Dyon sat cross-legged with the bed’s headboard to his back. Ri’s knees rested on his calves as she faced him. But, her head was lowered with her forehead rested gently on Dyon’s chest, seemingly trying to stop crying.
“Little feu glace,” Dyon smiled, pulling in Ri tightly, “If you have things you’re worried about, don’t bury them. The same way you want to help me carry my burden, I want to help you.”
“Mm,” Ri nodded, wiping her tears away on her sleeve before touching her belly, “It all seems so silly now…” She said softly, “How’d you do it?”
Dyon chuckled, “Your husband is a genius, that’s how.”
Ri rolled her eyes, pulling away to flick Dyon’s forehead. “Tell me.”
Seeing that Ri was back to her normal self, Dyon felt much better as he began to explain. Ri had always loved array alchemy, in fact, that was basically how they first met. It had been too long since they had a talk about it.
“I’m actually surprised that there’s nothing about seals in my master’s memories, but they’re actually quite interesting.”
Ri nodded, “The Celestial Deer Sect and the Elves were in an alliance, so your master should have known about the Sigebyrht and their manifestation. Might be another clue.”
“Mm, I think so too. Not knowing about a counter to arrays despite being so powerful doesn’t add up.
In terms of the seal placed on you, though, I may have been worried if it was put in place by an elder of the Lebna God Clan that woman is from, but Ulu, I think her name was, isn’t a match for experts on that level.
Also, her seal was meant to counter and lock away your yin and the life qi tied to it, but Ulu wasn’t skilled enough to use life will’s opposite. Instead, she used darkness will as a substitute for death will which weakened the seal from what it could be at its peak level.”
Ri pondered on that a bit before thinking of something, “If seals are making use of wills to form their counters, how is that any different from an array?”
“Remember during our first talk about arrays? And how we spoke about how lower level arrays simulate wills, while higher level arrays become them?”
Ri nodded, “So low level seals simulate high level ones by simply being arrays that counter something. They’re still fundamentally arrays but have elements of seals.”
“Exactly. A true seal requires minimal adjustments and can do a wide range of things. From what I can see, the Sigebryht family manifestation is a high-level seal. When they stopped the death qi from fueling the cyclones, they didn’t have to understand life qi. All they had to do was lock onto a target, analyze, and output their seal.
However, a low-level seal, while they may still use seal-like elements such as targeting and analysis, they need to manufacture their seals from scratch.”
“Targeting and analysis?”
“Yea. Although my master’s memories have locked the information, the Celestial Deer Sect’s library still has information on seals I looked at after treating Eli and while you were unconscious.”
That was also how Dyon got his hands on the Unique Type Manifestation technique despite it not being in his master’s memories. The 25th White Mother had purposefully not destroyed the books within the disarrayed library, even though she locked her memories, because she wanted Dyon to find her trail of clues. Clues she wanted him to learn slowly, and not all at once, because he was too weak to know everything now.
“Targeting is a method in sealing that locks down what is meant to be sealed. While analysis decides what it takes to do the sealing.
These two steps are really flexible if you have access to a high-level sealing legacy, like the Sigebryht do. But, it seems Ulu didn’t have that, or more accurately, the Lebna sealing legacy works differently from the Sigebryht’s.”
“Differently? You absorbed that guy’s memories to learn that, right? What Planet Nix like?”
“I got rid of most of the useless stuff, but there was something quite interesting that I saw, though.”
Ri used Dyon’s thighs as leverage to life herself up and sit in his lap again, before listening.
“There are actually two interesting things of note.
For one, Planet Nix is probably the most united planet in this universe. Here, the Royal God Clan exists, but it’s fairly handsoff – even to the point where the Ragnor and the Pakal constantly war with each other and the Belmont never step in.
But, on Planet Nix, the Lebna and Nuru God Clans both reside peacefully under the rule of the Jafari Royal God Clan.
That said, that isn’t the most interesting thing.”
Honestly speaking, Dyon was a bit apprehensive about this tidbit – even to the point where he was worried that he had given Ulu enough clues to assume that his technique absorbed memories.
In the heat of the moment, Dyon hadn’t had the time to sift through all of Chike’s memories. All he had time to do was check on exactly what happened while he was gone and find a motive.
Unfortunately, after he did that, he asked Ulu if she had really done all of this just to pull him to her side. Ulu had immediately responded with ‘how did you know that?’, which was a logical ask considering the circumstances. If Ulu thought deeply enough about it, she might be able to connect Dyon’s devour technique, to how he knew something he shouldn’t have.
And if Ulu knew that Dyon now had memories of a Nix warrior, and Dyon’s speculations about Chike’s memories were right… Then, there was more trouble than just the Nix revenge to worry about.
Taking a deep breath, Dyon continued, “From the memories, Planet Nix has no history with the Lebna, Nuru or Jafari dating more than hundred years before now.”
“Wait, what?” Ri’s brows scrunched in confusion. The impact of such a statement was much more profound than it seemed. “But…”
Dyon sighed, “Exactly right. No one has conquered a gate in millennia. So if their history in the universe is so short, where did they come from?”
