Now that Abaris and all his subordinates left, the awarding ceremony could continue, to Daimon's surprise the purple haired girl Sarah, who is also from the upper echelon of the Purple Haze's sect, stayed behind.
She didn't even look angry considering how bad Purplehaze who is her cousin got beaten up, instead she rose her cup towards Daimon as if she was offering him a toast as she smiled.
'What a strange girl', thought Daimon, considering how bad Cassy reacted when she saw that purple haired girl greeting Jasmine, there must be some past history between those three, but that could wait, right now he wanted to end this ceremony thing.
It would be a lite to say he wasn't excited to get his rewards from all those treasuries, Daimon, Mellie, Daphne, Jasmine and Aurora got up the stage and then continued from the moment they were interrupted before.
Daimon stood there on the stage in the middle of the three princesses, while Aurora said.
"Besides the permission of a free pick from my Light Palace sect, I hereby declare that from this moment onwards, Gabriel will be granted the status of young master of the sect, and will be treated with the same respect you show me".
Aurora's words took all the spectators by surprise, well almost everyone but Underwood who already expected something like this to happen.
Unlike the Mermen Sea where nobles existed, in the Elemental Sea they followed a different system, in a sense they gave more opportunities to those who had no background, but had talent, instead of focusing on lineage mainly.
For example, Purplehaze who isn't related to by blood to the Shaman will most likely be declared the next Shaman, because he was the most talented in what darkness affinity regards, in the young generation.
That being said, normally the families that led the sects remained unaffected, with all the resources they had if their offspring wasn't decent, they could always raise another one, but the Light Palace and the Black Fortress couldn't.
Or more accurately Aurora and Abaris couldn't have more children, literally the continuation of their lineage depended completely on Jasmine, that's in part why Abaris wanted to arrange the marriage of Jasmine with someone he considered worthy of her.
And the title of young master was given to the one who will inherit the patriarch position of a sect in the future, and now such a thing was given to Daimon, not only that, there has never been a man with that status in the Light Palace, since their royal lineage is always conformed by women.
No matter what, they are always women, the one that marries the Matriarch of the Light Palace in turn, traditionally belongs to the Black Fortress and it is prepared by the previous Shaman.
But right now, everyone saw Aurora destroying thousands of years of tradition, maybe she didn't directly declare Daimon as Jasmine's partner, but it was clear for everyone that Purplehaze will neve be chosen, and now Daimon was similar in status, so it wasn't hard to read between lines.
Let alone the spectators, even Jasmine was surprised by her grandmother's words, but she just slightly lowered her head and remained salient, while Aisha giggled on her seat, the Risha sisters on the other hand pouted.
'What a cunning grandmother', they thought as if they have forgotten about the fact that their mothers directly asked Daimon to take "responsibility" for them.
Daimon didn't pay too much attention to it, Aurora had previously said that she was going to give him authority publicly just in case, and while he could imagine what everyone was thinking he didn't care.
'Judging by those two's expressions, it seems the travel was worth it', thought Daimon as he looked at Heartstream and Stoneheart, who seemed to have taken a decision.
In part Aurora asked him to mount all this show to break the chains Abaris tried to put on Jasmine, since even if she would have rejected Skyflame and Purplehaze, there were plenty of suitors.
But now to even think on approaching her, they will have to be better than Daimon, and that is virtually impossible as long as one belongs to the young generation, also now that the people from the sects had seen the abnormal "light" element of Daimon, they were way more receptive towards him.
The following was just the normal, after receiving his reward and the authority Aurora wanted to grant him, the celebration followed up, if anything Daimon found himself in a weird position because all the respective leaders of the smaller sects that were subordinated to the Rock Mountain, Sea Soul and Bamboo Forest sects approached to congratulate him and present themselves.
As someone who isn't fond of formalities this was a torture for Daimon, the girls limited to enjoy the delicious food, chat with each other and laugh at Daimon from time to time, as if they had reached a mutual understanding.
Daimon tried to leave a couple of times, but Aurora's gaze fell upon him as she sent him a message.
