Path of the Ascendant

“How is it? What is the state of the dome?” Wei Yi asked the Kong Prison Realm’s spatial spirit, leaving the diplomat from the east on his own now that the threat had suddenly become so much more… real.

Her senses reached as far as Yi Shi Ming’s would, but her mind was worse at analysing such a large amount of information. She was still human, and her oddly effective mind lacked the ability to process more things at once than would be standard. On the other hand, the mother of the first Master of Yi City retained the memory of a human life, but her current state was that of a spatial spirit, and she could comprehend so much more in a brief period of time.

“It is holding, but the Hunger of the Beyond are having a greater impact than either of us appear to have expected. In addition, they aren’t simply attacking it, but almost seeming to devour it, as if that energy is food to them.”

“Almost?”

“They seem to be somewhat specific about the areas they target.”

“What’s different there? Whatever it is, we must improve the barrier so that it has some actual fucking effectiveness,” she subdued the aspects of her planar essence that were threatening to burst out of control, like her killing will would have done back when that was entirely separate from her other three paths.

“Those places have the least of the energy that you have provided.”

She raised an eyebrow, “Why? It shouldn’t be too unique. The result of the dome is also planar essence, and that… Oh, fuck me. I get it.”

“What is it, Wei Yi?”

“The clue’s in the name. They are the Hunger of the Beyond, a thing that comes when the world becomes too powerful for the standards of those that have particular designs for it. They must, therefore, be attracted to certain things that occur when the world reaches a high point. The ninth realm of energy is a good start, and it seems likely that once enough is amassed, it becomes similar to an aspect of planar essence, which they then devour until none is left. Is that right, Heaven’s Will?” Wei Yi felt something to her side, so she turned before that entity made itself known.

The answer came as soon as the featureless figure of pure white manifested itself, “It is close enough.”

“In that case, the difference has to lay in the fact that I have attained true planar essence, combining five paths.”

“No. The difference is in perfected stages and realms, as you refer to them. You might not have felt this as much as others, but by design, full perfected realms are not meant to be possible. Kong Shi Meng had failed to attain a full perfected realm until the eighth, and by that point it was too late. The foundation for a true difference to exist wasn’t formed, and so he struggled against the Hunger of the Beyond,” Heaven’s Will explained helpfully, “I had considered steps one to eight, but you are on step nine. Whatever concepts you have now are not directly under my control, and the Hunger is not attuned to them either.”

“In other words, my particular variant of planar essence has surpassed you.”

“You may put it that way…” the will of the heavens was clearly reluctant to agree, but disagreeing wouldn’t be right either. Most likely, it was the passive-aggressiveness that she was radiating with every single moment that it had an issue with.

Unfortunately for it, she considered it to be very well earned, so she had no intention of warding it off, even if doing so would be a bit easier without a force dedicated solely to making her agitated. She simply ignored its displeasure and placed her left hand on the dome’s array node again, letting out more of her energy so as to form a thin web throughout the entirety of the dome, ensuring that the Hunger of the Beyond would have difficulties with consuming much of it with any decent speed.

This was not going to be enough, though. That much was obvious from the fact that the Hunger of the Beyond weren’t just carnivores with no offensive ability.

To a certain extent, everything in and around the Planar Continents could be referred to as cultivators, though the further one went from humans, the less that term could legitimately applies. What was nearly inevitable was that everything would wield their internal energy, and produce various techniques and planar constructs using their powers to attack whatever they saw fit, as well as to protect themselves in times of danger. This kind of power was drawn by the Hunger the moment that the barrier became too unpleasant to consume.

As expected of an entire species referred to as the Hunger of the Beyond, their attacks took the form of vast jaws attempting to close around portions of the dome, teeth desperately attempting to dig into the energy that formed it.

For now, they were unsuccessful, but with a thousand beasts on the innermost layer of the black storm that formed what she hoped to be the entirety of their host – there being any more of the Hunger would mean some very bad news for her and the Western Continent – they would make a dent in either the dome or the energy supporting it. Either way, simply leaving things as they were wasn’t a good idea, no matter what.

