Chapter 26: Chapter 29 – Victory!

Three months passed since the decisive battle with Lord Achilles.

Theseus spent his time traveling through the four territories, spreading his ideas and cementing Oceanus’s ideals in the hearts of normal people. All were welcome, but if they didn’t want to stay, they didn’t have to. Theseus nudged those on the fence in his direction if he saw their potential, but he let Captains and civilians scared of the change to go to Taurus, Darkin, or Scorpius’ territories.

These people were few and far between or were the self-serving Captains with too great of an ambition, like the past Aries before he met Theseus. Gemini and Leo traveled with Theseus and had fun seeing the new acquired land.

“By the way, what did you mean by Lord Virgo’s return?” Gemini wondered out loud one day.

Theseus took out the Virgo Shade Core.

“Look at it, the souls holding him back are dwindling. In a few more months, he will break free.”

“But, you said he will be serving us after his ‘exile’.”

“Of course he will. I’ve been stabilizing his Shade Core all this time. Why do you think I’ve been carrying it around with me?” Theseus scoffed.

“How in the world could I have known that? I thought you were just keeping it safe.” Gemini gasped.

“I could’ve just hidden it in my old cabin near the borderlands’ forests that only Leo and I know about, but Lord Virgo’s backstory is one of an idealist becoming twisted by his own Shade Core.

Using a Spirit Cultivation like technique mixed with the shedding of the bulk of the souls from the Shade Prison is stabilizing Lord Virgo’s mind more and more every day.” Theseus explained.

“How are you using the Spirit Cultivation on Lord Virgo?” Leo asked.

“I call it, ‘Spirit Imbue’,” said Theseus while waving his hand dramatically.

Gemini, who couldn’t hear Leo, looked at Theseus like he was Deity. How did he know what he was thinking? Maybe, he had a mind reading skill too. Gemini took more notes.

Under Theseus, Gemini was now at the S Rank Mortal Realm. His rapid growth over the past couple of years were a testament to Theseus’s long accumulating knowledge finally bearing fruit. If Gemini had cut corners in his foundation, he could’ve been a Captain with the extreme knowledge and work ethic he held, but he was patient, working step by step according to Theseus’s logical and methodical regiments.

Now that Gemini was on the cusp of the Sage Realm, Theseus decided to bring up the most important aspect of Aura Realms and combat power, your main skill.

“Gemini, have you put any thought to what your main skill will be yet? I gave you a list of your most proficient skills to choose from:

Spirit Rush,

Ghostly Projection, and

Water Barrier.”

“I’m well aware by now that your specialty is the Authority Path. I can get the most out of choosing Ghostly Projection. Plus, I saw you add a skill on top of that during your battle with Lord Achilles.” Gemini explained.

“Don’t just choose that skill because Aries and I know it. Choose the skill that you want to build upon.” Theseus warned.

“I’ve decided. Ghostly Projection is the skill I’ll primarily use in the Sage Realm and above. With my firm foundation, the skill has a higher potential.” Gemini responded.

“That’s a fair analysis young man.

Projection Swap is the skill I used to swap my body with the projection during the fight so the projection could take the damage for me.” Theseus got right down to business explaining the next step for Gemini’s skill practices.

Gemini wasn’t the alone in his improvements. Now that Theseus understood the true limit of his foundation, he wanted to take advantage of it. Those with weak foundations could use one or two skills at their equivalent aura realm a day, whereas those with stronger foundations could use five or more skills. The absurdity that Theseus displayed against Lord Achilles was seven consecutive trump cards. A trump card like Holy Judgement or Cornucopia Feast consumed all the aura of an F Rank Royalty Realm user. Trump cards and all out attacks used the full capacity of the user of the skill, making it so Theseus’s foundation was seven times its supposed realm.

In other words, facing Theseus was like facing seven F Rank Kings at once. He couldn’t use skills above the F Rank because of his realm, but his prowess wasn’t below the D Rank, as shown in the battle against Achilles. Against someone C Rank or higher, Theseus would still lose, however. The unfathomable, peerless foundation Theseus held now couldn’t overcome the physical limitations of his aura realm, but assuming Theseus continued to grow, he would become an even greater monster. Imagine seven C Rank Theseus’s attacking at once!

Taking advantage of his limits, Theseus thought about skills that could be used from his previous life. The ones he could think of were all uncommon mental skills. Since he had the equivalent of seven trump cards, Theseus thought he could take up these slots with strategic passive skills.

The rare skill: Parallel Thinking, was the prime candidate for Theseus. This was a F Rank Royalty Realm skill that took up the aura equivalent of one trump card and was an unusual and rare passive skill. Once used, Theseus’s foundation would shrink by one F Rank, but the benefits were obvious. Parallel Thinking split Theseus’s thought processes into multiple, yet equal, directions. Now, Theseus could exploit his mind in combat and normal thought by up to five times at once.