'I'll do the convincing regarding joining the alliance, it will be easier if you met their leaders even for a moment, "young master of the Light Palace", I'll take you to the treasury later so endure it for a bit', she said, making Daimon sigh.
He stayed behind and just absently listened to all the presentations, surprisingly Heartstream and Stoneheart brought their sons and made them bow and apologize, what a joke the silver haired youth easily destroyed the most talented members of the young generation of two seas in a matter of days, he was destined to become more outstanding in the future, and who wouldn't want to be acquittanced to such a talent, not to mention he technically was if not their superior their equal, being the young master of the Light Palace to whom they are subordinated.
Underwood just casually waved his hand at Daimon, his daughter was staying with him so there was no need for presentations anyway, but his wife did approach to say hi, she was like a grown version of Cassy, having that same light green hair and lively aura around her, that being said instead of her mother she could pass as her sister, which was probably related to the fact that her element is wood.
In fact, Daimon was confused about what was the difference between these Elemental races as they call themselves, and for example the Alfear or the Dwarves races to whom Tessa and Femi belonged, they also had a strong connection to their elements and yet it wasn't the same.
After presenting herself as "Camellia" and smiling the moment she mentioned she was Cassy's mother before thanking him for saving her daughter and her disciples during the beast hunt, she left and that was the end of Daimon's torture.
The girls saw Daimon practically disappearing after that and they giggled before they also returned to the castle, unlike previously Aurora told them they could also enter her treasury to see if they found anything that could be useful for them, she already gave Jasmine the best equipment she could find for her rank and affinity, which included a new staff and that dress she wore earlier after all.
…
While the party kept going and all the guests discussed Daimon's feats enthusiastically as he now was officially part of the Light Palace, the protagonist of those feats was walking through the corridors followed by a group of girls while Aurora guided them towards the treasury.
They soon reached an isolated area of the castle, anyone that was allowed to freely wander inside the castle was trustable for Aurora, but to reach this area you had to go through around ten or so security checks.
Aurora stopped walking in front of a huge white metal door, she used her token of identity and a drop of her blood as well as some kind of pattern password to open it.
The moment the gate opened Daimon could feel the excitement of Disaster from his inventory, if it wasn't by Narasha controlling the sword, the thing might have left by itself to find the delicious "food" it wanted.
That being said, Narasha shared some of Disaster's enthusiasm.
'There is something that will be useful for us inside thar room, Daimon!', she happily exclaimed, she got stronger along Disaster after all.
Daimon chuckled and then with Aurora's greenlight he entered the treasury followed by the girls, what was at the other side of the door was an amazingly large room, in a rough calculation Daimon thought it was at least four or five times bigger than the one of the Arcarius family.
Everything was perfectly labeled and organized, unlike Raymond Aurora had nothing to hide from Daimon, so everything was in full display, including the best treasures that have been legated from the previous generations.
Daimon's eyes immediately were drawn towards a purple horn that was placed on a pedestal, just by being there lightning mana was dancing around it along with some laws which Daimon couldn't recognize.
"I want that one for starters", he said as he pointed at the purple horn, making Aurora nod in an approbative way.
"You sure do have good eyes, that is the horn of a lightning cloud beast that once attacked this white hill, surprisingly it bypassed the defenses that were placed back then without anyone noticing, the Matriarch of that time then discovered that it cut the barrier with that horn, so after joining hands with the Shaman of that time we kept the corpse while the beast core ended up in the hands of the Black Fortress".
Daimon smiled it was perfect to be the main material for Aura's sword, once it was combined with the wind thing, he got from the Arcarius, then it will be the perfect conductor for her element.
As he expected the darkness affinity materials, he found weren't the best, which is understandable as they should be in the hands of the Black Fortress, on the other hand he was urged by Disaster to find what it wanted.
Daimon walked towards the end of the treasury followed by Aurora who had a curious expression on her face.
"There is nothing especially valuable here, these is equipment that was confiscated or brought back as war trophies, they are at most early Stellar rank and were created to be used by other people", she kindly reminded to Daimon.
