Before Redding became a god, he could not have produced such an effect even if he had drained every bit of water element from his body. This was the greatest difference between divine power after becoming a god and elemental power before it.
Besides divine power, God's Domain was another crucial reason Redding had been able to trap Laius so easily.
After becoming a god, every God Level expert possessed God's Domain.
In a fight between opponents of the same level, God's Domain was next to useless. But against Saint Domain experts who had yet to become gods, a God Level expert's domain was an overwhelming advantage.
Those below God Level were all ants. Those were no empty words: even the weakest God Level expert could wipe out a whole group of Saint Domain experts with a wave of the hand.
Even at Peak Saint Domain, challenging a God Level expert across the gap was extremely difficult.
Within Redding's God's Domain, White Tiger Laius's struggles grew weaker and weaker. Redding raised his hand and closed it around empty air, activating the divine power in his Water Element Divine Clone. At the same time, he stamped his foot, and God's Domain expanded abruptly.
Two curtains woven from Water Element divine power unfurled at once. Together with the expanding God's Domain, they swept toward Vermilion Bird Nemo and Black Tortoise Bowen.
Thud! Thud!
Two muffled sounds rang out. Vermilion Bird Nemo and Black Tortoise Bowen were trapped by the water curtains Redding had formed from divine power without putting up the slightest resistance.
With God's Domain spreading over them as well, the two Divine Beasts had yet to react before they followed in White Tiger Laius's footsteps, each bundled into a ball by a water curtain.
As a Fire Element Divine Beast, Vermilion Bird Nemo feared water far more than Laius and Bowen did.
Her scarlet feathers turned dark red as the water soaked them. Nemo struggled to spread her wings in the water, intending to gather flames again and break free of Redding's restraints.
On the other side, Black Tortoise Bowen also began to summon earth element, trying to strike back.
As for White Tiger Laius, the first to be trapped by Redding, he was now like a limp pile of mud, with no strength left to resist.
With a soft breath, Redding fixed his gaze on Vermilion Bird Nemo. A surge of spiritual power gathered into a sharp needle and stabbed toward her mind.
"Ah!"
The sharp spiritual power pierced her mind. Nemo shuddered at once and let out a piercing, agonized cry. Her eyes rolled back, and she passed out cold.
A God Level expert's soul attack landing on a Saint Domain expert who had yet to become a god was no different from an adult bullying a newborn baby.
Even a casual strike from Redding was enough to leave Nemo unable to resist.
However strong Vermilion Bird Nemo, a Super Divine Beast, might become in the future, she was currently only a Saint Domain expert who had yet to become a god. And the one attacking her was Redding, her eldest brother among the Four Divine Beasts, who had already become a god.
Caught unprepared by Redding's deliberate attack, Nemo was knocked unconscious without the slightest ability to resist.
Having dealt with Vermilion Bird Nemo, Redding did not forget to give the similarly trapped White Tiger Laius and Black Tortoise Bowen a soul attack each.
After all, a family-no, siblings-should all be together!
Redding sat down cross-legged beside the three unconscious Divine Beasts and began contemplating the Profound Mysteries of the Water Law.
Hazy water vapor enveloped the Four Divine Beasts in an instant, gradually concealing them in the mist.
Pain!
Pain, pain.
Pain, pain, pain, pain, pain!
As Vermilion Bird Nemo regained consciousness, she shook her muddled head, trying to set her brain right again.
A single soul attack from Redding had left her unconscious for a full ten days, but compared with Laius and Bowen, her recovery was already fairly quick.
White Tiger Laius and Black Tortoise Bowen lay beside Nemo, still unconscious, their eyes rolled back and their expressions frozen in the agony their souls had suffered from Redding's spiritual attack.
Shaking her head as she gradually regained consciousness, the Vermilion Bird saw Redding sitting cross-legged not far away. She instantly spread her wings, and a fist-sized fireball gathered at her sharp beak, aimed at Redding.
"Third Sister, it's me." Sensing the heat of the fire element gathering at Vermilion Bird Nemo's sharp beak, Redding spoke to stop her.
"Big Brother?"
At the sound of Redding's voice, the fireball Nemo had gathered immediately dissipated.
