The four important parts of the formation breaker that determines its power are the energy core, the computation banks, the training data, and the AI logic model.
For the formation breaker to advance to the fifth mortal coil, it needs to awaken a spirit. The awakening of the spirit is heavily dependent on the AI logic model.
The energy core and computation banks also affect its advancement, but it is the way that the formation thinks that is still the most important factor. The more robust the AI logic module is, the higher the chance of the formation breaker awakening a spirit.
In the short term, by upgrading the AI logic model, it will become more efficient at thinking, and it will grow smarter faster. All he will need to do to help it advance is to help the energy core advance to the peak of the fourth mortal coil and add more computing units to its computation banks.
Once all of these have been done, when the training data and the intelligence of the formation breaker reach a certain level, it will advance. In comparison, he will need to upgrade the materials that he used to build his other artifacts.
While Arthur was thinking about his reward, everyone was also thinking about what they would do with their reward.
Everyone received something as a reward, no matter how small it was. Then Sword Flash ended the meeting on this happy note.
He said, "Let us end the meeting here. What we need to do next is activate the mana seed, refine the nascent soul pills, receive our reward for eliminating the Red and Blue Fire sect, and confirm with the league of world eaters that we will be accepting the leadership assessment."
"Once I am done doing these things, I will call another meeting to inform you of what came out of them. We will then determine if some of you will advance now, and we will start planning on how to complete the leadership assessment."
"All of these should take less than a year. I should have news in a month or so. At most, we will know where we stand in one year. So don't relax. Keep yourself ready to respond at any moment."
"That is all. You may all follow me to activate the mana seed."
After he said this, he took the mana seed out of the council hall. Everyone followed him to see him activate it.
Sword Flash took the white ball up into the air and infused it with energy. This caused the white ball to begin to glow. Then the white ball turned into a golden ball.
After the white mana seed became a golden mana seed, it levitated from Sword Flash's hand and expanded rapidly in the sky. It became a large golden ball of light similar to a star. Then mana began to gush out of it.
It was as if a floodgate had been broken somewhere. Mana of high quality suddenly poured into the secret realm and began to fill it up.
As the mana filled the secret realm, it created a tide of mana that pushed against everyone nearby with a tangible force. It made everyone think they were in a river of mana.
But there was another sudden change that caught everyone off guard. The golden ball in the sky suddenly peeled back its surface like an eyelid and revealed a bright white layer to them.
The color of this white layer was similar to the color of the white ball before it changed. But there was also a dark hole in the center of the white portion that had been exposed. This dark hole made the whole ball now look like an eyeball.
As soon as they had this thought, a powerful consciousness came out from the golden eyeball in the sky and pressed down on them. Then the golden eyeball moved around, gazing at everyone present and scrutinizing them.
The weight of the powerful consciousness on the world actually froze the world. Everything froze, including the thoughts of the people below.
Only Arthur could still think under the pressure of the powerful consciousness. But he couldn't move his body. He felt frozen, and time slowed down so much that he thought that he would be frozen forever.
The golden eyeball examined everyone present at the scene. Its gaze bore into them as if they were transparent.
The golden eye looked at Sword Flash first. Then it looked at the other two patriarchs next. After this, it glanced at everyone equally. But its gaze lingered on Arthur for a while.
When Arthur noticed this, he thought to himself, "Is it just me, or did the eyeball look at me longer than it looked at the others?"
As he was thinking of this, the powerful consciousness from the eyeball disappeared. Then the golden eyeball closed its eyelid and returned to being a golden ball.
Unfortunately, he couldn't ask anyone this question, so he wasn't going to get any answers to his question. However, the peculiar thing was that he didn't question who the eyeball belonged to.
He and everyone else knew instinctively who the eyeball belonged to. No one questioned the identity of the powerful consciousness because they knew without a doubt that it belonged to the Ethera tree.
If there is a reason why they were so sure, it was because they felt an intimate connection with the eyeball and the consciousness. The other reason is that the golden color of the Ethera tree is special, and anything that has the special shade of gold should be related to the Ethera tree.
This second reason is unreliable, as they can't explain what makes the gold of the Ethera tree special. But everyone had grown up seeing the golden Ethera tree in the distance and could immediately identify the special shade of gold that belongs to its brilliance.
But even though they knew who the eyeball and the powerful consciousness belonged to, everyone was still startled by its appearance and disappearance. The fact that it froze them made them especially rattled.