“You may not be able to maintain the dome for longer than an hour. I can assist-”

“Then do it!” she spat out, a faint crimson light flaring up within her pupils, “Unlike the Primordial Deities, this is within your control! You can end these things right now! So, don’t you dare ask whether you ought to assist with defending against them! DO IT!”

The natural energy of the world all rushed to the inner side of the dome, seeping through and reinforcing all elements where the pseudo planar essence was failing to withstand the enormous spectral jaws of the Hunger of the Beyond. It was able to condense to something vaguely superior, but it still lacked in comparison to Wei Yi’s planar essence and wouldn’t be able to forge something entirely impenetrable.

However, the crimson light didn’t die down, and only brightened as she glared at the manifestation of Heaven’s Will.

“You know, I meant what I said. Will you really keep doing nothing?”

“I… I cannot do it! The Old Ones are already focusing on this direction, and if I do something, then they will descend upon the world and undo everything that you’ve done. This is far too risky, and I will not do-”

“You’ve put it just great that time. Everything I’ve done. You’re useless. If you won’t fight, then at least make sure that the Hunger of the Beyond doesn’t invade while I’m away. Also, take care, Yi Shi Ming.”

Her tone had become quiet and subdued, but the rage within her eyes only grew with each word that she forcefully spat out. The aspect of killing intent within her planar essence almost wanted to burst out of her body, and it manifested in numerous arcs of crackling crimson and a layer of smoke that manifested beneath her feet, spreading out slowly but surely. Had she not immediately turned around and flew off to the dome, the whole land might have crumbled.

The smoke followed her, and in moments she arrived at dense layer of crystalline energy.

“Wait, Wei Yi-” Yi Shi Ming appeared beside her, one hand reached out, but she paused and then withdrew it, “Please don’t throw your life away. If you find that you are unable to fight them off, please return, and we shall attempt to figure out something-”

“No. If I can’t do it, then what can anyone else do? I wanted to help the world, but I hadn’t properly done the things I aspired to do. I didn’t raise the people’s level of power and cultivation to the extent that they could defend themselves on their own, yet I threw them into this crisis,” she replied, “Now, it is my duty to fight. If I don’t survive, then that’s that. They won’t consume too much, and the world will likely continue in some form, perhaps with more otherworldly gifts showing up and ruining everything. Whatever it is, it’s better than total annihilation because I fucked up.”

“Don’t you think you’re holding yourself to excessively high standards? You shouldn’t expect to be able to accomplish so much in just a few years.”

“I am holding myself to the standards I have for the heavens. What kind of hypocrite would I be if I cannot even maintain the same standards for myself as for the thing I currently despise the most? I’ll do what I have to.”

She placed her clawed hand onto the barrier and shifted around some of the planar essence within, opening up a passageway for herself to pass through via Omit Movement. This invited some of the Hunger of the Beyond over towards that point, but it was exactly what she had wanted, for gaining an opportunity to strike at them at least once before they had a chance to fight back would grant her a shot at actually damaging or even killing one of them.

“Wei Yi… I wait for your return.”

For a moment, she hesitated, but then nodded and vanished from inside the dome.

 

Thousands of massive creatures surrounded the dome of colourful light, and each one glared hungrily at it and the things within.

Each one was similar to one another, differing only slightly in their physical forms. Their front sides were occupied nearly completely by an enormous mouth, with a few sets of eyes above it. Black, smooth and slick flesh stretched out from there, forming a long body that had a few more sets of mouths placed haphazardly upon it.

There were several sets of arms as well, which were placed just as randomly and simply floated near the body, doing nothing at all while their primary mouth did all of the work. All of the planar constructs were conjured purely through the movements of that single mouth.

Within the large, front-facing mouth were at least a hundred teeth on the top and a hundred more on the bottom, and each one was the size of a small tree and looked akin to a black unpolished metal.

These monstrosities simply munched away at the dome for a while until a flash suddenly exploded atop the dome, where one of the Hungers had resided and was biting at the dome. It pushed it away just a little, and then dozens and then hundreds of small points of light manifested before it within a simple grid. Before the entity could even begin to respond to this strange gnat that showed up before it, those points burst into a series of beams that struck it and its insides.