Her sharp eyes turned toward Redding, and her outspread wings trembled slightly, showing a trace of wariness.
Redding slowly rose and walked toward Nemo. "Third Sister, there's no need to be nervous. This is my Divine Clone."
As he spoke, Redding's Saint Domain True Body flew out of his Divine Clone. The Azure Dragon's body, several thousand meters long, wound through the air as water element constantly gathered around it, giving it something of an appearance that could blot out the sky and sun.
Seeing Redding's Saint Domain True Body appear and sensing that his Divine Clone gave off the same soul aura as his Saint Domain True Body, Nemo finally felt reassured, and her taut mind slowly relaxed.
Redding explained to Nemo, "When I became a god, I chose External Godhood. Although my Divine Clone looks different from my true body, their soul auras are the same."
Hearing Redding's words, Nemo nodded slightly.
Nemo had truly been frightened by Redding's Divine Clone. Only a dozen or so breaths had passed between Redding's attack and her losing consciousness, leaving her no time at all to sense his Divine Clone's soul aura.
Nemo never wanted to experience that despair of being utterly unable to fight back a second time.
About a day later, White Tiger Laius and Black Tortoise Bowen finally woke up, one after the other.
Enduring the pain in his head, White Tiger Laius asked, "Big Brother, how did you get so strong?"
Before Redding became a god, he had been the strongest of the four siblings, but the gap between them had not been great.
One-on-one, Redding could easily suppress any of the other three Divine Beasts, but defeating them would still take some effort, let alone fighting all three at once and taking down Laius and the other two Divine Beasts with ease as he had this time.
With his hands clasped behind his back, Redding raised his head slightly and gazed straight ahead and up at the sky at a forty-five-degree angle. "This is the power of a God Level expert. Without reaching God Level, one is an ant in the end."
As he spoke, Redding shook his head, his tone full of emotion. From the corners of his eyes, he glanced at Laius, Nemo, and Bowen, studying their expressions.
White Tiger Laius's eyes were vacant, Black Tortoise Bowen was lost in thought, and Vermilion Bird Nemo's eyes gleamed as she murmured the words "become a god."
Taking in the three Divine Beasts' reactions, Redding's lips curved up slightly. Time to add more fuel to the fire.
Redding stamped his foot, and God's Domain burst open. An indescribable force instantly enveloped Laius, Nemo, and Bowen.
The three Divine Beasts felt as though they had sunk into a quagmire, unable to move a muscle. The restraining force around them grew heavier and heavier, as if a giant python had coiled around them. Laius could even feel the bones throughout his body cracking.
"Hah... hah..."
Vermilion Bird Nemo, the only one of the Four Divine Beasts whose attribute was countered by Redding's, was also the most severely restrained by his God's Domain.
Nemo, who already liked fire and disliked water, wheezed constantly under Redding's suppression, her throat sounding like an old, broken bellows.
Of the three Divine Beasts, Black Tortoise Bowen was in the best condition. Black Tortoises were Super Divine Beasts skilled in defense to begin with, and Redding's attribute did not counter his, so resisting was naturally easiest for him.
While the three Divine Beasts struggled against their dear big brother Redding's elbow strike, Redding silently gauged their resistance to the God Level domain.
Fourth Brother truly lives up to being a Black Tortoise Divine Beast. With that defense, I'm afraid I won't be able to break through it easily even after he breaks through to God Level. Third Sister isn't bad either; she's held on this long even with her attribute being countered. Second Brother's defense is falling a little behind and still needs improvement...
Redding continued to ponder. The Four Divine Beasts each had their own strengths, and by working together, they could even fight above their level. In the original story, they had merely been unlucky and had refined only Lower Sovereign Sparks.
With their Fusion Innate Divine Ability, the Four Divine Beasts had barely managed to reach the Sovereign tier in strength, but their raw power had ultimately been their weak point.
With the experience of his previous life, Redding naturally would not set his sights on a Lower Sovereign Spark. He had to obtain at least a Mid-level Sovereign Spark, or even a High-level Sovereign Spark of Sovereign rank. Only then could he truly gain a firm foothold among the Sovereigns.