Desterie listened to Iluka tell ancient stories as if he were hearing a tale. Though Dalayer had also been born very early, she had come into the world after the Seven Great Divine Planes were created, when the Sovereigns' order was already established. She knew very little about what had happened before then. Besides, as a homebody, she really wasn't well informed.
Suddenly, Desterie thought of something and asked, "Iluka, you became a Paragon so early. How come you didn't manage to claim a Sovereign Spark when they first appeared? It's difficult for anyone else to seize one; a slight misstep means certain death. But for a Paragon, claiming a Sovereign Spark shouldn't be that hard, right?
"Back then, there were no Sovereigns, no Sovereign's Might, and no Sovereign Artifacts. Just your Willpower would have been enough to ensure no one could hurt you in the slightest. And your attacks would have killed or injured anyone they so much as grazed."
Iluka fell silent for a moment. "When the seventy-seven Sovereign Sparks appeared across the Four Supreme Planes, I wasn't a Paragon yet. I had no advantage over the other Asuras."
"Since we're already talking about it, why don't you tell us what it was like when the Sovereign Sparks appeared?" Desterie asked with a smile.
"If you want to hear it, I don't mind telling you. It was a very distant memory. I remember that the Four Supreme Planes had already come into being when I was born, and the Plane Teleportation Arrays had appeared as well. After becoming a god, I went to the Heavenly Realm to continue cultivating. It took me tens of millions of years to reach the level of an Asura.
"Back then, many people hadn't discovered the 'secret' of Fusion Profound Mysteries. And those who cultivated the Laws could continue growing stronger even after reaching Highgod, becoming powerful enough to easily kill Highgod experts who cultivated the Edicts. So many people respected and admired us Law cultivators.
"After that, I can't remember how long it was before the Four Overgods appeared, each in their own Supreme Plane. It was the first and only time I ever saw an Overgod." Iluka spoke as he reminisced.
"The Overgods?" Dalayer repeated. "Did they come to distribute the Sovereign Sparks?"
"That's right. The Four Overgods distributed a total of seventy-seven Sovereign Sparks, but they couldn't be used right away. They were just 'seeds,' mere stones that needed to gestate for ten thousand years before they could emerge. Back then, we didn't know what a Sovereign was or what a Sovereign Spark was. We only knew that a treasure personally scattered by an Overgod had to be the greatest treasure in the world. So everyone rushed to seize them, and the first wave of slaughter began. Many experts died then.
"Looking back now, a Sovereign Spark contains only Willpower and a few unique authorities. The Overgods could grant Willpower in an instant, so there was no need for such a long gestation. The purpose of that process was to make the competition as fierce as possible, so the Sovereign Sparks would end up in the hands of those who possessed both true strength and good fortune."
Iluka showed no emotion as he spoke. He had long since seen through it all and no longer cared much.
"No wonder Lady Vivian said that luck wasn't all they relied on," Desterie said with a sigh and a smile.
"Vivian did have some luck, or how else could she have claimed a High-level Sovereign Spark?
"You should know that the seventy-seven Sovereign Sparks were distributed according to a pattern. The Four Rules Sovereigns' Sparks were all located in the planes created by their respective Overgods. As for the Seven Laws Sovereign Sparks, each of the Four Supreme Planes had one Lowgod Sovereign Spark. The Mid-level Sovereign Sparks numbered five in the Heavenly Realm and three in each of the others, but the Laws they represented differed within each Supreme Plane. The High-level Sovereign Sparks of Water and Earth were in the Life God Realm, Light was in the Heavenly Realm, Lightning and Fire were in Hell, and Darkness and Wind were in the Netherworld.
"Vivian was a being born and renowned in the Netherworld, yet she managed to fight her way into the Life God Realm and claim a High-level Sovereign Spark. She truly had both luck and strength!"
"So the Sovereign of Life was born in the Netherworld!" Dalayer exclaimed.
Desterie, however, didn't think much of it. "I was born in a Material Plane, and I became a Sovereign all the same. Where you were born doesn't matter."
"Mm. The Four Supreme Planes were all incredibly chaotic back then, and too much happened for me to know everything. In any case, only after slaughter on a scale far more brutal than a Ten-Win Streak in the Plane Battlefield did the first Sovereigns emerge. Then the first Sovereigns spent a long time killing one another and going into hiding. It wasn't until the High-level Sovereigns came forward to suppress the chaos that things began to stabilize.
"Heh, that's more or less how it went. The truth was brutal, but it takes only a few words to tell."
Iluka didn't seem keen to continue the topic. Instead, he said bluntly, "I know that on the surface, you're asking about the history of the world's creation, but what you really want is to learn Orloff's secret. You really aren't afraid of dying. But as agreed, you have to beat me using a Divine Clone first. I remember that your Life and Death Divine Clones aren't very strong. Even if they possess Willpower beyond a Paragon's, they still can't beat me. Since you can't meet the condition of defeating me, don't expect me to tell you anything about him."
Desterie nodded helplessly and gave a faint smile. "You're far too cautious... Dalayer and I are planning to return to the Earth Divine Plane. You've been in the Mulan Plane long enough. Why not come with us?"
"That's right, Big Brother Iluka. The Material Plane may be peaceful and beautiful, but it's too small. We had no choice before, but now that we can go out, we should travel around more," Dalayer urged.
Iluka shook his head resolutely, refusing without the slightest hesitation. He looked past Desterie. "I have things to do. Look, hasn't that little girl Miaoli come to see her teacher again?"
The one approaching at the speed of an ordinary Highgod was none other than Desterie's niece, the girl Miaoli had rescued from the Undead Realm.
She was moving so slowly that even after Desterie failed to persuade Iluka once again and sped off toward the Teleportation Array, she still hadn't reached the edge of the plane where Iluka was.
Watching Desterie's retreating figure, Iluka murmured, "Desterie, I won't leave until I get the Destruction Sovereign Spark Orloff promised me. You rise to the heavens while I fall to the mortal world. We may be people, but we're fated to different lives."
The Earth Divine Plane was unlike all the other Supreme Planes and Divine Planes. It was a strange world with no oceans, its boundless continents stretching all the way to the edge of the plane, in a constant cycle of creation and destruction.
Thus, unlike continents separated by seas, the seven continents of the Earth Divine Plane were divided by two enormous mountain ranges that crossed through their centers and a vast, unbroken rift. Each continent was governed by one of the seven Earth Sovereigns.
The seven continents were Turo, Proda, Atra, Leiming, Manbo, Black Tortoise, and Anfis.
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