Lineage History: Taiheng's Forces Depleted
The powerful Aristocratic Clan of Huaxia evolved from local magnates during the Han Dynasty to the Aristocratic Clan of officials and military leaders at the end of the Han Dynasty, and then to powerful clans during the Wei, Jin and Northern and Southern Dynasties, until the Tang Dynasty saw the emergence of the imperial examination system.
In order to participate in the imperial examinations and engage in various cultural and artistic activities more conveniently, Aristocratic Clan moved to Chang'an.
Furthermore, since they all lived in Chang'an, the aristocratic Aristocratic Clan no longer commanded troops, but only controlled the power of recommendation and promotion.
That is: centralization and demilitarization.
Then, this entire Aristocratic Clan living together was wiped out by Huang Chao.
The imperial streets are trampled with the bones of high-ranking officials, and the imperial treasury is burned to ashes.
In short, the form of existence and profit-making methods of the Aristocratic Clan change over time and with the evolution of systems.
The same applies to the Taiheng aristocratic Aristocratic Clan.
Yang Ning has now basically collected all the written materials about Taiheng. Based on various official histories, biographies, and casual complaints left between the lines by some people, he has roughly pieced together a complete version of the Taiheng Calendar.
They also gained a fairly in-depth understanding of the Tai Heng Noble Families.
Even the Tai Heng Noble Families itself probably doesn't know as much as Yang Ning does.
The Tai Heng Noble Families has evolved through four historical periods to its current stage.
The first historical period is from 300,000 years ago to 260,000 years ago.
Immortal Venerable Taiheng ascended to heaven; Immortal Venerable Taiheng's disciple; during the reign of Immortal Venerable Luo Yun.
Although he was called a Celestial Venerable, he did not become a True Immortal. Forty thousand years later, in order to seek fortuitous opportunity in the path of immortality, he passed on his position to his descendants and then left Taiheng.
At that time, Taiheng was sparsely populated because the dragon clan had just left, and it was teeming with Demon Beast and Fierce Beast.
Even when the Immortal Venerable Taiheng was still alive, he advocated for more marriages and more children.
He did not marry or have children, but he instructed his thirteen disciples to marry and have children, thus giving rise to the first Aristocratic Clan, which lasted for Thirteen Consecutive Families.
Because humanity as a whole was in decline at that time, there was little happiness to speak of in the Thirteen Consecutive Families. Since there were many of them, they naturally had to undertake the most difficult tasks: fighting against Demon Beast, killing murderers, clearing land, building houses, and constructing bridges and roads.
The thirteen Aristocratic Clan that time made great contributions to the human race. Without them, it's uncertain whether humanity would even exist today!
Then, forty thousand years passed, and humanity finally gained a foothold in Taiheng.
Immortal Venerable Luo Yun departed with peace of mind, Luo Yun descendants succeeded him.
The surviving records list descendants, but no one specified whether they were sons or grandsons.
Yang Ning speculated that this person should be a grandson, and a grandson of a very low generation.
As later records show, his authority was insufficient to suppress the major Aristocratic Clan.
If he is Luo Yun's son, then his status should not be so low.
In order to secure his position, he lavishly rewarded the major Aristocratic Clan, bestowing upon them not only wealth and resources but also power!
That is, hereditary official positions.
From this point on, the Tai Heng Noble Families entered its second phase.
Instead of paving the way for others, they began to reap the benefits without sowing, thus transforming themselves from heroes into parasites.
Thirteen Aristocratic Clan, exploiting hundreds of millions of people living on 77 million square kilometers of land, could be incredibly wealthy and extravagant—a level of wealth unimaginable to modern people.
It's important to know that during the Wei, Jin, and Northern and Southern Dynasties, the manors of the Wang and Xie families were larger than the entire city of Seoul, and the Wang and Xie families owned more than a dozen such manors!
Can you imagine what it means for a single Aristocratic Clan to own more than a dozen Forbidden Cities?
And the life of the Tai Heng Noble Families will only be more luxurious than this!
