Beyond the Timescape

Chapter 1193: Fundamentally in the Immortal Capital

It was a most holy occasion during the Immortal Capital’s Trial of the Hunt! It was a moment that countless cultivators dreamed of. Countless living beings would witness the moment in which the qualified participants ascended to the Immortal Capital!

Xu Qing was in the brightest beam of light that advanced ever upward. Behind him, ninety-nine beams of light rose from the four planetary systems, all of them bearing cultivators who were going to the Immortal Capital.

As of this moment, they were the center of all attention in the four planetary systems. As of this moment, they were entirely worthy of being called stars. As of this moment, the four planetary systems were all peaceful and quiet as the scene played out in the canopy of heaven.

Of course, the vast majority of people could only see some of what was happening. But the truly powerful experts in the four planetary systems could see how unique the most brightly shining of the light was. As everyone watched, the people in the beams of light rose higher and higher, getting closer and closer to the aurora. And finally… they turned crimson as they entered the aurora, one after another.

***

There was no starry sky above the aurora. There was only a foggy haze.

Within the haze were a hundred four-sided pillars, all of them very ancient and weathered. They were terraced, so that the tallest pillar was in the very middle, with pillars stretching out almost in a triangular shape on either side, with each successive pillar shorter than the one before it. As a whole, they looked like the character for ‘person’: 人.

All of the pillars glittered with seven-colored light. They seemed to have existed for countless years, to have witnessed innumerable magnificent things, and now pulsed with infinite majesty.

The light they exuded turned into numerous prismatic beams. They dropped down below the aurora and into the four planetary systems. They became the subject of all attention there.

The light coming from the central pillar was the brightest as… Xu Qing rose through the aurora within it! He was the first of the hundred cultivators to emerge from the aurora. As the aurora flowed around him, he seemed almost like something going from the bottom of a river up to the surface of the water.

Upon breaking the surface, he saw the infinite haze, as well as the one hundred seven-colored pillars. He didn’t hesitate. He approached the pillars and alighted on the tallest of them, the one in the center.

There he stood. Turning, he looked down. The vast aurora was like a crimson sea. Inside of it, ninety-nine beams of light contained more cultivators who were ascending to their corresponding pillars.

Among the crowd, Xu Qing spotted Zhou Zhengli, who smiled humbly.

He saw Sir Vilespirit, who bowed his head.

He saw Yuanshan Su, who avoided his gaze.

He saw Li Mengtu, who looked excited.

He saw Hordeslayer and Rampart. They usually acted proud and arrogant, but now they seemed to shrink in on themselves.

Xu Qing studied the group. The majority of the faces were unfamiliar to him, but there were some he recognized. Jiang Fan wasn’t there. But what was shocking was… a young man in black! He exuded a sensation of order, and was orbited by chains of starlight. Almost as soon as Xu Qing looked at him, he looked back.

Sir Star Ring!

Xu Qing remained completely calm. He was not surprised to see all of these people here. And he had long since come to sense that Sir Star Ring had awoken. He had gone to the Star Ring Pagoda sometime earlier and waited for a while, but Sir Star Ring never came. As a result, Xu Qing wasn’t taken by surprise at all to see him here. He quickly looked away from him.

Ignoring all the cultivators landing on the pillars, Xu Qing looked up at the haze. He had always felt that the Fifth Star Ring wasn’t very big. He had come to that conclusion after comparing it to the Revered Ancient mainland. It wasn’t that Revered Ancient was larger. It was a fact that the four planetary systems of the Fifth Star Ring were vast in size. Even just a single one of them would surpass Revered Ancient. Most cultivators could fly for an entire lifetime and never leave one of the planetary systems. Despite that, Xu Qing still felt that the Fifth Star Ring was small.

Based on the star ring map he had seen years ago that depicted the thirty-six higher star rings, he knew that a star ring should be incredibly large. But that was not what he had experienced in the Fifth Star Ring.

Of course, he knew that some of it was because of how the Fifth Star Ring had been compacted. It made sense considering that the various layers of a starry sky were all the same instance of space. After being compacted, the Fifth Star Ring turned into a landmass, and therefore, the way one perceived it with the senses would be different.

But when all was said and done, that was only one factor, and there was definitely a much more relevant explanation. It was a theory Xu Qing had developed after traveling to all four planetary systems. Yet now….

As he stood atop the ancient pillar looking at the haze, Xu Qing’s thoughts went wild. He was struck with a sudden premonition that the real Fifth Star Ring… was what he was looking at right now.

Anticipation filled him. The other cultivators in the area felt similarly. They didn’t have to wait long. Soon, the final person stepped onto the pillar, and the haze began to seethe. An indescribably heavy force was clearing the fog, as if an invisible hand were waving it away. And then… the haze that had been blocking their view vanished without a trace.

