Nine Heavens

Biodata

Power Progression

The Nine Heavens’ development concerns the condition of its Great Dao, spiritual energy, and cultivation environment, rather than a personal cultivation realm.

Geography and Defenses

The Heavenly Abyss

• Strategic protection: With the Foreign Realm’s Immortal Kings drawn away into the Boundary Sea, the Abyss makes a direct conquest of Imperial Pass impractical despite the enemy’s greater strength 279.
• Breaches: An Lan’s Immortal King Dharma Body cannot lift the barrier, but his Crimson Peak Spear opens a gap large enough for a True Immortal to enter 274 275.
• Later resistance: During the renewed war, its interwoven Dao marks withstand an Immortal King’s enormous white blade. An Immortal King bracelet is subsequently used to help forces cross its restrictions 291.

Factions and Inhabitants

Major Institutions

• Longevity Families — Ancient aristocratic powers whose ancestors fought the Foreign Realm. Their military strength makes them essential to the defense, but also makes accusations of betrayal politically dangerous 271.
• Major Dao traditions — Supply armies, warships, and senior experts. The Heaven Severing Sect, Heaven Mending Sect, and Vast Sea Academy participate in the mobilization at Ten Ferry Province 268.
• Cloud Palace — Rises into the greatest faction in the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths. Its five thousand disciples reach at least Void Dao, while its Cloud Realm becomes a coveted cultivation destination 293 307.
• Heavenly Deity Academy — Trains prominent young cultivators and later receives permission to establish itself within the Cloud Realm. Its elders benefit enough to reach Half-Step Immortal cultivation 218 293.

Leading Defenders

• Shi Qingyun — Leads reinforcements, exposes internal betrayal, repels Immortal Kings, and restores the realm’s cultivation environment 268 271 292 311.
• Meng Tianzheng — Senior wartime leader who suffers grievous injuries protecting the younger generation from a Foreign Realm Immortal 267 268.
• Shi Hao — A leading prodigy who becomes a hostage to secure a ceasefire; later restores the Nine Heavens after the wars against darkness 279 315.
• Demoness — Commands Cloud Palace forces, fights on the Border Wasteland front, and later directs rescue efforts during the realm’s devastation 291 311.
• Shi Yi, Heavenly Son, and Exiled Immortal — Prominent members of the younger generation who become Supreme Being-level battlefield defenders 255 291.
• Cang Yuan and Su Wen — Immortal King defenders who guard the realm’s entrances against invading kings 310.
• Gu Ancestor — Returns after the Foreign Realm’s destruction, has his name cleared, and strengthens the Nine Heavens as another Immortal King 314.

History

Immortal Ancient Legacy

The Border Wasteland retains the scars of the Immortal Ancient war: shattered terrain, drifting star fragments, and blood that has never faded from the sky. A battlefield revisited during the later war lies on a continent originally broken away from the Nine Heavens 251 269.

Ancient inheritances remain tied to that history. When an immortal’s tomb opens, its guardians initially restrict entry to descendants of the Seven Kings. Other Academy disciples protest that their ancestors also shed blood for the Nine Heavens, persuading the guardians to admit anyone capable of claiming the inheritance 235.

Conflicts Between the Younger Generations

A Foreign Realm delegation brings the Ten Worlds Diagram, a treasure capable of traveling between worlds and planes, into confrontation with the Nine Heavens’ Immortal King burial shroud. The encounter leads to an arena battle between the two sides’ young cultivators 231 233.

Shi Qingyun defeats Kong Ming’s Dao Body and suppresses the enemy fighters, allowing his allies to kill them. Despite that victory, the Nine Heavens’ prodigies are troubled that opponents from only the Foreign Realm’s second tier could keep them locked in prolonged struggles 232 233.

Border clashes grow into larger engagements. Chi Ling attempts to kill Shi Qingyun and cripple the Nine Heavens’ younger generation, but Shi Hao, Shi Yi, Exiled Immortal, Heavenly Son, and others answer his summons. The resulting battle ends in a Nine Heavens victory with devastating losses on both sides 255 256.

