第二章 神剑紫光琼

Chapter 2 The Divine Sword Ziguangqiong Ji Ning descended from the sky, landing beside the Five Elements Divine Cauldron. He turned to look at the ancient stone platform placed nearby; the blood-colored divine sword on it was still covered in cracks throughout its blade. “Ziguangqiong…” Ji Ning glanced at the divine sword, then waved his hand. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh~~~ a vast number of treasures appeared out of thin air, each emitting a startling pressure. In an instant, they piled up into a small mountain beside him. These were almost all the innate spirit treasures Ji Ning had looted from over a hundred True Gods and True Immortals. Of course, looting so many True Gods and True Immortals had also netted Ji Ning an additional chaos treasure. This chaos treasure was in the form of a great hammer, capable of emitting endless lightning. “So many innate spirit treasures… having too many is useless.” Ji Ning pointed from afar at the Five Elements Divine Cauldron. “Rise.” Hum~~~ The Five Elements Divine Cauldron immediately began to emit pressure, and the cauldron’s ears released five streams of light. “Go in.” Ji Ning’s vast divine power spread out, carrying a sharp sword intent, and swept up those innate spirit treasures. One after another, treasures in the form of blades, swords, axes, pearls, and other shapes flew into the Five Elements Divine Cauldron. Inside the cauldron, they were madly ground and destroyed, extracting the essence of the five elements. In just ten breaths, nearly thirty innate spirit treasures thrown in by Ji Ning had turned into waste slag, while the five-element essence within the cauldron’s internal five-element space had increased considerably. Large numbers of innate spirit treasures were thrown in batch after batch. This scene would make any mighty figure in the Three Realms tremble. Ji Ning felt some pain, but for the sake of the divine sword Ziguangqiong, everything was worth it. “Sizzle sizzle sizzle~~~” Sounds of treasures being ground came from the Five Elements Divine Cauldron. The pile of treasures beside him, originally a small mountain, visibly shrank rapidly. Soon, the mountain of treasures was completely consumed. “So much five-element essence.” Ji Ning looked at the Five Elements Divine Cauldron. Inside its space, a vast amount of five-element essence was contained. A large amount of waste slag first flew out of the cauldron. When it first emerged, it was a clump of slag only a few zhang in size, but after flying out, it quickly turned into a massive mountain of slag as tall as ten thousand zhang. Ji Ning’s divine power wrapped around the slag, and he casually tossed it. Boom, it landed hundreds of li away, giving birth to a mountain of waste. “Let’s see this time. Based on the experience from the last repair, this much five-element essence should be enough.” Ji Ning turned to look at the blood-colored divine sword on the stone platform. Swoosh, the blood-colored divine sword immediately flew up, hovering before Ji Ning. “Out.” Ji Ning pointed. Streams of golden yellow, water blue, wood green, fire red, and earth black flowed out from the Five Elements Divine Cauldron, coiling around and wrapping the blood-colored divine sword. The divine sword ‘Ziguangqiong’ immediately began to tremble, like a starving beggar encountering delicious chicken, and frantically started to devour and absorb. Through the faint five-colored streams, one could see with the naked eye that the surface of the blood-colored divine sword was recovering extremely slowly. The cracks gradually shrank and even disappeared. Time passed. The five-colored streams continuously flew out, continuously absorbed by the divine sword Ziguangqiong. The speed of the sword’s recovery was clearly much slower than the earlier destruction of the innate spirit treasures. …… Absorbing the vast amount of five-element essence took over an hour. Finally, all the five-element essence was consumed. “Hmm?” Ji Ning looked at the beautiful blood-colored divine sword floating before him, his brow slightly furrowed. The blood-colored divine sword was incomparably beautiful, with a beauty that made one’s heart tremble, but on its beautiful blade, there were still two very small cracks—the only remaining cracks on the entire sword’s surface. “It’s still not done.” Ji Ning frowned. “What to do? Pure Yang treasures and innate spirit treasures are almost all used up. The useless chaos treasure is only one, and the Five Elements Divine Cauldron’s power is limited; it might not be able to destroy a chaos treasure.” Ji Ning thought to himself. The Five Elements Divine Cauldron was at the innate level. To destroy a chaos treasure and extract its five-element essence would be extremely difficult. “Oh, right.” Ji Ning suddenly thought of a treasure. With a thought, a monkey-shaped puppet appeared in midair—it was the All-Things Emissary. “The internal key parts of this All-Things Emissary are already damaged; keeping it is useless. The Lord of All Things spent endless resources to refine only a few of these. Each one, when controlled by a Dao Ancestor, could unleash power close to the leader level. This treasure is even more useful than a chaos treasure, and its materials are