Chapter 1188: The Three Races of Arid Triad!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
"There is still a will hidden in your body, a weak Antecedental Spirit who was fortunate enough to evade the disaster, but whose spirit has been split countless times. Right now, what remains of him is weak, and he only retains a little of his soul. It is so faint that it is almost gone. He should be an Ancedental Spirit from Earthen Sand Tribe."
The old man cast an indifferent glance at Su Ming, and it looked like he could see straight through him to discover all his secrets. When his voice echoed in the air, Su Ming's heart trembled, but he did not show it on his face.
When he saw the face of the mysterious old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe, Su Ming buried his wariness in his heart. It did not matter whether it were his expressions or emotions he had revealed earlier, for he had showed them to let the old man know about them and also because he wanted him to do it.
After all, it was easy to find out whether a person was truly temperamental. It was also very easy for others to be on guard against such people. That was why they needed a disguise and a cover to hide all the changes in their heart.
Su Ming knew who the old man was talking about. It was the Spirit of the Sand Earthlings, a being who had declared himself to be an Ancestral Spirit but who was in truth an Antecedental Spirit. The old man's words also answered Su Ming's question about the Predecessor of Dao Ocean.
When he had thought of the Predecessor of Dao Ocean, he had also thought of the Spirit of the Sand Earthlings, which gave him some doubt. But it showed up that the Spirit of the Sand Earthlings was not an Ancestral Spirit as he had declared himself to be, but just an Antecedental Spirit.
It had been constantly asleep, and Su Ming did not summon it because the Seed of Life Extermination had left. He did not know whether something unexpected would happen if he summoned the Antecedental Spirit of the Sand Earthlings.
"Senior, you said before that I have the presence of the foreign races…"
Su Ming knew that he should not take the initiative and ask this question. He should should instead ignore it and did not pay any attention to this matter if the old man did not pursue this line of questioning. This would probably be the right way for him to go about the deal with the old man.
But Su Ming still asked that question. If he did not understand everything, then this so-called great serendipity which would be given to him might turn him into one of the red figures, making him a substandard being who failed in the ascension of his spirit.
"Who might these foreign races be?" Su Ming looked as composed as ever as he stared at the old man.
When he asked this question, a cold, fierce glare shone in the old man's eyes. He stared at Su Ming and did not say a word for a long time.
Su Ming did not speak either. Instead, he stared at the old man quietly. His level of cultivation might not be equivalent and the old man might be able to kill him with ease, but it did not take away Su Ming's courage to meet his gaze.
"The foreign races… are naturally those from Dark race and Saint race. To all the tribes in Arid race, they are foreigners!" the old man said in a flat voice after a long while.
A brilliant light shone in Su Ming's eyes. The old man's words had given him an incredible amount of information.
"Is Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos called a triad because of this?" he suddenly asked.
The old man stared at Su Ming, and a profound expression appeared on his face. He raised his head and looked up at the top of the cave abode. His expression was full of sentimentality.
"You glimpsed some ancient history, and you want to obtain verification about your thoughts from me, hmm? Very well, agree to our deal, and I will tell you everything. It is a past buried in the passages of time, and stories of things… I had experienced personally,�� the old man said calmly.
There was an ancient tone to his voice, and it echoed in the cave abode filled with skeletons, making it sound as if the wind of time was blowing in the cave.
Su Ming was silent. After some time, his eyes flashed, and he slowly nodded.
"I can agree to your request, senior, but I would like to have all my questions answered!"
"Arid Triad is known as a triad because there were three races when the Ancestral Spirits created all lives in the universe during the days of old. These three races were Dark, Saint, and Arid!
"There were plenty of tribes among each race." There was nostalgia on the old man's face. His voice was airy, as if it had come from a distant time in the past, though no one could tell the exact year.
"Then Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos' Ancient Wu, Ancient Shu, Ancient Wei…" Su Ming immediately said.
"I don't know about this ancient you speak of, but I do know that the Dark race developed in the period of time after the era of the Ancestral Spirits. Under the call of their Ancestral Spirit, all their tribes were uniformly known as… Wu!
"Similarly, the Saint Race also declared themselves as Shu under the orders of their Ancestral Spirit.
"We of the Arid race is the Wei you speak of!"
When the old man's voice echoed in the air, Su Ming's expression might have remained calm, but there was a storm raging in his heart. The old man's words answered his questions and made him recall Sir Tian Wu, the Heavenly Centipede he had met in Divine Essence Star Ocean.
That Almighty might have died in the fifth kiln, but Su Ming would never forget how he had stimulated the so-called blood of Ancient Wu. When he remembered that the man's real form was that of a huge centipede, Su Ming felt his head instantly become clearer.
Those from Dark Dawn practiced the cultivation method of cultivating their inner cores. While the people in this camp seemed like cultivators, they were in truth various strange creatures taking the form of humans, and this was completely similar to what Tian Wu had done!
"They are no longer the Dark race and the Saint race. They've come to declare themselves as Dark Dawn and Saint Defier…" Once Su Ming said these words, he stopped and looked at the old man.
The old man was silent. After some time, he sighed softly.
"Even the Ancestral Spirits have their camps… or else Wu, Shu, and Wei would not have appeared… but it does not matter which camp they belonged to. In a disaster that suddenly appeared in the past, about which even I did not know, I managed to find some clues regarding that disaster… which is that most of them had perished.
"In the era when all spirits and lives died, we lost our legacy. There were few Antecedental Spirits who rose to power, but the legacy halls were shattered. The massacre brought upon by those who failed in the ascension of their spirits caused a great war between the three races.
"In that war, Wei disappeared. The Arid race, who represented Wei, scattered, but Wu and Shu also paid a devastating price. This war meant the end of the tribal era after the era of the Ancestral Spirits came to an end. It also meant that Arid Triad was no longer suitable for the races to live.
"This was why besides a few people, most of those remaining in Wu and Shu chose to leave in search for a place which they could mold into a home suitable for their survival.
"Many years later, a member of the younger generation barged into this place and did something prohibited. I woke up from my sleep then, and I searched through his memories before he died. There, I came to know that the third era began after the age of tribes. Nine True Worlds appeared, and from his memories, I learned about Dark Dawn and Saint Defier…" When the old man said these words, he looked over.
Su Ming was silent. All of the truths caused his heart to tremble once he learned that many things were as he had thought, but while he had guessed a lot correctly, he did not expect the part about Saint Defier and Dark Dawn. This revelation didn't allow him to calm down.
"So that's how it is. No wonder there is such a great disparity in power despite us being on the same Realm. So that's how it is…" Su Ming sucked in a deep breath, and his eyes suddenly shone. "Was All Spirits Hall created by all the Ancestral Spirits of the three races, or was it..?"
"It was created by Wei's Ancestral Spirit. There is something similar in Wu and Shu as well," the old man said languidly.
"Then I have one final question. Regardless of whether it is Wu, Shu, or even Wei, what are the Ancestral Spirits who created all these, and where did they come from? Why… did they come here to create the universe and the three races?!"
When Su Ming asked this question, Dark Mountain appeared in his head. When he was still an ignorant teenager, he had read a sentence written on a beast skin scroll describing the legends of the Berserkers.
"Since the creation of the world and of man, the Berserker Tribe has existed and it still exists to this date…"
"So the legend is not just a legend. That seemingly normal sentence which I thought was just a myth… is real!" Su Ming's expression changed several times in succession before he looked towards the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe.
"Perhaps… there was another great era before the era of Ancestral Spirits." The old man was silent for some time before he sighed softly. That sigh held an ancient air that could make a hearer feel like their soul would soon turn to dust as well.
"The cultivation of lives during that era exceeds our imagination. They were unmatched in power, but the entire era had perished in an unknown disaster. Its remnants created Arid Triad, but in the end, they still could not escape fate. They too died.
"I've thought of your question before. I didn't puzzle about where they came from, but thought of myself. I was wondering… If I could live longer and witness the changes between eras until the day came when I would have to watch all of us, be it Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos where we stay, or the Vast Expanse itself, destroyed in a disaster which we cannot fight against…
"If I am still alive by then, what would I do? If you're alive, what would you do?" the old man mumbled.
"With my abilities, I would create another universe… I would make the legacy continue so that our Brand will never disappear…"
Su Ming's heart trembled. As he stared at the old man, the old man too stared at him. Su Ming had come to understand that the old man had used these words to give him the answer.