Surprising both it and the gnat, the beams actually penetrated its flesh, causing the entity to emit a horrific noise as it quickly withdrew, moving through an unknown method yet attaining an impressive speed.

Immediately after, the battle truly began. Thousands of beams of lights appeared and shot out at the nearby Hunger of the Beyond, while the gnat produced a blade from planar essence and used it to produce a series of other techniques to amplify her capability via weapon-specific techniques. Normally, she would have employed Moon Splitter, but that was lost only recently.

Needless to say, the gnat was Wei Yi, and she was pleasantly surprised by the fact that she had any success at all in damaging the Hunger of the Beyond after the impressive display they had showcased in simply devouring the Eastern Continent in a few minutes at most. Then again, producing three hundred Elysian Blasts and yet doing only surface-level damage wouldn’t generally be referred to as a success, but it did showcase that she had the ability to do something, which meant that she had the ability to win provided she did enough.

‘Elysian Blasts aren’t good enough in this situation, especially when… yeah, that one seems to be recovering. I need to get as many strikes as possible in as brief a time as possible, ideally at some vital point – if these horrors have a vital point I can target,’ she thought, glancing at her energy blade.

Most of her methods did not directly rely on the involvement of a sword, but there was a method that was best executed with a weapon. Omit Attack was her idealised, complete version of a technique she had not yet completed, but with the ninth realm and greater comprehension of the world in all aspects, she believed that she could finally pull it off. Thus, she set the field with as many Elysian Blasts as her mind could manifest at once, as it appeared to scare off the Hunger of the Beyond.

Soon, they would likely recognise that she was not sufficiently dangerous to back off from every little attack, but it should be enough for her to either succeed or fail.

 To begin, she lifted the blade of planar essence as if she was about to swing in an ordinary manner, feeling its weight and its shape, planning the possible arcs and motions that she could execute with the weapon. Strictly speaking, there were only a few basic moves to be executed with a blade, especially if energy techniques weren’t introduced into the equation, but there were thousands of slight alterations that could be made and therefore performed at once if she employed the true Omit Attack technique. She had to mentally calculate the exact motions of each variation, and then superimpose them onto one another.

Then, she also had to process the structure of her sword, though that was easy given that she had been the one to make Moon Splitter, and was now wielding a near exact replica within her hands in the form of a planar essence construct.

Those two were the simplest aspects of her technique, but even then there were a million factors and possibilities to sum up just for a single invocation of Omit Movement. If not for her Dao of Law, such a thing wouldn’t even be possible, though this was not the time for pondering such possibilities when there was nobody else who could even be within her place.

Her lack of time was best punctuated by the first of the Hunger of the Beyond finally choosing to advance in spite of the Elysian Blasts, using somewhat simplistic methods to release its energy and negate most of the beams and simply letting the others fall upon it. Just as she expected, they wouldn’t be warded off by something so basic, and even if they were afraid forever more, it wouldn’t do her any good unless it ensured that they would never attack the Planar Continents again, at least not until the people were ready to fight, which would involve each and every one of them redoing their cultivation just so that they would have a sufficiently distinct perfected path for the Hunger not to feed on them.

As that entity grew close, she finally felt everything coming together within her mind, and then threw out all of the energy she had on hand to ensure that a lack of it wouldn’t prevent her technique from being executed.

The blade fell, slicing the air, and then she saw thousands of chains flash before her eyes. They were everywhere, and so distinct that they felt more real than the Hunger before her. Everything seemed to freeze before her other than those chains, and after a few moments she couldn’t hold her hand back from reaching out and touching one of the chains.

A sharp sound resumed the flow of time and caused a thousand faint lines to manifest within the insides of the Hunger of the Beyond, followed by the sudden tearing of its flesh. Every cut united together and gouged out a great portion of its body, revealing in its depths a large organ of a blue and black tint, one that had a shape resembling a heart, and beat in a manner that was also very similar to how a heart might pulse, following a different yet consistent rhythm.

She couldn’t confirm that it was indeed a heart, but it was the best she had, so she dove in and appeared before it, using her empty left hand to grab the heart. Due to its size, she could barely cover a thousandth of its surface area, but a single point of contact was sufficient, not to mention five.

