"We sent our best to fight for us, no one came back, so we sent some more and more and more. Now only we are left"
-Unknown human cultivator ~ Deity transformation
The south eastern region of the vast tree universe - broken isle's.
Clusters of small and large spirit continents littered the surrounding space, the spirit continents were covered by several galactic nebula clouds making the continents seem like islands at sea.
These small continents had once been part of a larger whole but due to various wars over time this continent had split into thousands of smaller pieces.
Not just one or two spirit continents had been shattered in this area, well over one hundred continents of various sizes had suffered the same fate, leaving a chain of dust clouds littered across billions of light years of space.
Tens of thousands of Arks and millions of flying ships could be seen covering the skies making many mortals wonder what was happening, they had never seen so much activity in the sky before.
From isle to isle these vessels travelled gathering every resource available increasing their numbers along the way.
It was notable that things like flying ships were not rare to see for those living on spirit continents but most of the time cultivators would use illusion formations to hide the ships as they fly in the sky only to reveal themselves when they reached their destination.
This helped to avoid the attention of other cultivators while also helping to hide the exact amount of ships one had in case of an emergency, either way it was better to avoid trouble.
Unless one had a reason it was best not to stand out.
Going off the same line of thinking, using formations to hide the ship used spiritual Qi in large quantities, while most flying ships had Qi gathering formations to help, the amount of energy that could be gathered without revealing oneself was not enough to power the entire ship.
Most Qi came from the spiritual energy cores that powered the majority of the ships facilities, if that was not available the next best option was for the cultivator themselves to provide the energy.
Due to this, most ship captains and fleet commanders chose too not use concealment formations near spirit continents as this part of their journey could conserve power for any future problems that may arise.
Practice makes perfect after all, it was best to start regulating energy usage as early as possible.
This group wouldn't have any problems for the foreseeable future just based on scale, if anyone actually attacked they would truly be a hero.
The salvation arks are one of few flying ships created in the vast tree universe to travel the endless void for extended periods of time, although their original purpose was not to travel the inner universe's space it still held up when compared to conventional flying ships.
The outer frame was created to be durable, easy to fix and most importantly to not allow the chaotic energies of the endless void to enter the inside of the ship.
A good vessel must be well sealed, a vessel that can travel outside the universe boundary had to be so air tight that not even atoms can escape.
It was one of the best ship designs to ever be created and if not for the vast tree universe's impending collapse it would never have made its way to the common populace and be kept a secret of its creator.
As more Arks took to the sky joining the rest on the looting journey, devilish cultivators took this time to do what they generally couldn't do without being chased down and killed - loot, murder, rape and mass sacrifice.
All over the vast tree realm soul sacrifices, blood sacrifices, the creation of undead soldiers or refinement of devilish treasures took place causing a calamity to descend upon mortals and unlucky cultivators who had lost the greater protection of the cultivation world.
No other place in the Vast tree realm had such a large problem with devilish cultivators as the south eastern region did, likewise the southern region also had the most lax 'laws' amongst the 8 main directions of the realm as well as the most opportunities for those seeking to make a name for themselves.
The south of the Vast tree realm can simply be known as the adventurer's dream land for it is considered by most as a wild area with few footholds for any not considered a demonic beast.
Although this area has seen its calamities, wars and even occupations from several other powers not even 1/10th of the south had been conquered at any point in time.
While many have visited and gained immeasurable wealth in the depths of the south it has remained as free as it ever was, which is likely why it will never have a chance to rise either as it's simply too chaotic.
Currently the largest devilish faction had mobilized the entirely of its power to construct the largest sacrificial ceremony in it's history, while many of the previous powers that controlled the area were able to gleam what was going on they did not try and stop it and simply looked away.
Boarding flying ships and arks they left everything that was once theirs behind.
Mortals of all species slaughtered in droves to set up a single formation corner stone, devilish cultivators as a whole took this chance to rise in power across the universe.
Devilish cultivators were not immune to the affects of the calamity having lost more then half of their peak fighters sent to fight the corruption, which is notably less then the losses of other factions.
Had devilish cultivators not been outnumbered in a ten to one ratio they would have taken control over vast portions of the universe.
Many nobel cultivators had deserted the front lines during the many battles for the universe's defense being deemed devils as a result, gaining such a title made them unable to go back to their homes in shame.
Such cultivators had no choice but to barter for safe passage or even join devilish factions as a result of being deemed devils.
Today most of these cultivators would truly be deemed forevermore as devils.
As devilish cultivators gained power, some took this time to conceal themselves among devilish practitioners in order to cause mass slaughter upon enemy races they once had conflicts with.