General Mobilization and Internal Betrayal

The major families and Dao traditions assemble an expedition and nominate Shi Qingyun to lead it. Their decision also serves a political purpose: removing him from the rear, where his possession of the Ancient Covenant makes him difficult to oppose 267.

After the Foreign Realm attacks during the prodigies’ duels, the Border Wasteland deteriorates into all-out war. The Nine Heavens assembles several million Heavenly God cultivators, tens of thousands of Self-Slaying cultivators, thousands of Escape One cultivators, and several Supreme Beings as reinforcements 268.

At Imperial Pass, Shi Qingyun opposes Jin Taijun’s proposal to retreat and uncovers the Jin Clan’s secret contact with the Foreign Realm’s Night Watchman. The clan’s eventual destruction becomes a warning to other potential collaborators 271 286.

Breach and Ceasefire

The defenders gain the advantage through formations and Shi Qingyun’s suppression techniques, until An Lan opens the Heavenly Abyss for a True Immortal. The invader shatters the battlefield formation and overwhelms the defenders with immortal-level power 273 274 275.

Shi Qingyun subsequently draws the Foreign Realm Immortal Kings into the Boundary Sea. The enemy demands Demoness as the price of a five-hundred-year ceasefire, but the Nine Heavens refuses. Shi Hao instead goes to the Foreign Realm as a hostage, and hostilities subside 279.

During the ceasefire, the lineages intensify cultivation and competition for resources. Cloud Palace and the other traditions restrain large-scale internal fighting while new generations of prodigies emerge 279 282.

Shi Qingyun’s Return and the Golden Age

The Foreign Realm breaks the agreement, beginning another war that lasts roughly a century before immortal-level intervention threatens to overwhelm the Nine Heavens. Shi Qingyun’s projection saves Demoness and the defenders; his return drives back the enemy Immortal Kings 286 291 292.

An Immortal King left nailed dead in the void deters further crossings of the Heavenly Abyss for ten thousand years. Shi Qingyun erects a monument to the fallen using True Immortal bones, establishes the Cloud Realm, and becomes the foremost figure in the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths 292.

His presence revives the Great Dao and brings a golden age. After nearly ten thousand years, he returns with additional Immortal Kings, whose Dao inscriptions produce a complete revival and prompt factions to invest heavily in their disciples 294 307.

World-Destroying Incense and Reconstruction

A long-planned Foreign Realm scheme culminates in the lighting of World-Destroying Incense in the Border Wasteland. It exposes the Nine Heavens to wandering Immortal Kings from the Boundary Sea. The lineages move their prodigies into the Cloud Realm while Shi Qingyun and the other defenders intercept the attackers 294 307 309.

The fighting continues for thousands of years. Great Red Heaven and Boundless Heaven are destroyed, the Great Dao weakens, and the defensive line is breached. Emperor Yu and his Dao companion arrive as reinforcements when an enemy king is about to force entry 310 311.

The Nine Heavens wins, but three defending Immortal Kings fall. Preserved pills offer a means to resurrect them, while restoration formations and enemy Immortal King remains nourish the rebuilding realm 311.

Foreign Realm’s Fall and Immortal Domain Alliance

Shi Qingyun destroys the Foreign Realm and returns with Gu Ancestor. Disciples of the Nine Heavens explore the defeated realm to train, pursue surviving enemies, and obtain opportunities from its remaining resources 314.

Relations with the Immortal Domain develop into reciprocal visits and sworn assistance against the Great Calamity. Its visiting Immortal Kings discover that the Nine Heavens’ cultivation environment and reserves of experts now rival, and in some respects exceed, their own 314.

Wars Against Darkness and Final Restoration

Before departing, Shi Qingyun entrusts the Nine Heavens to its gathered Immortal Kings and True Immortals. The ensuing wars claim Su Wen, Heavenly Son, Shi Yi, and his remaining Immortal King Giant followers 315.

After thirty thousand years of battle, Shi Qingyun returns to find the Nine Heavens restored by Shi Hao. Demoness, Cang Yuan, Su Wen, and other fallen Immortal Kings have been reflected back into existence. Ten thousand years later, the realm hosts Shi Qingyun and Demoness’s wedding; another ten thousand years afterward, Shi Qingyun and Shi Hao depart for Above the Heavens 315.