From the tip of each black claw emerged a vast power, a primal one that touched both the material form of this supposed heart and the many chains that were entwined with it, forcing both to tremble as it quickly built up, surpassing the total capacity of her planar essence pool by several times in a matter of seconds. Concerned that the Hunger might attempt something to get her out of its insides, she stopped there and then transformed the power she had embedded into it by performing as simple a change as she could.

Taking the stable state of planar essence, she inverted it, transforming it to something similar to her Obliteration energy, fuelled by the branch of Ire, an aspect of rebellion from Law.

It was thus imbued by Law, and could therefore affect not just the world of matter and energy, but also the chains of Law that overlooked it all, causing a resonance that shook the whole enormous body of the Hunger of the Beyond and forced it apart. Amidst an explosion of energy and blood, the insides of the entity were torn apart, the destruction ceasing only when it reached the outer layer that contained the viscera of the Hunger of the Beyond.

Even that was torn apart in a burst of sheer force a moment later, when Wei Yi realised that aside from the blood covering her whole body, she also obtained energy.

‘Obviously, the Hunger of the Beyond would contain some quantity of a planar essence aspect, but I didn’t expect it to be so plentiful… They devour typical planar essence, so it is only natural that they would be primarily composed of it. Therefore, if I want to beat them, I must simply destroy each one and drain it of its power!’ her eyes lit up with a light other than the crimson of her rage.

She made sure to collect the ember that formed from the destruction of this Hunger of the Beyond, and then appeared outside of the lifeless shell, gazing back at the hundreds of black monstrosities that had gathered around her and her first target.

Once more, she brought up the construct of Moon Splitter, only to let it break apart before consuming all of that energy and invoking another Omit Attack. A series of swings manifested at the surface of another Hunger, each one performed by an ethereal phantom swinging an ephemeral blade, but the result was still a thousand cuts performed in such rapid succession that they were equivalent to a single mighty strike, digging deep into the entity’s form.

A moment later and she appeared inside of the Hunger of the Beyond with a mass of energy greater than the one she had employed against the first one, if only to ensure the detonation of its entire body.

She wanted to be able to get every drop of energy that it contained, for she had felt the boundary between her and the sixth stage finally shrink to a hair’s width after slaying the first Hunger. With just one more, she knew for sure that she would make it through, and then the following stages would be simpler and quicker to reach.

Indeed, the instant the second one was destroyed, and its energy flowed into her body, the barrier was broken, and her dantian and the structures within were rocked by a complete transformation, briefly causing her to be unable to control her body or mind.

The Eternal Gate, the True Apertures around it, the pair of cores, the Astral Scars and even the dantian over it all lit up and joined with one another in an unprecedented manner, manifesting a force that was entirely concentrated upon a single infinitely small point in the very middle of the structures, akin to the true form of a black hole. Similar to one, this point pulled in every drop of energy that could be gained at any moment, gaining something from every particle that it absorbed before it was spat out for her to employ.

In the moment that she had lost control, the body of the Hunger was blown apart and another one took the opportunity to soar in and clasp its jaws around her, attempting to devour her whole.

However, an instant later it was turned to ashes as a surge of power emerged from its body, injuring a number of other Hunger of the Beyond through mere contact. At its centre was a figure crackling with energy and illuminated with a weak yet persistent light – a pure and soft white, yet possessing a certain harshness and the feeling of restriction that affected even the Hunger of the Beyond. Some had thought to repeat the actions of their fellow, yet stopped in place as the light entered their eyes.

Wei Yi turned to the nearest Hunger of the Beyond and simply pointed at it with her left hand, letting much of the smoke within burst out to manifest into the countless instant strikes, then moved forth with her movement technique to project a form of Obliteration into the injury.

It was really straightforward to kill a Hunger of the Beyond, as it turned out, though the other ones weren’t going to make it quite as simple. Just as her initial show of strength was only a temporary measure, the effects of the aura manifesting around her could not last forever. Whatever else could be said about the creatures known as the Hunger of the Beyond, they were very much intent on consuming everything and anything in their path. Thus, when a potent source of energy presented itself to them, seemingly on a platter – she wasn’t sure how much they cared about one another, nor how intelligent they actually were, so she was going to presume that they didn’t care much for the loss of one or two of their own – they were not sitting still.