"I've answered your questions. Now, it is your turn to fulfill your promise and complete your end of the deal. I will give you a chance to have your spirit ascend, and if… you succeed, use the power of the All Spirits Hall to return to the past and stop me from killing my tribe members. Even if you can't, you have to plant a zone there so I can return to it countless times!"
An obsessive madness appeared in his eyes which he fixed them on Su Ming. It looked like if he was rejected, then even if Su Ming was a member of the younger generation of his allies, he would still wipe him off the plane of existence.
Su Ming was silent while staring at the old man. Even though he had tried to guess what the old man wanted him to do for the deal and the old man had let him see his face, Su Ming still did not expect that the old man's thoughts would be so mad.
Changing of the past… Forget whether such a thing was even possible. Even if it was, how could it be achieved so easily? The Ancestral Spirits before the old man would have certainly thought of this, but they still died in the end.
Chapter 1189: Position of the Ancestral Spirit!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Su Ming quietly stared at the resolve in the old man's eyes, and he suddenly pitied him slightly. This was an old man who had lived in a constant state of guilt and regret, even though he was incredibly powerful. He was a mad old man who would do anything to change his tribe members' fate.
"I will fulfill my promise," Su Ming said softly.
"This is your serendipity. If you fail in the ascension of your spirit, you will become a soul without consciousness, but if you succeed, you will turn from a Successor Spirit to an Ancestral Spirit!"
The resolve in the old man's eyes became firmer as he stared at Su Ming. When his words fell into Su Ming's ears, his eyes suddenly shone.
"I'm a Successor Spirit?"
"Of course you're a Successor Spirit. Based on the information I gathered from the cultivators who barged into this place, these so-called Successor Spirits and Succeeding Spirits appeared in the subsequent era, the one which came after my era ended.
"You obtained the real Berserkers' Initiation from the Great Berserker Tribe, and you also obtained the Abyss' Awakening from the Great Abyss Tribe. With these two together, you are no longer a normal Succeeding Spirit, but a Successor Spirit!
"Though with another step you could become an Antecedental Spirit, the gap between these two stages is a wide break between two eras. Without the All Spirits Hall, no matter how hard you would cultivate, it would be almost impossible for you to cross that gap. This is why this is your serendipity!"
When he listened to the old man's words, Su Ming thought of the difference between him and the other Almighties in Arid Triad again. He recalled his battle against the cultivators from Saint Defier's camp, and he understood the reason behind his victory.
"With my power, I can extract three examples of people succeeding in the ascension of their spirits from the passage of time. You only have three chances to copy them. Whether or not you succeed will be the main point during the three times you copy them. I wish you will succeed, but I must say that even during my time, there were incredibly few who could succeed in having their spirits ascend…"
The old man cast a complicated glance at Su Ming, then swung his arm. Su Ming immediately sensed the air around him distorting. In the blink of an eye, his vision blurred. When his world became clear again, they were no longer in a cave, but on a tall platform in white fog.
When Su Ming lowered his head to look down, he saw endless white fog along with some mountains which were barely discernible below.
"You've gone through the real Berserkers' Initiation, so you can be considered a Berserker. Then the first ascension I will show you will be the sight of a powerful warrior from the Berserkers!"
A piercing, brilliant light shone in the old man's eyes. His cultivation base erupted from him with a bang. The power of his cultivation base swept out in all directions, causing the sky to tremble and the fog on the ground to tumble violently. Su Ming nearly suffocated from it.
The old man's act of spreading his cultivation base immediately caused Su Ming to see some illusions. It was as if the person standing before him was no longer the old man, but a vast expanse of mountains and rivers, a complete expanse of sky, a complete world, and an entire Expanse Cosmos!
All of this seemed to be contained in the old man's body. As he stared him, Su Ming's heart trembled. At the same time, he compared him to all the powerful warriors he had met in the past, be it Sui Chen Zi, the Predecessor of Dao Ocean, or the figure belonging in Avacaniya Realm he saw through the gap torn through Arid Triad in the Immortals' Union. Then, his heart trembled again.
'He's indeed in Avacaniya!'
This was the first time Su Ming witnessed the strength of Avacaniya Realm. It was a strength that could make a world disappear if the old man wanted it, and the entire universe would have to change before him if he so desired. It was a strength which could not be put into words.
It… was a Realm which surpassed the word Realm, surpassed the heavens, surpassed space, and surpassed even the galaxy!
'This is definitely not the power of Antecedental Spirits!'
Su Ming's breathing quickened. He had met Antecedental Spirits before. Regardless of whether it was the Spirit of the Sand Earthlings or the Predecessor of Dao Ocean, they were definitely not as powerful.
"This is the power of those who have succeeded eight times in spirit ascension and are only one step away from becoming an Ancestral Spirit. Avacaniya… perhaps it fits into the Avacaniya Realm you speak of, but to me, if I succeed nine times in spirit ascension, I will not reach that Avacaniya you speak of… but Bhaashate! The Bhaashate Realm of the Ancestral Spirits!"
The old man raised his right hand and swung it against the sky. With it, the world roared. A huge vortex appeared suddenly in the sky. It spun and rumbled, then spread outwards in all directions. Wherever it went, the sky was reduced to countless shards. As cracking sounds echoed, the entire sky looked like it had turned into an expanse of land ravaged by a great famine.
It kept on cracking, and the shards swept in all directions. The fog on the ground tumbled backwards, and Su Ming immediately sensed the white ring on his finger buzz.
It came from it vibrating due to its instinctual reaction after running into a power which was much greater than it. These tremors caused Su Ming to understand that while the ring was a supreme treasure of Avacaniya, it was still weaker than the old man.
'This old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe is a powerful warrior from Arid, and he's more powerful than the Saint Defier who created this ring! Perhaps… he should be known as the Arid Deity!'
Su Ming's heart trembled when he saw the countless shards group together as if creating another sky. As they shone, the light descended on the ground, and time seemed to change…
A figure appearing on the platform in front of Su Ming. It was incredibly tall and built. Waves of aura belonging to Berserkers with which Su Ming was familiar with spread out from it, for the person was not holding any of it back.
Even though Su Ming could only see his back, the resonance created due to them being Berserkers made him feel like he had met an incredibly familiar person when he saw the man. The person was covered in scars that had already healed. While he stood on the platform, he looked like he was standing above the world, and the earth had to submit to him. The sky also had to lower its head to him.
"Berserker!"
"Berserker!!"
"Berserker!!!"
Deep roars came from the area below. When Su Ming lowered his head to look, he saw countless Berserkers on the ground beneath the platform. They stood there while shouting loudly. Their presence was so great that it felt as if their roars shot through the sky like long arcs, causing the ground and the sky to tremble.
"This is 83rd Elder of Berserkers having his spirit ascend countless years go. This is the first time he has his spirit ascend, but in the end, he failed. Observe well, this is me using my power to tear apart the universe and extract one of the memories from the will of Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos while hiding the act from it."
The voice of the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe echoed in Su Ming's ears. His figure slowly appeared beside Su Ming, and with a sentimental gaze, he stared at the man's back.
Su Ming's pupils shrank. The old man's words were imprinted at the bottom of his heart. 'So… when a person's cultivation base reaches a certain level, they can tear through the universe, hide it from the will of Arid Triad, and extract its memories…
'But he's hiding. That one word is enough to tell that even with his power, there is still a difference in power between him and the will of Arid Triad.
'He can only hide from it… instead of completely disregarding Arid Triad's will and forcefully extracting its memories.'
As Su Ming thought all of this, he cast his attention on the Berserker in front of him. He saw the man throw his head back and roar. All his veins popped up on his body, and a thick power of Qi erupted with a bang from his body. The blast from it did not contain any ripple of power from his cultivation base, but the Qi was strong enough to overpower all forms of cultivation and crush all barriers.
"Berserkers… they are a tribe who can fight against the God race among the Saint race of Shu. The power of their physical body has become so strong that it cannot be described with words," the old man beside Su Ming mumbled as if talking to himself, but he also seemed to be talking to Su Ming.
At that moment, when the man roared, a ripple spread from his body. It was an airwave, and it spread through the sky, making it distort like it was about to be torn apart. Then, the hall Su Ming had seen before appeared!
It was the Spirit Descension Hall, the one with countless red figures that had appeared to chase Su Ming!