For example, when Yang Ning quelled the Southern Forest, he saw that the Lin Family's branches lived in palaces that were thousands of times more luxurious than the Forbidden City. They were so magnificent and grand that even a hydrogen bomb couldn't destroy them!
If Aristocratic Clan continue to indulge in extravagance, the common people will naturally rise up in rebellion.
But the Aristocratic Clan not only held power, they also controlled influence.
Things are a bit better now; even princes from small countries and heirs from small Lineage can learn.
Back then, apart from these thirteen noble Aristocratic Clan, any other cultivator who wanted to learn the Great Destiny Technique? Dream on!
However, as the saying goes, a sage will always emerge every ten thousand years.
After Thirteen Consecutive Families generations of chaos had raged for seventy thousand years, and 190,000 years before the Xia Dynasty, a hero was born!
This hero is named Lin Feng!
That's right, it's that old ancestor Lin Feng from Southern Forest.
Southern Forest himself said that Lin Feng came from the Aristocratic Clan, but there was no one with the surname Lin in the Thirteen Consecutive Families.
Based on Yang Ning's archaeological discoveries, he speculated that Lin Feng was likely born into slavery.
This is normal. Firstly, those living in the Lineage lands of the Thirteen Consecutive Families are either members of the Aristocratic Clan or slaves.
Secondly, after Lin Feng became an immortal, he did nothing else but abolish slavery, which gave him a sense of resistance against the past.
How Lin Feng rose to prominence is unknown, but other people's records mention a woman from the Heng Clan, with whom Lin Feng was often by his side.
The Heng Clan was one of the Thirteen Consecutive Families of the same surname.
It is evident that Lin Feng must have gained the favor of the Heng Clan woman, thus embarking on the path of cultivation, obtaining the Great Destiny Technique, and then cultivating for 30,000 years to become an immortal!
The wife of the Southern Forest Patriarch, surnamed Lin, was named Zhao. Therefore, the Heng Clan woman probably did not live to see the day Lin Feng an immortal. However, there is no Heng Clan tomb in later generations, and even the Heng Clan no longer exists!
Therefore, Lin Feng probably had no feelings for his master, and he even hated the Heng Clan so much that he had them reduced to ashes.
Look now, not only has the woman from the Heng Clan disappeared, but the entire Heng Clan has also vanished.
There are very few records about the Heng Clan, which is enough to prove Lin Feng Heng Clan's hatred for them and how thoroughly he eliminated them.
Yang Ning understood him very well; he had also dealt with the Lin family in the same way.
The experiences Lin Feng has had over the past 30,000 years since he became an immortal are unimaginable.
He, whose surname is not from the Thirteen Consecutive Families, is able to cultivate the Great Destiny Technique, which will inevitably incur the hatred of the Thirteen Consecutive Families.
Later, the fact that only the Wang and Tang families remained out of the Thirteen Consecutive Families proved that Lin Feng had eliminated a total of eleven powerful Aristocratic Clan during the 30,000 years from the 190,000th to the 160,000th generation!
Thus, the Aristocratic Clan entered their third stage.
They no longer blocked the inheritance of the Great Destiny Technique, but they were afraid that someone would rise to power like Lin Feng. So they began to issue decrees similar to the Grace Decree, dividing up the great nation and splitting the Lineage into smaller parts.
It directly fragmented the nation and Lineage, allowing thousands of nations and tens of thousands of the Aristocratic Clan to exist on a land area of 77 million square kilometers!
This has led to the current geopolitical landscape of Taiheng.
Aside from the Lin family and the Wang Family, which are on good terms with the Lin family, these two families, one occupying Southern Forest and the other occupying Eastern Victory, remain behemoth Lineage.
From 160,000 years ago to 20,000 years ago, the Taiheng Aristocratic Clan remained very stable.
Because the country is small and the Lineage is small, the fortune is naturally limited. With such limited fortune, it's impossible to raise any true dragons.
Apart from Southern Forest producing another immortal, nothing else of note happened.
Although no immortals were born, the Lineage continued to exist, which fostered a fixed mindset among the Taiheng people.
