At the same time that the elder of the Star Shattering Sect was making his way into the town at the border of the Flame Sky Kingdom, similar situations were happening across all the major kingdoms around the Star Shattering Sect. Soon causing all of the major kingdoms to start panicking at the sudden realization that the Star Shattering Sect began expanding into their territory.
In the eyes of these major kingdoms, most of them had thought they would still have fifty to a hundred years left before the Star Shattering Sect stabilized their new territory and began expanding into their territory.
However, this thought was proven wrong with the Star Shattering Sect resuming their expansion after only a few years after taking control of the smaller kingdoms around them. By the point these major kingdoms realized what was happening, the Star Shattering Sect had already started building a branch sect in their territory.
In a sense, the Flame Sky Kingdom could be considered one of the kingdoms who had been impacted the least by the expansion of the Star Shattering Sect so far due to being located at the edge. Resulting in them having more time to prepare for the inevitable arrival of the Star Shattering Sect.
Of course, they were not able to fully prevent the Star Shattering Sect from entering their territory and could at most delay the construction of the different branch sects. After all, no matter how eager the Flame Sky Kingdom was to be independent from the Star Shattering Sect, they also understood how devastating a war with the Star Shattering Sect would be for them. Especially when considering that none of the other major kingdoms had started fighting back against the Star Shattering Sect yet.
At least they had the advantage of being one of the kingdoms farthest away from the Star Shattering Sect, so they had not yet been as affected as some of the major kingdoms located right next to the star Shattering Sect.
For now, the choice of the Flame Sky Kingdom and some of the other major kingdoms located far away from the Star Shattering Sect, was to wait for one of the more affected major kingdoms located close to the Star Shattering Sect couldn't endure any longer and decided to retaliate against the Star Shattering Sect.
It was in this tense situation between the different major kingdoms that something unexpected happened…
"What!? The Cloud Sky Kingdom gave up?!"
"Yes… News is that they didn't even fight back and just gave up after an envoy from the Star Shattering Sect showed up at their capital!"
"Hmph! You guys know nothing! Apparently, the main reason they surrendered was not due to the Star Shattering Sect showing up, but because the Flowing Cloud Sect and the rest of the sects in the Cloud Sky Kingdom already reached an agreement with the Star Shattering Sect!"
"Flowing Cloud Sect? No wonder then, that sect is almost as strong as the royal family of the Cloud Sky Kingdom. Facing both the internal pressure Cloud Sect and external pressure of the Star Shattering Sect, its no wonder they decided to give up without fighting."
"Indeed, at least this way, they can still keep themselves alive…"
The Cloud Sky Kingdom, the major kingdom located the closest to the Star Shattering Sect among the many different major kingdoms and also the main kingdom that the rest of the major kingdoms were expecting to start fighting back against the Star Shattering Sect, surrendered!
This unexpected turn of events instantly caused the major kingdoms looking towards the Cloud Sky Kingdom to panic. Not just because of the surrender of the Cloud Sky Kingdom, but because they understood that the Star Shattering Sect had also reached some sort of agreement with the Explorer Union located in the Cloud Sky Kingdom.
After all, the main people in charge of the Cloud Sky Kingdom were not only the royal family, but also the Explorer Union, who had one of their biggest branches in the border region of the Sky Empire in the Cloud Sky Kingdom.
For them to agree to the Star Shattering Sect taking control of the Cloud Sky Kingdom was a huge blow to these major kingdoms due to the fact that it meant the Explorer Union acknowledged the strength of the Star Shattering Sect. Something that had never happened in the border region of the Sky Empire before!
In the end, the major kingdoms were forced to rethink their plans of fighting the Star Shattering Sect, as they now not only faced the retaliation of the Star Shattering Sect, but also the possible retaliation of the Explorer Union.
No matter what, there was no way these major kingdoms dared to take a chance and possibly provoke the Explorer Union. After all, it was quite well known on the Ewaria Continent just how terrifying the Explorer Union was.
Not to mention these major kingdoms, even an empire like the Sky Empire did not dare provoke the Explorer Union!
Because of this, all of the major kingdoms focused their attention on trying to find out what had caused the Explorer Union to agree with the Star Shattering Sect taking over the Cloud Sky Kingdom that they had been settled in for the past thousands of years.
…
At the same time that the major kingdoms stopped thinking about attacking the Star Shattering Sect's elders that had entered their territory, Elder Song was reading through a report about how these major kingdoms had all sent their people to the Cloud Sky Kingdom in an attempt to figure out the relationship between the Star Shattering Sect and the Explorer Union.
"Hehe, looks like everything is working out perfectly! Now the elders should at least have a year or two to work on establishing the branch sects without worrying about the retaliation from any of the major kingdoms!" Chuckling to himself as he said this, Elder Song could not help remembering what had happened a month ago when Xuan Hao had returned to the sect from exploring the Main Star Peak.
Back then, he had gone to find Song Jia after having sent off the elders and ended up finding her at Xuan Hao's place. In the end, he ended up talking about something that was troubling him, the Cloud Sky Kingdom.
Although the kingdom was not the strongest, it had a major branch of the Explorer Union in the middle of its capital. Meaning that the kingdom was to some degree under the protection of the Explorer Union and it was because of this, he could not think of any way to take over the territory of the Cloud Sky Kingdom without possibly offending the Explorer Union as a result.
For this reason, he had only decided to have some of the elders establish a few small branches around the edges of the Cloud Sky Kingdom for now. Not daring to place one close to the capital. Fearful that it might end up drawing the ire of the Explorer Union. No matter how strong the current Star Shattering Sect was, Elder Song understood very well that there was no way for them to compare with a terrifying organization spanning the entire continent.
Unexpectedly, when he was talking about this, he managed to find out that Xuan Hao was friends with one of the elders from the Flowing Cloud Sect, a sect that had grown to become the most powerful sect in the Cloud Sky Kingdom over the past few years due to the emergence of a new and powerful elder.
Hearing about this, he was excited. The main reason for this was because the Flowing Cloud Sect was no less powerful than the royal family of the Cloud Sky Kingdom and even looked like they were about to topple them and take control of the Cloud Sky Kingdom. Becoming an independent sect similar to the Star Shattering Sect.
However, the most important thing was not this, but the fact that the Explorer Union did not interfere in this struggle for power. Most likely just seeing it as some sort of internal struggle instead of an external one… Or maybe the Explorer Union did not care as much about the Cloud Sky Kingdom as he and the surrounding kingdoms thought. No matter what the answer was, no one was willing to test it out themselves.
Not thinking too much about the Explorer Union, Elder Song decided to ask Xuan Hao to contact this friend of his. Soon resulting in him meeting with an elder of the Flowing Cloud Sect called Ji Yichuan.
Following this, he spent the next month cooperating with this Ji Yichuan to find out more about the royal family and their relationship between the Cloud Sky Kingdom and the Explorer Union. In the end, it did not take long before he found out that the Explorer Union had absolutely nothing to do with this royal family and wouldn't care whether they lived or died if nothing happened to their branch in the capital.
The rest was history, as Elder Song came to an agreement with the Flowing Cloud Sect before forcing the royal family to surrender with the assistance of the Flowing Cloud Sect and the different sects under them. Something that the royal family had no way to resist without the guise of the Explorer Union supporting them to hide behind.