Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 1701 - 1700 - Refining All Existence

The Realm Refiner from so long ago flashed in Lind's mind. The fact it required 3 enormous anchors of Fiend Qi and complex artifacts to simply consume all of the Celestial Fields had been made solely to fuel the Bastard's cultivation but now he understood more.

It was exponentially harder for Fiends to advance in their realms, even by minor realms compared to any other race. Heaven and Earth did not just keep things fair but in exchange for their nearly unending life, advancement was made massively more difficult for them.

The vile race did not face tribulations, instead they had to scrape and crawl forward slower than anything that lived. A mortal Fiend did not exist, they were always in the Soul Realm since they originated in the Celestial Fields like Celestials.

Thus, while a fair start, it immediately deviated. Where humans or demons could advance in a few decades from a Soul Realm to a Sky Realm, Fiends took centuries. He was uncertain if they had lower quality variations in their race but the Heaven Realm was where the stark difference shows up.

Each tier of the Heaven Realm took Fiends millennia to surpass whereas other races, even with poor aptitude, could only need 1 millennia to break through the entire Heaven Realm.

The Immortal Realm was absurd. They could take hundreds of millions of years to advance. The issue was their lifespan. Where other races would die and need more replacements, the Fiends could survive nearly fatal wounds so long as they had souls to refine.

Their lifespans meant they only ever grew in number unless they were annihilated outright.

He had known the Divine Realm was better off because of that issue. Where Immortal Fiends were fairly common between the Sliver and Shard Tiers, Crystal and above began to drop off sharply.

Over time, their numbers could increase but it would never be as out of control as the lower tiers.

The other races would exterminate them on sight to prevent that exact issue.

Divine Realm Fiends were just as hard to kill as any Divine Realm being on top of their own resilience piled on. Thus, their numbers have slowly increased but it took epochs for the Fiends to grow from the Apprentice Tier to the Journeyman Tier.

He had zero idea how they handled Mysteries but he did not care. What mattered was he knew why they existed at all. All the Celestials across all realms had been punished and turned into Fiends.

The Great One was the source, but the higher realms had been turned at the same time he broke the rules of Heaven and Earth to survive.

After speaking with Karu, while Master Tier Fiends existed, they were all stuck. None had advanced from time immemorial so far as anyone else was concerned but the Great Bastard was different.

Lind now knew all Fiends were tied to the Bastard like a giant network of rivers flowing into the ocean. All the water fed into the larger body and it absorbed all that was fed into it.

The Bastard had turned an entire race into his resource gathering array so it only served him. Even so, it was not enough.

The Master Tier was a bottomless pit to advance each step to the peak and now the Bastard was coming up to the final threshold. The next major realm would require the entirety of the Divine Lands and lower realms to be consumed.

Karu had affirmed Lind saved a portion of lives but that was all he could do. He could not save the Divine Lands themselves. The kraken and leviathan races were impossible to save without the Void Ocean to occupy too.

No Divine Realm could affect that place but the consumption of all life destroyed it as well.

The lower worlds had died but Lind had never considered the universe he had been born in! He had thought it would be safe but the Bastard had found a way!

Heaven and Earth had been consumed as well! The rules could be violated but how?

How could he insert them unless he simply let chance plant the seeds for him! The unraveling of the higher worlds left the lower ones vulnerable!

Lind then understood. Karu's reset had been the final safeguard! Just as the version he had met trapped in the fog could not really do much, he could no longer use the existing Fiends left behind after they escaped the Divine Lands.

Karu's ability could not touch the universe either as it would unravel it entirely! He had always been in a world with a Fiend at the heart of it!

Lind glanced at his captive. He quickly tore off the sleeves of his robes and bound her.

He then made a tether and dragged her to the center of the massive artificial cavern. His hand brushed the pylons and allowed emerald sparks to light his way.

He found an area in the middle bathed in the dim light of Fiend Fire.

Her arms had grown back very slowly proving she was far from her peak but also that she was an Immortal.

He also noticed that while she did have the dark beauty of her race, she was not as well nourished looking as she should be.

Her skin and hair were deteriorated in appearance while her arms were barely growing back now that he got a clear look.

"What happened to this world? I find part of it frozen in time and tears into another world at the heart of that fog. Surely you knew?" The female Fiend froze but then slowly nodded.

"I felt the Dao of Time and Space shatter a little over 20 years ago. It was not just here, that kind of shockwave had to cover this pathetic space easily." The fact the vast cosmos was a backwater to her did not surprise him but she confirmed Dao, not Laws.

"You were a Divine Realm?" She slowly nodded.

"If you stay here too long, you start to regress. I just barely got the arrays up and running while much more primitive life rose on the surface after my arrival. Their souls are nothing to me but over time, I can refine them to maintain a Crystal Tier foundation." Lind now understood.

The massive arrays were made by her as her cultivation fell. Millions of years were nothing to a Divine Realm. Once she had souls, no amount of time would matter.

"When did this world start to die?" Surprise bloomed on her face but she then nodded towards him.

"When those damn beasts started to arrive. The cataclysm was hardly the worst this world had faced. In fact, its lifeforce improved at first." Lind narrowed his eyes at that. He thought he was close to the final solution of the trial but it was not so easy.

He and the Bastard had contributed. He recalled the Bastard affirming he had caused the world to start dying, but which version of him and how?

"What do you know about future sight in regards to mortal worlds?" His odd question gave her pause but she seemed actually glad to have someone to talk to even while tied up.

"Mortal realms are still flexible. Higher powers can intervene or cause ripples but this world? I do not know of much that can affect this world. I did not even know it existed but it is so rigid and incompatible with us that even now, I cannot affect it much." Lind narrowed his eyes.

She was not lying exactly but he began to list off atrocity after atrocity. Her eyes went wide before she shivered.

"HOW DO YOU KNOW ALL THAT?!" The confirmation was nice but he knew the causes could not be laid at her feet. She might have eventually reached the rich and powerful but the benefits she could give were indeed limited.

Cultivation was impossible on Earth. Sustaining just 1 Fiend took a global sized array and even then, it only stopped her fall, nothing else.

The ever increasing population and violence was her fishing in troubled waters.

There was no doubt she influenced those with dreams of avarice with potential rewards of knowledge she could give.

"How are those weapons made? I have never seen Fiend Qi not corrupt materials before?" She smiled like a child receiving praise.

"This world is so rigid, it does not spread! Even simple gold and silver are not tarnished by me! I then confirmed it was enough to connect to me and speed up soul refinement!" Lind had his theory confirmed.

By imbuing the weapons with Fiend Qi, the only Fiend in the world connected to them instantly.

Efficiency was not a problem as humans could kill at a whim and were far more active than the passive array he had just walked.

Each confirmed piece built the puzzle but now he was left with a gap. All life was being refined eventually but it was not the current cause of this world's death.

What was? He had caused it in part and with the Bastards original plan it was doomed anyway.

The Fiend in front of him had never heard of him either. She had to be from a future where he never faced the Great Bastard.

His thoughts froze. A future where he did not exist? Of course that was possible but then Karu reset everything.

He began to pace. Karu's physique was unique. None of her children would have it and none of her descendents could get it unless she was dead.

Until then, time was able to be reversed but she could not alter her fate. She had confirmed that over and over until the day she met him. She had heard of him before that but only in rumors.

Yet, it had been impossible to confirm something that now made him look around and wonder, had the Great Bastard actually created him in the first place?