A majestic starry sky was now visible to them! Within the infinitude was a huge whirlpool that occupied about ninety percent of the starry sky. It seemed still, but if you looked closely you would realize it was rotating.

Xu Qing and the other cultivators on the pillars were minuscule in comparison. Everyone could sense that the astonishing whirlpool was full of a massive amount of heavenly bodies, and all of them had life on them as well as the aura of immortals. And yet, as everyone soaked in the astonishing sight… it was as if some immense power shrank that starry sky down. The whirlpool also shrank down rapidly.

And as it shrank down, an even more majestic whirlpool of stars appeared within the starry sky. The whirlpool from before wasn’t visible. But it hadn’t disappeared, it had shrunk down, revealing that it was one of millions upon millions of whirlpools.

His mind spun. Yet things weren’t over. The giant whirlpool of stars shrank down again. Xu Qing and the other cultivators saw countless astonishing whirlpools of stars forming together into a huge star chart. Or, put more precisely, it was a star domain!

If the first thing they had seen was the star domain, they wouldn’t have been able to grasp how large it was. But after seeing everything shrink down, it was obvious that it was so immense it defied description.

And yet… things still weren’t over.

The star domain shrank down, revealing a host of innumerable star domains, an infinitude that became a complete universe! Yet even as the universe became visible, the starry sky blurred, and… countless universes appeared to them. Then the universes shrank.

The starry sky trembled. Ultimately… an immense figure became visible in front of them. It was not a true body. Instead, it was made of countless planetary systems, galaxies, star domains, and universes! This person’s features were indistinguishable, but he was surrounded by the most paramount of sensations.

This figure was not the Immortal Paragon of the Fifth Star Ring! And that was because as the figure made up of countless universes appeared, the starry sky shrank again, revealing that, astonishingly, there were ten other such figures!

There were a total of eleven! They were like heavens beyond heaven! They were the eleven Immortal Lords of the Fifth Star Ring!

Each one was magnificent.

Xu Qing and all of the other hundred cultivators felt like they were being battered by waves of astonishment. Rumbling sounds filled Xu Qing’s mind and heart as he looked at the eleven figures.

One of the figures, despite having indistinguishable facial features, was immediately recognizable to Xu Qing thanks to his experience in the immortal palace.

That person was… Immortal Lord Nineshores! There was something unique about Immortal Lord Nineshores compared to the others. In front of him was a ring made of starlight.

As soon as Xu Qing saw the ring, he realized what it was. It was the ring of the epoch. It was currently… the Nineshores Epoch!

Xu Qing took a deep breath and suppressed the excitement in his heart as he looked at the other Immortal Lords. He was hoping to spot… Grandmaster Bai! Eventually, his gaze settled on the ninth of the Immortal Lords. It was a majestic figure who seemed to be an old man. It wasn’t possible to see his face clearly, but he had a medicinal decocting pot in his hands that immediately struck Xu Qing with a sense of familiarity.

The old man looked down at Xu Qing, and a very faint smile appeared on his lips. Xu Qing smiled back and then bowed.

After that, the starry sky blurred again, and the sensation of shrinking occurred again. And then, the heavens beyond heaven that were the eleven Immortal Lords shrank down. Behind them was an even more majestic figure who seemed unsurpassably holy, and who was mighty enough to occupy the entire starry sky.

This was the origin of all immortals! This was the paragon of the Fifth Star Ring. This was he who had crushed the gods. He was… the Immortal Paragon!

The eleven heavens beyond heaven all orbited around him. This was the true Fifth Star Ring!

After being taken over by cultivators, it was compressed, and that process caused the different parts of it to occupy heavens beyond heaven.

As for the four great planetary systems of east, west, south and north, they were the original homeland! They were where everything had started.

Fundamentally speaking, there wasn’t actually an Immortal Capital. The original homeland was the Immortal Capital. That was where the Fifth Star Ring’s pureblooded humans existed.

All of the fighting, killing, and bitterness was designed to raise pureblooded humans. It was all for the future of the Fifth Star Ring. The cultivators who came from there all had politically correct family backgrounds and educations. In the future, they would be tasked with an important mission.

As for the lives of those in the heavens beyond heaven, in some ways, they were simply collateral relatives. In fact, most of them weren’t even human, but instead, had just been blessed with human bloodlines. All of these things did not need to be conveyed with words. As soon as Xu Qing and the other cultivators saw the majestic scene in front of them, they understood.

“Now I get it….” Xu Qing murmured.

And then, among the eleven heavens beyond heaven, Immortal Lord Nineshores, whose turn it was to oversee the epoch, opened his eyes.

“Ascendees, you will now enter my own heaven beyond heaven.”