Chapter 703: The Decline and Death of Realms
The recent upheavals in the Realm of Split Void made it a fact that this realm would become the new center of the Domain of the Falling Stars.
Soon after Lei Tianqi left, Qi Bailu from the Tool Sect arrived, along with Zhao Luofeng from the Heaven Palace Sect and experts from the Realm of Flame Heaven.
They were all gathered in front of the majestic palace, gazing up at it with reverence.
Originally, Nie Tian had planned to go visit Wu Ji, Nie Donghai, and Nie Qian in the Realm of Flame Heaven after this. However, they had all come to see him, along with many people he barely knew.
Naturally, he was very warm to Wu Ji, Nie Donghai, and a few others. He took them into the grand palace, giving them a chance to see for themselves how remarkable it was.
Of course, people like Zhao Luofeng and Ling Dong weren’t among those who were invited into the palace.
Hua Mu, Qi Bailu, and Zong Zheng conducted thorough examinations of the palace, and determined that it was indeed a unique ancient starship.
According to them, once it absorbed enough star power, it would regain the ability to sail into the starry river.
Meanwhile, every expert showed a strong interest in the large-scale teleportation portal in the middle of the great hall, and the place for the fourth set of coordinates.
The way they saw it, it might be the key for them to leave the Domain of the Falling Stars to explore the boundless starry river.
However, it was a pity that none of them were able to tell what had happened in that place that was preventing successful teleportation.
Furthermore, they learned that Nie Tian was the only one who could open the heavy stone gate.
Without him, no one would be able to enter or leave the palace.
After coming out of the palace, Nie Tian showed Wu Ji, Nie Donghai and a few others around the vicinity to let them sense the changes in the Realm of Split Void.
Standing on a large meteor, Wu Ji gazed off at the distant Void Illusion Mountain Range. With a warm smile, he said, “Little Tian, why don’t you arrange for your grandfather, aunt, and those talented youngsters from the Nie Clan to come to live and practice cultivation in the Realm of Split Void? It won’t be long before the Realm of Split Void becomes the most blessed land for cultivators throughout the Domain of the Falling Stars.”
“Yeah, why not?” Dong Li chimed in with a bright smile. “You can have people build another bamboo forest beside that palace for your grandfather and the others.”
Originally, Dong Li had been consumed with the thought of fighting for the Dong Clan’s interests.
However, after hearing the conversations among Dong Wangling, Hua Mu, and the others, she gradually came to realize that the Realm of Split Void would soon rise to become the center of the entire Domain of the Falling Stars, and a blessed land that every major sect would drool over.
“Is that possible?” Nie Tian asked, looking surprised. “This region used to be a place where no life could survive.”
Wu Ji seemed to have long since conducted a thorough scan of this region as he said, “Too much has changed after that palace rose from the depths of the earth. The spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth around the palace is richer than anywhere else. As long as there’s rich spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth, all sorts of plants will be able to grow here. All you have to do is to plant the seeds and water them well.
“So it won’t be a hard thing to build another bamboo forest in this place.
“The fundamental difference between the Realm of Split Void and the other realms in the Domain of the Falling Stars is that foreign energies keep leaking into the Void Illusion Mountain Range. Those energies of unknown origin will prevent the Realm of Split Void from declining and eventually becoming a dead realm.”
Astonishment filled Nie Tian’s face as he asked, “Can realms die?”
“Everything in this universe is changing all the time. That’s true of us Qi warriors as well as the realms.” With these words, Wu Ji pointed up towards the heavens. “Each and every star in the sky is a realm. However, most of them are now ‘dead realms’ or ‘dead stars’.
“There used to be rich spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth in many of those realms tens of thousands of years ago. However...” Wu Ji shook his head and sighed. “As long as there’s energy in a realm, no matter what sort of energy it is, that realm will be able to produce all kinds of living beings. Some realms are filled with Demon Qi, so they’ll produce all sorts of demonic plants and animals, along with spiritual materials that agree with the Demons’ cultivation.
“Some realms are wreathed in Phantasm Qi, so they’ll become blessed lands for Phantasms.
“There are also realms that are covered in spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth. There, spiritual mines will form, along with all sorts of materials that contain spiritual power. Those realms will become a paradise for humans.
“However, none of those realms have inexhaustible energies. As different races appear and breed in those realms, they’ll mine and unearth all sorts of resources and use them to refine their bodies or spiritual seas.
“That way, the energies that took unknown amounts of time to form will eventually run out.
“When that happens, even realms that were once very alive will become dead realms.
“Originally, there were more a dozen realms in the Domain of the Falling Stars. However, as time passed, many of them became dead realms, and now only nine are left.
“Oh, sorry. There should be ten now. The Realm of Split Void should be included in the Domain of the Falling Stars again.”
Wu Ji went on and told him that each and every realm could be considered to be a spiritual mine.
Once the spiritual minerals there were exhausted, the mine would lose its value and be abandoned.
Every realm went from being full of life force to declining and dying. Normally, this would happen over a very long time.
What determined the length of the process was the number and strength of the beings that lived in the realm.
Once living beings discovered a thriving realm, they would soon set up headquarters or branches in it and start mining its resources. Powerful experts would start absorbing the energies in the air.
The more powerful they were, the faster they would exhaust the energies, and the faster the realm would die.
Even if they weren’t very powerful individually, but were in great numbers, they would also drain the realm of its resources at a fast speed.
Now, there were Qi warrior sects in each realm in the Domain of the Falling Stars. As they continued to take in disciples build up their sects, they consumed more and more of their realms’ resources, and pushed their realms closer and closer towards death.
That meant each and every realm in the Domain of the Falling Stars would become dead realms one day.
However, the current Realm of Split Void was a unique existence. Even though no one knew where those foreign energies were coming from, as long as they continued to pour into the Void Illusion Mountain Range, and turned into pure spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth, the Realm of Split Void would never die.
In fact, not only would it never die, but it would become more and more prosperous.
Even the Domain of Heaven’s Boundaries probably didn’t have a realm this unique, not to mention a weak realm like the Domain of the Falling Stars.
It was none other than the promising future of the Realm of Split Void that made Wu Ji realize that it was a good idea to have Nie Donghai and the others move here first.
After hearing his explanation, Nie Tian’s understanding of the development of realms and stars rose to a whole new level.
He also realized that, if a powerful Qi warrior sect were to thrive forever, they would have to keep looking for realms with rich spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth and move their headquarters from time to time.
Another option would be to find a realm like the Realm of Split Void that had inexhaustible spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth.
Other than that, the fourth set of coordinates in the teleportation portal in the grand palace would connect the Realm of Split Void to the outside world, which made the status of the Realm of Split Void even more special in the Domain of the Falling Stars.
Wu Ji was well-aware of this, and so were the Soul realm experts from the other sects.
Hua Mu, Zong Zheng, Dong Wangling, and many other experts sought opportunities to talk to Nie Tian, expressing their intentions to move their headquarters to the Realm of Split Void.
Even though they hadn’t encountered a resource shortage yet, they knew that their realms would eventually be drained of cultivation resources.
Therefore, they all hoped to move to the Realm of Split Void. Also, from the Realm of Split Void, they would be able to explore the starry river in order to find the rare materials they needed to build inner realms.
Nie Tian had a headache listening to their pleading, and thus bid them farewell and left for the Heavenly Thunder Mountain Range in the Realm of Earth Sieve.
On the third day after Lei Tianqi had left, Nie Tian arrived in the Thunder Mountain Sect’s headquarters, where Lei Tianqi personally received him and had him teleported to the designated location.