Great Calamity

Biodata

Power Progression

Her physical cultivation and soul power are distinct: after reconstructing her body, she explains that her soul can exceed the restrictions of her bodily realm 164.

Background / History

Great Calamity was the head of the Nether Clan, the sole cultivating clan of the First Heaven. Other realms called its people the Nether Clan because of their uncanny Dao Arts; her position as both clan head and sovereign gave rise to the title Netherworld Lord. She explicitly tells Su Mo that the title does not mean she governed reincarnation, which did not exist in the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths 161.

During the war ten thousand years earlier, she fought beside the Confucian Sage and died from grievous wounds. Her surviving divine soul became linked to a Flower of the Other Shore, which she planted in a safe location in the First Realm. Her memories of the war were incomplete: she remembered the fall of the gods but could not recall their origins, the enemy she fought, or whether the realms had fought one another or a common adversary 162.

She eventually remained sealed underground beneath Great Hua. She recognized in Su Mo a power of all beings resembling the Confucian Sage’s, which could free her from that confinement. By having him encounter wandering souls and acquire spiritual sight, she made it possible to attach herself to him and leave the underground 146 162.

Appearance

• Face and hair: An exquisite, jade-like face, delicate brows, and long black hair 33 171.
• Build: Tall and voluptuous; she stands a head taller than Su Mo during their reunion following his consciousness journey 189.
• Clothing: Habitually wears a thin gauze garment that partly reveals her figure 56 164 241.
• Voice: Pleasing and ethereal, but marked by an unmistakably eerie quality 33.
• Spiritual form: Initially appears illusory; the Confucian Sage Remnant’s soul power makes her form more substantial before her later bodily reconstruction 89 162.

Personality

Great Calamity is flirtatious, sharp-tongued, and openly mischievous. She enjoys embarrassing Su Mo, insists that he call her “Big Sister,” and dislikes being addressed as “senior” because it makes her sound old. Her impatience extends to elaborate schemes: although she knows how to play chess, she dislikes it and has little interest in the Confucian Sage’s ten-thousand-year games 33 54 89.

Her concern for Su Mo develops beyond the calculation behind their first meeting. She comforts him through guilt and grief, risks the flower sustaining her existence to save him, and believes he should choose his own Dao rather than inherit hers. She also withholds reassurance about the protection she can offer, fearing that dependence would hinder his growth 55 146 157 180 286.

Her tenderness toward him contrasts with her brutality toward enemies. She considers killing a practical means of survival and is willing to slaughter an opponent’s relatives and clansmen in retaliation. Beneath that confidence lies profound loneliness: having outlived those she knew, she admits that she once had little desire to continue living 57 157 432.

Abilities & Skills

Netherworld Dao

• Her Dao is sufficiently close to the Confucian Dao for her to teach Su Mo its principles and adapt her techniques for his use 56 57.
• She identifies excessive bloodthirstiness as a flaw of the Netherworld Dao, one that becomes more dangerous as cultivation rises 242.
• She does not deliberately make Su Mo follow her path. His Netherworld Dao arises through their connection but feels unusually ancient even to her 180.

Creation of Nether Arts

• Creates a volume of killing arts overnight by combining her own Dao Arts with Su Mo’s Confucian True Words 101.
• One documented technique is Nether Art, Prison Cage, which Su Mo uses to block an elderly sword cultivator’s killing strike 101.
• Su Mo suppresses the Book of Life and Death’s interference when using these arts, since its influence could mutate a technique and harm him 101.

Ghost Guard Command

• Commands more than one hundred Inquiry Realm Ghost Guards clad in black metal armor, each dozens of zhang tall 432.
• Can dispatch them through the void to pursue an enemy’s blood relatives and clansmen 432.
• Their attacks sever some of the Imperial Dynasty elder’s bloodline connections and prompt desperate pleas from the threatened sects 432.
• Summoning Ghost Guards does not require her own cultivation, allowing her to exert power beyond the apparent limits of her recovering body 442.

Possession and Spiritual Manifestation

• Possesses the mortal Su Mo and uses his body to kill three Foundation Establishment cultivators 24 33.
• Resides within his Spirit Sea and communicates with him internally 33 54.
• While she is a spiritual presence, ordinary companions cannot see her; Little Girl’s ability to do so surprises both her and Su Mo 89.
• After bodily reconstruction, she can live in his Spirit Sea again once it becomes a tangible space 164.

Healing and Spiritual Assistance

• Uses spiritual power to heal Su Mo’s injuries while he rests in her embrace 171 172.
• Soothes his divine soul after the Book of Life and Death’s absorption of soul incense causes a severe backlash 463.
• Channels black mist into him during the opening of his Spirit Sea, adjusting its flow when his pain intensifies 164.
• Crosses the World Barrier twice as a divine soul to retrieve the Flower of the Other Shore needed to save him 162.

Cultivation Knowledge and Instruction

• Teaches that Confucian cultivation advances through understanding and controlling Heaven and Earth’s Laws 56.
• Explains National Fortune Power, spiritual-root quality, and the three individualized inquiries beyond Spirit Transformation 54 164 286.
• Recognizes Netherfire and warns that the Book of Life and Death carries karma Su Mo cannot yet bear 56 57.
• Suspects that Su Mo’s exceptional comprehension comes from a mutated divine soul, which may progressively improve his spiritual roots 302.

Equipment / Weapons / Items

• Flower of the Other Shore — Preserves her divine soul after her death. She secretly saves it ten thousand years earlier, later retrieves it for Su Mo despite knowing that losing it could end her own existence, and ultimately gains a reconstructed body through the flower 157 162.
• Confucian Dao Inheritance — Takes the inheritance before pulling Su Mo through a rift out of the Divine Realm 78.