Once the hall descended, it floated in midair. Immediately after, the sky behind it distorted again, and a huge hall with endless golden light shining from it came down!
When compared to the Spirit Descension Hall, this hall was like an adult before a child.
The descended golden hall was completely revealed in the mid of the rumbles. It was so large that it seemed to have no end to it, and Su Ming could vaguely see two large words carved on the plate hanging on the hall.
All Spirits!
"Only one Spirit Descension Hall will appear during the first spirit ascension. When I went through my eighth spirit ascension in the past, eight Spirit Descension Halls appeared to surround the All Spirits Hall," the old man said faintly.
Once the huge, golden All Spirits Hall appeared, its golden light immediately spread one hundred thousand feet into the distance. It instantly painted the sky and earth golden, and countless figures shot out from the hall.
They were not the red figures who had chased after Su Ming, but people dressed in long robes. There were men and women among them, and they levitated outside the golden hall.
It seemed as if the ranking system between them was very strict. The person right above all the others had golden light shining from him which extended to one hundred thousand feet, and it was filled with a mighty pressure which caused people to suffocate. Below him were three people, and below them were eight people, then seventeen people, then thirty-nine people, followed by eighty-six people, and the final row contained eight hundred and eighty-one people.
"This is…" Su Ming stared at the two thousand odd figures before the hall.
He could tell that they were not real people, but seeds formed by some sort of aura which resembled energy. Their arrangement also seemed to be based on some sort of rule. There were ten horizontal rows. If he did not include the sole figure at the top row, then there would only be nine rows.
"These are the positions of the Ancestral Spirits, and there are a total of 2,603 of them! Spirit ascension means choosing one of those standing in the position of the Ancestral Spirits and fusing with them. The first time, you can only choose those at the bottom row, and you can perform analogies between them with the ones above. You will need luck in this. If you are lucky, you can slowly fuse with them nine times until you reach the one and only figure at the topmost row.
"Making different choices will also mean different levels of compatibility. You will need to try again and again, but only one, highly valuable person who has the right to go through spirit ascension will appear in each race once every few centuries. For their people, they will make a gamble with the mind that they will be sacrificed… If they fail, they will die and become mindless souls who only know to kill!
"Each race will remember the order of those who failed in the fusion so those in the future generation can try the others that do not guarantee failure," the old man said slowly and sighed.
Chapter 1190: Great Abyss Tribe
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Su Ming listened to the old man's words and stared at the two thousand something figures outside the golden hall. His heart trembled at the thought of the devastating fate the tribe members had to face.
There were 881 positions for Ancestral Spirits in the bottom row, and there might only be one of them which is suitable for the blood of a particular race to make offerings and go through the spirit ascension. This would mean that they needed to sacrifice hundreds of people who were worthy of going through the spirit ascension to lay out a path for their spirits to ascend!
And clearly, even though they were all under Wei jurisdiction, since Great Berserker Tribe, Great Abyss Tribe and Heavenly Spirit Tribe were different races, they had to each search for the Ancestral Spirit suitable for their people for fusion.
Due to each race's differences leading to different choices and results, there were no similarities between them. This meant that the path of spirit ascension was drenched in blood and built on human lives.
And this was just the beginning. Even if they managed to find the position of the Ancestral Spirit suitable for their people at the bottom row, there was still the second to last row, and it would continue until they reached the top. All of those who died would be powerful warriors and people who possessed the right to have their spirits ascend. This would make a tribe gradually walk to ruin. If they could last, then in the end… a true Ancestral Spirit would appear!
But that would require tens of thousands of years, and time did not give any of the races this chance. As the era of tribes came to an end, everything was reduced to nothingness. Even the order of fusing with the positions of the Ancestral Spirits and the numbers, which all the races believed were the most precious to them, had been buried with the dust.
In silence, Su Ming saw the tall Berserker on the platform roar towards the heavens. He rose from the ground and charged into the sky, rushing for the 560th of the illusory Ancestral Spirits on the last row, which was the ninth row if they did not count the row with the one and only golden figure right at the top. When the man stopped there, the countless Berserkers on the ground beneath him roared, but the next moment… the ground fell into dead silence.
With his own eyes, Su Ming saw that when the Berserker touched the 560th illusory Ancestral Spirit, his body shuddered as if an unimaginable pain had erupted in his body at that moment. He brought his right hand up and seized the sky as if he was trying to grab something in the air. Then, he pushed his hand towards the Ancestral Spirit he was fusing with.
"Eternal Creation [1]!"
The man did not say these words, for when he shuddered, he turned into ashes. A red light flew out of his disintegrated body and drifted in the sky, looking lost but also like it wanted to lower its tip to sneak a glance at its people one last time. Yet it could not…
The man's body was sucked into the Spirit Descension Hall by a strong force. A shrill scream of pain rang out, and everything returned to silence.
The person who had said those two words was the old man. They caused Su Ming to stare at the soul who had turned into a red figure in a daze. He fell silent.
The sky returned to normal. It did not matter whether it was the Spirit Descension Hall or the All Spirits Hall. Everything vanished from the sky. Only the countless Berserkers on the ground remained. They were silent, but there was a thick aura of sadness among them.
"Eternal Creation is an Art unique to Berserkers. Outsiders cannot understand it. This is… Great Berserker Tribe's strongest Art.
"Even after I've gone through eight spirit ascensions, if I face a powerful warrior who is at the same Realm as me casting Eternal Creation, I too will have to avoid its brilliance temporarily."
The old man's voice echoed and turned into an unseen ripple that swept in all directions, causing distortions to appear in the world.
When the scene disappeared from Su Ming's eyes and everything in the area filled with white fog, he felt like he had woken up from the previous era and returned to the current time and age. A soft sigh escaped his lips.
"Next, I will show you the spirit ascension from Great Abyss Tribe," the old man by Su Ming's side said calmly after a long time. He swung his arm, and the feeling of the world going in reverse immediately appeared again. When everything became clear, Su Ming was far away from the platform where he had previously stood and was surrounded by a vast expanse of fog.
The fog in the area was incredibly thick. It surrounded them, and when the old man swung his right arm, the fog scattered to reveal a huge, deep pit whose edges could not be seen with the naked eye. In that pit were hundreds of Spirit Ascension Platforms. They were built in circles and stood tall, giving off a feeling as if they were reaching for the clouds.
"Great Berserker Tribe, a tribe I am quite impressed with. The people in this tribe might not be calculative, but their straightforward attitude and their fearlessness towards death is something the other tribes do not possess.
"That includes my own Heavenly Spirit Tribe. In this regard, we cannot compare to Great Berserker Tribe.
"But if we talk about all the tribes under Wei, which includes Great Berserker Tribe, then there is only one tribe which I admire the most… and am in fact, slightly envious of, and that is Great Abyss Tribe," The old man stood on one of the hundreds of platforms and looked around him while he speaking in a soft voice.
"This place is where Great Abyss Tribe was located. In the past, this was a vast ocean, and it was known as Abyss Ocean, which was also known as Wei's Forbidden Grounds!
"Great Abyss Tribe is a tribe skilled with the power of time and Possessing all forms of life. They also have the Abyss Gate, which only powerful warriors can open to create their own World… Besides these three inborn abilities, the most frightening aspect about Great Abyss Tribe was that their people's souls… would not perish!
"This… is an unparalleled power which can only be understood by those who have activated all three of Great Abyss Tribe's inborn abilities. Once they come to understand them, their souls can last for nearly an eternity without perishing. No matter how many cycles of life and death they go through, their souls will remain. This is something that brings out envy in others, but they are also helpless against it."
When the old man sighed deeply over this, he raised his right hand and swung it. Immediately, the world roared. The sky shattered, and countless fragments were swept aside before they regrouped. A ripple swept outwards after that.
The world changed because of it as if a curtain had lifted, stirring up dust. Brilliant colors were revealed, and when the ripple vanished, Su Ming saw… a world belonging to Great Abyss Tribe.
It was a black ocean. The waves rose and splashed down as they tumbled about. Hundreds of platforms stood tall in the seawater, and they looked like they wanted to reach the sky. At that moment, most of the stone platforms were occupied by sitting figures.
Most of them were middle-aged man dressed in long, black robes which had shades of gray, making them resemble specters. They were sitting quietly with the seawater around them. None of them made a single sound.
Besides the sound of waves, it could be said that this place was completely silent.
