Chapter 2557: [Bonus] Honey Trap

[Bonus chapter courtesy of Fire2112 (aka Firemonster) <3 2/6]

'A honey trap?' Leonel almost wanted to laugh. Truthfully, sending a Pure-Blooded Spiritual was quite "sincere" of them. Most of these people thought that humans were scourges to Existence itself, trying to lure him with a Pure-Blooded Spiritual meant that at least some of them weren't so set in their ways.

A Pure-Blooded Spiritual couldn't be created in the traditional sense. In fact, a Pure-Blooded Spiritual could be born even from a pair of parents without the Pure-Blooded title. In this way, they were completely analogous to the Chaos Demons, and they were creatures on the same exact level.

With that sort of comparison, one could imagine how highly regarded they were. Regnier was probably seething that his people were actually trying to do this after he was so publicly destroyed.

Unfortunately, even if this woman was more beautiful -which she wasn't-it wouldn't be able to change even a single thing.

Of course, Leonel was likewise reading a lot into the simple action. The words were benign enough, and the woman was dressed quite conservatively, not even her shoulders were exposed, and her sleeves even covered much of the back of her hand.

It was just that Leonel's Dream Force was on a completely different level now than it had been in the past, and they had sent a girl that was of the junior generation for obvious reasons. From his probes, she was only the Seventh Dimension and hadn't even formed a Life State Force yet.

How could she hide her intentions from him?

Since the girl wasn't too overt with it, Leonel felt that there was no reason to be too rude to her, but he also didn't play into it.

He had some sympathy for the girl because it was doubtful that this was her choice, but at the same time, it was obvious whose feelings he'd choose between a stranger's and Aina's. He would rather be a little colder to draw a clear line, than to harm Aina, even superficially.

Plus, these people were idiots. Had they not clearly heard him insult several Demi-God women for the sake of his Aina? What was sending a Pure-Blooded Spiritual going to do? Then again, maybe this was the highest rank of people willing to lower themselves like this.

Either way, to the girl's words, he only nodded and went back to his thoughts.

The girl maintained a polite, though a hint of relief and disappointment flashed in her eyes. They were the same rainbow color as her hair, changing colors and moving like the clouds.

In the end, Leonel sighed to himself.

'If I don't trade for it here, where else would I trade for it? There's no way I'd be able to find it in the Human Bubbles, and if I venture elsewhere, I might die before I know what was happening...'

"I've made my decision. Please exchange a mature Ninth Dimensional Evolution Ore Mine for me."

The young woman's eyes flickered with a hint of surprise. This wasn't a low-cost exchange, certainly not. There were probably only a few thousand such deposits in the whole of Existence. There was no doubt that this was a valuable exchange...

It just wasn't as valuable as they were probably thinking. It made her curious about what Leonel was trying to do with this mine, but it wasn't really her place to ask. She wasn't even really supposed to be here; her Pavilion had pulled some strings and caused this to happen.

After fumbling around a bit because she was clearly unfamiliar with using these controls, she eventually found what Leonel wanted and exchanged it for him. Soon, Leonel had an orb with a world inside of it and was ready to leave.

The girl gathered up her courage, speaking before Leonel left. It seemed that she had to say these words, or else her elders would scold her for not trying hard enough.

"My name is Lyra Emberheart; it's nice to meet you. I hope to see you at the gathering."

Leonel planned to give the young woman a glance before he left without a word, but the mention of a gathering caught his intention.

He went through his information and he frowned.

This gathering was known as the Gathering of Kingdoms. It was a weird name considering only a small fraction of those participating could actually be considered as such, but it was one steeped in tradition so no one changed it.

The first Gathering of Kingdoms had been held by the God Beasts many years ago, and their purpose was for the sake of finding the subjects they wanted to take in to pass on their bloodlines to other creatures. This had, of course, created the Northern Star Lineage Factors.

These days, it was a method of balancing power. The so-called "Kingdoms" were being powers not ruled by Gods or Demi-Gods.

Everyone knew that Existence was running on a finite clock and many were taking steps to try and manage that.

To take a complicated list of rules and make them simple, the harsh truth was: those that lost this gathering had their Bubbles destroyed and turned into energy that dispersed into the wider world. This chance would also give those beneath Demi-Gods to forge Demi-God-level Worlds, and thus evolve their race.

Essentially, the largest hurdle to a Race becoming one of the Gods could be boiled down to the environment. God Bubbles were simply on a completely different level.

Of course, this wasn't the only thing that was needed, and there were a few powers with Demi-God worlds that weren't ruled by Demi-Gods at all. That said... all Demi-Gods were created from Demi-God Worlds even if not all Demi-God Worlds had Demi-Gods.

All of this said, the Human Race was actually immune. The Dream Pavilion was like a badge of protection, and they didn't need to partake in this... culling. It could be said that this was the only reason they had survived for so long.

However...

Leonel's eyes narrowed as he vanished without a word.