The Undying Immortal System-Chapter 336: Life 77, Age 74, Martial Sovereign 1

With all the immediate crises dealt with, at least for the moment, I could finally take a step back and focus on other projects. So, while ShouLi and the leadership council were busy codifying a new system for selecting their replacements, reestablishing the various guilds, and working to rebuild the nearly destroyed Sovereign Clans, I hid away in my cultivation chamber and turned my attention to the growth and development of my inner world.

During my years in the Nine Rivers Sect, the radius of my world had grown to over 1.5 kilometers, giving it a volume of nearly 3.6 cubic kilometers. This was slightly larger than I had originally intended, but that was fine. The important part was simply that Chang’an had grown large enough that I could finally push my inner world toward the next step in its development.

A while ago, I had the idea of separating my world into several different ‘planes.’ I would, essentially, create entirely separate disks for each different element and then add additional disks for various combinations of elements.

When I first had this idea, I had wanted to make Chang’an’s disk my Plane of Earth. However, considering that the city would inevitably become the ancestral home of my Su Clan, restricting it to only earth qi felt rather limiting. Also, when I saw the ribbons of fire created by the seed of the Three Thousand Flames Fire dance through the city’s skyline, it had sparked a new idea in me for what an elemental plane can and should be.

So, I rearranged my plans.

Grabbing hold of the seed of the Expanding Realms Fire within my soul, I started creating a long, slender tube that was 1 centimeter across and extended out from the center of Chang’an’s underbelly.

After a bit of experimentation, I found that as long as this tube was thin enough, I was able to use my space affinity to twist and reshape it even after it was fully formed. Once an entire plane was attached to the end of such a tube, moving it around would likely become extremely difficult, but with a high enough space affinity, it should be possible. This gave me a bit of confidence that I could place my planes now and not necessarily need to worry about the space that they would eventually occupy as my inner world continued to grow.

Still, I didn’t want to have to monkey around with moving planes about until absolutely necessary, so I continued extending this tube until I felt the first signs of resistance from my space affinity. Even with this resistance, I might have still been able to push this tube even farther, but there was no need. Its length was already far beyond what could be considered ‘reasonable.’

When I was done, one end was stuck to the underside of Chang’an. The other end was 1,000 kilometers down and 10,000 kilometers to the ‘south’ of Chang’an, giving the tube a length of slightly over 10,050 kilometers. However, as this tube was only a centimeter in diameter, its total volume was only 30 cubic meters, practically nothing.

After this first tube was formed, I went back and created two more, one extending to the ‘northwest’ and another extending to the ‘northeast.’ While I only planned to use two of these for the moment, I went ahead and built all three so that I could better visualize my inner world’s future layout.

Next, I focused the Expanding Realms Fire at the end of the northeastern tube and created a new cylinder that extended out from the end of it so that the tube connected to the center of the top of this new cylinder. First, I created, essentially, another tube that was 1 centimeter in diameter and stretched down for 1 kilometer. Then, I set the fire to work on expanding this cylinder’s radius.

This cylinder was to be my new Plane of Earth—at least, temporarily. Where Chang’an was only 500 meters tall, I had decided to expand the height of this new plane to a full kilometer. This meant that I would have less land area to work with, but considering that a proper ‘Plane of Earth’ would likely need impressive-looking mountains, 1 kilometer seemed like the bare minimum for what its height should be.

After allowing this new cylinder to expand to a radius of 1 meter, I retracted the flames, sent them to the end of the tube that pointed to the northwest, and repeated the same procedure. I hadn’t yet fully committed to which element this second cylinder would embody, but because of the order of the bagua, I only had two options: wood or fire.

Once this second proto-plane was in place, I returned the flames to the Plane of Earth and set them up to expand the place indefinitely.

Because the volumes that I had been working with were so small, I had been able to complete all of this prep work in only a day. However, if I wanted my world to advance to Rank 2, I first needed to expand its total volume from 3.5 cubic kilometers to 10 cubic kilometers, and that would be the work of decades.

Therefore, I shifted my focus to another important topic: karmic energy storage.

After weeks of intensive care, Mei and Murong NaYun were able to purge all of the toxins from Ning ZeKun’s body. It would still be a while before he was back to his old self again, but he was already on the road to recovery. freēwēbηovel.c૦m

So, considering the Ning Sovereign to be my most reliable source of information for details on karmic energy storage formations, I paid the man a visit to see how he was holding up.

Not one to mince words, ZeKun had me get straight to the point, and after I told him what I was interested in, he punched a hole in the air to form a portal to the exact place that I wanted to visit. No Oaths tried to stop him. Apparently, being the Provisional Emissary of the Nine Rivers Saint came with a few additional perks that I hadn’t considered.

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That said, the room that Ning ZeKun took me to…

A dozen unconscious bodies lay in a heap on the ground. At first, their positioning appeared to be random, like someone had slain them and haphazardly tossed their carcasses into this room. However, upon looking at the place in energy vision, I was astonished.

“You… made a formation out of… people?”

Ning ZeKun let out a wry chuckle. “Not me. I don’t have anywhere near that skill level. This was a gift from the Saint after I completed the Path of the True Chosen.”

