Almond and others directly returned to the planet while most of the powerful Regalons, including Grim Breakers, were still on Planet Gezero, in their temporary territory.
Planet Earth had completely transformed in a sense, both geographically and socially.
Most of the population was still human, as Almond didn’t want to make Regalons wantonly.
The people who ran Earth’s society and lived normal, gradually progressing lives were different, but GAA still existed and was the most powerful organization.
However, the planet had distinct rulers now. Almond and Lily. King and Queen. Emperor and Empress.
It was no longer a democracy but under rules and laws. A place where unfairness and crime were not an option with Astra AI observing every nook and cranny of the planet and punishment given swiftly.
With Dungeons and Labyrinth gone, people didn’t have the means to get strong quickly, but there were still means to get strong, which required more hard work.
Dojos and Academies opened up for new generations to train in their combat skills and arcane training, and Almond also distributed general Prana Arts and Soul Arts of low ranks for people to start their Adventure because that was the only way to get strong now.
Since everyone was in the second layer, the only way to get strong was using Prana Arts and fighting monsters to hone their combat to break through from Bronze-rank to Mythical-rank and if one wanted to become a Regalon, which frankly, every aspiring Adventurer wanted, they could after reaching Legendary-rank.
Although dungeons were gone, the Prana of the second layer affected planet Earth and changed it, while also birthing monsters in the wilderness along with occasional invasions of monsters from space or the river.
Those who worked harder progressed faster, those who were determined awakened their soul quicker, and could get the chance to be admitted into the Starry Horizon Academy, which would increase their progress explosively.
The duration of their stay as students hinged on their performance. So far, Grim Breakers, old monsters, and other top powerhouses were still students after passing two quarterly trials, but a few young ones and some old ones failed the trial and were expelled.
Still, Almond’s Mad Nuts faction grew bigger with the addition of Earth’s members, though Almond and Lily rarely took general missions since Big D handed them tougher, private missions exclusive to top powerhouses of the Academy.
Aside from that, Planet Earth’s technology advanced by leaps and bounds thanks to Neo, and this was only just the start.
Once Neo broke through to High-Mortal rank and manifested his Ability Trees of his Conceptual Powers, he would become significantly stronger and bring out much innovation and development.
Making a public appearance was a bit necessary for Almond and Lily, as they were supreme leaders and the strongest figures.
Everyone knew that without Almond, Earth would’ve been destroyed. And without the effort of others, they would have never defeated the 30 floors of the Labyrinth to clear the Grimworld Tutorial.
The people of Earth were living the best life possible with advancements in technology and a society where no one was hungry or poor anymore.
One’s status was determined by either their combat power or their usefulness in other areas such as Alchemy, Blacksmithing, Cooking, and various other things, including myriad research.
Alas, the heaviness left by those who died, the half of the population that vanished, still lingered in people’s hearts, but there was nothing that could be done, and everyone was gradually moving on, looking forward to the future while living their best in the present.
They were safe and had the freedom to decide the kind of future they desired, given they put in effort for it.
Even the Griminions couldn’t breach Earth because Almond had created a massive spatial formation at the incoming river’s entrance to another river’s stream that led to the next planet, directly teleporting Griminions into another river, skipping Planet Earth. But just the presence of so many Griminions still affected many monsters on Earth, and they turned into Griminions.
Naturally, they were dealt with swiftly, so there wasn’t any danger.
After checking on planet Earth and staying there for a bit over an hour, Almond teleported back to Planet Gezero, into their territory, and called every Regalon, as Almond had brought all Regalons here to fight in this defense battle against this Griminion Tide.
The total number of Regalons stood at 213 people.
142 of them were at the Mortal-rank, almost half of them at peak with their foundational stats reaching 1000, except for Arcane Constitution, which was higher for the most part since there was no limit to Arcane Constitution.
And Arcane Constitution directly determined the raw potency of one’s abilities.
As everyone gathered, they stood in sections, and Almond looked at these 142 people first, his eyes faintly glimmering with a hazy X symbol that flickered and rotated. It indicated the activation of his Ability Tree, Riftveil Grimblade. More specifically, an ability of this Ability Tree—Unbound Eyes, the upgraded version of All-Seeing Eyes.
With his last breakthrough in Spirit Animation six months ago that resulted in him creating a unique bloodline and race, Almond couldn’t progress further in it, nor did he want to, as he poured his focus into Riftveil Grimblade next, developing it further, along with increasing masteries of his Elements via the Academy’s facilities and resources.
“Everyone,” Almond spoke. “I want all Mortal-ranks who have Ability Power of SSS-rank to form a big group.”
“Boss, my Ability Power is of SS-rank, but my Regalon Spirit Armament can boost me enough to reach the Ability Power of Alpha 1940,” Brynjar said as he blinked. “Where should I go?”
“Join the group of SSS-rank,” Almond smiled. “Our biggest strength is Regalon Spirit Armaments, something unique only to us and developed by us individually. This is also a chance to develop them further, so our task here is simple: kill Griminions and get strong.”
Almond then made a group of High-Mortals numbering 44. They were mostly guild leaders and other top powerhouses.
There were still 27 High-Mortals, but that included old monsters, some Grim Breakers, and a few top powerhouses whose Ability Power easily reached the level of Immortal rank after using Regalon Spirit Armaments.
After the partition of groups finished, Almond held a combat test for the group, with the testers being his 10 Spirit Lords.
There was still time, and it had been a month since he saw everyone’s progress, so this was a good time to measure them.
As the combat training continued, five hours passed by in the blink of an eye.