'Yea, yea. You didn't mention how – '
"How it might evolve beyond a 10th grade supreme treasure if there was enough tribulation lightning?"
'Cocky prick.'
Dyon's eyes seemed to smile as he once again began to scan the treasure room. Suddenly, his eyes brightened.
"Is that a King level Reverse Scale?"
'Yes, but that reward is here for the Dragons, not you. You can't use it anyway.'
"I might have a way to, though."
'You mean with the technique from the second trial? You should be careful. The second trial was created using an odd time will path, but that doesn't guarantee that everything from that era is true. I have no doubt that the technique once existed, but it's possible that there might be some small mistakes lost during the creation of the second trial world. If there are enough mistakes, you could go into cultivation deviation.
'If I was able to communicate with you during the trials, I would have told you not to waste so much time on it. But, alas, I couldn't.'
Dyon pondered for a bit. But, he still felt that the technique was real. On the other hand, his runic vein theory was still too shallow to make an accurate judgement.
"I'll listen to you grand teacher, but only partially. I'll take this King reverse scale, but I won't use the essence blood within it for my technique until my attainments in runic vein theory are high enough."
The old man sighed, 'Remember that a reverse scale is no joke, especially one of a King level character. There's a reason why it takes a Dragon multiple scales to upgrade their own, much of the scale's efficacy is lost in the battle to assimilate it.
'But, if you're going to be stupid and make an enemy out of the whole Drago-Qilin lands, you might as well take the Half-Step Sovereign Dragon Soul instead, lest you blame me for cheating you again.'
Dyon's eyes refocused when he heard this. He had been staring so fixatedly at the King reverse scale that he almost missed the fact there was an even more powerful scale just nearby.
When his eyes landed on the finger length golden scale, he suddenly felt his heart stop beating. A roar that could have shaken the heavens resounded in his heart, causing blood to flow from his ears and his chest to contract and forcefully push blood out of his mouth.
Dyon coughed violently, spilling mouthful of blood after mouthful of blood onto the treasure room floor.
"What a bullshit reverse scale." Dyon raged. "You're already dead. Accept your fate."
Dyon had never seen such an overbearing reverse scale before. Although the Daiyu had handed him millions of them, they were all seemingly red and from a particular dragon race that couldn't stand anywhere near the level of this golden scale.
'This scale is from the Golden Dragons of the Drago-Qilin Lands. Much like the Crystal Dragons, they're a race born with Gold Dragon Souls and also happen to be one of the King God Clans of their quadrant.
'Even among Dragons and Qilins, their arrogance is on another level.'
Dyon stepped toward the scale, grabbing it with a fire in his eye.
The scale seared his palm, attempting to burn all the way through.
Dyon's Presence erupted in full force, bearing down on the scale. Although it couldn't match up to a half-step Sovereign Dragon Soul, this particular reverse scale wasn't attached to a Dragon or Qilin. This meant that it was far weaker that it would be should it be assimilated.
The rage of the scale eventually became docile, allowing Dyon to pick it up. Dyon knew that his Peak King Presence was only the equivalent of a lower King to middle King level Dragon Soul, so he was quite lucky to be able to take this half-step Sovereign Dragon Soul.
With a flash, the Dragon Soul disappeared into Dyon's [Inner World]. The fact Dyon could do this let him know that it wouldn't be long before the seals on him were undone, which was quite gratifying. Not having his soul to use felt particularly uncomfortable to him.
Originally, it would have taken 5 to 10 years to complete his Inner World, and that was because of his overwhelming soul talent. However, after his soul was damaged, the estimated time skyrocketed to centuries.
After Amphorae healed his soul, the time one again dropped down to about 5 to 10 years. But, that was when his Inner World evolved to an Ancient Inner World. Taking the characteristics of Ancient times, and even beginning to produce its own primordial energy, made his Inner World much more troublesome to form.
In the end, Dyon didn't know exactly how much time it would take. But, now, about 13 or so years had passed. Unfortunately, this wasn't an exact science. Even Dyon's more sure estimates deviated 5 or so years. He could only be thankful that the process seemed to be closing in on its end.
What he did know, though, was that once his Inner World entered the world formally, his power would increase to all new heights.
After taking his second treasure, Dyon once again began to look around. He had four more selections to make, so he wanted them to be as perfect as possible.
That was when he remembered that the Demon Sage's blood essence had always been difficult on him. Because of its dark and demonic leanings, he constantly had uncontrollable lust. Maybe he could find a blood essence to balance it out here?
"What do you think? Is there such a treasure here?" Dyon asked after explaining his thoughts to his grand teacher.
'To balance out the Demon Sage's blood essence?' The old man spoke thoughtfully, sinking into his own mind.
The very first time he had met Dyon, he had sensed the Demon Sage within him. Remembering the rampage the Demon Sage had gone on due to losing himself to the demonic path, Dyon's grand teacher couldn't help but worry for his little grand disciple. After all, Dyon's personality was much too similar to the Demon Sage.
However, after time passed, and he observed Dyon more, he began to see the error in his previous thinking. Although their personalities were similar, Dyon never despaired.
In truth, the losses the Dyon had suffered weren't any less than the Demon Sage already. He had lost his parents at a young age, he was forced to endure shame and misery at the hands of powerful clans, his entire world was quite literally destroyed by a menacing old lady. Yet, unlike the Demon Sage, Dyon didn't break.
Honestly, that was partially due to Dyon's master sacrificing herself to bring Dyon's mind state back from an unchangeable depth, but something told the old man that Dyon would have eventually climbed back out of those hells before anything too terrible happened. He just had too much confidence in Dyon's dao heart.
That said, it wouldn't be too bad of an idea for Dyon to mitigate the risk of the Demon Sage's bloodline. But, this would be a highly difficult thing to do.
For one, the Demon Sage was an incomparable talent, and his body cultivation reached the peak possible in this plane of existence. To find someone matching in this talent was nearly impossible.
Secondly, body cultivators tended toward the demonic path to begin with. So, not only was it difficult to find a matching talent, it was even more difficult to find a matching talent of a counter path.
Thirdly, there was the matter of quantity of essence. It was simply too rare for an expert to leave all of their blood essence back in a single place or to a single person. Usually, they would leave a drop or two in order to give their descendants a boost in talent or affinity. It was rarely enough to boost cultivation like what the Demon Sage had done for Dyon.
These three problems were a great hurdle to leap. There were definitely blood essences that might work here, but the quantity they were left in simply wasn't enough for Dyon who had already assimilated 32.2% of the Demon Sage's blood essence.
'Maybe…' The old man started, but suddenly paused. Shaking his head.
"What is it?"
'It's not possible for you right now… But it could be in the future.'
"And?..."
