Maybe if they were a bit more vigilant, they could have at least disrupted the teleportation again. This would have resulted in Dyon's destination for them becoming skewed and them ending up far closer than he wanted them. However, when had these ancient times ever seen formations used in such a way?!
**
In the Viserion throne room, Veles sat slouched with a frown on his features. It had been hours since the elders were sent to pursue Dyon, yet there had been no results! Even worse, his dao formation experts had yet to come back from what should have been a simple task. What the hell was going on? Was this truly a plot?
As much as he wanted to go out himself, he couldn't act as recklessly as he had in the past. He was a King now. He had no choice but to act as such.
Considering there hadn't been any emergency flairs sent up, there were only two possibilities. One, the entire Viserion army had been wiped out. Even if Veles was beaten to death he wouldn't believe such a thing. His Viserion clan was filled with fierce warriors, a measly barbarian clan couldn't stand up to them. The second was just that the mission took longer than any of them estimated.
His best opportunity to escape the scrutiny of his elders while also participating was to chase Dyon down immediately. He was confident that after his break through, his speed would be no less than Dyon's. However, he had no choice but to tend to Mina. It had taken hours before he finally coaxed the little beauty to sleep.
The truth was that this wasn't like those Chinese light novels with continents that spanned millions of miles across. Within the martial world, such large expanses of land didn't exist in reality and could only be found in artificially built worlds like the Epistemic Tower floors or Planet Earth after it was forced to expand by millions of times, for example.
The universe didn't create such large planets naturally. As a result, it was quite easy for a celestial level character to fly around the circumference of a planet in less than an hour. As for dao formation experts, those who specialized in speed might be able to accomplish the feat in minutes, if not seconds should they specialize in the dao of space.
This was all to say that if Veles left now, it wasn't impossible for him to find where a fight was taking place. The problem was that Dyon would never remain in the same place because he understood this concept very well. How could Veles know that Dyon had used his former friend's high opinion of him to do exactly that?
Because Dyon had gone around in a large circle, he was technically still within Viserion territory. If Veles knew this, he might cough up blood in anger. However, there was nothing he could do about this now.
At that moment, an old man with a dignified expression walked in. He seemed completely normal, without any fluctuations of energy whatsoever, but Veles showed a rare sign of respect. He only showed this face to three people. Dyon, Dyon's father, and… His own father!
"Father!" Veles called out to the man who walked in, doing his part as the dutiful son and standing to greet him.
Old man Viserion waved his hand. He didn't believe he was at the age yet where his son had to help him walk. He was well aware that he could extend his life by thousands of years if need be. It was just a shame that he had only had a worthy son so late in life. But, he was gratified that he could watch most of his journey before he passed on.
"Little Veles, you're King now. What are you tearing up for? This old man still has many years left, stop treating me as though I have one foot in the grave."
Veles was actually feeling very guilty at the moment. His father had reached the otherworldly 11th stage of dao formation. If he broke through, he would gain another hundred thousand years of life and Veles would no longer have to worry about this old man of his anymore.
However, old man Viserion simply didn't have enough vitality left to do so.
The reason why only those with overwhelming talent waited until they were 18 to energy cultivate was exactly because of this. If your talent wasn't up to par, and you tried this method, much of your youthful vitality would be gone before you could cultivate more. However, if you tried to cultivate earlier and before your meridians were mature, your future prospects would dim, likewise. This was the balance that those without special constitutions had to weather.
Unfortunately for Veles' old man, he had fought a large battle about three decades ago. As such, he was forced to burn his blood essence which directly effected his vitality. If it wasn't for that fateful fight, Veles' father would have likely broken through to the 12th dao formation stage by now and could have been working toward the legendary half-step transcendent stage.
However… Instead, he was the fragile old man before him. Although he still had a few thousand years left of life, that was only if he didn't strain himself. The truth was that a few thousand years to someone who had lived hundreds of thousands was the same as a handful of years to a mortal…
This was why Veles had become King so early…
Veles found this quite depressing. He wanted to spend more years leading the helm of armies and being a grand general whose name shook the heavens. However, he had a responsibility to uphold and he couldn't let his father down.
It was obvious that with Veles' personality, he had exhausted all methods of trying to repair his old man's vitality. This search led him to excessively studying the Dragon Refining Arts to the point where he had reached the level he had today.
There was a simple reason he did so. The vitality of beasts far outweighed that of humans. They usually lived for longer and had a better connection with the universe. So, Veles cleverly thought that if he reached a high enough level of refinement, he would be able to share a small portion of his blood essence with his father. If it was potent enough, maybe he would be able to cure him.
In reality, this would harm Veles' talent and impair his ability to conquer the cosmos in the future. However, for your father, what sacrifices wouldn't you make?
This was why Veles was so pained by the robbery of their sacred treasure. The only reason their mere branch family had the original copy was because he had had a bet with the Viserion main branch on the day of the universe tournament.
With him being the winner, and the affair being so public, they were forced to hand it over, or else they would lose a lot of face. This was actually part of the reason they pressured the Ahpuch family to allow Luna to marry Dyon, because they were angered by the fact the Ahpuch had become witnesses to their promise with Veles.
Dyon stealing the Dragon Refining Arts was almost like sentencing Veles' father to death. How could Veles not be angry beyond belief? He felt like tearing that little vixen who stole it apart!
Here, those familiar with an expert's memory might wonder why Veles didn't just memorize the technique. The truth of the matter was he had… memorized the parts he could see.
The Dragon Refining Arts was a truly fascinating divine technique. According the Viserion family, there were 9 stages, each harder to reach than the last. But, when Veles received the book, he realized that there were 18 blank pages while only 9 had words on them! Even if you beat Veles to death he wouldn't believe that such a high level technique just had random blank pages on it.
Normally, he might have ignored this. Since the others of the Viserion long line had never seen what was truly meant to be on those remaining 18 pages, he should just take things one step at a time, no? However, the moment he broke through the major 6th to 7th stage bottle neck, he suddenly felt something special when he looked at the book. As though… It wasn't complete…. Like there was a mountain beyond the one he was climbing now.
When he broke through to the 8th stage, only one away from the supposed peak, the feeling became even stronger! How could he stand the holder of the secret being taken away from him when he was already so close?!
Not only had Dyon stolen his chance to save his father, he might have cut off his former friend's future! This was an irreconcilable event! This grudge wouldn't be settled so easily!
