The Desolate Era (Web Novel)

“Wait.” When Ji Ning saw the steady stream of black-caped warriors pour out from the distant ship, he couldn’t help but feel surprised. “The warriors I fought previously had scales, wings, and blood-red eyes. But now, we have some black-caped warriors in front of me…all of which have four arms, golden eyes, and blood-red horns. They look completely different from the earlier enemies; even their auras are far more powerful.”

If the ten foes Ning had previously slaughtered were adorable little kittens, then these black-caped warriors standing before him were like truly savage tigers!

“A total of over a thousand black-caped warriors.” After counting more than a thousand warriors flying out from the distant ship, Ning saw how, after a long moment passed, yet another warrior emerged from the ship. This one was dressed in a violet cape, but in all other respects, he looked identical to the black-caped warriors, save for the fact that there was an enormous difference in their auras of power.

“What a terrifying force.” Ning suddenly felt as though it was hard to breathe.

The violet-caped warrior took just a single step forward. His body blurred, then suddenly appeared before the thousand-plus black-caped warriors. This speed caused Ning’s eyes to twitch; even when he used his [Obscuring Wind of the Nine Heavens] divine ability, he still wasn’t as fast as this person.

The invisible aura the person emanated caused Ning to feel even more pressure. “He’s definitely more powerful than any Celestial Immortal I’ve faced to date.”

“Commander.”

The thousand-plus black-caped warriors all looked towards their leader with eagerness.

The violet-caped warrior, however, gave Ning a curious glance. “An alien who looks like this and who is so small…I’ve never seen or even heard of someone like him.”

“What should I do? What should I do? What’s my next course of action?” Ning was feeling extraordinarily nervous right now. The entire region of many tens of kilometers was encompassed by this grand formation; there was nowhere for him to flee, and the army squad which the Snaphorn world had just sent out was terrifyingly strong.

“The voidwaves are being completely blocked out by the Third Void Sector’s defenses; no need to worry, everyone.” The violet-caped warrior smiled. “Release your children and capture this alien.”

“Yes!”

“Yes!”

“Yes!”

Instantly, a series of deafening roars rang out, shaking the region of space. At the same time, the thousand-plus black-caped warriors simultaneously opened their mouths. Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!

Ten small spheres flew out from each of their mouths, producing a total of more than ten thousand small spheres. These small spheres instantly expanded in size when they entered the space of the Void, and they quickly transformed into a series of scaled, winged, blood-eyed warriors of enormous size.

“They vomited them out?” Ning was completely flabbergasted.

“Children, capture this alien,” the violet-caped warrior ordered.

“Yes!”

The ten thousand-plus blood-eyed warriors all assented in unison…and then half of them, the shorter and smaller ones, all opened their own mouths and emitted soundless roars, causing an invisible ripple of power to instantly sweep towards Ning. Ning knew what was coming this time; he knew that these smaller blood-eyed warriors were skilled in hypnotism. Last time, he had only faced five of them, but this time more than five thousand of them were simultaneously using the technique.

The formless ripples couldn’t be avoided; all he could do was take them head-on!

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Ning could feel booms ring out from within his soul!

However…with his heartforce at nearly the peak of the iceheart stage, Ning was still able to survive.

“What a powerful soul.” The violet-caped warrior nodded lightly.

“This alien really does have a bit of talent.”

“Yes. Although our children are merely fairly weak cannon fodder meant to be used up during a battle…in large numbers, they are still quite dangerous. I wonder where this alien came from? He’s quite strong.”

The black-caped warriors were stealthily chatting amongst themselves.

……

Since hypnotism had failed…the ten thousand-plus blood-eyed warriors pulled out their weapons, then all charged forward, filling the Void with their massive bodies.

These could be considered as having power that was just barely comparable to Void-level Fiendgods, but they didn’t have Fiendgod-like indestructible bodies. If he used all his abilities, such as the [Starseizing Hand] or [Three Heads, Six Arms], Ning could wipe them all out in a very short period of time! After all, they didn’t have regenerating bodies; killing them would be very easy, very simple. However…Ning didn’t dare to recklessly waste his divine power.

The [Starseizing Hand] used up a vicious amount of divine power; once his divine power was exhausted, he would no longer be able to even fight back.

“I’ll have to rely on swordplay.”

Ning’s two hands each held a Darknorth sword. He made the swords expand to nine hundred meters.

Swoosh!

He used the [Obscuring Wind of the Nine Heavens], instantly charging into the very center of that mass of blood-eyed warriors. Ning didn’t use any additional divine abilities after that, relying solely on his sword-arts. Slash, slash, slash! Sword-light flashed everywhere.

Ning’s sword-arts were unfathomably profound, far beyond what these blood-eyed warriors were capable of. The pair of nine hundred meter long Darknorth swords slashed through the air, chopping past the heads of the blood-eyed warriors, sometimes completely bisecting them in half!

All of the blood-eyed warriors died, unable to heal from their wounds, regardless of where the injuries were, head or waist.

“Eh? His sword-arts truly are profound.” The violet-caped warrior was surprised by what he saw.

Ning was born to be a Sword Immortal. Even though he could no longer sense the Dao of the Sword or summon the natural energy of the world…his sword-arts remained unfathomable.

“Blaze, my children,” the violet-caped warrior called out.

“Roaaaaaar!”

“Die!”

“Alien!”

The horde of blood-eyed warriors bellowed as their bodies began to glow with a blurry green light. Instantly, their speed and their strength rose dramatically. They began to assault Ning en masse.