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Next up on Theseus’s list were some lesser skills to modify. The common Analysis skill used to appraise opponents was modified into the Skill: Soul Scan.

This skill could analyze opponents or others’ souls to see which Aura Path they followed and the limits of their Aura Realm as long as their Aura Realm was lower than his own. With such an advantage, Theseus could tell at first glance that Gemini had decided on Ghostly Projection before asking him because of the qualitative change in his aura.

Lastly, Theseus also wanted to take up one more trump card slot with another passive skill, leaving him with about five trump cards to be used in pure combat. There were two other rare skills he was in-between, Passive Insight, and Passive Perception.

Building upon his Soul Scan, Passive Insight would allow Theseus to casually discern motives, lies, and surface level inner thoughts. It was akin to mind reading.

The other Skill: Passive Perception, was the heightened ability of one’s surroundings. Little details Theseus would usually miss, hidden skills, smells, and sounds were all magnified under Passive Perception. It was akin to Theseus’s five sense undergoing a heightened transformation.

Because he already had the Soul Scan, Theseus thought it would be overkill to use Passive Insight, considering he already thought he could judge others’ potentials and motives fairly, much to Capricorn and Jezebel’s protests. Therefore, he chose Passive Perception. When his foundations inevitably grew deeper, he would pick up the Passive Insight skill as well.

The reason passive skills weren’t used often in the real world was simply because they were not useful in combat situations and were more important for research minded aura users. The massive boon of his two new passive skills, Parallel Thinking and Passive Perception, were that these skills were developed for scientists, not warriors. Theseus had a gigantic advantage over his peers, who would be hard pressed to use two trump cards in one battle.

***

A few days later, Theseus met with Aries and the head Oceanus officials.

“I have some important matters to discuss with you, Shade.”

“Do go on brat.”

“You dare call me brat after witnessing my battle with Lord Achilles?” Theseus boomed.

The meeting room went silent. The Captains and officials in the room looked around nervously, but the two friends burst out laughing.

“Come on, that’s not funny! Look at poor Centos’s face!” Aries cackled, at the expense of Centos.

Centos, who tried to pretend he wasn’t nervous, harumphed.

“Sorry everyone. Aries is sometimes a terrible influence on me.” Theseus admitted. Aries stuck his disgusting tongue out.

“Put that tongue away.” Theseus put a hand over his eyes. That was a sight no one wanted to see.

“Anyways, it’s time we talk about the elephant in the room, Lord Virgo.”

Instinctively, Aries’s joking demeanor shifted seriously upon hearing the mention of his old master.

“As I mentioned in the Oceanus Victory Speech, Lord Virgo will be coming back, and soon. I’ve worked for months now on a plan to rope him in when the Virgo Shade Core lets him free.” Theseus explained.

“Wait, wait, wait. What is the Virgo Shade Core?” Naiad asked, clearly out of the loop. Toby, the merchant director was also confused.

“When Aries defeated Lord Virgo over a year ago, he didn’t kill Lord Virgo but trapped him in this.” Theseus pulled out the core.

“When the skill wears off, Lord Virgo will return, but I’ve been working on stabilizing his Shade Core. Hopefully, when he is released, he will join us, and he will work as a Suzerain Lord in his old territory with my policies.” Theseus explained.

“Will the people accept this?” Centos daringly asked. Standing up angrily, Centos couldn’t believe Theseus would let Virgo have his territory back. He was once a Captain under Lord Virgo, and his life was now qualitatively better under Theseus. He didn’t want to go back under Lord Virgo’s tyranny.

“Calm down Centos. Once his Shade Core is stabilized, his personality should revert to what it once was. If it doesn’t I will kill him personally.” Theseus promised, and Centos sat back down.

“From now on, I actually want to move away from using the term ‘Suzerain Lord’ in our territory. I want to shift the term Lord to the term Elder, and we will work as a  council, instead of under the rule of one dictator. I, of course, will be the head Elder for now. After Darkin is defeated, I wish to hold a vote among the Elders.” Theseus declared, causing an uproar in the meeting room. Captains and officials that lived with the Suzerain Lords all their afterlives were shocked.

Aries sat down in the corner of the room minutes ago, laughing to himself. In the best-case scenario, Aries thought they would briefly hold onto Lord Virgo’s territory before Lord Darkin invaded. He never expected Theseus to grow into his own like this. First hand, he witnessed how pathetic the living Theseus was on the mountain in the Self-Soul Hypnosis. Sure, Theseus was bold and smart, but he was still naïve.

Theseus never dared to stick to the conventions, and this led to the abolition of the Suzerain Treaty. Now, four of the seven territories fell under the Oceanus banner, a banner of freedom and change. No longer the Head Captain, but an Oceanus Elder, Aries continued cackling in the back of room throughout the uproar.

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