"Great Abyss Tribe is a very quiet tribe, but they are also incredibly terrifying. If we talk about combat abilities, they might not be as skilled in battle as us in Heavenly Spirit Tribe, but their ability to survive is so great that it's frightening.
"In fact, there was a saying going among us that even if a disaster fell, while the other tribes might perish, Great Abyss Tribe would definitely not be destroyed. This was a race of people who could raise back to power even if only one of them remained," the old man said as he stared at the black ocean
Su Ming was silent while watching the people from Great Abyss Tribe. Upon seeing them, he felt another sense of familiarity, but it was different from the familiarity he had sensed from the Berserkers. This was a familiarity in his soul.
"Spirit ascension!"
When Su Ming looked over, he saw the people on the platforms speak up. Nearly one hundred people were performing spirit ascension at the same time!
"This is also something the other tribes cannot do. Since they can change time and they have clones, Great Abyss Tribe has a great advantage over the others when they perform spirit ascension. They can have multiple people perform spirit ascension at the same time, and from there, they can find the order hidden among the positions of the Ancestral Spirits."
As the old man's voice echoed by Su Ming's side, the All Spirits Hall appeared again. Golden light covered one hundred thousand feet, and the two thousand something figures appeared.
Soon after, nearly one hundred people flew out from the platforms to charge towards their positions. Su Ming watched it without blinking. He saw the people from Great Abyss Tribe turn into red figures and watch the sky in a daze. Then, one person among the near one hundred shone with a golden light that reached a piercing degree. He… had successfully fused with one of the Ancestral Spirits and threw his head back to roar.
His roar was loud and had an indescribable presence to it. That was not the presence of a cultivator, but the presence of an Antecedental Spirit!
The waves roared and surged into the heavens. A brilliant light shone in the eyes of all the people from Great Abyss Tribe. They stared at the only person who had succeeded after all the other members of their race had failed. Then, they slowly stood up and bowed together towards him.
"With Great Abyss Tribe's talent, they should have been the first among us to have a person who could succeed in all nine spirit ascensions, but the Great Destruction arrived, and it did not give them or us that chance…"
The old man sighed softly. He lifted his right hand and seized the air. The scene in front of Su Ming was torn to pieces and returned to the original world of fog.
"With my level of cultivation, I can only hide from Arid Triad's will only one more time and extract another of its memories for you to copy. This is the last time, so I will give you the chance to choose.
"You can pick the Spirit Ascension Platforms from either Great Berserker Tribe, Great Abyss Tribe, or Heavenly Spirit Tribe to have your spirit ascend!"
The old man cast a glance at Su Ming. He swung his right arm, and when the world roared, the world looked like it had started shrinking. When Su Ming's vision became clear, he had returned outside the cave where he had met the old man and saw a white mountain standing tall in the fog.
He also saw a stone platform which had appeared at some unknown point of time at the top of the mountain. There were ripples spreading out from it. When it surrounded the area, he could vaguely see an old figure sitting on the stone platform.
"There's no need to look," Su Ming suddenly said. "I'm not from Heavenly Spirit Tribe, so it's useless no matter how many times I try to copy it. Senior, you can save your power. There's no need for you to waste it."
A hint of resolution appeared in Su Ming's eyes. This was something that would not necessarily bring him more benefits the more he watched it. If he witnessed too many of these scenes where the people turned into red figures after they failed, his own confidence would be affected.
The old man's right hand came to a halt midway up to being raised. A surprised glint appeared in his eyes when he looked towards Su Ming.
"Then which tribe's Spirit Ascension Platform will you choose, Great Abyss Tribe or Great Berserker Tribe's?"
"I choose Great Berserker Tribe's Spirit Ascension Platform!" Su Ming said with firmness.
Translator's Note:
1. Eternal Creation: Call back to 'Wine, Water'.
Chapter 1191: I Am the God of Berserkers!!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe cast a deep glance at Su Ming, then raised his right foot and took a step into the air. Ripples immediately spread out from beneath his feet. In an instant, he brought the entire area to the spot where the Berserkers' tribe had previously been.
The white mountain stood tall and by its side was the Berserkers' tribe. In the distance was their Spirit Ascension Platform reaching the skies. It was as if Heavenly Spirit Tribe was in the old man's hands, and as long as he wanted to, there was very few things in the world which he could not do.
Moving the mountains and seas, shifting the ground, turning the universe upside down, extracting Arid Triad's memories—all of these opened doors upon doors of possibilities in Su Ming's mind. He was seeing more and more see eye-catching divine abilities.
"You only need to succeed once in spirit ascension. The path of spirit ascension is arduous, but every time you succeed, you will experience extreme changes. With your current level of cultivation, if you succeed in your first spirit ascension, your level of cultivation will increase by ten times!
"This is secondary, however. The main point is that your soul and aura will become out of the ordinary. You will no longer be a Successor Spirit, but an Antecedental Spirit. Even the lowest ranked Antecedental Spirit can stand tall in the world with pride.
"It'll be especially so when you fuse your aura with your cultivation base. You will ascend to another plane of existence, and when you become an Antecedental Spirit, you will be able to bring forth the true power of that ring on your finger. It is the power to kill all those in Death Realm.
"Based on the categorizations of the cultivation systems in the eras after mine, you have only stepped into Fate Realm, but as long as you succeed in your first spirit ascension, you can move slightly past it and master the power of being imperishable, a power that belongs to those in Life Realm!
"In fact, if you can perfect your own laws of fate within a short time while you are in the world outside, your cultivation base will experience a second explosive increase. This will be due to the power remaining in you after the spirit ascension. At that time, it will not be impossible for you to move straight into Death Realm!
"This is a serendipity, but also a matter of life and death. I cannot help you to achieve success. It will entirely depend on you," the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe explained slowly while giving Su Ming a long look.
His expression was grim. He longed dearly for Su Ming to succeed, but it was just as he said, he could only provide Su Ming the chance. Unless he succeeded nine times in spirit ascension and became an Ancestral spirit, there was nothing more he could do. After all, only at that time would he be worthy of helping others in their spirit ascension, since he would be standing at the peak of the entire universe.
"I, Tian Bai, wish you success!" The old man wrapped his fist in his palm, and for the first time, he bowed deeply to Su Ming.
Su Ming stared at the old man, and in silence, he too wrapped his fist in his palm and bowed to him. Then, he swung his arm and charged towards the Spirit Ascension Platform that belonged to Great Berserker Tribe, which was located not too far away from him.
In an instant, he approached it and landed on the platform. Su Ming lifted his head and stared at the sky. His expression was calm. The scene he had seen before appeared in his head. He could see the people who had existed countless years ago right beneath him, and they were all shouting that one word—Berserker.
'I did not choose Great Abyss' Spirit Ascension Tribe because my sense of belonging to the Berserkers is much stronger. I have always believed that I am a Berserker, and I am also… the God of Berserkers!'
When Su Ming lifted his head, an indescribable presence surrounded him and formed a layer of distortions. Once they entered the old man's line of vision, his pupils constricted.
'This junior possesses two different presences, those of Great Berserker Tribe and Great Abyss Tribe. Yet this is not due to interracial marriage, but should have been intentionally done by someone… They placed a person with the blood of Great Abyss Tribe in Great Berserker Tribe and nurtured him until he became an adult. In fact, he even has the true signs of a race's enlightenment about him…'
The old man stared at Su Ming. In truth, when he first saw Su Ming, he had not been as calm as he had appeared to be.
All of this was not because of Great Berserker Tribe's presence about him and neither was it because of his blood of Great Abyss Tribe. Instead, it was because there was a race's enlightenment about him that the old man had never seen before among all those who had entered the place!
It was the Berserkers' Initiation, but it was also their race's enlightenment!
'A race's enlightenment. This is the power to bring enlightenment to an entire race. This is something only the next elder of the race would be worthy of inheriting from the previous elder of the race in the era of the past. In fact, even during the late days of the tribal era, while there were more of these inheritances, most of them were just imitations.
'The value of those who received the imitation enlightenment was to test which of the positions of the Ancestral Spirits were correct so that they could lay out the path for those who truly received the race's enlightenment!
'The true goal of passing down the race's enlightenment was not to give it to the most powerful member of that race, but to present the chosen person… the right to not turn into a red figure even if they failed during the spirit ascension!
'In the current era, those who know of the Art for the race's enlightenment… should be incredibly rare.
