Dimensional Descent

This was exactly what the Oryx King feared. He didn't want for the Oryx to suddenly be forced into a situation where they had no choice but to become the warriors of others. As for Leonel's comments about his cowardice, if such comments could faze him, he would have long since changed his approach to ruling.

People who could call themselves Kings wouldn't easily change their mind about such things.

As for Leonel, his mind had been made up. He had been too nice for far too long.

Even disregarding what he had done for the Oryx Kingdom, back when Valiant Heart Mountain was being attacked, it was he who gave them a path to survive. Afterward, he invested a large amount in their development through Elthor to ensure that they would take full advantage of their Hyper Evolution stage.

Those resources were nothing to Leonel now, but to the him of back then, they had practically been everything, and without said resources, how would the Oryx have been able to thrive in the way they had now?

None of this even mentioned the fact he had quite literally brought their two most important pillars back to life, or the fact that the only reason they could live such comfortable lives as a member of another race so deep within Human Domain territory was precisely because of his name and organizations he had helped birth backing them.

Even if King Oryx said he wanted to pay back those things in kind, could he even do so?

For one, an investment was worth not only the price itself, but also what it was worth to the person receiving it.

Let's say that the Oryx King wanted to return the resources Leonel spent on them back then. That process would be akin to giving back a loan without any sort of interest. And to make matters worse, even if the Oryx King did pay this "interest", it still wouldn't be enough.

Usually, when a person takes a loan, a small interest is applied because the person giving the loan is well off to begin with and most of the risk is on the person receiving the loan. However, in this case, the risk Leonel had taken was just as great.

He wasn't some rich tycoon handing over a small percentage of his wealth, he had been akin to a pauper giving up the last few dollars he had on him.

The Oryx King "repaying" him would be akin to two dear friends having an agreement, one of whom would invest the last bits of money they had while the latter used it to make it big. Then years later, the friend who had succeeded would turn around as a millionaire, maybe even a billionaire, and return his "friend" exactly the amount he had originally invested, no more and no less.

This alone would already be enough of a slap in the face and a lesson in picking better friends, but the matter was only made worse by the fact that even if the Oryx King was thick-faced enough to do such a thing, he had no way of returning the value of his life and his son's life!

That was the shocking truth. Even if he wanted to return the bare minimum… he couldn't!

Leonel knew this quite well, and it was precisely why he had run out of patience. If this so-called Oryx King couldn't make a decision even after almost three decades, then Leonel would force him to make one.

Leonel didn't wait for the Oryx King to respond and simply turned and left. The fact he hadn't attacked, as far as he saw it, was already an act of benevolence.

King Oryx's eyes narrowed but there was nothing he could say. The ultimatum had already been laid, there really wasn't much else to be said.

After Leonel's back view vanished, Elthor couldn't help but sigh.

"He's right you know, old man," Elthor shook his head. "It's been well over two decades since you were resurrected, you should have made a choice by now."

"It's not as though the circumstances are conventional," King Oryx said lightly. "He wasn't even here."

"And that's why he's anxious. If he had been here for all 20 years, do you think he would care very much about what help we could provide? You saw how strong he was, do you think I've been slacking for these last 20 years?"

The Oryx King's eyes narrowed before he shook his head.

"This concerns our entire race, we have no one to rely on but ourselves. We can't allow ourselves to become canon fodder for others. Plus, I'm getting a bad feeling from this Leonel, a bad feeling that wasn't there before. It's obvious that my patience has revealed something that I wasn't aware of before, it only makes caution all the more important."

"I don't know what you're talking about, but what I do know is that Leonel had an opportunity to gain a second Ability Index 20 years ago."

The Oryx King frowned. "A second Ability Index? That's impossible."

"It is possible if you eat the egg of an unborn child of a foreign race that's spent the last several years being baptized by the vital energies of countless long dead Seventh Dimensional existences. It's even easier when you consider the fact this egg is from a being not of your race, so it wouldn't even technically count as cannibalism. And, it's even more enticing when you realize it's an Ability Index as groundbreaking as Shadow Sovereignty."

The Oryx King's expression flashed. "What are you trying to say?"

"I'm trying to say that Leonel entered a Rapax Nest where everyone's goal was to gain this Ability Index, and yet he was the only one who saw those ugly bastards as people and treated that unborn child like an actual unborn child.

"If you were there, father, I doubt even you would be benevolent enough to protect this unborn child as though it was no different from an unborn Oryx, right?"

The Oryx King's heart skipped a beat.

All this time, his mind was filled with the echoes of the words Shadow Sovereignty, he hadn't really cared about the unborn child ever since he heard it was a Rapax. Even Oryx looked more human than they did.

Would he save that child?

Definitely not. What idiot would give up such an overpowered Ability Index?