I tried to analyze what the formation was doing, but too much of it was missing–pushed into other dimensions. “What…”

ZeKun walked over to a circle that had been marked on the floor and tapped on a formation plate. The circle below him lit up, and a stream of karmic energy was pulled from his body and pushed into the formation.

“Any time we gather energy, we deposit it here.” ZeKun tapped on two of the bodies. “The one on the left is a random cultivator whose ‘services’ I purchased. The one on the right is a member of my clan who was born with only a marginal level of talent. This formation… splits the energy. Purifies it. The karma connected to my clan goes one way, everything else goes the other.”

He walked over to where the other ten bodies were tangled together in a heap. “These fellows are the actual storage device. With only ten people, the amount of energy that can be stored at any one time is somewhat limited, so I generally only use it for Emperor- and Sovereign-level energy.”

He walked to a circle on the other side of the room and tapped on a formation plate. A thread of karmic energy flowed out of the bodies on the floor and entered ZeKun’s dantian.

I stared. “Do you have another one of these set up in your manor in South Gate?”

He looked at me and cocked his head. “Interesting that you know about that… But no. That formation is a bit different. It just allows for the easy transfer of karmic energy from one person to another.”

I nodded. I had seen my fair share of horrors in the world, so using living bodies as a battery wasn’t as revolting as it might have been in the past, but still… “These people…”

“Are all volunteers. They are all Grandmasters who are being paid the wages of a Lord. After entering the formation, their bodies fall unconscious. After 50 years, they will rotate out, and new people will take their places.”

“I… see.”

Could I do this? Was I willing to do this? More to the point, did I even need to do this?

TongBin and his assistants had basically replicated all of this formation’s functions. As long as I was willing to provide a low five-star karmic affinity to at least one person per generation, this formation wouldn’t serve any purpose.

A thought struck me. “The Nine Rivers Sect is able to store far more karmic energy than what can fit in only nine people. How… How do they do it?”

I returned to the Nine Rivers Sect, found Grand Elder Zheng BoQin, and explained what I wanted to know. He didn’t ask any questions. He simply turned, guided me through a series of portals and tunnels, and took me to a cavern deep within the bowels of Dragon Peak.

That place… it was far more impressive than Ning ZeKun’s pile of unconscious bodies.

Dozens of 100-meter-tall trees stretched to the ceiling of an enormous cavern. At first, I was wondering how such a large, open space could remain standing with the weight of a mountain pressing down on it from above, but then I noticed that these trees were serving as support columns.

The Grand Elder gestured to the scene. “This is how we store karmic energy. The elders are the official lords, kings, and emperors within the sect’s territory. They harvest the sect’s karma and come down here to deposit it. Whenever the energy is stored, contribution points are awarded to the appropriate stewards. When karmic energy is purchased, a child formation pulls energy from storage and pushes it into the purchaser's dantian.”

It was the same as the Ning Clan… The sect was also storing karmic energy in bodies. The only difference was the size and… species of the bodies.

As I walked through this underground forest, I noticed a flickering green flame. I moved to approach more closely, but the Grand Elder put a hand on my shoulder to hold me back.

“Emissary Su…” A look of hesitation crossed the man’s face. “That is the seed of the Eternal Grove Fire, an Earth-Rank wood-element fire seed. It pulls in qi and expels vital energy, nourishing the grove around us.”

The thought of acquiring a fourth Earth-Rank seed to match the fire, wind, and dark seeds that I already possessed was extremely tempting. But… “What is vital energy? I’m not familiar with that term.”

“It is… the energy of life. As long as a being has sufficient reserves of vital energy, they cannot die.”

My eyes widened in excitement, but the elder shook his head sadly. “Unfortunately, it isn’t quite as mystical as that. Sapient beings are unable to absorb such energies. This flame cannot help people–or even trained demon beasts–live any longer than what was preordained by the Heavens. For humans, it cannot even heal the most basic of wounds. Its effects are limited to increasing the lifespan of ordinary plants and mortal animals.”

That… ‘Preordained by the Heavens.’ But… What if the ‘Heavens’ couldn’t interfere?

“Elder Zheng, might I be allowed to… borrow this fire seed? I can leave a copy of its spirit fire in its place. The grove will be unaffected.”

He nodded. “As the Emissary of the Nine Rivers Saint, that is within your rights. However, apologies for saying unkind words, but understand this. The seed remains the property of the Saint—not you, and not your clan. If he requires it, the Saint may reclaim the seed at any time. And when you die, it must be returned here. Also, no seeds, not even the Yellow-Rank ones that you have acquired from outside the sect, are allowed to leave this continent. They are all the property of the Saint, and attempting to take them away will result in an immediate death sentence. Understood?”

I nodded. “Yes, Elder. Thank you.”

Without hesitating any longer, I ran forward, pulled the seed into a jade box, and replaced it with a copy of its spirit fire.

Seeing this, the elder hesitated for a moment, but eventually, he breathed out a resigned sigh. “There… is something else that you may wish to see.”

After passing through another series of portals and tunnels, we arrived in a far smaller cavern that was buried beneath the roots of Dragon Peak. There, the Grand Elder introduced me to yet another fire seed.

“This… is the seed of the Immutable Mountain Fire, an Earth-Rank earth-element fire. It is the seed that created Dragon Peak.” He shook his head helplessly. “You may borrow this one as well. It should be of use in your study of formations.”