“There’s also… If they weren’t here a hundred years ago, then what happened to the warriors that represented Nix at the last world tournament?”
Dyon shook his head, he had no idea. It was likely the upper-echelons of the God Clans knew, and that would include the Elvin Elders as well. But, that wasn’t the main issue. Who the other clan was, was irrelevant.
In fact, it was likely that the God Clans of Earth were already aware that there was a change but couldn’t be bothered to care about the changed political landscape of another planet.
For the world tournament, each Planet sent their best representatives. In the end, for Planet Naiad, Nix, Deimos and Mino, they each sent two God Clans and one Royal God clan. If they had been hosting, they would have likely sent more, but, the expense of interplanetary travel didn’t allow that to be worth it.
The interesting part was that although each planet had their own Sapientia God Clan, none of them had brought any members. It was likely that the planet’s assumed the Sapientia would afford the expense themselves.
However, that aside, there was another thing of note. Something that Dyon had no clue about because Chike and the members of Planet Nix, also did not know –
The members of Planet Mino, including Saru Shruti of the Shruti Royal God Clan, had also not been here just a hundred years ago. And now? They were suddenly very interested in Ri’s origins.
Dyon sighed, “Nothing can ever be simple, huh?”
After a pause, Ri asked a question that had been grating on her, “Do you think how those clans appeared without a gate conquering being noted, is the same way my parents left too?”
“I thought of that possibility as well. If we pay enough attention, we might find some clues. I think I should have a good relationship with at least one set of in-laws.” Dyon laughed to himself bitterly.
Ri giggled, “Maybe if you weren’t so arrogant, you would have approached them by now.”
Dyon pouted in disagreement, “The first time I met Madeleine’s father, he was part of a group of people trying to kick me out of their school. The second time was after he tried to end my and Madeleine’s relationship – according to Madeleine, Oliver had acted on his own, but I still never got an apology for that, despite the sword through my chest.
I guess I’ve never had any interactions with Madeleine’s mother, but if I’m to take what Madeleine says about her seriously, her goals are always in lock-step with her father’s. The only time they even remotely disagreed was when Madeleine seemed to be on her death bed.
It’s moments like these that I appreciate Uncle Acacia.”
“It seems Uncle might have his own in-laws to deal with soon,” Ri said teasingly, “He might not be in a good enough mood to deal with your antics anymore.”
Dyon sighed, “In all seriousness, though, something is converging and its converging on this universe.
In the past, this was universe was the best in the quadrant. It had peak dao formation experts, and I’m not certain, but it’s like that that also included half-step transcendents. This is why the Epistemic Tower was originally placed right here, in a bridge between this universe, and the next one over.
With the Ragnor and then the Pakal. But now Planet Nix. And even before that there was likely the Kitsune who came too. Too many clans much too powerful to be here are coming here.”
“Dyon,” Ri said softly, “We should probably talk about when it is you was to enter the Epistemic Tower to start training toward Transcendents.”
Dyon shook his head, “When WE go, it’ll be all of us. The old man said he had a limited supply of resources, but he never said I wasn’t allowed to let other in with me. If that was the case, then Alidor wouldn’t have been able to bring in his sister.”
“But… You said the old man teleported the Basilisks Alidor had brought with him out when they tried to take the trials.”
“Mm. That’s true. But, that was only because they weren’t talented enough. My fiancées are the most talented women in this universe, grand teacher will of course accept you two. You have a faith seed and a God level constitution, and I have a feeling that Madeleine just got a faith seed of her own.”
With Dyon’s words, Ri finally sighed in relief. She had been worried that she would be separated from Dyon, but there had been a reason for that. Dyon’s ultimate goal was to make his name spread far and wide and the best way to do that was with the help of the Epistemic Tower. If he went in, there was no telling when he’d be able to come out.
“I want to take you, Madeleine, Little Lyla, Little Black, the demon generals and likely Alidor and his little sister with me. I also have a few others in mind… Like Caedlum Pakal. And Thor Ragnor.”
Ri looked back at Dyon in confusion, “Why Alidor and his little sister?”
“It’s not that I trust him, or that I’m putting any stock or hope in him. It’s only that he’ll be useful. This will essentially be a quadrant vs quadrant battle, and our universe is lacking in talent. Also, unless his soul strength becomes stronger than mine, he’ll never break his slave seal without my say so.”
At the moment, Dyon had no intention on ever letting Alidor surpass him. When Dyon completed his soul, his strength was at the peak 6th stage. In fact, he was mere days away from breaking through and having his incomplete soul be at the lower 6th stage, while his completed soul would be able to enter the lower 7th stage! A saint level soul!
“It will be dangerous, though, Ri.” Dyon’s face steeled. “The Epistemic Tower isn’t just about the trials to receive the greatest techniques of that old man, it’s also a competition. And it’s a competition that involves everyone who was talented enough to forge their way into the Tower.
