Chapter 1186: The Situation

The second problem they had to solve on their agenda was slightly less pressing, and that was the issue regarding their Rank Up. It was mixed up with the previous Event and scuffle with the AI, so it had ordained them a tough task to clear the entire Divine Realm of the Grey Rot in order to reach Rank 6.

Rank 6 would give the Evil Trio access to Origin Grade Source Origins, allowing them to fight Semi-Origin Gods who currently had Energy Suppression on them. It would also translate into a very nice boost to their various fighting abilities, but even more importantly their Tradeskills, especially Draco’s.

Listing all possible benefits to Refinement could easily encompass 2000 words, but suffice to say that the extra assistance would let him climb to a new level.

Theoretically, it was not exactly impossible for the Evil Trio to clear the entire Divine Realm, albeit the time they would have to invest would be anything but short, but they simply did not wish to do that… at least not on their own.

The ascended playerbase would have to fight the Grey Rot back to its source through grinding, then participate in the first Divine Realm Grand Raid Battle versus the source of the Grey Rot. After that, they would begin rebuilding the ecosystem as well as the society of the Divine Realm using their various foundations from the Main Plane.

After the establishment of a preliminary ecosystem, it would be time for what should have been the same thing on the Main Plane pre-ascension, Guild Wars!

All player factions would split up into pantheons with various players taking their pieces of land and fighting for expansion, for mortals to worship and generate Faith Energy, and more. This battle would span both the Divine Realm and the Main Plane, forming the core of the late game content.

The current plotline was something neither the players nor the Evil Trio had ever encountered during the previous timeline when they had been stuck at Rank 6. They even guessed all this through a mixture of precognition and basic calculation based on their familiarity with the AI as well as information revealed so far.

This plotline was too well designed and was also something they needed to hone not only players, but their own core members as well as themselves. The Grey Rot was an omnipresent foe that could help players master the rules and usages of Laws, and the feedback that was growing between the AI and players would see players begin to gain comprehension bit by bit.

In fact, this was also why classes would be predetermined for players through their allocation of points. Your class would natrually morph into your Law so if you were not truly compatible with it, you would only suffer in the future.

This put the Evil trio in a tough sport because they didn’t want to clear the Grey Rot and they couldn’t yet, but they also needed to hit Rank 6 otherwise they would be vulnerable against Semi-Origin Gods, of which many factions present in the Divine Realm now had.

Don’t look at how they beat poor Ratipreme, that guy underestimated his foes, had shit Laws and was a coward at heart, so his ending was natural. Against a Semi-Origin God with an offensive Law, the Evil Trio would truly be helpless and might even perish.

The third issue was the matter of their territories and population. The Vita Kingdom, the Ancestral City of Dragons and now, this Divine Umbra Church were their three official and notable territories.

The Vita Kingdom was their base territory that had stringent requirements for upgrade due to its immense foundation, so even becoming an Empire was difficult, much less a Divine Empire that could tie its patron gods to its territory and even benefit the attached pantheon in the Divine Realm.

For Vita to upgrade, it needed to create one capital city, four high-grade cities, 20 mid-grade cities, and 50-low grade cities. Towns and villages were optional for Vita alone due to the nature of its progression.

And the nature of its progression was the precise problem. Vita Kingdom’s Capital City was not a normal city because it could freely and near infinitely expand its borders using the Aether Conversion Orb. A city like that, how could it need to generate subsidiary cities when theoretically, it alone should be enough?

In the original conquest and repopulation plan, the Evil Trio had intended to follow the path of top territories like the Ancestral City of Dragons by maintaining one massive territory with endless power.

This would allow the benefits of Vita Kingdom’s Capital City to cover the entirety of their territory – which was the entire Main Plane back then – and limit the need for multiple cities.

However, if the Evil Trio were planning to rely on this, it would take centuries to repopulate such a huge kingdom even if they forced everyone capable to procreate to go at it 24/7.

In that sense, the best way to achieve their plan was to accelerate time over a specific area and let a chosen few procreate and rush the growth process until a fully formed adult is born, then let them continue until the population shot up to grand numbers.

This plan would have been great back then but was futile now. Too many wrenches had been thrown into the plan and now, they would have to upend everything and go back to the drawing board to formulate a new one.

So, unlike the Ancestral City of Dragons, Vita Kingdom would have to walk the beaten path. The way to do this was to use continents as cities, rather than as… well, continents. As such, for Cario Continent, the Vita Kingdom Capital City would expand to cover the entire landmass as well as some of the sea area around it and that would be the limit.

For another continent like the Vareas Peninsula, a new city would be built at the center attached to the Vita Kingdom’s interface and then using the same method, be fitted with an Aether Conversion Orb, Aether Palace and the like, expanding rapidly to swallow that whole continent and its nearby sea area.

