Dimensional Descent

Leonel didn't speak immediately.

In truth, he had come here for two reasons. The first was to touch base and make sure that everything was running smoothly, while the second was to give the Umbra family the Bronze and Silver Tablets of the Dark half of their Lineage Factor.

From what Leonel could see, the Umbra family was stuck with their Shadow Tail Lineage Factor much like the Luxnix family had been stuck with the Snowy Star Owl. But, compared to the original Luxnix family, the Umbra family had far more potential and talent, it was just hard for them to see the road forward.

If they were able to upgrade their Lineage Factors, the help that they could provide to Leonel would be much better. The gap between the Lineage Factors was not small. If not for the perfect synergy between the two halves of the Lineage Factors, Leonel would have already abandoned his panda construct in favor of the stronger Lineage Factors of the Dark Force half.

But now, Leonel realized that he would need to understand more about the Umbra family before he made this decision.

In truth, the reason why he "trusted" them was obvious. This wasn't because he liked Radlis, or he understood Silam's character, it was rather because he had a firm hold of their greatest weakness. Someone who feared him and what he could do to them was much more trustworthy in almost all cases.

Judging by the context clues of Seltin's words, however, there was too much he didn't understand to hold firmly to this conviction. In fact, just the mere fact Seltin was speaking instead of Silam spoke volumes about how little he knew.

"… I can tell you now that you've got it wrong," Leonel spoke slowly, "it isn't me who should be convincing you of my use to you, but rather the vice versa."

Seltin and the others frowned at these words. For a moment, they thought that Leonel might not have been as intelligent as they once thought. Could he not tell the underlying meaning of their words? Did he really think that this was all they had?

Leonel shook his head. "The matter of the Three Finger Cult is trivial as of right now. Even if you all were suddenly exposed right this moment, I highly doubt that the Cult would have the bandwidth to deal with you right now. In fact, I'm pretty sure they have their hands full dealing with my old man's temper."

Leonel had already deduced that there was just one matter that could be keeping his father busy, and that had to be the Three Finger Cult.

This was just an obvious conclusion to make.

The Void Palace had been all but out of commission for at least 10 years before it finally clawed back enough high ranking members to reestablish themselves. But even then, their rules became more difficult to implement and even something as simple as their no leaving policy was broken again and again, casually.

Even setting aside Leonel's brothers, even the likes of Rychard had just directly left without a word. It was clear that the prestige of the Void Palace had taken a great hit.

And yet, even with the Void Palace absent, what was the worst thing that had happened in these last 20 years? The invasion of the Cloud Race, maybe?

Compared to what could have, or one could even argue should have happened, that was a mere joke.

The only way that the Three Finger Cult could have been stalled for that period of time was if someone, or several someones with exceptional power, had stifled them at every turn.

If Leonel knew of the disparaging words the Three Finger Cult had spoken about his old man, he would have laughed directly in their faces. To him, such words would have sounded no different from the triggered ravings of a group of losers.

And, now that the Void Palace was back, the task ahead for the Three Finger Cult would only be made more difficult.

As expected, when Leonel said these words, Seltin's expression flickered.

"I don't need to threaten you, and I don't have a habit of threatening those who are supposed to be my allies."

"Is that why you destroyed those four families?" Seltin asked lightly.

Leonel grinned. "Were they supposed to be my allies? As far as I know, in the midst of a crisis, instead of supporting the world they were born in, they attacked it and slaughtered countless young geniuses. Destroying them, as far as I'm concerned, was taking it easy on them."

Seltin didn't respond. Her words seemed to be implying something different, but at this moment, it didn't seem to matter much.

"So, I'll say it again. It isn't you all who needs convincing. I came here today with the intention of helping your family a great deal, but now I'm not so sure anymore."

"Anyone could just say those words," an elder suddenly spoke from the side.

BANG!

A bronze tablet fell from Leonel's ring onto the ground, causing cracks to spread in all directions.

"Can they? Why am I not so certain of that?" Leonel asked without even looking in the direction of the elder who spoke.

By this point, although Leonel's gaze never left Seltin, even her own eyes were entirely focused on the bronze tablet at his feet. It radiated an aura that they were all too familiar with, an aura that made their hearts skip several beats.

Leonel didn't seem to care about it very much at all, letting it rest at his feet without a single hint on his expression to its value.

"Even if you all are a thousand times more powerful than what you've shown on the surface, I can promise that I can still leave this place entirely unscathed.

"So, I won't repeat myself again. This time, I'll need proper explanations. I'm not here to beg you, I'm here to lead you. I'm not here to threaten you, I'm here to show you a light at the end of the tunnel. If you don't want it, just say so and our relationship will be cut off here, just don't think of coming back to me later. I already have a pet peeve against being tested."