Maybe the worst part is that this quadrant, according to grand teacher, is likely among the minority when it comes to accumulated knowledge on the Epistemic Tower. No one here remembers the importance the Epistemic Tower is meant to have, but that doesn’t mean other places have forgotten.”
“The Epistemic Tower in our quadrant was ignored because our universe became too weak to bother with.” Dyon continued, “Eventually, the cultivation cap of the gate fell so far that many forgot entirely.
With all of the once powerful clans gone, new ones had to build up to the power of the former. But, the information that the destroyed powerful clans had, weren’t available to the weaker. Which meant that even though this quadrant now has clans that are as powerful as the Celestial Deer Sect used to be, they have no idea about the Epistemic Tower because that information was never passed to them.”
“Are you saying that those powerful clans are converging to look for something… But, they don’t know what they’re looking for is the Epistemic Tower?”
Taking a deep breath, Dyon answered, “That’s likely at least a part of the truth. The fact that the Pakal and Ragnor clan geniuses essentially ignore the Epistemic Tower is evidence that they don’t know of it. But, there are a few reasons why that might not be all there is to it…
For one, there’s the human world. If the reason the clans were converging had nothing to do with the seal placed on my home, I would be very surprised. In fact, maybe the only thing I’m certain about is the fact that seal has something to do with it.
Secondly, there’s the expansion of Earth by thousands of times its original size. That seems far too out of place and random to be by coincidence. Scientifically speaking, there’s no non-martial world related laws I can use to explain that… At least, none that I can use that don’t include the Earth becoming uninhabitable.
Then there’s the Daiyu Clan. They were, for all intents and purposes, a powerful clan from back then. By right, they should have information on the Epistemic Tower. And yet, it doesn’t seem to be their focus at all. As though there’s something more important…”
“Maybe that’s because they haven’t birthed anyone who is capable of conquering the tower? Remember how Chenglei seemed stifled by their lack of resources and he didn’t seem to have the talent to open the tower either. And from what it seems, he’s now the best genius they have…”
“That’s a possibility. They might be ignoring the tower because they know they can’t open it. Maybe they’re making all of these moves to find another way to open it? After all, if they went to the tower without a plan and failed, they’d only draw attention to it. Something they likely don’t want.”
Dyon had been lucky in terms of the way he approached the tower. Unlike Alidor, he hadn’t had the ability to teleport throughout the gate at the time, so, he would have had to travel there manually had he not fallen into the spatial tear.
But, if he had done that, his movements would have been noticed by scouting personnel at some point. Even if the Ragnor had pulled away the Saeclum clan, the Uidah universe had their own scouts too…
In a way, Dyon almost dying was a blessing in disguise. However, the problem was that the Uidah still found out because of Alidor’s seeking out faith seed.
“Also, I don’t believe that Chenglei is so weak…” Dyon thought back to his fight with Chenglei and he wondered if he would have won had it not been for devour. “When we fought, Chenglei had reset his cultivation. Which means that we were essentially on an even playing field and it still took everything I had.
As of right now, I believe I’ve left him far behind. The Daiyu don’t have the means to even awaken his god constitution fully, let alone temper his meridians with Gama. But, I can’t underestimate his talent… I had access to so many wills, I had such a powerful soul, and my body cultivation was doing well, and yet it still took a perfectly tailored technique to win. Next time I meet him, I’ll still need to be careful… because this time, I have to kill him.”
After a moment of silence, an evil grin appeared on Dyon’s face as his hands creeped up Ri’s night gown to find two soft bundles of flesh before kneading them gently.
Ri giggled, slapping his hands away, “Pervert. We have work to do. Help me with my cultivation.”
Smiling gently and bowing to his wife’s needs, Dyon nodded, “Alright.”
With that, Dyon began to meditate with Ri. Because Ri was only half a beast, her intuition when it came to choosing paths and the legacies that were ingrained into her, wasn’t as intuitive as it was for Little Black. This meant that she needed to analyze her body slowly to fully understand it.
So, that was what they did. Facing each other, they held hands to mold their auroras and peak out their 6th sense. Then, the began to slowly tease apart the legacies of the Kitsune. And more specifically, the legacy of the void kitsune… Kukan.
**
A few kilometers away and still within Arena City, another gathering was taking place.
This time, though, it wasn’t so youthful as it had been in Chaos Arena. In fact, it was quite the opposite.
Powerful masters of the five planets converged on a single building, ready to hold their own conference. After all, the other four planets would never send their best and brightest without protection.
However, interestingly enough, this wasn’t going to be a meeting about just the World Tournament. Maybe just as importantly, another event was taking place to take advantage of the rare convening of the planets’ elites.
This would be the first meeting of its kind. Spurred on by the appearance of a never before seen phenomena, the array alchemists of the universe would meet for the first time…
Before, the Guild Headquarters had been but a figure head, only stepping in when rules were broken. However, something significant enough had happened for them to finally make a move on this scale. It was time for a change, and that change revolved around one person.
So… Fittingly… As they made their way to Arena City’s Alchemy Guild, they were all thinking just one thing.
‘Will the Demon Sage come?’