The path to immortality is extremely difficult; only one person can achieve it every tens of thousands of years. Therefore, our purpose in cultivation is not to become an immortal, but to maintain our power and status so as to continue our Lineage.
That's right, after so long since anyone became an immortal, the people of Taiheng have actually given up!
Their purpose in cultivating was no longer to become immortals, but to perpetuate their Lineage!
Becoming stronger isn't about becoming an immortal, but about having greater power and a stronger Lineage!
Over the course of 140,000 years, Taiheng has been caught in a cycle, with countless Aristocratic Clan rising and falling, yet never achieving greater development.
Some Aristocratic Clan have also considered venturing out, because Taiheng has a long history and a splendid culture, and for these Aristocratic Clan, going anywhere would essentially be equivalent to cultural poverty alleviation.
Even if they didn't inherit the Great Destiny Technique, and only possessed ordinary human-level, earth-level, and Heaven-grade Divine Ability Divine Ability, it would still be enough for them to dominate a region.
Most of the countries in the Taihang Mountains today began to develop the concept of a nation during this period.
Yang Ning also proved this point using molecular biology identification of genes. In the entire Taiheng region, apart from the Far North Myriad Saints Alliance, Tianfei Palace, and a portion of the people from Jiang Yun Northern Foothills, the ancestral bloodlines of the remaining people are basically derived from the period between 160,000 and 120,000 years ago.
The Tai Heng Star indeed fitting, as even the Tianyi Sect members are descendants of the Taiheng people.
The timeline jumps to 20,000 years ago.
The Tai Heng Noble Families still hasn't made much progress, but the outside world is changing.
People who migrated to other worlds gradually discovered local ruins and the Dragon Clan Inheritance.
However, due to the closed nature of the Aristocratic Clan and the fact that outsiders kept it a secret, the Aristocratic Clan did not become vigilant.
Forty thousand years ago, in the far north, the Myriad Saints Alliance, someone unearthed the <Netherworld Tome> from the Abyss.
This is likely a compilation of several books, including the Great Netherworld Technique, the Great Dragon Vein Technique, the Great Curse Technique, and the Great Demon Forest Technique, which record a total of 64 unparalleled Peerless Divine Abilities.
Unfortunately, this lucky person had the fortune to dig up the book, but not the fortune to preserve it.
He was betrayed by his companions, and not only did he die, but the Netherworld Tome was also split into fifty-four parts, and ten more parts disappeared without a trace.
These fifty-four lineages formed the prototype of the myriad lineages of the Far Northern Myriad Saints Alliance.
Later, other lineages joined in, and the fifty-four lineages became sixty-four, then eighty-four, and one hundred and four. Now, even the Myriad Saints Alliance itself doesn't know how many lineages it has.
Yang Ning had counted that there were a total of 8,169 meridians, of which 71 possessed Peerless Divine Abilities.
Thirty thousand years ago, in the territory of the Tianyi Sect, a cultivator named Tianyi was preparing to build a school in the area. While digging, he discovered the <Great Celestial Phenomenon Art>.
Having learned from his predecessors' experience, Tianyi kept quiet and continued to build schools and train disciples while attempting to translate the "Great Celestial Phenomenon Art." He then led his disciples to various places to build schools and train more disciples.
After ten thousand years of low-key development, he trained two hundred thousand disciples and then began to formally translate the "Great Celestial Phenomenon Art".
However, his slogan at the time was not this; instead, he wanted to compile the heritage of the Tianyi Sect's territory.
Because he built many schools, took in too many disciples, and had connections with various local forces, Daoist Tianyi was known as the Holy Master by the locals.
Furthermore, because he had cultivated the Great Celestial Phenomenon Art, Daoist Tianyi's cultivation level was extremely high. When he said he wanted to compile a book, all the major forces naturally responded one after another, not only contributing money and effort, but also sending their own Daoist Tianyi to Daoist Tianyi for his reference.
After forty years, the Great Celestial Phenomenon Art was successfully translated. Daoist Tianyi achieved perfect cultivation, ascended to the True Immortal realm, unified the continent, renamed it Tianyi Continent, and founded the Tianyi Sect.