She didn't mind giving him whatever he wanted from the treasury, in any case all of this will one day belong to Jasmine and then… in any case there was no need to look at the random things.
But it's not like Daimon wasn't aware of it, all these things indeed had lower law gathering capacities if they had any to begin with, but then when Daimon's hand accidentally touched a random shield and he could feel Disaster drooling over it.
"You want this really?", mumbled Daimon, the shield was nothing special, it was an early stage ranked treasure and it was really worn out, Daimon couldn't feel any special effect from the materials of which it was made.
Still he took it from the piles of treasures and then took out Disaster from the inventory, the moment the black sword was out it urged Daimon to let it destroy the shield, since Aurora didn't care about it, he just let go of the sword which then let out that ominous black aura with red borders that once tried to drain Daimon out of his mana and vitality a long time ago.
"Crack!!!", cracks appeared on the shield and then Disaster dived into the shield completely destroying, Daimon's eyes glowed as he saw Disaster actually devoured something out of the shield, but he didn't know what it was.
[Ding]
The sound of a notification woke Daimon out of his daze.
[Cosmic Weaponry's requirement has been updated]
[A weapon who has seen battles on par with the ones experienced by the host has been assimilated by the Soulmate Narasha, .0005% of the experience was successfully integrated]
[?????: Defeat one thousand long range weapon users to unlock, (0 à 500)]
Daimon raised an eyebrow at the word "weapon", this happened after Disaster destroyed the shield, so it didn't make sense, also he didn't know he could get the "experience" he required in this way.
'It's because Nasha lives inside Disaster, the system allowed it because that shield has seen glorious battles on par with yours, but the amount was penalized since you didn't have to defeat its owner and just destroyed it', said Evangeline.
Daimon wanted to reply that it was a shield and not a long-range weapon, when he suddenly saw a small brilliant object among the debris that used to be the shield, he crouched down to grab the thing and then frowned.
"This is a partially melted bolt?", he mumbled, he couldn't see this bolt earlier, so it was probably deep into the shield, he saw that the bolt started oxidating unlike the other parts of the shield, meaning Disaster absorbed this bolt not the shield.
'A bolt that has seen a million fights on par with mines but against long range weapon users', Daimon concluded.
The one who shot that bolt was probably an expert marksman, what surprised Daimon is the fact that the same bolt was used to defeat one million people, if not this wouldn't have worked, Disaster would have had to destroy the weapon that shot the bolt instead.
What kind of situation will force a marksman to use the same bolt a million times wondered Daimon, unfortunately besides the fact that this shield was confiscated from a bandit that was chased by the guards of the Light Palace after trying to break into the light crystal mine of the sect, there was nothing else she knew about it.
It happened a really long time ago and the shield was even older than the date if that event, Aurora could tell because of the runes used to engrave the arrays of the shield, that style was used on the age of foundation of the Elemental Sea, but that covered a large number of generations, so it would be impossible to when the shield was created.
Still Daimon was happy for this unexpected gain and also the capricious sword was satisfied with its meal, so it was a win-win situation, the material of the bolt was also unknown it's a shame Disaster destroyed it and now it was just a pile or rubbish.
The girls returned, most of them had smiling expressions while others were a bit depressed, meaning not everyone was lucky.
"We still have three more treasuries to visit so don't be disappointed so soon, you two", said Daimon to Leslie and Yvonne who were the most discouraged on the group, apparently, they couldn't find something for their mothers, Liliana was lucky because Heartstream's sect has given some decent things as tribute to the Light Palace over the years, so she found a nice resource for Anya.
The same applied to Mellie, Daphne, Chris, Cassy and even Tessa and Femi, their elements aligned with Aurora's subordinates, wood, earth and water, so they were able to get something useful, only two of the sisters were unlucky.
Daimon was going to use his two picks from the treasury of the Black Fortress, but the ones from the Sky Flare and Purplehaze's sects were bonuses, he already knew they didn't have incomplete emblems because Aurora audited them.
"Mm~", the two sisters immediately cheered up, previously they would have declined such a gift from Daimon, but seeing Aisha winking at them, they just gladly accepted the offer.