precious.” Ji Ning nodded to himself. “The five-element essence it contains must be abundant.” Although the All-Things Emissary was powerful, the puppet itself was only comparable to a top-grade innate spirit treasure in durability. Reaching the ‘chaos treasure’ level was too difficult. “Go.” Without hesitation, Ji Ning threw the All-Things Emissary into the Five Elements Divine Cauldron. Crack, crack, crack~~~ The All-Things Emissary began to be gradually ground up. If forcibly destroyed head-on, a top-grade innate spirit treasure would be hard to break, but the ‘Five Elements Divine Cauldron’ did it with ease—this was the principle of mutual generation and restraint. After a good while, the entire All-Things Emissary was completely ‘harvested’ into a pile of waste slag, and a large amount of five-element essence gathered again. “One All-Things Emissary contains far more five-element essence than a hundred innate spirit treasures. No wonder the Lord of All Things, exhausting the resources of their entire camp, only managed to refine a few of them.” Ji Ning’s eyes lit up. He then guided out this five-element essence. Five-colored streams flew out, once again wrapping around the divine sword Ziguangqiong. Hum! The divine sword Ziguangqiong let out a sword hum, rapidly absorbing this five-element essence. Ji Ning stared intently at the two cracks. They quickly shrank, grew shallower, and then completely disappeared. Then, some broken patterns inside the divine sword Ziguangqiong gradually began to recover, but internal recovery was much harder. After a moment, the five-element essence was exhausted, yet the internal recovery was negligible. “The World God Beixiu was right.” Ji Ning sighed softly. “Surface repair is easy, but internal repair… is hundreds or thousands of times harder.” “Fortunately, the most precious origin of this divine sword is intact. Using so few innate spirit treasures and the All-Things Emissary, I repaired the surface, allowing it to unleash part of its power.” Ji Ning reached out, and the blood-colored divine sword fell into his hand. Holding the blood-colored divine sword, Ji Ning felt the incredible power contained within the sword itself. Because the sword’s interior was riddled with holes, only the surface was intact, it could only unleash part of its power. “What a terrifying sword.” Ji Ning gently swung the sword. Whoosh. The space ahead seemed to split open, forming a canyon of torn airflow that extended for tens of thousands of li. “Although it can only unleash part of its power, it’s still breathtaking. With this divine sword, looking across the Three Realms… in terms of offense, I’m probably number one. Only Huanmu Master, Buddha Tathagata, and a few others skilled in defense can block me head-on.” Ji Ning murmured to himself. Having or not having this divine sword made a huge difference in strength. Without using the divine sword, Ji Ning was still at the leader level, comparable to a Patriarch God. But with the divine sword Ziguangqiong, he stood at the top among leaders. As for who was stronger, that could only be known through combat. After all, it had been too long since the ancient war of destruction; no one knew how strong the mighty figures of the two camps truly were. Some might have hidden their strength. For example, the ‘Buddha Jueming’ of the Buddhist sect. Buddha Jueming also cultivated the 《Kuji World God》 and had the 《Nine Yuan Destruction》 divine ability. Ji Ning believed that after such a long time, Buddha Jueming’s strength must be extraordinary, but in the Three Realms, Buddha Jueming kept a low profile, and most mighty figures regarded him as an ordinary True God or Dao Ancestor. “In the great calamity, one must be cautious.” “If I don’t reveal the divine sword, fine; if I do, it must achieve a miraculous effect.” Ji Ning knew well that a sudden trump card was more likely to produce a miraculous effect. The appearance of the divine sword Ziguangqiong… would definitely claim the life of a mighty figure from the Lord of All Things camp as its first trial. “Withdraw.” With a thought, the blood-colored divine sword flew into Ji Ning’s body, entering the golden core space to be nurtured. “Now, it’s time to deal with the True God Shiyu.” Ji Ning was extremely eager for the Kuitian Grand Pagoda. What he lacked most now was time for cultivation. If he could comprehend a Heavenly Dao, he would have hope of becoming a Patriarch Immortal or Patriarch God! Swish, a Northsong sword appeared in Ji Ning’s hand. There were six Northsong swords in total. Through recent battles and killings, some True God and True Immortal prisoners would rather die than submit. Ji Ning showed no mercy in killing them, which allowed his other five Northsong swords to also step into the ‘chaos treasure’ level. However, according to the World God Beixiu’s classification, Ji Ning’s six Northsong swords could only be considered ‘ordinary-grade chaos treasures’. Chaos treasures, in the records left by the World God Beixiu, could be divided into three levels: ordinary-grade, high-grade, and top-grade. “Against the True God Shiyu, the Northsong sword is enough.” Ji Ning held the Northsong sword, and with a swoosh, he turned into a black electric snake, disappearing into the horizon.

