Absolute silence reigned over the stadium.
How overbearing was what Dyon had just done? Before everyone, without thought of manipulating the evidence to his benefit, he had stepped out in front and boldly made his revenge as clear as possible.
These were two women that had dared to attempt to take the lives of his very own wives right before his eyes. And then had the audacity to not even show any remorse or regret. As though it was their right to toy with whatever lives they wanted, and it was Dyon’s job to just accept it.
Well, he had returned the favor in kind. They learned very quickly what it felt like to have their own lives toyed with and ended with the flip of a hand.
Even Tau Aumen was shocked beyond belief. In fact, that sentiment spread even to Lionel’s usual deadpan expression.
They were both one and two in the eyes of many, and yet would they have handled the situation like Dyon had? Would they be so bold?
But, even worse, Tau was angry. Dyon’s final words were directed toward him without a doubt.
In their final confrontation in the Chaos Tower, Tau had warned Dyon. He had said that Dyon shouldn’t have thoughts of attacking Eboni or Ode because they were under his protection. And yet what had Dyon said in response? He had said he cared little for Tau’s ranking… Something he had just repeated before everyone.
Suddenly, an outcry of rage shook the stadium. In fact, it seemed to four voices melded into one, but two were decidedly more power than the rest.
Celestial aura blanketed the stadium, causing the weak to cough up blood immediately as two figures burst into the air.
Dyon immediately made a guess as to who they were. In all likelihood, they were the Geb and Horus God Clan Heads. The other two voices were probably Femi and likely someone else that had a strong connection with either Ode or Eboni. He didn’t know. But, quite frankly, he didn’t care.
A blaze of violet flames erupted into the skies as the roof of the Belmont skybox melted away in an instant. It was as though it had never existed.
“Child! Today is the day you die!”
Dyon’s cultivation was much too weak to react to such experts. But, his soul strength and observational abilities allowed him to easily see up to celestial level speeds. So, he could clearly see Patriarchs Geb and Horus charging through the skies and toward him.
That said, it seemed like they were focused on killing Thadius first who had stepped out in front of Dyon as his trident appeared in his hand. After all, to them, Dyon was an ant and Thadius was just a slightly larger ant they wanted to crush first.
Patriarch Horus’ long silver hair whipped behind him as the air that was shoved due to the speed of his flight continually condensed into a larger and larger sphere bomb.
Patriarch Geb was like the mirror image of an older Femi, even right down to his protruding jaw and rough features. In a moment of tranquility, Dyon laughed to himself. ‘How did such an ugly clan produce as top six beauty like Eboni?’
The truth was that not many if any God Clan Heads had strong bonds with their children. Celestial level parents like King Belmont, King Acacia or the like, were rare. The reason why was because these experts simply spent too much time cultivating and had too many children to form strong bonds with all of them. They would normally choose to focus on building relationships with their strongest spawn to groom the future rulers of their clans.
So, it was clear to anyone intelligent that their act of rage now was more out of spite for Dyon slapping them in the face rather than anger at the loss of their daughters. After all, Ode and Eboni were talented, but not so talented as their elder sons. And, being women, many saw them as tools for marriage alliances as opposed to legacy bearers. It was quite rare for a female to be so talented as to be given the first in line genius title like Madeleine had. You either had to be overwhelmingly talented like her, or part of a women’s only sect like Evelyn.
Seeing Dyon laughing to himself, the anger of the celestial experts burned. They assumed that it was because his cultivation was too low and thus he hadn’t realized they were aiming to kill him. But, seeing him really not put them in his eyes was enough to set such experts off.
Connery Sapientia had already noticed King Belmont’s reaction to the situation, but he sat back with a small smile playing him lips. He knew very well that just a few weeks ago, King Belmont had been willing to sell his tombs for Madeleine’s hand in marriage to his son. So, in Connery’s shallow light, King Belmont had a bottom line he would push for the right benefits.
As such, the way Connery saw it, as a King, Belmont had the obligation to defend the actions of his citizens considering Eboni and Ode had cheated. But, on the other hand, it would only be an act before he disciplined Dyon. With any luck, Dyon would be crippled, then he would forcefully take Madeleine away at a later time.
It wasn’t that he wanted Madeleine. He was sure that her virginity was gone, and she was therefore useless to him. But, he wanted to make her suffer for causing him so many losses.
In an instant, the patriarchs were a mere hundred meters from Dyon, a distance that was akin to a single step for a celestial expert. They could almost taste Dyon’s blood already and a deep satisfaction had begun to seep into their very bones.
But then, they froze. As God Clan Heads, they were mere lower celestial experts. At most, they had filled a handful of meridians with celestial energy. However, a Royal God Clan Head was on another level, usually being at least the third celestial level and far above what they could match up to.
