Locke was naturally well aware of this method of relaying messages.
It was just that in the past, his strength had been insufficient, and he had been unwilling to risk exposing his own information through the divine-level messengers carrying communications.
But now, things were different.
He had already become the most powerful Sovereign beneath the Four Rule Sovereigns.
Even if information about him were exposed, it no longer posed any real problem.
"I understand, Lord Locke."
Oakes nodded.
As the only liaison between Lord Locke and his subordinate forces, every time a message needed to be delivered—or whenever Lord Locke required something—it had always been Oakes running back and forth alone.
Each trip would almost always consume nearly a thousand years before Lord Locke's will could be conveyed to the others.
But once an intelligence division was established, Oakes would finally be freed from that burden.
The next time Lord Locke issued an order, he would no longer need to put aside matters of the Sovereign Army just to relay it personally.
Moreover, once the intelligence division was in place, there would no longer be any need for Oakes to personally travel across the various planes to collect the Divine Beast blood essence and heavenly treasures gathered by Lord Locke's subordinate forces.
Those forces could simply deliver everything directly to the Netherworld.
It would be far more convenient.
After Oakes left, Locke extended his divine sense into the interspatial ring and inspected the Divine Beast blood essence within.
After carefully identifying each drop with his soul power, a trace of delight flashed through his eyes.
"Excellent. This time, there are actually twelve drops of blood essence from Divine Beasts possessing innate space-type divine abilities."
"Six of them are species I've never collected before. They can be added to the 'Dijiang Bloodline.'"
"As for the other Divine Beast blood essences…"
After separating the twelve drops of space-attributed blood essence into another interspatial ring, Locke began analyzing the rest.
Although the innate divine abilities contained in these blood essences no longer offered much direct benefit to the growth of his own strength—
every Divine Beast was, by nature, a miracle born of the laws of heaven and earth.
Their innate divine abilities were direct gifts from the universe itself, representing fragments of its governing laws.
The more thoroughly he analyzed the innate divine abilities of a Divine Beast, the deeper Locke's understanding of the universal laws became.
Naturally, his attainments in magic formations would rise faster as well.
In the original timeline, after the Fate Sovereign Orloff obtained the Chaotic Spacetime technique derived by the Destruction Sovereign from the Four Divine Beasts' fused innate ability, he had initially possessed no clue as to how to advance further.
But after witnessing Linley's Sovereign Army's magic battle formation during the Planar Wars, a new train of thought had immediately opened for him.
In a very short span of time, he had created the most powerful technique in the Coiling Dragon Universe—
Transcending Samsara.
Why?
Because by the time he created the Samsara Golden Body, Orloff had already analyzed the blood essence of countless Divine Beasts and special lifeforms.
His understanding of the universal laws was arguably the greatest in the entire Coiling Dragon Universe.
Under such circumstances, once he grasped the principles of magic formations, he was able to rapidly convert his understanding of the laws into formation techniques, thereby creating a supreme move that surpassed even the fused innate ability of the Four Divine Beasts.
The same was true for Locke.
Over all these years, after analyzing so much blood essence from Divine Beasts and special lifeforms, Locke dared to say that, at this point in time, if he claimed second place in his understanding of the Coiling Dragon Universe's laws—
no one would dare claim first.
After the Divine Plane War and the Sovereign War, every Divine Plane and every Sovereign entered a period of recuperation and regrowth.
As a result, the Seven Divine Planes and the Four Higher Planes had all become exceptionally peaceful.
Aside from the occasional emergence of a genius or powerful expert that astonished everyone, most forces were quietly focused on consolidating and developing within their own spheres of influence.
As for the Material Planes, since the Sovereigns had already discovered the limits of faith energy, they no longer valued it as highly as before.
Thus, they recalled the soldiers of their Sovereign armies who had previously been stationed in the various Material Planes.
However, once those divine-level experts withdrew, the Material Planes were left without sufficiently powerful figures to maintain order.
Saint-level experts, acting in the names of gods, began waging large-scale wars for their own interests.
As a result, most Material Planes descended into war, division, and chaos.
Ironically, under such circumstances, the amount of faith energy the Sovereigns received not only failed to decrease—
it actually increased.
The whole thing was both amusing and absurd.
Still, heroes were often born from chaos.
The beings who had ascended from the Material Planes into the Divine and Higher Planes during this era were noticeably superior in both quantity and quality compared to before.
With the relatively peaceful environment of the Divine and Higher Planes, the transfer of power between old and new forces, as well as the conflicts between them, were far less intense.
And under these circumstances—
the Four Divine Beasts Clan finally began to step out of the Skyrite Mountains.
Unlike other clan-based powers, a large portion of the Four Divine Beasts Clan's members were limited by insufficient bloodline purity.
Combined with mediocre talent, many remained trapped at the Saint level and dared not venture outside for fear of danger.
Thus, lacking any other form of entertainment, the clan members became highly enthusiastic about one thing—
producing more descendants.