True God · Chapter 3 · A Sword In the valley. A silver-haired man stood before a cluster of flowers, gently plucking one and lowering his head to sniff it, yet his expression remained somewhat gloomy. "The warden..." the silver-haired man murmured to himself. "Is it him?" Earlier, chaos had surged, and the True God of Release had also guessed who had broken through to become a true god, or even a progenitor god! Those prisoners had been imprisoned in the World Prison for too long; if they were going to break through, they would have done so long ago. The likelihood of breaking through while confined in the World Prison was far too low. So the most likely possibility was... that lucky alien warden who had obtained the World Prison had broken through. "That alien is no ordinary being. If he really has broken through, it will be troublesome," the silver-haired man said with a gloomy expression. "After all, he is the warden and likely has treasures on him. Although my defenses are formidable, if I end up in a contest of divine power with him, I won't be able to outlast him." He could only slowly draw power from the chaos within the World Prison, because the World Prison was covered by a grand formation that extracted most of the power into 'Chaos Spirit Liquid.' What he could absorb was far too little. The warden, however, could draw on external forces to replenish himself. In a contest of attrition, he naturally couldn't outlast the warden. "Hmm?" The True God of Release suddenly looked up. In the distance, a black bolt of lightning flashed and arrived above the valley. It was a white-robed youth holding a black divine sword. The white-robed youth descended from the sky, his aura ordinary, like a mortal. Yet the True God of Release's expression changed drastically as he watched, and then he sneered, "It hasn't been long since our last encounter, and you're here again. It seems the breakthrough earlier was indeed you." "It was me," Ji Ning said, holding the Northbright Sword as he approached. "So what if you've broken through? Last time, without using any divine abilities, I could easily block you. Let alone you, even if a progenitor god or progenitor immortal came, I could still hold them off," the True God of Release said coldly, looking at Ji Ning. He naturally had his pride; back in the Nine Directions Chaos Kingdom, he had escaped from progenitor gods and progenitor immortals several times. "If you're strong, that makes it interesting," Ji Ning said with a smile, stepping forward, holding the sword in one hand. A short staff appeared in each of the True God of Release's hands, and he watched Ji Ning warily as he approached. Suddenly, Ji Ning transformed into a streak of light, his aura erupting as if he were Pangu splitting heaven and earth. He swung the divine sword in his hand. With that single strike... in an instant, it seemed as if heaven and earth were collapsing. The enormous black divine sword, bearing boundless might, smashed directly toward the True God of Release. "Hmph." The True God of Release swung his twin staves in two arcs, vaguely forming a massive Taiji diagram, simultaneously blocking the terrifying sword strike. "Boom!!!" Ji Ning's sword, like a swung Pangu axe, struck the intersection of the twin staves, sending the True God of Release flying backward. It plowed a huge trench through the valley floor, and the surrounding flowers and grass were shattered into powder by the ripples of the shockwave. Even the distant mountain walls cracked from the impact. Heaven Collapse Strike of the Brightmoon Sword Art! "Your swordsmanship has improved again since last time," the True God of Release said, standing in the massive trench, looking at Ji Ning. "Not only is your divine body far stronger than before, but your swordsmanship has advanced in such a short time." He didn't know that Ji Ning had cultivated for six hundred years in the Moon Under the Abyss, gone through several life-and-death battles, and then experienced countless life-and-death struggles in the World Prison. These battles were like a whetstone, constantly honing the potential of Ji Ning, who had cultivated in seclusion for six hundred years. Naturally, his swordsmanship had entered a period of explosive improvement. "I wonder if your staff technique can withstand my sword," Ji Ning said, still holding the sword in one hand as he advanced. With a flicker, he was already close to the True God of Release, and a beautiful crescent moon suddenly lit up. Faced with such a beautiful sword strike, the True God of Release became even more solemn. He gripped his twin staves and desperately tried to block this eerie, beautiful sword. "Pfft." The sword was finally blocked. But the True God of Release didn't dare relax, because Ji Ning's next strike was already coming. The sword light flared up, as if the bright sun were suddenly covered by dark clouds, plunging the sky into pitch blackness. Facing this terrifying sword strike... it gave the True God of Release a nightmare-like feeling. Pfft! Pfft! Pfft! Every sword Ji Ning used was the 'Shadowless Strike' of the Brightmoon Sword Art—eerie and swift. This originally eerie and swift sword technique, when executed with a 'Half-Step Progenitor God' divine body, became even faster and more astonishingly powerful. Although the speed was only slightly faster than last time, it had already surpassed the limits of the Heavenly Dao. Now, every slight increase made the difficulty of blocking skyrocket. "I hate this kind of swordsmanship the most," the True God of Release said after blocking three consecutive strikes. Forced to use his