Connery Sapientia had immediately noticed the actions of King Belmont because his soul was so strong. But, it was only when the patriarchs had nearly reached Dyon that they noticed the heat permeating the air made even them as Celestial experts uncomfortable.
‘Mid level celestial…’ A sharp breath was pulled into the lips of the patriarchs as they grinded to a halt in the skies.
King Belmont stood leisurely in the skies with his purple hair flowing and his arms clasped behind his back. “Were you two really planning on attacking my junior in my presence?”
Junior? Since when did a king refer to a child as his junior? This was a Celestial level expert! Unless they shared the same master, saying something like that was ridiculous.
The truth was that King Belmont had wanted to call Dyon his nephew. With his close relationship with King and Queen Acacia, not to mention how he was nearly 90% certain that a pair of friends he hadn’t seen a long time were Madeleine’s true parents, Dyon really could be seen as his nephew.
But, he couldn’t reveal such a thing, not now. With how vigilant they were against the Ragnor, even the fact they had invited King Acacia into their sky box was almost too much of a give away. Had they not been confident in Dyon’s ability to conceal himself, King Belmont would have never allowed him to come to their skybox.
There was a reason why no one reacted when Kawa charged out of the skybox and appeared before Dyon, Ri, Madeleine and Clara. Even though Dyon released his soul to its utmost, even to the point of unleashing many of his manifestations for fear that Kawa was an enemy, no one in the crowd had said a thing about it.
If the rankers had seen Dyon react to a celestial level expert, would their noses be so upturned as they were now? Would Femi still be so arrogant?
If the God Clan Heads had seen how powerful Kawa was and seen her relationship with Ri and Madeleine, would they have dared to allow Ode and Eboni to attack them?
Of course not.
No one had reacted, because no one had seen anything.
Kawa had the ability to conceal her own self and Dyon, for the sake of protecting his secrets, had concealed himself.
Never in a million years did Kawa ever think that Dyon would react to her. That was why she had confidently leaped out.
Luckily for them, Dyon had learned to be more cautious about certain things. Something he was clearly willing to throw out the window when it came to an attack on the lives of his wives.
“King Belmont, do you really intend to stand in our way?” Patriarch Geb’s hoarse voice reverberated through the arena.
“You as members of the elder generation just stepped into a dispute between the younger generation. How could I not intervene?” King Belmont replied calmly.
“Younger generation?! He clearly made use of a saint level expert! How does such logic hold up?!” Patriarch Horus boomed.
Thadius snorted even as Dyon chuckled behind him.
The patriarchs turned their heads in anger, boring holes in the two of them.
“This is the kind of disrespect you allow you proliferate on your Planet Earth?!” Patriarch Geb had always had a petty reason for hating Earth. It was always among the weakest planets, especially since half of its population was mortal. And yet, it took the name of a will he found to be the greatest! He found this to be nothing less than a slap in the face of his clan.
“We’re laughing because you’re an idiot. Thadius isn’t even 40 years old yet. Iris, my opponent from just a few hours ago is already a decade plus older than him. How is he not part of the younger generation?” Dyon chuckled lightly.
But, his words were like a stun grenade launched into arena. A saint not even 40? Was that true?
It was near impossible to tell by the naked eye alone how old an expert was. Without inspecting them with a 6th sense of sorts, or probing them with energy, it was impossible.
That said, when experts trained their eyes and senses onto Thadius, Dyon’s words were found to not be lies. His life force was to pure and new to be anymore than 37 years old.
Many seemed to remember in that instant that the world tournament used to consist of four cultivation levels. The foundation stage, the meridian formation stage, the essence gathering stage, and the saint stage. It was only after years of decline, where saint experts became rarer and rarer that they were removed. After all, if it took you hundreds of years, were you still a member of the younger generation?
The truth was that in many outstanding universes, even being thousands of years old was considered young. But here, living centuries often placed you in the middle of your life.
‘This…’ Even King Belmont and Acacia didn’t know how to feel. Queen Acacia wasn’t fazed because she had seen many saints even younger than Thadius. But, the same couldn’t be said for her husband.
How could these people understand that the demon generals were geniuses among geniuses? How could the demon sage ever choose any less to lead his armies? To be a demon general was an acknowledgement that not only your talent, but also your combat prowess, was in the top echelon of your cultivation rank.
In fact, in the year since Dyon had awakened the demon generals, they had already improved in their cultivation vastly. Even the slowest of the saints had filled at least 4 or 5 more meridians in the span of a year. A pace that was otherworldly to this measly universe.
Maybe the funniest part in all of this was how River and Ronica always toyed with Thadius. Why? Because even with all his talent. He was nowhere near the strongest of the demon generals.
That said, if you paid close attention to the reactions in the arena, there were a surprising amount of people that took this new piece of information in stride.
