The deeper they delved, the more shaken the Four Divine Beasts became. Even Vermilion Bird, who was usually hot-tempered and reckless, began to grow uneasy. "No, if Orloff really has been manipulating us, we need to complete the Supreme God Mission as soon as possible. Not only that, we should spend more time with Uthred. Right now, he's the only Sovereign capable of standing against Orloff whom we can still rely on."
Black Tortoise spoke gently. "Actually, since the Sovereign of Death is also caught up in Orloff's scheme, she'd make a good ally. Unfortunately, her likes and dislikes are hard to change. We've just offended her, so she won't believe us. If the Sovereign of Death rejects us, that means the Sovereign of Life will, too."
The chief suspect in this elaborate conspiracy theory, Orloff, naturally knew nothing about it. He was still frowning as he pondered. "Iluka, what am I supposed to do with you?"
Just then, Augusta's voice rang out in Orloff's mind. "What else? Lure him out and kill him. Do you think that Desterie will protect him for the rest of his life? Hmph. You should have pulled up the weeds by the roots instead of leaving trouble behind."
Orloff sighed. "At this point, it's not what I want."
The sun and moon endured, but time flew by. In the blink of an eye, ten thousand years passed.
For the first hundred years, Desterie had a truly miserable time. During his frequent battles and training sessions with Iluka, the backlash from Strong Luck's side effect brought him one misfortune after another. His troubles included, but weren't limited to: choosing an attack path that happened to run straight into Iluka's Sovereign Artifact longsword, which pierced him through; failing to control his Destruction Divine Power when taking off, causing it to explode inside him—which made Desterie very relieved that it hadn't been Sovereign's Might; and, just as he finally formed a powerful attack, a spatial rift conveniently appeared, swallowed it, then vanished just as quickly, leaving him to face Iluka's full-strength blow...
There was so much to it that he could talk for three days and nights without running out of embarrassing stories. He truly suffered defeat after defeat, only to keep getting back up and fighting, making Iluka seriously doubt how much progress Desterie had made in understanding the Destruction Rule.
As for the Fate Sovereign Clone, its strength was unrivaled in the Material Plane. It spent its time either meditating with the help of Faith Power or wandering among mortals to comprehend the Fate Rule, so it suffered no misfortunes. However, whenever it had an insight, something would interrupt it or its thoughts would inexplicably wander off, causing it to fail. During the first hundred years, it made no progress at all.
But Desterie had never regretted it. There were countless people who would have envied him for trading a century of bad luck for a Sovereign's body.
One other thing happened during that first century: Diting, the Intermediate Sovereign of Death, sent her Sovereign Envoy to deliver a Sovereign Artifact and Sovereign's Might.
The Sovereign Envoy brought a Spatial Ring and a Sovereign Scroll. After meeting Desterie, he ignited the scroll, summoning Diting's Energy Avatar. Diting was a strikingly beautiful woman with long black hair that spread across the floor. As they talked, she often seemed to hit upon Desterie's thoughts exactly, making their conversation quite comfortable for him.
Through his conversation with her, Desterie also confirmed something about the Supreme Artifacts.
At present, each of the Four Rules Sovereigns had a Supreme Artifact suited to their respective attributes. Orloff had a soul-defense Supreme Artifact, while the other three had Offensive Supreme Artifacts.
As for Augusta, at least publicly, he didn't have a Supreme Artifact. Regardless of whether Augusta had obtained the Fate Offensive Supreme Sword, Desterie could infer that the Supreme God Mission he was currently completing was the one that would allow Orloff to acquire the Supreme Material Defense Artifact, Augusta Garden.
Finally, Diting removed her ownership mark from the Spatial Ring, left it with Desterie, and dispersed her Energy Avatar.
After Diting left, Iluka said, "Diting is a divine beast of the Death and Earth Elements. She has a special talent for hearing people's thoughts. Back then, she also coveted the Lowgod Sovereign Sparks of the Earth Element. Bowen's was one of them, as was Komodo's, but she never managed to get either."
"Hearing people's thoughts—reading minds? She can do that to Sovereigns, too?" Desterie asked in surprise.
He knew that Sovereigns could probe the memories of Saint-level beings and those below, and that experts in the Death Rule could even probe the memories of gods. But he'd never heard of anyone being able to probe a Paragon's or Sovereign's memories. Listening to their thoughts shouldn't be possible, either.
If someone really could read a Sovereign's mind, wouldn't the secret of Orloff and Augusta sharing one mind have been exposed long ago?
Iluka shook his head. "It's not that exaggerated. She can use it on Sovereigns, but all she can hear is their likes and dislikes, or whether they're lying."
Desterie smiled. "Even so, it's incredible. You really are a Paragon from the dawn of creation. You know a lot of secrets."
After the first century passed, Desterie's luck finally returned to normal. With the torrent of Faith Power, his comprehension of the Fate Rule began to advance by leaps and bounds. Until recently, when he could progress no further, he had reached a state where it seemed he could take that final step at any moment and become a Paragon.
On the snow-covered Domain of High Heaven, Desterie's Fate Sovereign Clone was just about to enter the Spatial Turbulence when a vast amount of Fate Sovereign Power suddenly appeared and began to gather frantically. In the end, it coalesced into a kindly old man with white hair and white eyebrows.
"Lord Orloff?" Desterie was astonished. He never expected Orloff to "deign" to visit him.
"Haha, what's wrong, Desterie? You don't welcome me?" Orloff smiled kindly.
"Of course I do, Lord Orloff. Please, have a seat!" Desterie hastily ushered him in. He took some fine wine brewed in a mortal empire from his Spatial Ring and poured Orloff a cup. "This wine is a specialty of my home plane. It may not be fit for a grand occasion, but it has a flavor all its own."
Orloff picked up the cup and drained it, then fixed his gaze on Desterie. "Desterie, ever since Angnak died ten thousand years ago, the Angnak Continent has been left without a ruler. It's still waiting for you to return and take charge. You don't intend to stay holed up in this little Material Plane forever, do you?
"If you're worried that I'll hold a grudge and feel uneasy, there's no need. Ten thousand years ago, I was so enraged that I wanted to kill Iluka. But once my anger faded, I realized that rage and killing wouldn't solve anything. Bring Iluka out, and we can talk it all through.
"Besides, the second round of the Plane War has already begun. You should plan and take charge of it from a Sovereign's perspective.
"We lost the last Ten-Win Streak, but Sovereigns live forever. We'll have plenty more chances. We can take our time planning and striving for another Ten-Win Streak."
Before you continue