six-armed divine ability, he now had six arms, each holding a short staff, and he began to resist with all his might. Ji Ning had only one sword. But that single sword already made the True God of Release struggle immensely. "A swordsmanship that surpasses the limits of the Heavenly Dao—where did he learn it?" the True God of Release gritted his teeth. "His divine body is already this strong, his swordsmanship is already this profound, and he's even learned a swordsmanship that surpasses the limits of the Heavenly Dao." If the swordsmanship hadn't surpassed the limits of the Heavenly Dao, the True God of Release would have had a much easier time blocking it. But now, using six arms to block a single sword was already extremely difficult. ... The Shadowless Strike, eerie and elusive, faster than lightning. The Heaven Collapse Strike, as if causing heaven and earth to crumble, the most ferocious. The Blood Drop Strike, like an assassin, the fastest with instant burst. Ji Ning's sword techniques shifted unpredictably. The 'Shadowless Strike' kept the True God of Release on edge and flustered—the technique was too eerie and hard to track. The 'Heaven Collapse Strike' relied purely on overwhelming force, each time sending the True God of Release flying backward. The 'Blood Drop Strike' was the sharpest assassin; every time Ji Ning used it, it sent chills down the True God of Release's spine. In truth, during their last encounter, blocking the Blood Drop Strike had been relatively easy, as it had fewer variations and focused more on speed. But this time, Ji Ning's speed was even greater. Even with fewer variations, the increased speed made the True God of Release's heart tremble. If it were even a bit faster, the True God of Release might not even be able to intercept it in time, and the sword would pierce straight through his head. "I concede." Suddenly, a voice rang out. Ji Ning was startled. The True God of Release had already retreated far away. He looked at Ji Ning, his eyes filled with reluctance and helplessness. "Concede?" Ji Ning was somewhat taken aback. Although this time his goal was the Skylight Tower, the True God of Release was indeed a very rare opponent. Facing the three offensive sword techniques of his Brightmoon Sword Art, he had managed to hold out for over a dozen strikes—it was almost unbelievable. Ji Ning himself believed he was at the leader level. Having such an opponent to hone himself was something Ji Ning treasured. After all, he had no plans yet to fight progenitor gods or progenitor immortals. Because in the entire 'World Prison,' there were a total of sixteen imprisoned progenitor gods and progenitor immortals! Every one of these progenitor gods and progenitor immortals had a higher foundation than him. To become a progenitor god or progenitor immortal... their comprehension of the Dao would also be far greater. They were not comparable to those true god or true immortal prisoners. In terms of offensive techniques, he might not necessarily be able to defeat them. For example, in terms of techniques, although he was at the fifth level of sword force and had surpassed the limits of the Heavenly Dao, the True God of Release had reached the fifth level in both 'Taiji Force' and 'Wuji Force.' Combining them, despite his divine body being weaker than Ji Ning's, he had still held out for so long. Those progenitor gods and progenitor immortals likely had higher realms than him. Their foundations were stronger. Their realms were higher. Although he had the divine sword Ziguang Qiong and could fight with some confidence to retreat, who knew if any of those progenitor gods or progenitor immortals had special techniques? After all, in terms of divine body and golden core, they were comparable to the Lord of All Demons! Beings at this level couldn't be judged by common sense. Even in the Nine Directions Chaos Kingdom, they were second only to the three World Gods like the Nine Directions Lord. The Nine Directions Chaos Kingdom had more advanced techniques than the Three Realms. Ji Ning couldn't predict the methods of these sixteen progenitor gods and progenitor immortals, nor did he have any confidence. If his true body were killed in battle, it wouldn't be so easy to cultivate back. Because one of Ji Ning's true body's avatars had already reached the true god level. A major realm breakthrough. When one avatar broke through, the other avatars broke through as well. This was a kind of mysterious rule. During the breakthrough, chaos surged, and power was actively infused into the body. At that time, that avatar of Ji Ning had also received the infusion of chaotic power. That avatar was a true god... to cultivate seventeen more avatars would take an extremely long time. "Yes, I concede. Last time, with your three heads and six arms, I could easily block you," the True God of Release shook his head. "Now, even with my six-armed divine ability, you only have one sword, and I'm already struggling so much, consuming a great deal of mental energy. I feel that if I endure a few more strikes, I will inevitably lose. Your swordsmanship has improved so quickly, and you have a swordsmanship that surpasses the limits of the Heavenly Dao. I concede willingly. I can give you all three of my Chaos Treasures, but I hope... that when you have the ability, you will set me free." "Alright," Ji Ning nodded. In the future, he would follow his life-bound oath, leave the Three Realms like Goddess Nüwa into the endless chaos, and while searching for the Heavenly Cang Palace, if he had the ability, releasing these submissive prisoners wouldn't be a problem.