��This is a right reserved to only one person in a race. This is… the one and only Ancestral Spirit's Watch… the one that the Ancestral Spirits gave to each race!'
The old man stared at Su Ming, and a raging storm roared in his mind. He could tell that Su Ming possessed the race's enlightenment. This was clearly a hope placed on him, which had lasted from Great Berserker Tribe up till this date.
It was the hope for an entire race to raise to power…
That was why the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe had told Su Ming so many things of the past. It was also why he had asked Su Ming to go through a spirit ascension and had even used his cultivation base to retrieve the memories from Arid Triad's will for him to observe them. This was a treatment that no one who had met him before had experienced.
All those in the past were mostly forced to go through the spirit ascension. He would absolutely not talk to them, and neither would he make any sort of deal with them. Everything had to go according to the old man's will.
But when it came to Su Ming… the old man hesitated. He could not do as he did before.
The race's enlightenment on Su Ming was Great Berserker Tribe's only hope at that point in time. He could not wipe it out. In fact, he was already prepared to give up and even harbored the thought of sending Su Ming away if he failed once.
He… was also one of the races in Wei, and Su Ming could be said to truly be a member of the younger generation from his allied tribes!
Su Ming's arrival also fitted the inheritance. He could be said to be the first one over the course of countless years to have come by completely adhering to the requirements of the inheritance instead of some other methods.
Su Ming's guess had only scratched the surface in regards to the Sun Sinking Talisman. He had guessed that it was activated because of the soul in his clone's body, but in truth, the real reason behind its activation was the race's enlightenment on Su Ming himself!
'Seed of Great Berserker Tribe… Why do I sense an old friend's presence in your race's enlightenment? Is it you? But I saw the illusion of Great Yu you created in the past, and when you were searching for the hope for the future of your race, you died in anguish…' The old man stared ahead in silence.
'It should be you, and I will not wipe off the seed of Great Berserker Tribe. I absolutely won't…'
As the old man watched Su Ming, his heart suddenly shuddered. At that moment, Su Ming had lifted his head to look at the sky, and he looked like he had fused with the world.
More accurately speaking, he did not fuse with the world, but had fused with the Great Berserker Tribe on the ground. It was as if Su Ming's presence had triggered some sort of strange change and some sort of ripple of power from the Berserkers left on the ground. The air which had been as calm as the surface of a lake suddenly started boiling.
Waves of rejecting force instantly appeared. They were not rejecting Su Ming, but projected their own mountain and their tribe on the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe and the white mountain.
The change caused the old man's heart to jump, and at the same time, he became even more certain of his perception towards the race's enlightenment on Su Ming. He even noticed that there was a strong feeling like the Berserkers' tribe… had been waiting for countless years for a person which had finally arrived.
Soon after, the old man's pupils shrank. Wisps of indistinct souls suddenly appeared on the Berserkers' land, which was once home to the Berserkers but was now the ruins of Great Berserker Tribe. Those souls might be indistinct and not even Su Ming could see them, but the old man could tell that they should have disappeared a long time ago in the passage of time. Yet the wisps of Berserkers' will, perseverance, and determination to protect their land had been waiting for the Berserkers to raise to power!
They had remained in the land, not wanting to disappear from the universe. They did not intend to sleep in the emptiness of time. They lay on the land and waited… Now, the person they had been waiting for seemed to have arrived.
More souls appeared. In the span of a few breaths, there were more than one million of them, and more continued to appear. There were quite a few of them who made the old man tremble once he saw them, for he was familiar with them. They had all been his friends in the past.
"Old friend, you predicted the Berserker Day in the illusion of Great Yu to search for a hope for the Berserkers to live through the disaster. Is he the hope you found in the past? Did you execute Eternal Creation for him?"
While the old man mumbled to himself, the number of the souls reached nearly ten million. They quietly surrounded the area and stared at Su Ming quietly, but he could not see them.
Su Ming stared at the sky. His will was burning in his heart at that moment. A great confidence had gathered within him without a single sound.
'I am the God of Berserkers!
'It doesn't matter what my blood is or where I come from since from the moment I remember myself, I was a Berserker. Even though my body is different from the other members of my tribe and even though my soul is not that of a Berserker…
'My will, my spirit, and life belong completely to the Berserkers. I am a Berserker!
'I am the God of Berserkers!'
A powerful light shone in Su Ming's eyes. While standing on the platform, he did not know that there were more than ten million Berserker souls which he could not see in the area below. Yet all of them had an unseen, great power erupt from them.
Their presences mixed together and formed an unheard booming sound, causing the projection of the white mountain from the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe to disappear. He had to retreat, and when he cast his gaze at this sight from the distance, his heart trembled. He couldn't help sucking in a deep breath.
The presences of the ten million souls swirled and gathered around Su Ming to turn into a white dragon in the blizzard. It rose into the sky, and when it roared at the heavens, its whole body turned crimson. With a madness and an unwillingness to admit defeat to fate gathered from the wills of countless Berserkers, it charged towards the sky.
Chapter 1192: Those Six Numbers!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
"I am the God of Berserkers!" Su Ming lifted his head and stared at the sky. At that moment, his presence erupted with a bang from his body. His cultivation base swam swiftly through him, causing his long hair to float, and the red dragon he could not see let out a soundless roar. It then rushed to the sky as if it was doing so in the same dimension as Su Ming but performing this act an unknown number of years ago.
"Berserker!"
"Berserker!!"
"Berserker!!!"
The ten million illusory figures in the area cried out at that moment. Their voices fused with the dragon's roar, forming a shocking roar that Su Ming could not hear, but which made the pupils of the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe shrink again.
He was moving back as images from two different periods of time appeared before him. One was from a time in the distant past, and one was the present. One had the Berserkers from the past, and the other had Su Ming. The two seemed to have reached a resonance due to the race's enlightenment in Su Ming's body, and a sight akin to the deviation of time appeared.
During that moment, Su Ming's cultivation base was stimulated to the peak. His conviction was extremely firm as he stood on the Spirit Ascension Platform. He might not be able to see the abnormality around him, but he could sense that there seemed to be countless pairs of eyes watching him. Those gazes were filled with expectation, excitement, and a resonance that filled Su Ming with determination.
"The place where I was born still did things according to the laws of the universe. When I was born, the Berserkers had weakened. If the heavens are heartless, then we will all be separated. The earth was heartless, and it made my Dark Mountain die…" Su Ming mumbled.
In this situation and on this occasion, the instant he chose Great Abyss Tribe and announced that he was the God of Berserkers, he remembered… the God of Berserkers' song.
As he mumbled to himself, shock appeared on the face of the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe who was watching in the distance. This was because he noticed that when Su Ming spoke the four sentences, the red dragon's roars became even more intense. The ten million souls in the area increased in number as well and became tens of millions. There were also several more figures among them which the old man was familiar with.
The world trembled, and the sky distorted while the ground rumbled. Layers of ripples spread out. It was as if… a strange power had been activated at that instant due to Su Ming's existence.
That power should have been buried in the place. When it was activated, it looked like two worlds were about to fuse together. This might sound complicated, but if anyone described the Great Berserker Tribe during ancient times as one world and the current era which Su Ming resided in as another world… then the current situation would be like the world from ancient times moving through space and waking up from death, wanting to come to this world and fusing with Su Ming's era.
All of this might seem abstruse, but that was indeed what the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe saw and felt.
'What a tribe, Great Berserker Tribe! What a man, Great Elder of the Berserkers, a man who succeeded six times in spirit ascension! What a great plot of yours to predict the Berserker Day!'
The old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe sucked in a deep breath. Admiration appeared on his face. He could already tell that not only did Su Ming possess Great Berserker Tribe's race's enlightenment as well as Great Berserker Tribe's hope, he also had the entire Great Berserker Tribe's will gathered on him.
His spirit ascension was bound to be extraordinary… because he was not performing the spirit ascension alone. He had already fused with the Berserkers' kismet and everyone's will. All the Berserkers were protecting him… and performing the spirit ascension with him!
"If the heavens have eyes, then why do they never see that my world is plunged into eternal darkness? If the deities have souls, then why did they divide the sky and seas to the south and north? I kept my duty to the heavens, so why did they not let me see the darkness of night? I kept my duty to the deities, so why did they tear me into pieces and scatter my memories?" Su Ming mumbled.
The God of Berserkers' song echoed in the air, making it look like he could see the days of the past, the tens of millions of souls in the area, and the blood-red dragon in the sky. The Berserkers' will was gathered within it, and as it roared… it looked like it was Su Ming!
