The other Sovereigns looked at Augusta in surprise. At first, they thought he was lying to try and gain sole custody of Ace to experiment on freely, but looking at the deadly serious and completely sincere expression on his face, they realised he was deadly serious.
It had to be remembered that aside from his power, Augusta was most known for his arrogance and tyrannical attitude. Even amongst Sovereigns, he was the only one who didn't have at least one friend, so their shock over Augusta's words should come as no surprise.
Unfortunately for the Chief Sovereign of Light, though it caused no small amount of shock, it failed to deter his fellow Sovereigns. As powerful as he was, the other Chief Sovereigns weren't exactly pushovers.
But when Blue Fire, Beirut, Ismarelda, Shinji, and Gitara all declared their intention to stand behind Ace and his friends, the expressions of the other Sovereigns all changed. They still weren't scared; after all, although they couldn't exactly be said to be on one side, they still had the overall numerical advantage.
Still, their shock only deepened. It was completely unprecedented for so many Sovereigns to be willing to back a single deity. Unfortunately, it only made them more resolved to get their hands on Ace and figure out what secrets he held exactly.
But that was when Orloff also stood forward under his disciple's urging, explaining that not only was Ace the captain and good friend of his only disciple, but he, Orloff, also owed Augusta a favour.
As the situation between the Sovereigns became increasingly tense, Ace remained completely unaware. All of his attention was on the changes that had happened to him. The first was the changes to his physical body.
Just standing there, he could sense that his body had evolved into that of a humanoid Apex Divine Beast at the Demi-God level, but that was without the use of his [Armament Haki].
As he coated his body in his new and improved [Armament Haki], Ace realised that his body jumped directly over the level of a Full God, leaping all the way to the level of a Humanoid Apex Divine Beast at the High God level – a truly impressive leap in strength.
The next change came in the form of his spiritual essence. Before his breakthrough, with the help of his Willpower-infused Golden Sun Manifestation, Ace's was nearing that of a Sovereign, but now, after regressing to the level of a Demi-God, the power of Ace's soul had reached the level of a paragon. And then, when his [Observation] was added into the mix…
Ace could only sigh as he felt his Divine Sense spread further than ever before. Right now, without the use of Willpower to bolster the power of his soul, Ace's Godrealm spread a little under a quarter of the Divine Light's side of the Planar Battlefield… that was a little over 10% of the entire Planar Battlefield.
To understand how impressive that feat truly was, it had to be understood that even a Lesser Sovereign could only, at most, cover half of the entire Battlefield.
Although there was still a large difference between the two, it could be said that they were at least in the same realms.
The third change came in the form of Ace's divine power. Ace's regression to the Demi-God realm hadn't been faked; he truly was a Demi-God now. But now, his former fire-type divine power had evolved into something else, something far more powerful.
Ace summoned a small ball of golden fire in his hands, and as he did, he watched as the space of the planar battlefield warped around it.
Although he was now a Demi-God, Ace's divine power was precisely 2000 times more powerful than normal Demi-God Divine Power.
It had to be remembered that a two-way soul mutate's divine power saw a tenfold increase in power, whilst the divine power of a three-way soul mutate saw a 100 times increase. Though there were no known four-way soul mutates, many theorised that their divine power would see a thousand-fold increase in divine power, but Ace's was actually double even that – it was simply terrifying.
Still, it was the fourth and final change that excited Ace the most. Previously, as a Full God, Ace only had a single unit of Willpower, but now…
Ace channelled his Willpower into his fist as he calmly thrust it forth.
On the floor beneath him, Killian and the others stared wide-eyed at Ace as his seemingly ordinary fist genuinely shattered the space in front of it for several miles.
Ace laughed hysterically as he realised his Willpower had multiplied five times over. That's right, Ace currently had five units of Willpower, and that was without the use of his Divine Ability.
He suddenly felt the urge to hurry up and find Muyan and Phueus' other emissaries so he could "thank them properly," but he didn't. Instead, he returned to the side of Amira and the others.