This would be the new layout of Vita Kingdom, which would soon transform into the Vita Empire. The main capital city would naturally be called Vita Capital City henceforth and the entire continent shall be its territory, meaning that the name ‘Cario Continent’ will be no more.

Its four main cities will be established on the four biggest continents in the new Main Plane which was expanded after Update 3, namely Gregario Continent, Pan Shu Landmass, Dong Hua Zone and Erethal Realm.

These four continents were only slightly smaller than Cario Continent and Cario itself was only so big because it was nourished by a recuperating True God turned World Boss that the Evil Trio had slaughtered.

Of them, only Gregario and Pan Shu had been cleared by the core members while Dong Hua and Erethal were still fighting back or had yet to be reached. As such, it was not time to implement this new plan yet, especially since Vita Capital City had not yet swallowed the entire Cario Content yet but was getting there.

As for the lower cities, there were hundreds of continents in the new mapped zones and more than enough of them to be fitted with the necessary cities for expansion.

Whether it was Vita Kingdom, the Ancestral City of Dragons which was populated by Dragons who were working hard to procreate more into the world and the Divine Umbra Pantheon they were currently seated in, it seemed like all it needed was… time.

Time for the core members to clear out the main plane and use the gathered exp to raise their classes to Rank 7 before upgrading to True Gods.

Time for the masses of the Main Plane to be reorganized, reeducated and assimilated into Vita’s fold by Sublime then allow them to expand further from there as a base.

And especially time for the Dragons to establish the city and spit out a few eggs which could be hatched by using a mixture of Vita’s benefits and the Ancestral City’s own mechanics as well.

The fourth and final problem had to do with the situation regarding the Lineages as well as players. The top 3 had been reclaimed and established by the Evil Trio, even gaining small worlds where they could grow wantonly and prepare for the future war with Primordials as well as the takeover of Earth.

The others were in a limbo state of freedom and chaos, after the Pangu Lineage had been cleared and the top three had been reshuffled, knowing it would be their turn soon. The bottom three were scattered to the wind and hard to gather in one place due to various difficulties.

As for the players, they were currently in turmoil and chaos as the extinction Event was still ongoing with the Supreme Faction representing Vita and Umbra as well as the Power Faction representing basically everyone else.

Many accounts had been zeroed then deleted, forced to restart amidst wails of lament and regret, while many others had gone from kings to paupers, forced to live ignoble existences in the game.

Even so, an influx of new players were still rushing into the game and especially so right now when there were rumors of stat feedback to reality abound, right after Item projection had been unveiled. Governments, corporations and more were flocking to the game with frothing mouths, seeing potential for investment and power changes here.

They couldn’t keep being suppressed so the war would have to come to an end in order to let them continue to develop, otherwise who would be able to ascend with the wall that was Umbra and Vita in front of them?

In fact, they precisely needed Umbra and Vita to ascend, and this was a fact. Whether it was the Lineages or the players, it seemed the problem was that they needed space and support to grow as well as… time?

Huh, would you look at that.

The Ilah, Morrigan and Anansi Lineages basically existed in name only now and their inheritors would have to be dug or, preferably, find their way in front of the Evil Trio.

Whatever the case, with the war between the Lineages having been settled, the top 3 could give all the other Lineages some support and reconnect with them, preparing for the huge moment when all 9 original humans would be fully ‘reincarnated’.

Looking at it like that, Draco seemed to see the path forward and what he had to do now. There was a lot on his plate and personally, he also had to consider the problem with his Eternal Chaotic Bloodline’s poor energy conversing rate, his need for perfecting Control as well as his need to practice and master Refinement as it was a unique power he could also use in reality if need be.

And that was not even taking into account his swordsmanship which was being upgraded by his Innate Technique Generator to match his current realm in control as well as to make the most of Divine Energy which he now had access to.

Then there was his Subjective Magic which had proven to be more than useful after coming to the Divine Realm, quite possibly his most important ability yet. He had to bring it to the True God Realm to coalesce it into Law and take it to a level Richmond might have only ever dreamt about.

And most importantly, Draco had to actually sit his ass down and spend time with his family, behaving like a qualified husband, father and patriarch to the people of the Morningstar Clan in the Morningstar World.

This might quite possibly be, the most important task he had to achieve, much above everything else.

With this in mind, the young man was no longer confused, walking into the boundary of the Divine Umbra Pantheon along with his wives who were already within and chatting.

Draco smiled as he watched them. Since time was the solution to every problem they faced, then he would patiently wait until things reached a point when he could fix them.

With this thought he closed the door to the church.

10 years within Boundless – 2.5 years in reality – came to pass.