Death... and me

"My help with the Sacred Ground? It seems like it has reached the activation criteria, then," Celis replied, not looking very surprised. Rean had told him about it before, after all. 

"We believe so." Phex nodded. "Also, it seems like the Zasfins want to participate in the opening of the Path to the Realm of Gods."

"What?!" Celis immediately went into a rage. "Those fuckers now want to use the demon beasts' method? Tell them to go to hell! There's no way we would allow them to come together."

Rean and Phex's groups scratched the back of their heads when they heard that. Naturally, Celis noticed it, asking in a fit of rage, "You can't be serious, right?" Celis got angrier the more he thought about it. "After all you've gone through, you're also giving them a pass into the Realm of Gods? Can you be any more idiotic?"

Roan, on the other hand, was pretty calm. "We had to allow them to come. In fact, for them to come together was a must for our plans to work. If not, calamity would befall us in the future."

Celis knew that Roan wasn't the type to create excuses, so his words caught his attention. "Calamity? What kind of calamity? They lost the war, didn't they?"

"They did." Roan nodded in response before continuing, "However, they still have a lot of strength and Ancestor-level Zasfins in their Soul Rulers headquarters. Also, there are the Emperors, Celestial Land Leaders and so on who are also at the same level except for the Rank Ten Soul Mark."

Rean continued from there, "If all the Stage Nine Demon Beasts take this chance to enter the Path to the Realm of Gods, who will stay behind to protect them and the humans? Without demon beasts of a similar level to you all, the demon beasts' territories will be taken back in a flash. We need them to come together."

"This..." Celis couldn't find a flaw in Rean and Roan's argument. Indeed, if he was in the Soul Rulers' shoes, he would definitely take that chance to take everything back. Not only that, without Stage Nine Demon Beasts, the Zasfins could even take the Demon Beast Continent itself. They would truly become the masters of the world.

Phex also added, "However, this trade wasn't for free. They will have to help to activate the formation in the Bestial Sacred Ground. We still don't know what we need to do. Still, it's a lot better to have so many top experts in this endeavor at once. Besides, everyone definitely wants to enter the Realm of Gods, so we don't need to be afraid of a trap from their side. If anything, they'll be entering our territory, so they should be the ones afraid that we could try anything."

Celis couldn't help but ask, "Can't you take the chance they enter the Bestial Sacred Ground to get rid of them?"

Roan shook his head as he replied, "It's not that easy. If we really do that and all of them decide to activate the Soul Mark Immolation Art at once, they'll be an unstoppable force for a short amount of time. We can't guarantee that even the Bestial Sacred Ground would leave that event unscathed. For the sake of the new power balance of this world, we need this plan to work for both sides."

Eventually, Celis decided to give up, knowing that he didn't have any argument that could beat the twins' reason. "Fine! Let's do this." Celis then looked at Phx's group before asking, "So, what do you need me to do? These two brats told me that the number of Divine Demon Beasts on the planet made the Bestial Sacred Ground react. Naturally, that means I'm part of the reason."

"Exactly," Darian confirmed. "We will need all the Divine Demon Beasts to come to the Bestial Sacred Land later when it stabilizes. As we mentioned before, it would take a few years for that to happen. However, a lot of time has passed since then."

Darian then looked at Xaon, who had gone to check the Bestial Sacred Ground. "The Bestial Sacred Ground's energy has stabilized a lot since that time. To be honest, we could already enter it the way it is if only the Stage Nine and Zasfin Ancestors come in. However, since we also need Kentucky, Gulan, Red, and Senior Celis, we'll need it to become calmer. That means we'll probably have to wait around one more year. That's because we can't guarantee we can protect anyone else other than ourselves in there."

"Do you know what we will have to do inside?" Celis asked in response.

However, everyone shook their heads. "No. First of all, there's no guarantee that the Path to the Realm of Gods will open. The activation of the Bestial Sacred Ground's formation might have a completely different purpose that we don't know of. It's just that the Path was the only other thing present there other than the Blood Pond that increases the demon beasts' power."

Rean then added, "That's why I'm going there as well. As a Formation Master from a more developed world of formations, I might find out something. The Zasfin Ancestors also have Formation Masters in their midst, so that will also help out a lot."

It was then that Sister Orb's voice echoed in Rean and Roan's mind, telling them, [Well, the Soul Gem System Mission says you need to activate it, so it shouldn't be anything bad for us at the very least.]

The twins agreed with Sister Orb on this. Of course, they couldn't tell the others about this topic. Not to mention that it was better to keep the experts in their group on guard than to let them relax.

"Very well." Celis finally yielded in the end. "One year from now, I'll head there with everyone else. Just make sure you won't let the Zasfins take me away again, idiots." 

Phex's group immediately nodded in response. "Definitely. We don't want the same thing to happen again, so we'll protect Senior Celis even if we have to die in the process."