He knew how worried they must've been, and he could also tell that his pulling through had something to do with them; as such, the first thing he did after regaining his composure was thank them all and celebrate his survival, as well as the breakthroughs made by Killian and Julius who were now genuine paragons.
He no longer worried about the dangers of the Planar Wars. As it stood, unless a Sovereign descended, there was no one qualified to be his opponent anymore.
During the celebration, Julius told them that all of the Sovereigns were in a chaotic space watching them whilst discussing what to do with Ace.
Hearing that, Ace's eyes lit up as he realised that it was their spiritual essence he could sense. Although it was blurred at best, from the moment he awakened, Ace had been able to sense the eyes of others locked on him. He had his suspicions previously, but now he had his confirmation – he was capable of sensing the divine sense of Sovereigns. Yet another feat, which, by all intents and purposes, should've been impossible.
Aside from Ace, Julius' words caused Killian and the others to frown, feeling like no matter what they did, they just couldn't catch a break. Still, Ace merely sneered and said they didn't have to worry; they would be just fine.
They didn't know what Ace had planned, but they knew he wouldn't steer them wrong; as such, they were able to relax, even including Linley, Reisgem, Garott and the others who weren't members of the Golden Sun Pirates. They didn't realise it at first, but Ace's words had an almost magnetic effect.
Still, realising they were being spied upon, Ace and the others decided to speak using their divine sense. Because of that, Ace was able to explain what really happened to him freely, without any unwanted listeners listening in.
When asked if he was some sort of evolved soul mutate, Ace shook his head and replied, "Not exactly." He explained that although his new divine power was fundamentally based upon the fusion of the laws of fire and light, his Golden Sun Manifestation fusing with his Divine Spark allowed the fire and light energy to fuse more thoroughly than ordinary fused divine power until it became something new entirely…
Summoning his newly acquired golden flames, Ace explained that when this new energy formed, it proceeded to be recognised by the will of the universe itself. Those chimes everyone heard were precisely heaven's way of acknowledging this new energy, a new energy the heavens named "The Mandate of Pure Yang."
Ace explained that as the "creator" of the new Mandate, he received several blessings from heaven.
As they were all there when Ace experimented with his new power, they knew what he was referring to, but what they didn't know was that, whilst he was surrounded by those golden flames after his awakening, aside from the physical blessings he received, Ace also received information about his new Mandate and his current progress from heaven itself.
According to Heaven, unlike the other Laws, which only had six profound mysteries, The Mandate of Pure Yang had ten mandates. Of which, he had started comprehending six:
When asked what he meant by "started comprehending," Ace explained that because Pure Yang was the evolved version of fire and light, his previous comprehension of fire translated into comprehension of six of the ten mandates.
Unfortunately, though they had a lot of similarities, at the end of the day, Fire and Pure Yang were still different laws, so whilst he wasn't exactly starting from scratch, he was nowhere near the level of a paragon.
When asked about the specifics of his progress, Ace happily shared that the six mandates he comprehended were:
The Mandate of Pure Yang Essence – 45% The Mandate of Heat – 90% The Mandate of Explosions – 90% The Mandate of the Spirit of Yang – 90% The Mandate of Warped Light – 45% The Mandate of the Body of Yang – 25%
And whilst he had become a paragon in the laws of fire, that only translated into a six-way fusion of around 64% of the ten Mandates of Pure Yang.
From that, everyone could understand why Ace's realm had dropped back to that of a Demi-God.
It had to be remembered that saints become Demi Gods after comprehending a whole profound mystery of their chosen law or fusing two mysteries over halfway, and to become Full Gods, one must comprehend a third of their total profound mysteries.
Unfortunately, Ace was still some distance from achieving that. Even so, all those present could tell that Ace was filled with nothing but excitement. And why wouldn't he be?
Everyone there was a genius-level talent who loved overcoming challenges and obstacles; if anything, they felt envious of Ace getting to face this all-new and completely unprecedented challenge.
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