From then on, the second sect to possess Supreme Dao Arts appeared!
Taiheng's attitude towards Tianyi's emergence was contradictory. On the one hand, he believed that Tianyi needed to be suppressed, but on the other hand, he felt that Tianyi was not a threat. He thought that Tianyi's "Great Celestial Phenomenon Art" was no match for "Great Destiny Technique".
But in the end, they gave up and decided to ignore it.
After all, they have true immortals among them!
But if you don't fight Tianyi, Tianyi will fight you!
As the Daoist Tianyi was about to ascend to immortality, he felt that he had only cultivated one Supreme Dao Arts and that his status in the Immortal Realm would probably not be high. Therefore, he wished to see the <Great Destiny Technique>.
Taiheng Sect refused, and thus the Eastern Victory War broke out.
Tianyi did not take the initiative in this war because Daoist Tianyi was also aware of Hengming's existence.
Hengming won't launch an attack first, but if you attack his base, he will definitely retaliate.
Therefore, the Tianyi Sect supported the Sun Sect, which was located next to the Taiheng Sect, and launched an invasion against the Taiheng Sect.
In the end, Taiheng was victorious, the main branch of the Wang Family was destroyed, and the branch rebuilt the Wang Family with the support of Southern Forest. Daoist Tianyi ascended to immortality.
As for whether Daoist Tianyi actually obtained the <Great Destiny Technique>, Taiheng Sect says he didn't.
After this battle, Taiheng was stunned to realize, "Am I no longer the world's number one?"
Restructuring, immediate restructuring!
During the post-war honeymoon period, Taiheng sent people to the Tianyi Sect to investigate, and upon their return, they established the Ascension Academy.
Initially, Taiheng planned to establish four Ascension Academy: one each in Eastern Victory, Western Splendor, Southern Forest Northern Plains.
But firstly, Taiheng discovered that the students graduating from this academy were quite remarkable; some of them even cultivated faster than the scions of the Aristocratic Clan!
A large forest is bound to produce some geniuses!
Secondly, there's the story of Daoist Tianyi ascending to heaven.
They built the Ascension Academy to cultivate geniuses and counter the Tianyi Sect. Now that the Daoist Tianyi has ascended, the threat is gone. Is there still any need to fight back?
No, it's not necessary!
Therefore, the motivation to build the Ascension Academy was not so strong.
To prevent a repeat of what happened to Lin Feng, and given that it was no longer necessary, Emperor Hengzong urgently halted the construction of the new Ascension Academy. The only one they had originally intended to destroy was abandoned, but since students from the Ascension Academy had already secured certain positions in Taiheng, they ultimately had to give up on the idea.
With the entry of disciples from the Ascension Academy into Taiheng, the Aristocratic Clan of the Aristocratic Clan in Taiheng has undergone its fourth evolution.
A large number of newcomers entered the Taiheng Sect. These people either joined the Tai Heng Noble Families or established their own Aristocratic Clan.
The new pool water brought a fresh atmosphere, and the new ideas brought a new trend.
For the sake of fortune, status, or simply to exploit newcomers, the aristocratic Aristocratic Clan of the Taiheng Sect began to monopolize various industries within Taiheng.
Once someone does it, others will follow suit. But this world is ultimately a world that values strength. No matter how many ideas you have, if a powerful expert at the Spiritual Law Realm wants to take your place, there's nothing you can do.
From then on, the power of Taiheng gradually came into the hands of the twenty Lineage to which the strongest cultivators belonged.
The structure of the twenty families of Taiheng was thus formed.
Five thousand years ago, Emperor Jiang Yun rose to power, and the first cultivation system different from that of sects was born: the Immortal Kingdom System.
The Aristocratic Clan and the Tianyi Sect were astonished to discover that this system seemed to be stronger than the Aristocratic Clan and the academies. Because everyone was cultivating, even if the general quality of Jiang Yun person was not as good as that of Tai Heng, their population base was larger than yours, so the number of geniuses that emerged was naturally greater than yours.