It was clear to see that these people were far more cruel then the devilish cultivators themselves for the devils had become very efficient with the mass slaughter they caused quickly killing for what they needed but these 'other' cultivators taking revenge did not kill quick, choosing to prolong the suffering of those they encountered.
Massive explosions and rituals reaped the lives of millions while leaving the survivors to see the aftermath and curse the ones who caused this.
Cities destroyed, fortresses leveled and countless civilizations fell overnight it was as if hell had descended and madness had taken over.
Very few protected by the few who choose to stay for their people till the very end, in hopes of buying time to evacuate as much of their people as possible.
While this small area of the vast tree universe's southern sector had taken the warning given to them to heart, the rest of the south had turned ignorant to this 'Calamity'.
Those that left were considered cowards by the vast populace, while many joined simply to not miss out on all the looting going on.
"Can you believe it?! Those beasts in the deep south have started to believe these rumors about the end of the universe, they just up and left everything behind!"
"Cowards! I didn't think the enemies we've been fighting all these years to simply leave because some big shots of the vast tree realm told them too, if it was me I would have shown them what my canon's can do"
"Heck yeah! Screw the central coalition, what have they ever done for us!"
"Well since they left all that open land with no one to defend it, why don't we uh, go sightseeing?"
The southern region had yet to experience the full weight of the oncoming calamity, having experienced countless 'World ending calamities' they no longer held the same fear to the word 'Calamity'.
This was truly not fully their fault, when every event is considered some major disaster of a scale never before seen, people tend to start ignoring warnings.
The biggest factor to the south's ignorance was simply, terrible leadership.
Even if the vast majority of the south held the same beliefs, they had always entered conflicts over even the slightest of missteps.
With the vast amount of wealth gained from the vast resources of the south, the leadership could simply wave some money at the problem and it will simply disappear for a while.
If that didn't work, they always had the option of threatening to call someone a devil should they not align themselves with the rest.
Even if one wanted to change the south for the better, the fragmentation of power had already seeped so deep into the south that no one force could ever dream of achieving unity.
Those in charge wanted to keep the status quo and they will promise to do absolutely everything required to improve life in the south but never actually do it, claiming 'Heaven has willed it to be, we cannot fix this'.
The southerners had become so accustomed to these lies or 'fibs' that they started to believe the heavens were truly punishing them for doing nothing wrong.
....
In the space of the Vast tree universe one-hundred thousand flying ships headed towards the west, they were one of thousands of squadrons sent out to delay the calamity and part of the remaining survivors of the United army that did not die or flee during the final battle.
The leader of this group was considered to be among the top 100 strongest beings in the vast tree universe and with the death of so many high tier cultivators he could now be considered one of the top 30 cultivators in the Vast tree realm.
This did not mean he was one of the strongest beings to ever exist in the universe, simply he was one of the strongest of the current time period.
"How are the preparations going? Are we ready to once more face off against those corrupted fiends? And is the mind destroying formation ready?" A mans calm voice spoke almost seeming disinterested.
"We have finished all preparations, all thats left is... Well the enemy" a confident woman's voice sounded out.
The calm man was Abner, he was one of 147 surviving void realm lords left in the vast tree realm.
From a peak of 1,107 void realm experts in the current time period, he had survived thus far among the 147 only because his own power was simply above others, yet below the truly strong.
The woman was Ritika a heavenly rebirth stage arch lord who had participated in most campaigns against the corruption a strategist known throughout the realm, it was thanks to her plus the sacrifices of hundreds of quadrillions that the Vast tree realm could even survive as long as it did given its current crisis.
One might think the loss of life would have sent the universe into a panic, but in truth these numbers were expected for universe scale warfare.
Even galactic warfare could result in the deaths of trillions over the course of a few years let alone a battle for the entire universe.
Currently the flying vessels part of the fleet had around ten thousand peak grade cultivators at or above the soul integration stage, all veterans of cultivation and all renowned heros amongst their race.
In total about ten million high grade cultivators had been sent out to face the calamity as the vanguard of 4 waves of attack, with another thirty million to replace those that fall.
These numbers were considered as nothing more then a small militia.
The only reason one would rather avoid such a small army would be from the shear amount of fire power that this small force carried.
Any single ship would be strong enough on its own to conquer entire galactic clusters with relative ease, these ships are the current pinnacle of spirit artifacts available to the vast populace.
Any spirit artifact stronger then these ships was not obtainable by just anyone.
The goal they had was simple, to slow down the advancing calamity with minimal casualties over the next half year to buy time to set up a 'God realm formation' across the entire western quadrant which would buy at minimum 4 months time for all nearly continents to evacuate towards the north passage.
Considering it could take a normal flying ship several weeks to simply reach another galaxy it was a pointless waste of time.