The first was maybe not so surprising. Lionel Belmont was always deadpan. After getting over his initial shock at Dyon’s actions, little else could perturb him.
But, maybe the others were decidedly more interesting. Maybe they too were quite used to such high level saints at such a young age.
That said, that wasn’t a good thing, because they happened to be enemies of Dyon.
Saru Shruti and her Planet Mino members.
And Ulu Lebna and her Planet Nix members.
After their initial surprise, though, anger began to boil on the features of the patriarchs. They were completely blinded, and quite frankly, were about to make a very stupid move.
If they were at all intelligent, they would begin to think about where a genius like Thadius could possibly come from. Then they would think about how said genius, despite having every right to stomp over the entirety of this world tournament, was instead playing subordinate for Dyon.
Without a full host of information, anyone willing to think that far would immediately think that Dyon’s genius was also linked to this young man. And just one step further and they’d conclude that Dyon and Thadius must have a master capable of raising disciples on that level.
In the end, if such a master existed, would they really put anyone in this universe in their eyes? Much less the patriarchs of mere God level clans.
In any other universe, the God Clans here wouldn’t barely be fit to be Focus Academy level existences. But, these old farts were so used to reigning supreme over everything that they couldn’t even be bothered to think that far.
However, before the patriarchs could say another word, yet another wave of heat threatened to melt away the stadium. This time though, it held none of the beautiful violet that came with King Belmont. No… This time, it was like the golden blaze of sun descending the horizon.
In an instant, a middle-aged man with golden hair that looked like the fiery mane of a lion descended from the skies. To his sides stood two young men. The first was someone everyone recognized – the first rank of the foundation stage, Tau’s younger brother, Ur Aumen. The second was someone even more famous. The true rank two of the cumulative rankings, only behind Lionel Belmont, Tau Aumen.
It was clear that this middle-aged man, then, was their father. The head of the Royal God Clan of Planet Deimos – King Aumen.
“Young man.” King Aumen ignored them all, including Dyon, focusing his attention on Thadius. “Tell me, is your master the owner of Heaven’s Wine?”
A sudden thought seemed to materialize in everyone’s mind all at once. Who else could be his master if not for a hidden expert on that level?
Heaven’s Wine wasn’t an establishment held to only Earth. In fact, it was found throughout every planet in this universe. Many even speculated that it just might be found elsewhere in the quadrant as well.
Many had been looking forward to seeing the performance of this expert’s students, but none had seemingly chosen to participate. Or, maybe none had made it clear that they were his or her disciple.
The only true disciple of the Heaven’s Wine owner that Dyon knew was Iaachus. However, although Dyon hadn’t been out to look for him, he hadn’t noticed his presence at the world tournament either.
To everyone in attendance, if Thadius was truly a disciple of this expert, then it made sense why his other disciples hadn’t participated either. After all, if they were such high-level saints at a mere 30 to 40 years of age, this tournament would be nothing but a joke to them!
Thadius snorted, “All you need to know is that Dyon is the successor to my master, and therefore, for all intents and purposes, is my master.”
Thadius didn’t have much patience for people like King Aumen. Thadius’ previous actions had made it clear that he listened to Dyon’s commands, and yet this King Aumen still asked something so obvious. It was obvious that he was only asking because he couldn’t wrap his head around Dyon being so great.
King Aumen turned his attention to Dyon, boring his golden eyes and scanning someone he thought he’d be able to see through easily. ‘No cultivation? 2nd stage soul? That can’t be right…’
After witnessing Dyon fight Iris, King Aumen knew that it was impossible for this to be true. It was a fact that understanding wills boosted your combat prowess, so technically speaking, if you were masterful enough with your wills, even a foundation stage expert could beat an essence gathering expert who was weak in his wills.
In fact, it was possible to match up to even celestial level experts at that low of a stage, theoretically speaking. This was because will level fusions, if on a high enough level, could trump intents often times just like how even low-level supreme laws were worth investing in even if you grasped intents.
However, even if King Aumen accepted the possibility of Dyon having no energy cultivation, having such a weak soul would have made it too difficult to learn the wills he knew. Which meant only one of two things. Either Dyon’s body cultivation was that tyrannical, or, he had the ability to hide things even from him as a mid level celestial expert…
“Are you willing to tell me who your master is?” King Aumen faintly released his aura, trying to probe Dyon further.
Dyon smiled, “It’s no secret.”
The crowd waited with baited breath. Was he really about to reveal it?
“I’m the last disciple of the Celestial Deer Sect. However, I’m also the successor the Demon Sage Sargeras.”
The heart of Patriarch Pakal seized. This was a name written in the annals of Pakal lore. How could he not recognize such a name? The man who had sacrificed his everything for the hope of a better future.
Sargeras Pakal.