He didn't think he would be surprised, but he was still surprised when they finally had to stop at the destination. This was mostly because the destination had changed so much it looked unrecognizable to him.
The large hall that he expected to see had disappeared. The whole underground had been hollowed out completely to create a large underground cavern that was almost the size of the inner sect itself. And standing in the middle of this large space was a large spaceship, the likes of which he had never seen before.
The patriarchs told him and the other golden core elders a lot of things about the leadership assessment, but the patriarchs didn't tell them about the motherships, so he was surprised when he laid his eyes on it.
The mothership was so large that it made everyone standing before it look like ants. And Arthur was a giant for a human. He was over four meters tall. Yet, he looked diminutive standing before the mothership.
He said in awe, "If there is such a thing as Noah's ark, this must be it. I won't have a problem believing that this held two of every creature."
He had to crane his eyes up to look at it. What he saw was a jet-black structure that was gleaming in the low light of the underground space.
His divine sense couldn't penetrate the hull of the mothership to see what was inside it. In fact, his divine sense could not perceive the mothership at all. Anytime his divine sense pushed mana around to get a feel for the mothership, it always came up empty.
He tsked in admiration and said, "It even has stealth capabilities. I doubt Noah's ark had that."
Then he saw the large main gun and the two auxiliary guns flanking the main gun and said, "Yeah, Noah's ark definitely didn't have those."
Everyone was led into the mothership. In total, there were 10,000 at the third mortal coil and 21 at the fourth mortal coil, and some golems were to be used as avatars for the patriarchs.
Not everyone in the sect was going to Aries. Only one third of the third mortal coil members of the sect and two thirds of the golden core elders of the sect would be going.
This was to prevent the crippling of the manpower of the sect in case of a terrible loss. After all, going to Aries is easy. Coming back at all is uncertain.
When everyone who was to leave had entered the mothership, the large door of the mothership was closed, and the mothership was sealed completely. Then the mothership activated and rose into the air.
The mothership rose into the air a little. Then it began to approach the large gate at the other end of the underground cavern.
The gate was large, but it was definitely not large enough to compare to the mothership in terms of size. The gate was only the same size as a mobile fortress. It had a diameter of 100 meters.
However, as the mothership got close to the gate, space began to bend around it, and the mothership began to shrink. The mothership shrank until it became small enough to fit the gate.
Once the mothership had shrunk, it entered the swirling mass of white energy in the gate and disappeared. As it disappeared, Space shuddered and vibrated a little bit. The three patriarchs watching all of these from the side felt the shuddering of fate.
To them, it felt as if they were in a pond of water and something heavy had been dropped into the pond, which caused the surface of the pond to ripple for a while.
Sword Flash smiled and said, "Here we go."
Thunder Drake glanced at Lady Evergreen and said, "Like him or hate him, if not for him, we wouldn't have this gate, and things wouldn't be so easy for us."
Sword Flash nodded and said in agreement, "That's true. I didn't say it before, but the fact that we had a gate capable of traveling through worlds is the third reason why we were considered for the leadership position."
"If not for him, we wouldn't have the gate and might not be considered for the leadership assessment. Even if we were considered for it, it would be very expensive for us to rent someone else's gate."
Lady Evergreen said, "Yes, yes. You have been bought by a rank 7 artifact. Pardon me for having a little backbone and not immediately giving up my self-respect and freedom because of some powerful gate."
Sword Flash said, "You have a point. This gate is a bribe. It is a bribe to make us feel that being restricted by a curse isn't so bad. But I also think that the gate is a warning."
Without waiting for them to ask what he meant, he explained. But he started by asking them a question, "How powerful do you think someone who can use a rank 7 artifact as a bribe will be?"
They didn't reply because they didn't know. But his point had been successfully passed across to them and understood. So they became solemn as they pondered his question.
As for Sword Flash, his eyes became unfocused as he recollected an unpleasant memory. He looked into the distance with his unfocused eyes and said, "I once saw a rank 7 being. He or she was truly divine."
"I saw them before and after I advanced to the sixth mortal coil. And I can tell that there was no way for me to defeat one. They felt ethereal and transcendent. They felt completely out of reach."
Then he shook his head and said, "I can't fathom how powerful a rank 7 being is, so even if this gate is not enough to bribe me, I don't dare to have any rebellious thoughts."
Lady Evergreen didn't like what he said. But he had a point, so she couldn't argue with him. She could only snort in dissatisfaction.