The number of souls in the area grew again. This time, they increased to nearly one hundred million. There was no end to them. All the Berserkers who had lived in the land in different periods of time felt as if their souls had returned to their homeland. When they appeared, they roared… to worship the God of Berserkers for whom they had been waiting for a long, long time!
This made the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe retreat again. His breathing quickened. When he moved back, he looked towards Su Ming. In his eyes, he no longer saw a single man… but the soul of the entire Great Berserker Tribe!
And Su Ming was that divine soul of Great Berserker Tribe. His appearance became a source for the tribe to boil over. It was as if the sleeping Berserkers, the Berserkers who had died in this land had woken up again!
"I cry tears of blood when I lift my head, so tell me, why should I cherish this life and not defy the world?! If the heavens don't have eyes, then I will step on it and watch myself seal the heavens! If the deities don't have souls, then I swear I will slaughter the deities and become the Emperor!
"The world's kismet is upon me, and I will surely kill Arid Triad with my own hands! My Berserkers' Soul has formed, and I will dye the Immortals' sky red with millions of their lives!
"The Berserker Obliteration is the song of my life, and when it ends, what can hold me back from making the Berserkers rise to power with this will alone?!"
Su Ming threw his head back and roared. With it, the one hundred million Berserkers' souls around him howled, and the blood dragon in the sky roared. The weather changed. As the world rumbled, the roars of the countless Berserkers and the roar of the blood dragon turned into one single voice.
"God of Berserkers!"
"God of Berserkers!!"
"God of Berserkers!!!"
"I am the God of Berserkers, and today, I will have my spirit ascend!!"
Su Ming swung his arm up. The blood dragon lifted its head, roared, and crashed against the sky. The sky distorted, and when it rumbled, a hall swiftly descended.
This was not the All Spirits Hall, but the first Spirit Descension Hall. As it appeared and the one hundred million Berserkers' souls roared, the golden light in the sky spread to one hundred thousand feet. Then, the true All Spirits Hall descended with a bang.
The golden hall was broken in parts, but had an ancient will. It was the legacy hall the Ancestral Spirits of Wei worked together to create in the past, and at that moment, it truly descended from the sky.
The old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe had been forced into the distance by the presence brought by Great Berserker Tribe rising to power. At that moment, he appeared to be slightly excited. In his eyes, Su Ming's spirit ascension had a much higher rate of success compared to the other people. He hoped Su Ming would succeed, for if even Su Ming, who had Great Berserker Tribe's soul gathered on him failed, then he did not know just who could successfully have their spirits ascend in this era.
Once the All Spirits Hall descended, the golden figures swiftly rushed out. If the one person at the very top was not included, then the two thousand-something figures were divided into nine horizontal rows that appeared like a tower in the sky. The ancient presence spreading out from the All Spirits Hall turned into a mighty pressure, and a resolute look appeared in Su Ming's eyes.
There were 881 golden figures at the bottom row. Waves of mighty pressure spread out from their bodies and enveloped the ground while they waited for Su Ming to make his choice.
He stared at them, and the resolve in his eyes grew stronger. He knew that if he made the wrong choice, he would die. He only had one chance.
He stared at the Ancestral Spirits in silence, his gaze sweeping across all of them. Eventually, he looked towards the figure above the other nine rows whose presence was clearly much stronger than that of the Ancestral Spirits in the other positions.
'The order towards this legacy… is a path of flesh and blood built in exchange for the lives of a great number of powerful warriors from each tribe… It's a path for their descendants to have an increasingly safer route to spirit ascension passed down to them by their ancestors after numerous tries.
'But the order…'
Determination shone in Su Ming's eyes. He jumped into the air from the Spirit Ascension Platform and turned into a long arc that charged towards the eight hundred-something figures at the bottom row.
He could only take a gamble. The only thing Su Ming knew was that he could not try the fifth hundred-something position since he had seen the ancestor of the Berserkers fail there during his spirit ascension. Clearly, if a race wanted to try and lay out this path of blood, they could not choose at will. They should have tried one by one in order. Because of it, Su Ming was certain by fifth-tenths that the previous five hundred-something positions of the Ancestral Spirits would also guarantee failure.
Yet if the Berserkers had started testing the order from the back, Su Ming's guess would be completely wrong, which was why… it would be the same as him not obtaining any sort of clue at all.
He charged forward in silence, and the instant he approached the last position, a glint shone in his eyes. When he swept his gaze across all the other positions, he gritted his teeth and instantly went towards one of them, but when he was about to close in, his feet suddenly came to a halt.
He did not continue onward, but moved back. When he was several thousands of feet away, he fixed his stare on the positions of the Ancestral Spirits beyond the All Spirits Hall. He had suddenly remembered something.
Su Ming's act of moving back caused a light crease to appear between the brows of the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe. When he turned his gaze towards him, he saw that Su Ming seemed to be contemplating something.
"Senior, do you happen to know the highest amount of times a person had succeeded in spirit ascension within Great Berserker Tribe?" Su Ming suddenly asked. His voice echoed in all directions.
"Six times!" the old man's eyes immediately answered as his eyes sparkled.
Su Ming went silent then, but a brilliant light shone in his eyes. There was also a hint of nostalgia within it.
'Six times… six numbers… Elder told me six numbers in the past to help me climb up Wind Stream Mountain…
'32, 79, 248, 371, 563, 781…'
Su Ming's heart trembled. He lifted his head and stared at the All Spirits Hall. He cast his gaze at the 781st position at the bottom row. Then, he looked up row by row while comparing the numbers until his gaze fell on the third row from the top.
'Could it be…' Su Ming's eyes focused. He gritted his teeth, and without any hesitation, he charged… to the 781st position on the bottom row.
His speed was a reflection of the determination in his heart. Since he was taking a gamble anyway, he would rather take a bet on the seemingly ordinary set of numbers his elder had given him in the past.
With a bang, he drew close to the 781st position and touched that Ancestral Spirit. At that moment, the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe in the distance might have looked composed, but he was incredibly nervous in his heart.
A shocking roar accompanied by Su Ming's shout rang out in the sky!
Chapter 1193: Berserker Body in Death Realm!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
"These numbers…" Su Ming mumbled.
When he came into contact with the 781st position, his heart trembled. He did not sense any danger. Instead, there was a warm feeling that surged into his body from that position. It filled him in the blink of an eye and fused into his soul.
'These numbers… are the order exchanged for with the blood and lives of the members of Great Berserker Tribe's blood. It is… the most precious knowledge of the entire tribe!' Su Ming's heart trembled. Many thoughts rose in his mind when he considered the set of numbers.
At that moment, all those not involved would not see Su Ming's body since he had already fused completely with the Ancestral Spirit in his chosen position. As the world roared, a powerful light erupted from All Spirits Hall. It covered the area and charged into Su Ming's body as if it wanted to make Su Ming's body go through a metamorphosis.
During it, a familiar feeling rose within Su Ming's body. It was… the feeling of a Berserker's Initiation! He would could not mistake it for anything.
At the same time, the one hundred million Berserkers' souls who had returned to the ground beneath him worshiped the sky. Their murmurs could not be heard clearly, but when their voices reached Su Ming's ears, a loud bang echoed in his head as if he had returned to the moment his elder performed the Berserker's Initiation for him when he was in Dark Mountain!
'It's the Berserker's Initiation! It's the Berserker's Initiation which allowed me to step foot in this place, to become the God of Berserkers… and to obtain the will of this land belonging to the Berserkers!
'It's also the Berserker's Initiation which gave me the possibility to have my spirit ascend right now!'
Su Ming's heart trembled as he sensed the presence of the Berserker's Initiation in his body. In fact, during that moment, he had a strong feeling that even if he had not chosen the 781st position but another one, he might have failed, but he would not be wiped off and turn into one of the insentient red figures.
The Berserker's Initiation in his body was more like a form of blessing and protection. It came from Great Berserker Tribe, and it was a legacy from the ancient Ancestral Spirits… and had a strange form of connection with the All Spirits Hall.
But what was more… it was a blessing from all lives!
When the presence of the Berserker's Initiation rose in Su Ming's body and he went through the metamorphosis while his spirit ascended, he suddenly came to a complete understanding. He could sense that there was not just one presence of the Berserker's Initiation about him… but thirty-seven!