A dozen charged right at her, some manifesting constructs and others simply intending to bite down on her with their own teeth. Others weren’t far behind, though they had the common sense to wait a bit instead of simply forming up into a massive ball of flesh and energy for Wei Yi to take from as she pleased.

She mentally sealed away matters of lesser importance and techniques that would not be useful to her, and focused herself entirely upon the battle at hand. Strictly speaking, it wouldn’t be too challenging to kill one or two more, but to go through possible thousands or millions would require absolute concentration upon the situation, and nothing else at all. Her actions were doing wonders to distract the Hunger from the Planar Continent – the one that’s still inhabited by life – so she had the freedom to let herself overlook their current situation.

Then, she vanished and seemed to reappear in fifteen places at once, then each figure waved their left arm and conjured numerous points of light in mid-air, within which a vast quantity of energy was concentrated.

None of the Hunger of the Beyond were fast enough to prevent the points from blasting out their energy in a slightly weaker replica of Omit Attack, and then the figures she generated appeared in the wounds and launched their own blasts of Obliteration into those wounds. As her cultivation had improved, she needed less to take down the same opponent, and so she employed methods which would use that energy more effectively.

The destruction of the following fifteen let the figures absorb the energy within them, with which they retreated to her true form, which reappeared away from the centre of the battlefield and absorbed all of it, letting it sink into the infinitely small point within her centre. Her realm began to progress once more, and so she repeated the process.

Fifteen figures grew to sixteen, seventeen, then nineteen and twenty-two, and each time she produced them an equivalent number of Hunger of the Beyond perished, and even more than that were injured, causing their blood to spill into the void and hover, forming vaguely spherical collections of dark-blue substance. Few of these masses rested for long, though, as the death of each Hunger caused progressively larger explosions that rocked more of the void within which the Planar Continents had resided within.

In other words, the skies were filled with blood and parts of beasts slain only moments earlier, and Wei Yi simply continued on, draining the things she killed to ensure she could advance.

The sixth stage soon gave way to the seventh, and the eighth was coming after, but on the second breakthrough to that stage, the perfected stage breakthrough, she felt the light at the very centre of her core ignite into something. It was not yet solid nor anywhere near the true form of her desires, but it was an Echo of the truth. One might even call it an Echo of Omnipotence.

Just like with a seed, an echo of infinity was still partly infinite, and thus her power leapt further on.

By the time she was nearing the ninth realm, she had eliminated most of the Hunger of the Beyond that had gathered around the Planar Continents, but following the trail of the few that remained led to the discovery of an enormous cloud of Hunger that resided further in the distance, gathered around one another for some unknown reason. Whatever their purpose and origin, Wei Yi simply knew that they were a threat to the world.

Thus, she attacked, turning the darkness to light as billions of strikes were performed within an instant, even though there wasn’t a single blade there with which she could attack.

Hundreds turned to thousands and all fell before her as she pushed herself into the peak of the ninth stage, feeling that faint echo within her grow stronger and stronger with every single Hunger of the Beyond that she absorbed. At the same time, she could tell that she had been straining her body with how much energy she had been throwing out all of the time, to the extent that her strength was beginning to fall below what she had been capable of when she attacked the first Hunger. Given that she was surrounded by that point, an endless array of mouths waiting to feed, she focused her power and released an attack that was as much a concept as it was a true strike of any kind.

Fuelled nearly entirely by Law, she let it rend apart the nearest foes and move onto the next while the energy of the fallen sank into her. Even then, the sheer quantity of energy this consumed led to her skin beginning to dry, as if it was deprived of the blood that flowed beneath.

In the last moment, she sent out all she had and all that she received, and in doing so the darkness seemed to finally clear.

Her foes were gone, but her body was drained as well. As her mental energy had been entwined into her planar essence, it meant that she could only sustain her consciousness for a brief moment. Still, it was enough for her to gaze inward, and to behold a brilliant light beyond anything she could have ever imagined. Had her facial muscles had any energy within them, perhaps a smile would have graced her face.

Unfortunately, she passed out before that could occur.