Relationships

• Su Mo — Her self-declared younger brother, student, friend, and romantic attachment. Their initial arrangement becomes sincere mutual trust; by their later reunion, he recognizes that their bond exceeds both master–disciple and elder-sister–younger-brother relationships 146 180 871.
• Mysterious Maiden / Spirit Lord — Ancient rival and surviving companion of her generation. Great Calamity exploits the desirelessness required by her cultivation method to defeat her through tricks, then recruits her to help guide Su Mo. Their rivalry develops into cooperation and shared devotion to protecting him 172 175 176 447 481.
• Confucian Sage and his remnants — Fought alongside the Sage in the ancient war. She exchanges insults with his remnants, warns them against drawing Su Mo into their schemes, and receives a remnant’s accumulated soul power 78 89 162.
• Little Girl / Girl — Can see Great Calamity when Su Mo’s Academy companions cannot. Later reveals the life-sustaining flower’s uniqueness and its ability to reconstruct a physical body 89 157.
• Void Beast — Initially flees in terror from her gaze. By her return outside the Demon Realm, it affectionately approaches her and treats her as a source of security 188 431.
• Emperor Ying Consort — Regularly keeps her company during Su Mo’s long absence and calls her “mother-in-law.” Su Mo notices that Great Calamity has adopted some of the consort’s guilt-inducing teasing 872.

Story Role / Major Arcs

West City and Su Mo’s Early Cultivation

• Encounters Su Mo in the blood-red mist beneath West City and draws his attention to the wronged souls there 21.
• Possesses him during the confrontation with three Foundation Establishment cultivators, then reveals that she has remained in his Spirit Sea 24 33.
• Comforts him when he blames himself for the wandering souls’ deaths, telling him that freeing them was already a blessing 55.
• Her curiosity about the Book of Life and Death prompts her to teach him Confucian cultivation. After recognizing its dangerous karma, she prepares alternative killing arts for his protection 56 57 101.

Divine Realm

• Serves as Su Mo’s strongest source of confidence, but discourages reliance on her and normally reserves intervention for life-threatening danger 75.
• Warns him about the limits and karmic cost of borrowing the Book of Life and Death’s power against the Divine Realm 77 78.
• Takes over a game against a Confucian Sage Remnant and demands that he leave Su Mo out of his plans 89.
• The remnant transfers all his soul power into her, forcing her into sleep. Without her protection, Su Mo abandons further exploration 89 91.

Saving Su Mo and Reconstructing Her Body

• Retrieves the Flower of the Other Shore sustaining her soul to save the dying Su Mo, dismissing the danger to herself as weariness with life 157 162.
• Reconstructs her physical body and reveals her identity as the Netherworld Lord 161 162.
• Helps Su Mo open his Spirit Sea into a tangible space where Girl’s withered flower can be planted and she herself can reside 162 164.

Rivalry with Mysterious Maiden

• Refuses to intervene openly when her ancient nemesis descends, directing Su Mo to escape instead 171.
• Avoids a duel while her bodily cultivation remains at Foundation Establishment. She proposes competing through their guidance of Su Mo toward Nascent Soul 175.
• Persuades Mysterious Maiden to participate by suggesting that Su Mo can accommodate multiple Dao intents and ultimately forge his own path 176 180.
• Keeps an anxious vigil during his consciousness journey, then welcomes him back when the Void Beast returns him 181 188 189.

Beyond the Realm and the Long Corridor

• Advises Su Mo to cultivate until he is strong enough to find his missing Academy companions 241.
• Watches his increasingly extreme treasure collecting at Floating Life’s End, attempting to defend it to Mysterious Maiden before berating him for removing the teleportation formation’s core stones 265.
• Recognizes the region between worlds as the Long Corridor. She and Mysterious Maiden leave to investigate its connection to their missing memories, refusing to expose Su Mo to its danger 309.

Return and the Calamity of the Nine Heavens

• Returns when Su Mo is threatened by the Imperial Dynasty elder, Blood Sect Ancestor, and Cold Sect Ancestor. After they reject her demands, she sends Ghost Guards against their bloodlines and sects 431 432.
• Later claims that she and Mysterious Maiden found only nothingness at the corridor’s end and had not recovered their cultivation. She urges Su Mo to retreat with those he loves to the Underworld or Spirit Realm 442 446.
• Comforts him through the soul-incense backlash and recognizes that the Heavenly Cataclysm has arrived 463 464.
• Secretly joins Mysterious Maiden to confront the calamity, hoping to buy him another ten thousand years. Their conversation reveals that they have concealed the calamity’s truth from him 481.
• Before they can enter the Forbidden Lands, golden light from Flowers of the Other Shore transports them to Peach Mountain. They realize Su Mo has prevented them from going to their deaths 481 484.

Reunion After a Thousand Years

• Embraces the returning Su Mo in tears, admitting how deeply she missed him. He reciprocates and acknowledges the care she gave him throughout his growth 871.
• Teases him for not visiting immediately and reveals her frequent visits to Emperor Ying Consort during his absence 872.
• Enters his Spirit Sea with Mysterious Maiden and sees souls crossing the River of Forgetfulness between blooming Flowers of the Other Shore, recognizing that he is preparing something involving the departed 872.

Notable Quotes

“The greatest means of preserving your life is killing your enemies!” 57

“I don't intend to make him follow any Dao. Only he can decide his own Dao!” 180

“How could it be more important than my little brother...” 481