'That's right. I once went through thirty-seven cycles of life and death in Yin Death Region, which means that I've received thirty-seven Berserker's Initiations… I… have at least thirty-seven chances to fail!'
When this understanding came to him, nostalgia rose within his eyes. He remembered his elder's kind gaze as he looked at him, the smell of the land where he lived as a child, the Berserker's sky, and everything in Dark Mountain.
'781, 563, 371, 248, 79, 32… These six numbers are the order for Berserkers' spirit ascension. They had only found six successive spirit ascensions before the disaster arrived. They did not have time to search for the seventh, eighth, and ninth numbers.
'But… the elder performed the Berserker's Initiation for me thirty-seven times. He gave me thirty-seven chances. Even if I tried all of the positions left one by one, it would be enough for me to find a path to successfully have my spirit ascend through the seventh, eighth, and ninth rows. Then… once I succeed in all nine spirit ascensions, I will turn into an Ancestral Spirit!'
Su Ming's heart trembled. He had now completely understood the numbers and the indescribable expectation and love his elder had for him.
'But he���s by Su Xuan Yi's side… I understand now!'
If Su Ming still did not understand the schemes between the elder and Su Xuan Yi, he would not be Su Ming.
'The elder had long since chosen the Abyss Builders as the hope for Great Berserker Tribe to raise to power, because only the Abyss Builder's innate talents could allow the soul to withstand these many reincarnations!
'He created a path to guarantee my success in becoming an Ancestral Spirit…'
Su Ming threw his head back and roared. As his body fused with the Ancestral Spirit and went through a metamorphosis, he sensed himself becoming much more powerful.
It was a transformation of his physical body. While he was fusing with the Ancestral Spirit, the power of the Ancestral Spirit changed his body so that he could obtain a true Berserker's body.
Based on what the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe said, the strength of the Berserker's physical body was so great that they could fight against the Gods in Shu. In truth, even the Gods there could not compare to their physical body in certain aspects.
'If that's the case, then since this Ancestral Spirit is already transforming my physical body, I might as well make this transformation more complete. I will fill with even more madness!'
Determination appeared in Su Ming's expression. At the instant his body was changed, he lifted his right hand without hesitation and struck his storage bag.
As he was fusing with the Ancestral Spirit and his body was being transformed, he went to open his storage bag.
The old man in Heavenly Spirit Tribe saw from the distance, and his expression changed. He found that he had no idea what Su Ming wanted to do, but even if he did, he could not do anything to stop him at that moment. If there was any interference from the outside world causing any sort of instability on Su Ming's side, there was a high possibility that his spirit ascension would be affected, and this was something the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe could not accept.
At the instant Su Ming struck his storage bag with his right hand, the body of his clone that practiced the Art of Swallowing Hollow Shadows Whole appeared in front of him. A sleeping soul also appeared on Su Ming's right palm. It was the soul of the clone which had become independent due to the Heavenly Incense Rune.
At the instant the soul was extracted, madness burned in Su Ming's eyes. He had come to understand that he absolutely could not waste the serendipity provided to him by spirit ascension. He wanted to fuse with the Ancestral Spirits and transform his body according to his own will.
While holding the independent soul of his clone with his right hand, he struck the top of its head to send it straight into the clone's body. A red glare shone in Su Ming's eyes, and he executed his second Possession on on his clone!
In the past, when he brought out the clone and his soul, the fog would immediately change color, and numerous red figures would be attracted to him, but while he was going through his spirit ascension, not a single shade of red appeared under the golden light of the All Spirits Hall. Everything in the outside world was normal.
This was the first time Su Ming had attempted a second Possession. At that moment, as his spirit ascended, he swiftly split up a little of his soul and had it charge towards the clone. He was already incredibly used to this sort of Possession, and he had already completely broken the clone's soul. Even if it resisted, its power would not be enough for it to put up a fight for more than ten breaths before it was completely devoured by Su Ming.
In an instant, his soul occupied the clone's body, and once he turned him into his clone again, Su Ming did not have time to check whether any changes had occurred after he Possessed the clone a second time. Instead, he immediately sent a thought to his clone, telling him to fuse with his current body.
'If the power of spirit ascension wants to change my body, then let's make this transformation complete. I will have this clone of mine fuse with my current physical body and have it go through this transformation together with me… so that I can form a body that will possess extreme physical strength!'
Determination appeared on Su Ming's face. The power contained within the Ancestral Spirit descended on him with a bang and enveloped him once he merged his clone and the body of the black-robed man he had Possessed. He was wrapped up in the golden light formed by the strange power.
At the same time, pain which made him feel as if he was being torn apart instantly filled his body and soul, but it was nothing to Su Ming. Instead, he sensed the great changes in his body.
The first to change were his bones. They were instantly crushed and reduced to powder. Then, rays of golden light fused into them, turning into specks of golden light that formed the bones again. They were golden in color, and they were the foundation of a physical body filled with a powerful aura!
An incredibly thick presence that belonged to Berserkers spread out from them. They were Berserker Bones, bones that only true members of Great Berserker Tribe could obtain!
They were much stronger than the Berserker Bones from the Bone Sacrifice Realm. They had been lost in the passage of time and came from another powerful Realm that belonged to the Berserkers! They held a completely meaning compared to those so-called Berserker Bones Su Ming had obtained in the past while he was in the land of Berserkers.
When all of Su Ming's bones turned into Berserker Bones shining with bright golden light, he sensed his veins shattering. They then swiftly grew back from the Berserker Bones. In an instant, they covered Su Ming's entire body, and wherever they went, his flesh and blood would melt, and a presence which belonged to the Berserkers that was much stronger than before erupted with a bang.
Su Ming now possessed Berserker Veins, which were another Realm that surpassed Berserker Bones. It had also been submerged in the dust of time. Only at that moment when Su Ming went through his spirit ascension and the metamorphosis as well as the serendipity provided by the golden light did it return to the universe.
Su Ming threw his head back and roared. As he did so, the blood in his body surged up. It had originally turned black from drinking too much blood of the offering beasts.
At that instant, however, golden light erupted from his blood. It melted Su Ming's flesh and blood, but even while it was doing so, new skin and flesh grew to become a body that could support Su Ming's Berserker Bones, Berserker Veins, and Berserker Blood!
The body created after Su Ming fused his clone and the body of the black-robed man he had Possessed thoroughly transformed while he was enveloped by the golden light formed by the power of the Ancestral Spirits. Yet the next instant, a power he had never imagined erupted from him.
His body had become an extremely powerful Berserker Body that would never perish, had endless life force surrounding it, and looked like it had become one with the world. As long as all lives were not destroyed, it would not die!
It was Death Realm!!
A Berserker Body in Death Realm!
It could be said that this was the first true body in every literal sense that Su Ming had ever possessed over the thousands of years he had practiced cultivation. Its strength surpassed everything that he had ever had, and it was his first clone after he had reached perfection—a Berserker's body!
Chapter 1194: It's Here
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The Berserker's body shone with golden light that spread through the area of one hundred thousand feet!
Golden bones, golden veins, golden flesh and blood, and a golden body were what formed the first body that reached perfection in Su Ming's life. It was the body which was the closest to his wish to have the entire universe at his beck and call.
It was a Berserker Body in Death Realm. It was the most powerful body which could use divine abilities with the power of the physical body, and they were strong enough to terrify powerful warriors in Death Realm. It could be said that from that moment onwards, Su Ming had become one of the most powerful warriors in Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos.
And this was just one of Su Ming's clones midway through the spirit ascension. But Su Ming could already sense the terrifying power contained in that body of his. In fact, he had a strong feeling that if he clenched his fist and threw a punch… the sky would break!
Those in Death Realm were much stronger than those in Fate Realm. Once they moved past the state of having never ending life, the life force in their bodies would gather together until it reached a certain level, and some strange changes would happen then, allowing them to reach an imperishable state. Their bodies could not be destroyed, while they could wipe out other people's life force, which was why… this Realm were known to be Death Realm!
With an imperishable body, such people could bring the destruction of millions. They gathered together life force and turned it into a will of heaven that stood above all rules and laws. When they opened their eyes, they could make all lives tremble. When they closed their eyes, they could sense the presence of Arid Triad's will.
This was Death Realm. In the fourth era, this was the strongest Realm on the surface of Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos!
Only those who had moved into Death Realm within the four Great True Worlds could truly be considered to rulers of a region. Only then could they try to determine their own destiny.
