surprised to learn that a third realm fighter was commanding an entire spatial realm and many of the Remnants without any difficulty to be seen.

It was a topic that was easier to approach, however, so Great Dark immediately sought to switch to it as the focus of the discussion, perhaps hoping that Wei Yi and those on her side would just forget those earlier words, “How exactly did this happen?”

“Again with your questions, Great Dark. You were significantly less inquisitive when I had been playing around as Da Gang. In fact, tell me – those jade slips of yours, were they intended to contain a fragment of your will meant to compel those that used them? Did you want to make them more subservient to the Deadly Martial Colosseum, or perhaps your entire faction? Did you want Da Gang to become one of your soldiers? If not, how exactly did this happen?”

The question being thrown back at him prompted him to get quieter, “We can discuss that in private.”

“Oh, I am sure that we can. Still, everyone, I have one thing to correct from Yi Shi Ming’s earlier words,” Wei Yi said, “I wish to correct a misconception. While the faction certainly did lack a name until recently, I have thought of a suitable name for it, and I hope that you two will join it. We all intend to defeat Them, do we not?

“In a way, we are correcting the countless decades of their forceful control over the Western Continent, over Yi City, and returning things to how they should have been according to the natural progression of the world. Their forceful destruction of progress and techniques that are not to their liking, their forceful binding of the world’s energy, their constant insistence of deciding how the world ought to go, it must all go, and as the people that are going to enforce this, under the leadership of someone with the Yin-Yang Ascendant’s physique, there’s only one suitable name, isn’t there?

“We will force them to face the laws of the world, enforce them, and execute those that refuse to follow them.

“The Ascendant’s Arbiters. What do you think?”

She hadn’t used a voice technique, nor any mental technique, and she hadn’t even manifested her physique energy to prove her own words, but she hardly needed to. Whether as the one to control a spatial realm in a time when they were nearly gone, someone to have killed two of the third generation of the Great Families while at the same realm as them, and as someone who had stolen a spatial realm from those same Greats without them even realising, she could hardly be argued with.