Ning remained very calm. He didn’t use any divine abilities; instead, he relied on his sword-arts to continue to slaughter these blood-eyed warriors. In fact, he even used his own body as a weapon, using it to block the enemy axes and whips head-on. Due to having trained in the [Eight-Nine Arcane Art], Ning was able to actually conserve power by using his own body to take on blows as he fought within the mass of blood-eyed warriors!

Ning wasn’t worried about them being able to injure him in the slightest.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Ning was occasionally sent flying here by an axe or flying there by a whip…

But each time he was sent ‘flying’, his sword-light would flash past in a graceful manner…and many enemy heads would go flying as well.

……

Within the infinite darkness of the Void, three powerful minds were communicating with each other.

“This human’s body is rather strong.”

“Right. It’s like one of those ‘magic treasures’ those humans use.”

“This human is probably at the Celestial Immortal level of power at most…but his body is this powerful…he most likely must have trained in an earth-shatteringly powerful protective divine ability those humans have.”

“Ideally, we shall capture him alive, so that we can analyze his body. If we can gain some insights into some of the profound mysteries behind his divine ability, then use them to make us sisters grow more physically powerful, that would be wonderful.”

……

By relying on the [Eight-Nine Arcane Art] and his sword-arts, Ning was able to wipe out all of the blood-eyed warriors in the time needed to boil a kettle of tea. However, Ning didn’t feel excited at all…because he saw the amusement on the faces of the distant black-caped warriors, and the calmness of the violet-caped warrior. He understood from this that to the Snaphorn world, the forces he had just killed most likely represented very little.

In truth…

They really did represent almost nothing. They were cannon fodder; in fact, they weren’t even viewed as true members of the same race to which the horned warriors belonged! To produce a true member of the race required an extremely high price to be paid! Producing this sort of cannon fodder, however, was much easier and much cheaper. However, there was a limit to how many of them each horned warrior could control; some would have to perish before they could give birth to more.

“He was able to kill more than ten thousand of our children; he does have a bit of talent.” The violet-caped warrior said, “Hellsong, go and test his abilities.”

“Yes.”

A black-caped warrior nodded, then manifested four shortswords in his four hands.

Ning’s heart clenched.

They had just seen him kill more than ten thousand of those blood-eyed warriors…but still chose to send a single black-caped warrior to fight?

“Hmph.” The black-caped warrior suddenly moved, transforming into a blur as he pounced towards Ning.

“So fast!” Ning was somewhat caught off-guard. Those earlier red-eyed warriors had been far slower than him, but this black-caped warrior was so fast that he was only slightly slower than Ning when using the [Obscuring Wind of the Nine Heavens]. He could already be considered as being on Ning’s general level; he was slightly slower, but it wouldn’t make much of a difference.

Four icy shortswords came plunging towards him.

Ning’s Darknorth swords struck outwards as well.

Clang clang clang!

Consecutive collisions could be heard. Ning’s advantage lay in the profoundness of his sword-arts, while the enemy’s advantage was having four arms.

However, from that clash…

Ning was sent flying back!

“What great power.” Ning’s face changed, then his body blurred, transforming into his three-headed, six-armed form.

“Three heads and six arms? So is this your true form?” The black-caped warrior was quite surprised, but he then snickered, “Interesting.” He charged forth once more.

Ning now had six divine swords in his six arms. His sword-arts were profound, but he remained unwilling to use the [Starseizing Hand]. The [Starseizing Hand] simply used up far too much divine power, and the strength of this Snaphorn world was immeasurable. It was better to make himself appear weak; if he immediately revealed his trump cards, they would probably prepare even more powerful trump cards to deal with him.

Slash! Ning’s sword-light sliced through the black-caped warrior’s body. The black-caped warrior retreated at high speed, but a gaping wound was still cut through his chest. Green blood spewed outwards, but in the blink of an eye the wound was healed.

“Healed?” Ning was surprised. “So they really are two separate races. Those cannon fodders were completely unable to heal, but the black-caped warriors are capable of self-regeneration.”

Once someone became capable of self-regeneration, killing them would be much harder.

“Eh?” The violet-caped warrior saw what had just happened. “Hellsong’s unit, engage.”

Instantly, nine more black-caped warriors went flying forward.

“Hellsong, can’t you get it done?”

“You can’t even capture a single alien, and you even got injured.”

The nine other black-caped warriors all spoke teasingly, but they showed no mercy in their movements at all. They soon formed a complete circle around Ning, attacking him en masse and giving him nowhere to flee at all.

Boom…

Ning’s body suddenly increased explosively in size, expanding to three thousand meters.

Three thousand meters was Ning’s limit in using the Heavenly Transformation technique.

“What?” Prior to this, those ten black-caped warriors were surrounding and assaulting a tiny little dot, but that tiny little dot had suddenly and explosively increased in size to become comparable to them; this caused them to feel completely flabbergasted.

“So this is how tall you actually are…I imagine this is your true form, right?” Hellsong sighed in amazement, “Three heads, six arms, and as tall as us…this alien is quite strong.”

Ning, however, just felt misery; the more divine abilities he used, the faster his divine power would be used up.

However…while using Heavenly Transformation, his speed and strength would both increase tremendously!

“Every single one of these black-caped warriors are comparable to Celestial Immortal Goldclock or Deadwood; if any more come, I’ll be forced to use the [Starseizing Hand]. Once I use it…my end will come shortly thereafter.” Ning was frantic now; every bit of divine power that he used up was irreplaceable, at least in the short term. However…he still had no idea as to how he was supposed to flee from this place.

He could neither ascend to Heaven nor descend to Hell; there was nowhere to flee!