As the lowest-level beings in a Higher Plane, Saints had a vastly higher chance of conceiving children compared to gods or Sovereigns.
Over several hundred thousand years, the population of the Four Divine Beasts Clan multiplied several times over.
And it was precisely at this time that the Four Divine Beast Sovereigns—the clan's true progenitors—finally perfected the Bloodline Baptism Secret Art.
This secret art could condense the blood essence of the Four Divine Beast Sovereigns into Bloodline Stones.
Whenever needed, these Bloodline Stones would be placed into the Ancestral Baptism Pool, allowing clan members to enter the pool and absorb the Divine Beast blood essence of the Four Sovereigns.
As a result, more than seventy percent of the clan members who underwent the ancestral baptism would have their bloodline purity elevated to the level of third-generation direct descendants.
Their cultivation talent would undergo a heaven-shaking transformation.
At the same time, once their bloodline concentration reached the required standard, the majority of clan members would become divine-level experts upon reaching adulthood.
With this, the Skyrite Mountains were no longer sufficient to support the continued expansion of the Four Divine Beasts Clan.
Under the leadership of the clan's stronger experts, a portion of the clan members began leaving the Skyrite Mountains and spreading outward into Hell.
Many major powers were well aware that the Four Divine Beasts Clan were descendants of the Four Divine Beast Sovereigns.
Thus, most of them avoided conflict whenever possible.
Likewise, since the clan itself still lacked sufficiently powerful experts, it had no intention of provoking those major forces.
Both sides maintained an unspoken understanding.
Under these circumstances, the Four Divine Beasts Clan gradually began to establish a stable foothold in Hell.
"…Sigh."
Outside the mist in the deeper regions of the Netherworld Mountain, Celes let out a sigh, his expression rather unpleasant.
After all these years of repeatedly venturing into the deeper mist of the Netherworld Mountain Range, he could feel himself improving ever so slightly each time.
For others, sensing even such a small improvement would naturally be a cause for great joy.
But compared to a certain someone—
Celes felt utterly inferior.
Even after more than a hundred thousand years, he was still only a Six-Star Fiend who had fused three Profound Mysteries.
Meanwhile, Mila had already grown into a Seven-Star Fiend who had completely fused four Profound Mysteries.
Not long ago, Mila had even found the fusion point between her fifth Profound Mystery and the others.
What was Celes even supposed to say to that?
Ending his cultivation, Celes turned his gaze toward the other side.
There stood the encampment of the Sovereign Army.
Over the past hundred thousand years, many experts who had already reached their limit here—whether Five-Star or even Six-Star Fiends—had almost all chosen to join this Sovereign Army.
As far as Celes knew, within this force, even Three-Star and Four-Star Highgods were merely ordinary soldiers.
Only Five-Star Fiends could serve as squad leaders.
Six-Star Fiends could become company captains.
Seven-Star Fiends qualified as battalion commanders.
Experts at the Asura Prefect level could serve as vice commanders.
Of course, if one had sufficient strength, they could choose to challenge the army commander—
Oakes.
Upon victory, they would become the new commander of the Sovereign Army.
Those were Oakes's own words.
Moreover, according to him, once one became commander, they would gain the right to audience the Sovereign at any time and would receive a Sovereign artifact bestowed personally by the Sovereign.
Unfortunately, no new experts at the Asura Prefect level had yet joined the army.
Still, the army already had three battalion commanders with Seven-Star Fiend strength.
In addition, Celes had noticed something else.
This Sovereign Army seemed to possess two entirely different promotion systems.
Beyond meeting the strength requirements, there appeared to be another mysterious power.
This power could grant immense amplification to oneself and one's soldiers, allowing them to unleash strength far beyond their natural limits.
Alternatively, it could gather everyone's power and concentrate it into a single individual, increasing their strength dozens of times over…
Under such circumstances, certain individuals who were not particularly strong had nevertheless become company captains—or even battalion commanders.
Celes had personally witnessed a Highgod with only Five-Star Fiend strength lead tens of thousands of soldiers under his command and defeat another battalion commander who likewise commanded tens of thousands.
The strength of the soldiers on both sides had been nearly equal.
As for the commanders themselves, one was a Five-Star Fiend, the other a Seven-Star Fiend.
By all logic, it should have been a one-sided massacre.
And indeed—
it was.
Just not in the direction anyone expected.
Rather than the Seven-Star Fiend crushing the weaker side, it was the Five-Star Fiend commander's force that overwhelmingly routed the Seven-Star Fiend's army.
Even that Seven-Star Fiend had been unable to withstand more than a few attacks from the formation before being defeated.
And that was with everyone holding back.
Otherwise, that Seven-Star Fiend battalion commander likely would have been annihilated in a single strike.
Because of that, although that commander's personal strength was not especially impressive, the respect he received within the Sovereign Army far exceeded even that of the three Seven-Star Fiend battalion commanders.
(End of Chapter)
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