Seeing that Jiang Yun Nation had unified a continent in just a few years and even begun to conquer the territory of the Jinxiang Sect and the Demon Alliance, showing a strong momentum to unify the world, Taiheng Heaven finally couldn't sit still.
The two powerful sects joined forces to kill Emperor Jiang Yun at the top of the Purple Heart Stone Mine, split the Jiang Yun Nation in two, and handed it over to Jiang Yun Nation deity appointed by Emperor Jiang Yun.
However, the Aristocratic Clan were not entirely without merit; they learned something from Jiang Yun Nation's system: the cabinet!
Emperor Jiang Yun was powerful, but governing a country was a laborious and demanding task. Therefore, he formed a cabinet and recruited dozens of intelligent people to help him govern.
However, the Aristocratic Clan saw this policy as a way to limit the power of their leaders, so they followed suit in Taiheng and formed an Elder Council.
The Elder Council is different from the Cabinet. It does not need to govern the sect, but it can still question the sect leader's decrees.
In short, the cabinet has a lot of work but little power.
The Elder Council is a place with few affairs but great power, which is perfect for aristocratic Aristocratic Clan who are parasites that leech off the Taiheng Sect.
From then on, the Aristocratic Clan structure of Taiheng was fully formed and has continued to this day.
Judging from the fear that Taiheng and Tianyi Sect have of Jiang Yun, the Immortal Kingdom system is a more advanced system of cultivation than the Aristocratic Clan and academy systems.
And the advanced will inevitably replace the outdated.
Therefore, even if Yang Ning does nothing but focus on developing his strength, one day Great Xia will surpass Taiheng. At that time, Aristocratic Clan will be as easy as turning his hand.
However, he couldn't swallow his anger as long as these powerful Aristocratic Clan continued to do evil!
The fight against the Aristocratic Clan cannot stop for a moment!
At a single command, not only the Aristocratic Clan of Eastern Victory, Western Splendor, and Northern Plains were purged, but also sects of all sizes.
These affiliated sects of Taiheng have very few people who possess Peerless Divine Abilities, and not a single one of them is a cultivator at the Spiritual Law Realm.
The quality of the cultivators in the Spirit Realm is already sufficient to fight against them.
The effect of purging them was also obvious; the following year, Fang Zhuo, the Dean the Ascension Academy, discovered that the Ascension Academy could not recruit any more people!
The kingdom has been destroyed; there are no princes left.
The Aristocratic Clan have all perished; there are no more heirs left.
They could recruit some sect disciples before, but now the sects are busy fighting. There are still children, but the Ascension Academy's Flying Boat dares not land!
A single hair can affect the whole situation.
As soon as the affiliated sects made their move, Qu Heng realized that his forces had dwindled again.
Previously, the troops he could deploy, apart from the outer and inner disciple Taiheng Sect, were mostly disciples from affiliated sects.
But now, these sects are also mired in war, barely able to protect themselves, so how can they possibly provide support to Taiheng?
Taiheng has only been recruiting students for the past 20,000 years. How many inner disciple and Outer Disciple disciples can it possibly train?
Fourteen years have passed since Zhang Jiao's uprising, and Taiheng has also been fighting for fourteen years, suffering extremely heavy losses among its disciples.
You wouldn't believe it until you did the math; the number of inner disciple Qu Heng could actually use was only a little over six thousand, and even with his pageboys, servants, and maids, it was less than thirty thousand!
There are still 1.2 million Outer Disciple, but now the Ascension Academy can't recruit any more students. These 1.2 million are like water without a source; once they're used up, they're gone!
Of course, even if all the commoners die, there are still the scions of the Aristocratic Clan, worth 28 billion.
Should we send these scions of the Aristocratic Clan to fight in war?
Qu Heng feared that before he could even issue the order, he would lose his position as sect leader!
"Being a sect leader is so difficult!" Qu Heng sighed, unable to think of any good solutions, so he took out his phone and opened Deep Blue Knows again.
Who would have thought that the Taiheng Sect would govern the sect using Deep Blue Knows?