There was something that the other big nations couldn't possibly know about the Elbas family, and that was the Royal Inheritance in the Nerere country.
The Hive knew about it thanks to Noah, but it couldn't affect that matter even as the fourth force in the Mortal Lands.
The exact location of the inheritance had been kept a secret for all those years, which prevented the Hive from seizing it through the separate dimension.
Yet, the Elbas family had never stopped trying to retrieve it even during the matters in the new continent.
June had always been a core part of the exploration team, but she discovered that a new teammate had been added to her party after the winged beasts' crisis.
To her surprise, that new entry was her lover's grandfather, Thomas Balvan!
What was even more surprising was that his dantian had reached the fifth rank!
He wasn't a complete rank 5 cultivator though since his mind was still in the fourth rank.
June immediately felt the need to warn Noah at that sight, but they had decided not to have any form of contact that could reveal the nature of their relationship before their separation.
After all, they didn't know how thoroughly the Royals would have investigated June, so it was better not to leave any trace.
Thomas' arrival quickened the exploration of the Royal Inheritance, and his might allowed the exploration group to reach its end in a few years.
The party had been disbanded and rewarded accordingly when it delivered the reward of the inheritance to the Elbas family.
Still, even the Elbas family ignored the nature of the item retrieved in the last layer of the tower.
The Royals had directly brought the item in the new continent to study it since they were already moving part of their most valuable assets there.
Those studies had also taken some years, and the Elbas family could uncover the nature of that item only some time after the events with the black flowers.
What they discovered claimed even the attention of King Elbas, and the Royals could only disregard the fact that small-size noble families were being destroyed right under their nose at that point.
There was a series of large structures built among the spiked roots on the eastern side of the new continent.
A series of powerful formations prevented any unauthorized cultivator from entering that place, but most heroic assets under the Elbas family's banner could access it nonetheless.
That was the new academy that the Royals had completed after the crisis of the winged beast, and all its experts were loyal nobles.
The arrival of the new continent had given to the Elbas family the chance to fix the issue of the fragmented power of the Utra nation.
The Royals could simply place conditions to whoever wanted to migrate, which forced even some of the nobles loyal to the Cause to switch sides.
It couldn't be helped, the new continent opened the path to many possibilities, and it would obviously be the focus of any organization in the future.
The old continent had been exploited for too long, while the piece of Immortal Lands still had an environment that vastly surpassed the standards of the Mortal Lands.
There were a few areas inside the new academy though that only those carrying the blood of the Elbas family could reach.
A series of rank 4 and 5 cultivators had gathered in one of those restricted areas a few months after Noah led the raid in the twelfth small-size family.
All those cultivators had golden hair, but the brightness of their color changed depending on how pure their bloodline was.
There were five cultivators with silver hair in front of that group, and all the Royals in the room were keeping their heads lowered toward the crowned man floating above them.
"Repeat the outcome of the tests once again."
King Elbas said, and one of the five silver-haired cultivators immediately stepped forward before listing a series of data.
"Out of fifty rank 4 cultivators in the gaseous stage, twenty-five of them have reached the liquid stage after seven years of meditation inside the pool. The others died during the process, and the pool fed on their power to keep working."
King Elbas didn't show any reaction when he heard those words, but his gaze became more intense as he looked at the reward of the inheritance that had been moved at the bottom of that area.
The item was a fuming pool that radiated an eerie aura, and that contained a murky, oily liquid.
There wasn't any inscription on it, which was why it had taken years to study it.
"Drawbacks?"
King Elbas asked, and the same silver-haired cultivator promptly gave him a detailed answer.
"We can only make suggestions for now, but the dantians of all those cultivators were tainted during the prolonged immersion. There should be some potential lost in the process. Still, the breakthroughs aren't affected by the stagnation of the center of power."
"Limits to the effects?"
"It should work on rank 5 cultivators, but we have yet to test it. We were thinking about blaming some of the large-size families in the old continent for the recent chaos, but we wanted your approval before proceeding."
The silver-haired cultivator answered each of King Elbas' questions without the slight trace of hesitation, but the latter fell silent at that point.
No one in the room dared to speak while the leader of the Royal family thought.
"Leave it. The Mortal Lands will need all the available assets in the next years. You all should prepare too. Political borders will soon lose their importance."
The five silver-haired cultivators showed excited expressions when they heard those words, but the Royals behind them didn't understand the meaning behind King Elbas' words.
King Elbas disappeared from that room at that point, and the heroic assets there relaxed when their Patriarch left.
Their questioning gazes though went on the silver-haired cultivators since they were the only ones that could explain the plans of their leader.
"King Elbas has worked on an ambitious project for a while by now. The appearance of the black flower might have finalized his research."
Gasps and resounded in the room when one of the silver-haired cultivators explained the situation.
Still, a mental message reached their inscribed notebooks at the same time before they could disperse.
Another series of surprised gasps echoed through the air since the message stated that a medium-size noble family and the small-size ones near it had been destroyed.