Su Ming threw his head back and roared. Golden light surrounded him. The Berserker Body in Death Realm had the power of the clone that practiced the Art of Swallowing Hollow Shadows Whole and the body reformed when Su Ming Possessed the black-robed man. The mystery of the second Possession had also caused its potential to be nigh endless.
The clone that practiced Art of Swallowing Hollow Shadows Whole had originally possessed endless potential once it fused with the Ancient God. Even if Su Ming did not have all the other elements, such as the black-robed man's body and the mystery of the second Possession added into the mix, there was a very high possibility that he could have obtained the Berserker Body when he went through the spirit ascension.
The black-robed man Su Ming had Possessed in the past had been an existence who was slightly stronger than Sui Chen Zi. He was one of the Eight Paramount Daos in Saint Defier Expanse Cosmos, and he had a noble status. However, to successfully descend in Arid Triad, he had chosen to disperse his cultivation base so that he could reform his body in Arid Triad. If he'd had enough time, he could have regained the terrifying power he possessed in Saint Defier Expanse Cosmos while he was in Arid Triad.
That was why his body also had endless potential.
There was also the matter of the mystery regarding the second Possession. Su Ming might not have investigated it in detail, but based on what he could sense, he could clearly tell the differences.
This was why when all of the things were gathered and fused together along with the power of spirit ascension, the Berserker Body Su Ming formed possessed a potential that surpassed the bodies of all other Berserkers!
Death Realm was definitely not his limit. This was just the beginning!
The spirit ascension had not come to an end. The appearance of the Berserker Body was just a start. As the Berserker Body in Death Realm reached perfection, Su Ming threw his head back and roared again. The golden light around him shrank swiftly to stick to Su Ming's skin as if it would spread through the golden veins in his body once it fused into him.
Then, the thing that would experience a metamorphosis would be Su Ming's cultivation base!
The golden light seemed like nutrients that all lives in the universe could absorb. It was an extremely gentle energy in the world that could change a living being's physical body and their cultivation base.
During the instant the golden light fused with him, Su Ming's cultivation base became much livelier. It swam through his veins, and when it filled his body, it ceaselessly absorbed the golden light. As it was continuously nourished, Su Ming could clearly sense his cultivation base slowly rising in power.
This increase was incredibly gentle. It did not seem like it was making him become superficially stronger, like the act of a farmer pulling shoots to accelerate the growth of his plants. Instead, this increase came to him in a form akin to an inheritance, causing countless epiphanies to appear in Su Ming's mind as his cultivation base increased in power.
Su Ming did not gain these epiphanies by himself. Instead, they came from the Ancestral Spirit with which he had fused. As the epiphanies entered his mind, Su Ming stopped breathing. No storms raged in his head. Instead, he sank into a relatively calm and relaxed state of mind.
As he experienced those epiphanies, Su Ming seemed to hear someone murmuring. The voice belonged to a man, and it sounded like it came from an unknown period of time along with the golden light. It fused into Su Ming's cultivation base.
His head slowly became clouded. Gradually, his mind scattered, and his thoughts turned into a picture with a crimson sky. Fire burned in it. Meteors charged to the ground in long arcs, and every single time one of them landed, the ground would tremble violently.
Earth shattered. Roars shook the sky and earth. Strange beasts several tens of thousands of feet big crawled out of the meteors, and they started ravaging the land with loud roars.
There was an indistinct figure on each of the ferocious beasts' heads. These figures were staring at the lives on the ground aloofly, and there was a merciless look in their eyes.
Further into the distance, mountains shattered to reveal a village they had surrounded. There was a little girl at that moment in the village. She was crouching down and weeping softly. All around her were corpses. Every single time the ground trembled, the little girl would shudder even more. She hugged her head and did not dare to move.
"Mother… Father…"
The little girl's voice sounded frail and powerless in the rumbling world. There were no longer any living beings around her. The sky burned as the meteors fell one after another. The huge ferocious beasts that walked out of them were not far from the little girl.
The ground rumbled, and a ferocious beast came out while roaring. Wherever it went, the mountains would crumble. Shattered stones shot out and scattered in every direction.
At that moment, a long blue arc suddenly appeared in the sky. With an extreme speed that made it look as if it was about to slice apart the air, it charged to the ground. Before it descended, the long blue arc flashed once, and immediately, a blue ripple swept through the area. Wherever it went, the ferocious beasts would let out shrill screams of pain, and their forms as well as their souls would be destroyed.
At the same time, the blue arc turned around and went to the little girl. In an instant, the man went over the little girl's head and closed in on the incoming, roaring beast behind her. With one sweep of his sleeves, the ferocious beast trembled. As it coughed up blood, its head flew higher into the air. Its huge body plunged to the ground with a bang, sending dust and dirt up. This alarmed the little girl so much that she seemed to have forgotten to cry. As she trembled, she stared at a young man in blue robes walking out from the dust fog.
The young man carried three great swords behind his back. There was a smile as warm as the sun on his face. At the center of his brows was a vertical red line. When he walked out of the dust fog, he came to stand next to the little girl. Then, he crouched down and handed her a small red flower that he had found in the dust fog a moment ago.
"Little girl, don't cry. I'll bring you away from this place."
The young man touched the little girl's head. When she instinctively took the little red flower, she was carried away by the young man who turned into a long arc that charged into the sky. He came to a stop while high above and swept his gaze across the land.
"I, Zhan Bai, third rank disciple of White Heron Compound, have come by the orders of my sect to destroy all of your rebellious Dao Beasts!"
The picture came to a pause, then shattered to pieces before disappearing from Su Ming's mind. At the same time, his cultivation base moved past Fate Realm with a bang and headed straight towards Life Realm!
Ceaseless life force existed in Su Ming's cultivation base. When it swam through his entire body, the power of Life Realm erupted from him… It was what Su Ming had been yearning for a long time!
Moving slightly past Fate Realm did not mean that Su Ming had reached great completion in Fate Realm. Instead, his cultivation base was simply covered by the golden light. He reached a temporary completion, and because of it, avoided directly reaching Life Realm. If Su Ming could reach great completion in Fate Realm on his own, his power would definitely raise by a considerable margin.
But at that moment, Su Ming could already sense just how strong he had become. The aura bursting out from him when his cultivation base swam in him caused the world to tremble and allowed Su Ming to sense a pinnacle of power he had never sensed before.
'I should be able to make it raise a little more…'
Su Ming's eyes sparkled a little. His cultivation base came to a swift halt, then at his will, it started moving in reverse. This action instantly filled Su Ming with intense pain. However, the golden light around him instantly gathered on him again. It fused with his cultivation base, which began to show signs of rising in power once more.
At the same time, the fragments formed after the picture in Su Ming's mind shattered came to a swift halt, and they too, started moving in reverse to regroup and form a new picture.
In that picture was another world. That sky was sinking with loud bangs as if it was about to crumble. The ground trembled. In fact, if Su Ming lifted his head, he could see that the galaxy beyond the sky was crumbling as well. He was seeing a picture of a galaxy being reduced to dust, a universe dying, and an entire cosmos suffering a disaster!
The ground sunk and formed pits. A sect had been established underground, but at that moment, it got buried. There were various figures in midair, and the power coming from each of them caused Su Ming's heart to tremble. The weakest in the group had power equivalent to those in Fate Realm, and the strongest gave Su Ming the feeling that they had completely surpassed the old man from Heavenly Spirit Tribe. It was a Realm Su Ming could not recognize.
The group looked like it wanted to leave their world, but when they flew up, their bodies roared as if an indescribable will had swept past them… completely wiping all of them out.
Su Ming's heart trembled violently. In fact, for the first time ever, a great wave of terror rose from the bottom of his heart. The will was so strong that it left Su Ming in disbelief. Its merciless act of wiping out lives held an aloofness that required no words. It was as if the entire universe and all the lives before this will had to be completely destroyed no matter what sort of level of cultivation they possessed. They were not allowed to leave any sort of mark in the world.
Standing at the peak of a crumbling mountain on the ground was an old man in a long robe. Kneeling behind him was a young man. There was grief in his eyes. He trembled while he stared at the sky around him. That young man was the person Su Ming had seen in the first picture—Zhan Bai.
"It's here…" The old man sighed softly. There was an ancient and complicated look on his face, along with helplessness and a reluctance to admit defeat.