While the ships the army rode could travel 10 galactic clusters in a week, most couldn't afford to buy such ships.
Yes the ships are available for anyone who wants to buy one but just like a Porsche not everyone can get one.
The only ships fast enough to traverse billions of light years in mere weeks were the arks and not everyone could afford to make one.
Luckily many other options besides the arks and ultra expensive warships were available to speed up travel times.
If anyone is still in the western zone by that time they will be left for dead for no one is going to risk their lives for them.
"Huh? There seems to be a ship nearby, seems they are being chased by some corrupted fiends" the man said with a slight smile.
"Thats interesting, we are still several days away from the nearest continent, and its not supposed to be encroached by the corruption yet! After all we planned to use it as a rest stop" the woman was a bit perplexed but not overly concerned.
Space was vast, to even encounter a stray rock would be a miracle big enough to pray to the heavens let alone another ship.
"Ok. Lets get the information we can first" said Abner as a trace of boredom left his face, standing up he simply phased through the hull of his flying vessel entering space unprotected.
Heading towards the fleeing vessel with extra vigor, his aura grew allowing one to see a sun like ball of pure spiritual energy surround his body.
On the flying ship that was being pursued, many cultivators were launching ferocious attacks behind them.
"Captain! The teleportation formation is almost ready, 5 more minutes!"
"Good!" The captain responded with joy while in his mind 'dammit we probably won't make it out alive from this, 5 minutes is too long!'.
The vessel they rode was not in good shape and seems to have lost many of its parts already but the people on board did not seem overly panicked, clearly speaking for their experience or possibly loss of hope.
This flying ship was circular and seemed to carry mostly low grade cultivators and mortals, other then them was the crew which seemed to be made up of a captain in the body reformation stage and a crew consisting of mainly core formation and nascent soul cultivators with a handful of deity transformation stage experts.
It was clear as day that this was a hired ship payed for by the low grade cultivators collectively to ferry them away, a sizable sum must have been paid to move such high ranking cultivators hearts to become their taxi.
The pursuers behind and around their vessel seemed to fly in the void with no wings or propulsion to be seen, numbering in the tens of thousands at first sight, some clung to the sides of the ship in an effort to dig inside and force themselves in while others simply tried to use their size to crush the Ship from the outside.
The ships crew and the few stronger passengers were fighting back keeping them at bay striving for time and trying not to die in the process.
The 'creatures' had horns on their heads, beady eyes, sharp teeth with no lips, earth yellow skin with thinly spread hair which seemed to stick extremely closely to their bones.
All their skeletal figures differed in shape and size some looked like animalistic, others like insects and even a few humanoid figures could be seen.
The low grade cultivators were not of much help here but they could at least provide power to the ships defensive arrays taking pressure away from the ships core, those fighting head on against the enemy struck with a their might yet for every creature they killed the others would consume their fallen comrade to make themselves stronger.
This current stalemate was not in the favor of the defenders, eventually the fiends would overcome the defenders or the ship will run out of fuel and canon fire, no other option was available when facing the calamities ghoul's.
Monks chanted, nuns prayed, visions of rivers and mountains attempted to seal the fiends or break them, all to no avail.
"Be cleansed you foul beast! Return the the depths of hell where you came from" the monk screamed at the top of his lungs emitting holy light able to cleanse evil spirits and foul beasts of evil thought.
The skeletal fiends held no fear for the light charging regardless of injury.
As the fiend neared another man bald of head wearing red and yellow garments clapped his hands together.
"Rejoice o lost one! For I shall lead you to repentance!" The bald monk in red and yellow struck at the ghoul with a fist covered in light.
The ghoul beaten back, the bald monk looked at the other monk "Would it not be better to spare your energy to power the ship instead?"
Both monks stared at each other in silence.
All of the sudden one of the crew members in charge of navigation noticed a change in the spiritual radar.
"Incoming! We got more incoming from the front!"
The captain looked to the forward direction the ship traveled.
Just as it was said space seemed to shake, compress and crack all at once followed by a deafening sound, as massive suns crashed down all at once.
The ship was miniscule among these falling suns, fire tendrils spread from the suns grabbing any fiend latched onto the ship and ripping them off.
Unbearable heat spread out threatening to incinerate the flying vessel only to disappear in a flash.
The next thing anyone knew, all of the attackers were gone and only silence remained.
Everyone was stunned and only after a few breaths did they realize they had been saved.
"Who's in charge here?" Abner asked emitting a crushing pressure upon the vessel.
The difference in cultivation being too great, his voice sounded and several low tier cultivators popped like blood bags.
Captain Fulson quickly used his own spirit to cover his crew from harm but he had fallen to his knees unable to stand.
Everyone else on the ship passed out besides for the captain himself.