When only a small portion of the bats remained in the sky, Neo stopped absorbing them, just as Kallen had expected, and had the Mad Pope stop suppressing the Ancestor of the Bloodthirsty Otherworldly Demon.
The Mad Pope offered no resistance. He understood what Neo meant, accepted being used, and tacitly agreed to restore this balance of mutual restraint.
This was something of a defining trait of the Mad Pope. This personality of his also hoped to "control" Neo, but he wanted to do it through preaching and persuasion, unlike the Ancestor of the Bloodthirsty Otherworldly Demon, who wanted to take direct control.
The latter was greedy to the extreme and barely bothered to conceal it, even subjecting his descendants to the perpetual risk of losing themselves through the "Ancestor's Whisper"; the former was like a "spiritual aristocrat," disdaining crude methods, respecting the process, and even willing to disregard the outcome.
This was not merely a triangle of power, but a moral triangle as well, because it was impossible to imagine the Mad Pope ever willingly joining forces with someone like the Ancestor of the Bloodthirsty Otherworldly Demon against Neo.
Once everything was over, Neo dropped to his knees, braced both hands against the ground, and gasped for breath. Surges of power spilled out of his body, only to be absorbed again the next instant, like someone who had overeaten trying his utmost to suppress his physical discomfort.
"Not enough... still not enough... it's still not enough..."
His power had increased, but this simple accumulation of power still could not produce the qualitative leap Kallen had achieved upon completing his Divine Revelation.
If they fought to the death, at most it would make it slightly harder for Kallen to execute him by cannon fire.
*Wasn't this fucking just giving Kallen